A lot of business educators have a lot to say about email marketing. That’s because it’s so effective in converting subscribers into customers. Before you can even “grow your list,” you need an email platform. We’re sharing what we believe is the best email platform for small businesses and how we use it to drive leads consistently.

Note: This blog post contains affiliate links. If you make a purchase through them, Brandcendent will make a small commission. We only share business tools that we use ourselves.

The Best Email Platform for Small Businesses

There are so many email platforms out there. What criteria did we use to pick the best email platform for small businesses? 

Simplicity

Small business owners are busy people. We wear so many hats, often including Marketing Director. We believe business tools should simplify your life instead of adding a lot more to the to-do list. For that reason, we chose a platform that’s intuitive.

Capabilities 

The best email platform for small businesses needs to be able to support the creation of two types of email strategies: ongoing emails, such as newsletters, and automated nurture sequences. Not every business will use both, but it’s important to have the flexibility that automation gives you.

Analytics

Like any marketing channel, you need to review your email analytics to figure out what works and what doesn’t. Some platforms give incredibly detailed reports. For most entrepreneurs, the most important data points are the open rate and click rate. Those are pretty standard across platforms. 

With all of this in mind, we came up with a clear front runner: Flodesk. We use Flodesk in our copywriting, business coaching, and photography businesses. In the rest of this post, we’ll explain why we think Flodesk is the best email platform for small businesses and how we use it every week to power our marketing.

Why We Love Flodesk for Small Businesses

Intuitive Templates

Whether you’re new to email marketing or an old hat, it’s easy to get sidetracked by clunky templates that are difficult to customize. Flodesk offers elaborate, customizable templates as well as minimalist plain text options. All of them are customizable with drag and drop elements. We know some people love an aesthetic email, but we honestly prefer to keep it simple so the focus stays on our content. Flodesk makes that easy. 

Automation and Sales

Flodesk makes automated nurture sequences easy. Once you get the hang of setting up opt-in forms and workflows, the world is your oyster. We love this method of automated passive marketing. Set it up once, and it works for you over and over again. Have multiple lead magnets? You can duplicate a sequence to use again for different opt-ins.

Once you have your automated sequences set, you can sell directly from your email. Flodesk Checkout makes it possible to sell through Flodesk instead of a website. You can even set up sales pages using one of their templates. Lowering barriers to purchases is never a bad strategy. 

Easy-to-interpret Analytics 

If you’re like us, you nerd out over your marketing analytics. It is the only way to get a solid sense of what’s working and what needs tweaking in your marketing strategy. In Flodesk, all you have to do is click an email on your dashboard, and you get a report with all the most important information. You can see which of your subscribers opened an email, who clicked on your links, and how they viewed your email. 

Reasonable Rates

Did you know that some email platforms limit the number of subscribers you can have based on your plan? Klayvio, for example, caps their mid-range package at 1,500 subscribers. Flodesk is one of the best email platforms for small businesses at $38/month for unlimited subscribers and unlimited email sends. You can get 50% off your first year with our affiliate link!

There is one glaring downside to Flodesk depending on your marketing channels. This is not the best email platform for small businesses who use SMS marketing. Currently, Flodesk doesn’t have SMS capabilities. In our experience, very few small businesses actually use SMS marketing, so this may not matter much for you. 

How We Use Flodesk 

As we mentioned before, we believe that Flodesk is the best email platform for small businesses because we use it ourselves. Here are a few examples of how we use it on a weekly basis.

Lead Magnets and Nurture Sequences

With Flodesk, people can opt into our lead magnets. Then we create automated email sequences that deliver the freebie and introduce subscribers to our brand. Nurture sequences go so far as to generate interest and drive leads once people have gotten invested in our brand. It’s pretty magical!

Weekly Email Marketing

Weekly emails are a big part of our marketing strategy for Brandcendent’s copywriting and business coaching. Email is a powerful tool for getting subscribers invested in our brand and services. In fact, a large portion of copywriting leads come from our weekly emails. 

Launches

When it comes to launches, Flodesk is indispensable. We create email sequences that we schedule and organize into folders. We can duplicate and tweak emails later on, too. For example, when launching a group program a second time, we were able to duplicate and revise some content instead of completely starting from scratch.

TLDR: Flodesk is easy to use and cost effective. We believe it’s the best email platform for small businesses because it simplifies our marketing every week.
Want to get Flodesk and launch your email marketing? You can get 50% off your first year with our affiliate link here.