5 Signs You Need to Outsource Your Email Marketing

If you're lucky enough to have an email list that you have been nurturing, you likely know how valuable it can be. Even if you are just getting started with email marketing, the power of it is pretty obvious early on in the direct to consumer nature of it.

According to MailMunch, email marketing can still get upwards of 50-100 x more clickthrough than social media. This makes so much sense given the landscape of social media in 2025. Especially when you consider how algorithm changes in the past few years making it increasingly difficult to get any organic reach with business posts.

For many small business owners, their email marketing takes a hit when they are struggling to get everything checked off of their to-do lists. Social media companies have done a great job hooking us all in with their gamified addictive designs. Stop posting at the same frequency and you'll watch your reach and engagement plummet.

But that reach is designed to be variable enough that you believe there is a chance that THIS post could be THE one that launches your small business into profitability. So even with consistently showing up on social media, you might not be generating the sales that you are hoping for. Social media seems to be designed to give you just enough success to want to play the game. And the game is, you guessed it, ad spend!

You know what isn't currently being controlled by an algorithm? Your email marketing. It's in your control to be able to do more with growing your email list and cultivating it, but that takes time. That time that you are already booked doing every other thing in your business. Whether you make a product or provide a service, there are a million and one moving parts to tend to and only so many hours in the day. Where are you supposed to find time for one more thing?

Contracting out some of the roles of your company can be a scary decision. Especially when you aren't sure how long you are going to need help or if can get a return enough on what you are paying someone to justify the additional expenditure. That's why this article has come across your path, to help you to know whether or not outsourcing makes sense for you right now and help you weigh out the pros and cons of hiring a pro (like myself - okay shameless, I get it, but so do you 😉).

Here Are 5 Signs That It's Time to Outsource Your Email Marketing:

1. Lack of Time & Consistency – If your business struggles to send emails regularly, outsourcing ensures a steady, well-planned schedule without you having to stress over it.

2. Low Engagement & Conversion Rates – If your open rates, click-throughs, and conversions are low, a professional can optimize subject lines, content, and strategy to improve results.

3. Limited Email Marketing Knowledge – Email marketing involves segmentation, automation, A/B testing, and compliance laws (like GDPR). If you’re unsure how to implement these, outsourcing can bring in expertise.

4. No Clear Strategy or Personalization – If your emails feel random or generic, a specialist can create targeted campaigns, segment your audience, and personalize emails for better engagement.

5. Poor ROI or List Growth – If your email list isn’t growing or isn’t converting leads into customers, an expert can implement lead magnets, automated sequences, and better list management to maximize ROI.

If you are struggling with just one of the above signs, you might be able to make a small change in the way you structure your week or get a little more education to overcome your challenges.

If you see yourself reflected in 2 or more of them though, it could be the right moment to consider outsourcing your email marketing. Especially if you are struggling to stay consistent and haven't been able to come up with a clear strategy that converts, working with an email marketing team or consultant can help keep you focused and get one really important part of your business off your plate.

Once Your Ready To Get Support, What's Next?

Once you decide that you need support, setting your budget is key. This should be done before you walk into a negotiation with any company. That way, you know very quickly what you can and cannot afford to do. Comparing this against industry standards can be helpful as well. Here's a good place to start.

Still unsure what you are willing to spend? Try getting a baseline of how much your email marketing has brought in over the course of it's lifetime. Use the months that you were the most engaged and compare your average sales to the months that you didn't use email marketing to it's fullest (or at all - no shame). This will double as a benchmark for you to compare with the results the folks you hire end up getting.

Budgeting this way will have you prepared for an adjustment period while your new team optimizes their approach with YOUR audience and YOUR brand and can capture YOUR brand voice.

Make sure you're ready to commit to the relationship. You will want to have regular meetings and updates from the folks you are working with. What can you reasonably fit into your schedule? Will you be able to take calls? Do you prefer email? With the number of agencies dedicated to this kind of work, you are bound to find someone who you work well with. Even if the first one doesn't seem quite right, don't give up. Your email marketing is a powerful tool for your business and now is not the time to be sleeping on those leads that you have worked so hard to cultivate!

If you haven't been doing email marketing to this point and are interested in getting started, you won't have historical data to rely on, and should definitely temper expectations for the first few months of email marketing as the team will need to work to build you funnels to drive signups. This may include some additional meetings for you compared to the folks that have already been gathering signups and using email marketing.

Remember, having direct access to your clients as you nurture your relationship with them is key to closing deals with them and social media companies change your ability to do that depending on the whims of their founders. The potential gains in email are far better than anything social media is providing right now, but it has to be done right. If you're struggling to make a plan on your own, or even choose what tool to use for your email list, you should absolutely consider hiring someone to help.

Separately, if you hadn't though about Constant Contact, I love their tools and you would help my small business by using my affiliate link here if you decided to take a look at what they offer. Their customer service is incredible and they have libraries of content dedicated to how to optimize using their suite of tools.

Once you know what your comfortable spending and how you want to communicate, it will be time to head out to Alignable, Pinterest, LinkedIn, Fiverr or Upwork to see if you can find an email marketer or agency that you feel comfortable and confident in. Then you can let the interviews begin!

If you want to skip the search and found this helpful and wanted to reach out to me, I would love to hear from you! I have space available for email marketing clients and would love to know more about your business's needs and goals. You can set up a discovery call with me by clicking below!

Either way, I hope you make 2025 the year that you get the most out of your email list!