Why Email Marketing Is Important For Your Weed Brand

Building and maintaining an email list is necessary for the growth of any business in 2024.

But a cannabis brand has even more of a reason to invest in an email marketing strategy.

Why?

Because this industry is unpredictable.

You never know when your brands’ social media page may get banned (again).

If you know, you know - any of your social media pages can metaphorically ‘have the rug pulled out from under them’ at any time, for any reason.

Your email subscriber list is something you own.

Something they can’t take from you.

Email is where a lot of your sales come from anyway!

Your social media should be an engagement tool that is constantly funneling your audience to your website/email sign up.

Allow me to repeat myself for clarity…

Your social media should be an engagement tool that is constantly funneling your audience to your website/email sign up.

1. Use pain points to get the attention of your target audience.

2. Show them that you have the solution to their problem.

3. Direct them to the link in your bio.

Once they’re signed up, they’re automatically getting your emails.

Hint: You can add links to your social media stories to send people to your website.

Social media is too unreliable as your main form of marketing (especially for this industry).

At any point you could face bans on your social media accounts.

Using ‘inappropriate’ terms like cannabis or weed? Banned.

Posting pictures of your products like every other business does? Banned.

It sucks, but we gotta do what we gotta do until people accept that cannabis is a legitimate form of treatment.

Email marketing is predictable.

We know what works, and what doesn’t.

We know how to evoke emotions, and persuade your reader to buy.

We know how to build an email list of engaged subscribers.

What we don’t always know is how to avoid getting bans for talking about a plant.

There’s certainly ways around it, such as replacing ‘inappropriate’ terminology with words like ‘hemp’ or ‘hemp-derived’ since those words are more widely accepted…

But I’ve seen enough weed brands getting banned and giving up on social media marketing to know that you can’t rely on Instagram for keeping in contact with your audience.

You need to give them a reason to become an email subscriber.

• Establish yourself as the go-to brand for all your ‘hemp’ needs.

• Promise subscriber-only exclusives like discounts and reward points (and deliver on those promises).

• Get creative with your lead magnets.

The main purpose of any of the content that I write for my marketing services (outside of HOM) is to get my reader to sign up for my email list.

That means any links that I post about my business on LinkedIn or any other platform directs you to my email sign up form.

Once someone signs up, I already have the first several weeks of emails written that they’ll receive.

My welcome series does the work of introducing them to my brand, and hopefully does a good job at both:

• Showing them that I know my stuff

• Giving them free tools to improve their marketing (i.e. guides, templates, etc.)

The free tools convince them to sign up.

Showing that I know my stuff validates their decision to sign up.

That’s how you build a community that wants to hear what you have to say.

It works the same for your cannabis brand.

A New Subscriber discount is a great way to get people to sign up.

And the first email in your welcome series has one of the highest open rates of any email.

Give them another gift in the first email.

• Additional discount

• Free reward points

• Free strain guide

Something that either validates your brand as a source of reliable cannabis info, or persuades them to take an action, like with discounts or points (preferably both).

You’ll improve everything:

• Customer engagement

• Customer satisfaction

• Click-through rate

• Sales

And best of all, your email list is yours.

You can get creative and see what works best for your brand.

You don’t have to walk on eggshells with every word you write.

Until next time!

Steve