It’s challenging to compare social media platforms and email marketing for B2B marketing since they both serve different purposes as it relates to marketing. However, if a business wants to improve growth and performance, there has to be a distinction as to which platform is the most effective and how it benefits the company in the long run.

There is a distinct approach for each of those platforms. Both of them work in different ways and have different pros and cons and set of goals. Let’s dive in and explore more.

The Digital Arena

When it comes to social media, it is safe to say that it has changed the way people do business in the digital marketplace. Social media is used to promote a company’s brand globally. In other words, it allows businesses to have their posts shared by people all over the world; sometimes in real-time. However, this approach does not necessarily address the core benefits of doing business with another company. On the contrary, email marketing does because it is more personable and direct. Let’s explain briefly.

Limitations

When a business creates a social media post, the words and characters are limited, and so, it does not provide the opportunity to be as in-depth as the business would have liked. Within an email message, there is an opening to do just that. In addition, when a person opts into an email list, it means they want to receive more information about the company. In such a case, the business can be more elaborate in explaining and providing more details. People have been using targeted mailing lists for years, and this is nothing new. Social media marketing has exploded in recent years but still does not have the reach that email marketing does. It is not as targeted.

Strategy

There are certain times when social media marketing plays its part and can be successful. However, overall, email marketing is constant. It works every time and with any business model. Marketing mailing lists are more influential and are known to be the kind of strategy that business owners generally use to maximise their output.

Email marketing is able to achieve higher conversation rates and at a lower cost in comparison to paid social media marketing. When your purchase email lists, it is usually targeted, which means that the prospects are potentially interested in the offer and so it provides a better return on investment. Social media is more of a gamble. The ROI rate for the use of marketing mailing lists is 122%, and for social media, it is just 28%. This is a huge gap.

Traffic Generation

There are roughly 2.5 billion across the globe that use email. This number is three times more than users on Facebook and Twitter combined. Therefore, marketers have the ideal opportunity to generate more traffic using targeted mailing lists instead of relying on social media posts. Another important thing to note is that social media platforms depend on emails for logging in, the registration process and password resets. In other words, without access to email, social media marketing could not exist by itself.

Lists

As a business owner, targeted mailing lists give you the ability to promote an offer by email to consumers and other relevant businesses. For example, sending out one message to thousands of users at one time via Simple group emailing and mailing list management – Simplelists.com (or a similar service) is much faster than the manual alternative. Plus it’s likely the recipients will open more than half of those email messages because they already opted in.

With social media, not every post will be read since most people read posts according to relevance and interest. It is so much more genuine to connect with potentially interested clients through email instead of social media. It is likely that the email messages will be opened and that the reader will follow the call to action. The marketing mailing lists are known to convey the message more than social media does.

Partnerships and Relationships

When it comes to B2B, the use of targeted mailing lists tends to help to nurture professional relationships and lasting partnerships. In that respect, sending an email to a business is the ideal choice. Most companies purchase mailing lists to generate business and especially to communicate with prospects on an ongoing basis. It is also used to build a company’s reputation and foster trust while building a relationship. Social media posts play a more insignificant role in that regard.

Improved Sense of Security

Email marketing provides businesses with a better sense of security in comparison to social media marketing. Businesses are able to edit their email lists and get rid of unsafe contacts. With the social media account, businesses have more risks of having the platform closed down at any time. And when social media marketing strategies no longer work, marketing mailing lists will always be something to fall back on. Using targeted mailing lists makes it more effective to reach a certain segment of the marketplace. You have the ability to segment your lists with different approaches and different targeting options while controlling the strategies.

Conclusion

Finally, if you had to choose between email marketing and social media marketing, the obvious winner would be the former. However, both can be combined to glean a higher ROI. Most business owners prefer the targeted mailing lists because it allows them to grow their lists and improve their bottom line. As long as you are providing value to your email recipients, they will look forward to your messages and most of them will pay closer attention to the call to action.

Shift Frequency © 2020 – Why is a mailing list a better strategy
than social media for B2B marketing