If Instagram, Facebook, YouTube or Twitter came crashing down tomorrow would you still be able to reach your ideal clients?

Time and time again, people ask me, “How can I grow my social media following?” When what they should be focused on is growing their email list.

In today’s episode of The Online Business Clinic Podcast, we’re taking a closer look at why you as an entrepreneur need to make list building a top priority in your business.

Here are the 4 reasons:

#1 You can control it

Social media is great, but it’s a platform that you don’t own. Now, no, you also don’t own the CRM platform that you use to communicate with your subscribers, but you are able to bounce out the lists as often as you want via a CSV file. And now you essentially ‘own’ that list. You can control when and how you communicate with your audience.

You’re also able to add tags to help ‘funnel’ the conversation or get notified if no action has been taken so that you can properly follow up. With social media post, there’s no guarantee that even those your like and follow you will actually see your post, but with email, there are intelligent tools that can better help cultivate the conversation and lead your prospective clients into paying clients.

#2 You can nurture your leads

When someone opts into your email list by giving you their name and address, that person is ‘subscribing’ to you. Essentially they’re saying “Yes, I want to know more. I give you permission to connect with me.”

This is your opportunity to nurture the new relationship that you’re building. Educating them further about you, your business and how you can transform their lives by working together.

#3 You have unlimited access

Now when I say unlimited access what I mean here is that you can reach your people any time of any day, but you want to be mindful about the quality of the content you mail out as well as the frequency. Be sure to focus on providing value to your subscribers.