Email marketing gives a small business something social media can’t: an audience you own. Platforms can cut your reach overnight, but a list of customers who asked to hear from you stays yours. In Australia, the rules are simple: get consent, say who you are and let people unsubscribe easily. Start with a sign-up form on your website, a welcome email and one genuinely useful email a month.
Key takeaways
- Social reach is rented. A platform can change what your followers see without warning.
- The Spam Act needs three things: consent, accurate sender details and a working unsubscribe.
- Unsubscribe requests must be actioned within 5 working days, with no fee or login.
- Send from your own domain with SPF and DKIM set up, or your emails may land in spam.
- One useful email a month beats a burst of promotions followed by silence.
Why does owning your audience matter?
Because someone else controls the reach you build on social media. In 2018, when Facebook changed its News Feed to favour posts from friends and family, it said plainly that it would “show less public content, including videos and other posts from publishers or businesses”. It warned that Pages “may see their reach, video watch time and referral traffic decrease” (Meta).
For businesses that had spent years building followers, each post could now reach fewer of them. Changes like that will keep happening, on every platform. An email list doesn’t depend on anyone’s algorithm. If you change email provider, you take the list with you.
| Social media followers | Your email list | |
|---|---|---|
| Who controls reach | The platform | You |
| Can you take it with you? | No | Yes, as a file of contacts |
| Who sees each post | Whoever the algorithm chooses | Everyone who subscribed, inbox filters aside |
| Best for | Being discovered | Staying in touch and bringing people back |
Social media still matters for being found. The point is to move the people who like what you do from a platform you rent onto a list you own.
What does the Spam Act require?
The Spam Act 2003 covers commercial emails and text messages. It has three core requirements, and they apply to every commercial message your business sends.
1. Consent
You need permission. It can be express, where “the person knows and accepts that they will receive marketing emails or messages from you”, or inferred, where “it’s reasonable to believe they would expect marketing from your business” (business.gov.au). An existing customer who bought from you may fall into the second group. A stranger whose address you found online almost certainly doesn’t.
For express consent, keep a record of who agreed, when and how. A sign-up form on your website does this for you. Bought lists are a bad idea: you can’t prove the people on them agreed to hear from you.
2. Accurate sender details
The Act requires commercial messages to include accurate sender information (Federal Register of Legislation). In practice, show your business name and a way to contact you in every email.
3. A working unsubscribe
Every message needs a functional way to opt out. According to business.gov.au, you must remove people within 5 working days of their request, keep the option working for at least 30 days after you send, charge no fee, and not make them log in or hand over more details. Breaches can be investigated and fined by the Australian Communications and Media Authority (ACMA).
Tip: Treat a quick unsubscribe as a good outcome. People who don’t want your emails drag down your open rates and are the ones most likely to mark you as spam.
How do you make sure your emails arrive?
Email providers have tightened up. Since February 2024, Google has required everyone sending to Gmail accounts to authenticate with SPF or DKIM and keep reported spam below 0.3%. Bulk senders of more than 5,000 messages a day need both, plus DMARC and one-click unsubscribe (Google Workspace Admin Help).
A small business list won’t reach 5,000 a day, but the basics still apply. Send from an address on your own domain, not a free webmail account. Make sure your email platform is authorised in your domain’s DNS. Our guide to SPF, DKIM and DMARC walks through the setup.
How do you start email marketing as a small business?
- Pick an email platform. Choose one that handles sign-up forms, unsubscribes and consent records for you. Most offer a free or low-cost tier for small lists.
- Add a sign-up form to your website. Put it in the footer, on your blog and on the contact page. Say what people will get and how often.
- Give a reason to sign up. A seasonal checklist, a price guide or first notice of bookings works better than “join our newsletter”.
- Write a welcome email. Send it automatically when someone joins. Thank them, remind them what to expect and point them to your most useful page.
- Send one useful email a month. Tips your customers can use, a job you’re proud of, a seasonal reminder. Keep offers to a small part of it.
- Measure clicks, not just opens. Privacy features in some email apps make open rates unreliable. Clicks and enquiries tell you more.
Writing is the part most owners put off. Our website copywriting tips apply just as well to emails: one idea, short sentences and a clear next step.
How does email work with your website?
Your website is where the list grows and where emails send people back. Search brings new visitors, especially if you’ve worked through a local SEO checklist and added schema markup for small business. Email then brings those visitors back when they’re ready to buy.
That only works if the pages they land on load fast and make the next step obvious. Our website speed and improvement work covers that side. If your current site has no good place for a sign-up form, it may be time to weigh up a custom website vs template.
For campaigns, content and design, our design and marketing from the Next Level Creative family brings the strategy and the website together.
Frequently asked questions
Can I email customers who have bought from me before?
Often yes, under inferred consent, if it’s reasonable for them to expect marketing from your business given the relationship. The safest approach is to ask at the point of sale with a clear opt-in, and record it. Every email still needs your details and an unsubscribe link.
Can I buy an email list?
We wouldn’t. You need consent from each person you email, and you can’t show that for a bought list. Bought lists also tend to have high bounce and spam complaint rates, which can hurt delivery of your emails to the customers who do want them.
How often should a small business send emails?
Monthly is a good starting point. It’s often enough to be remembered and rare enough that each email can be useful. Send more around busy seasons or launches if you have something worth saying. Consistency matters more than frequency.
Do the spam rules apply to text messages too?
Yes. The Spam Act covers commercial SMS and MMS as well as email, with the same consent, identification and unsubscribe requirements. Businesses that send branded text messages must also be registered on the SMS Sender ID Register, according to business.gov.au.
Should my newsletter come from a Gmail or Outlook address?
No. Send from an address on your own domain, such as [email protected], and authorise your email platform with SPF and DKIM. Free webmail addresses look less professional and are more likely to fail the checks that inbox providers now apply.
Sources
- News Feed FYI: Bringing people closer together, Meta, January 2018
- Promoting your business by email or text messages, business.gov.au
- Spam Act 2003, Federal Register of Legislation
- Email sender guidelines, Google Workspace Admin Help