How to Start an Email Marketing Agency and Get More Clients

If you’re wondering how to start an email marketing agency, this guide is for you!

Email marketing is a powerful tool for providing a unique brand experience, maintaining consistent communication, and boosting sales. According to a study, 60% of consumers want brands to contact them via email. This digital channel can provide an ROI as high as 3600% to 4000% for every $1 spent.

The steady need for a cost-effective and user-friendly digital channel has led to a demand for skilled email marketers. This has also motivated many to consider starting their own email marketing companies.

While experience is valuable, it’s not a prerequisite to starting an email marketing business.

This guide will outline the essential steps to launching your business email marketing, from understanding the fundamentals to getting your first client and setting prices.

Why is Starting an Email Marketing Services Company a Great Business Opportunity?

Businesses of all sizes use email marketing to connect with potential and existing clients. It’s a cost-effective channel, and the number of email users is set to grow to 4.89 billion by 2027.

With enormous potential for higher ROI and user base, you can perform email marketing on behalf of others and develop a profitable business.

Starting an email marketing agency in 2025 is a fantastic business opportunity for the following reasons:

It’s a growing market: Businesses increasingly recognize the value of email marketing and invest in professional tools to optimize different types of email campaigns.
It offers low start-up costs: Email marketing costs are relatively lower than other marketing channels. You primarily need a computer, internet access, and a reliable email service provider.
Marketing skills can be learned: While the experience is valuable, email marketing skills can be learned quickly through online resources and practice.
It’s a scalable business: You can start as a solopreneur and grow your company as you acquire more clients and team members.
It’s a recurring revenue model: You can offer a retainer model, where users will need ongoing services for a fixed monthly fee.
It has reasonable client retention rates: By delivering exceptional services, you can build a long-term client base and recurring revenue.

example of an email marketing agency -- Invisible brands — Example of an email marketing business website – Source

There is significant demand for expert email marketing services, especially to optimize email campaigns and email deliverability.

If you’re still hovering over the idea, the next section showcases the effectiveness of email marketing in the current digital landscape.

Fascinating Statistics About Email Marketing For Your Business

number of email marketing users globally — A statistic chart that showcases the number of email marketing users from 2017 to 2026 – Source

Email marketing gives brands more control over the audience and the content. This creates a direct channel with the consumers, helping you reach them in their inboxes.

We’ve put together other interesting facts regarding why email marketing is a versatile channel to use:

87% of brands say email marketing contributed to their success (Hubspot)
59% of consumers accept that marketing emails influence their purchase decisions (Forbes)
One in three people who click on automated email messages make a purchase (Omnisend)
B2B marketing emails see a 23% higher click-to-open-ratio than B2C emails (Emfluence)

If you like solving problems and raising brand awareness, starting an email marketing company can be the perfect way to help other businesses grow.

The best part is email marketing gives you enough room to use your creativity through varied content formats and email campaigns. It also helps you scale your business by providing plenty of services.

Types of Email Marketing Services You Can Provide

Email marketing is broad, encompassing a wide range of strategies and tactics to engage subscribers.

You can provide a variety of services tailored to different business needs, such as:

Campaign strategy and consulting: You can help businesses define their goals, target audience, provide email list management services, and content creation.
Email automation: You can set up welcome emails, abandoned cart emails, and post purchase upsell emails to increase email engagement.
Email marketing consulting: Start by analyzing campaigns, best practices guidance, segmentation strategy guidance, and A/B testing best practices.
Specialized email services: Based on your expertise, you can manage transactional emails, offer SMS marketing, or handle multichannel marketing campaigns.

By offering a comprehensive suite of services, you can increase profits while helping businesses leverage the power of email marketing.

Next, we’ll discuss how you can use email marketing to grow your clients’ business.

How to Use Email Marketing For Your Clients?

Email Marketing Funnel — Email marketing funnel and how users convert from a lead to a customer

The core of every business is a solid customer base. Email marketing allows you to tap into consumer psychology and provide email content that resonates with recipients’ behavior and interests. For example, you can send a promotional email campaign to deal hunters and email marketing newsletters to information seekers.

Whether it’s email marketing for e-commerce companies or email marketing for SaaS businesses, these fundamentals will help you craft engaging email campaigns for your clients.

Build a High-Quality Email List

Your email marketing list will contain active and valid email addresses of people interested in receiving brand information.

If your client is struggling to build an email list, here are 4 ways to help them:

Offer valuable content: Attract email marketing subscribers through exclusive downloadable content, such as e-books, whitepapers, or checklists, in return for their email addresses.
Use opt-in emails: Utilize sign-up forms on your website, blog pages, or in-store setup. Subsequently, you can send opt-in emails to receive consent from individuals.
Promote your list: Combine social media and email marketing by actively promoting your email list on social channels.
Run contests and giveaways: Encourage sign-ups by hosting contests and giveaways where people are required to enter their email addresses to participate.

It’s a safe practice to use a double opt-in process to re-confirm a recipient’s consent to receive emails.

Find a Reliable Email Marketing Platform

To send email campaigns on behalf of other companies, you need an email service provider (ESP) with basic to advanced features, such as segmentation and automation.

Choosing a platform will depend on your needs and budget. Many providers offer a free plan with limited features and allow you to upgrade as you see fit.

Popular ESP options are outlined in the table below.

Email Service Provider	Best Known For
Campaign Refinery	Offers the highest email deliverability rate on the market.
Mailchimp	User-friendly interface and advanced automation.
Constant Contact	AI-powered writing assistance.
Hubspot	Options for scaling your business.
Sendinblue	Offers email, SMS, and chat options.

Popular email marketing tools in 2025

Define Your Goals

Depending on your clients and their industries, define your marketing objectives — what do you intend to achieve by sending email campaigns? Is it to increase brand awareness and sales, or drive traffic to your website?

Set time-bound and measurable goals. Creating a list of specific email campaign metrics, such as increasing open rates, click-through rates, or conversion rates can be a good starting point.

Segment Your Audience

Your email list could contain varied sets of audiences wanting different things from your marketing campaigns. Implementing email segmentation strategy will help you divide customers based on their interests and pain points.

You can group them based on the following methods:

Tailor your messages using dynamic email content based on the subscriber’s preferences and purchase history.

Campaign Refinery users can now utilize the Audience Groups Segmentation tool to choose multiple audience sets for the same email campaign.

Design Effective Email Campaigns

You can keep your clients’ subscribers engaged through different types of emails and campaigns based on their requirements.

Start with the campaigns mentioned in the table below.

Types of Email Campaigns	Purpose
Email marketing newsletters	To introduce your brand to new subscribers, educate them, and provide consistent updates.
Promotional email campaigns	To send regular promotions, coupons, and deals for people looking for them.
Drip campaigns	To nurture subscribers across the different stages of email marketing customer journey.
Abandoned cart campaigns	To remind customers to complete a purchase.
Survey and feedback campaigns	To collect honest feedback from customers and improve the product or services.
Re-engagement campaigns	To encourage inactive customers to explore the latest product line and come back to the brand.
Cross sell and upsell campaigns	To provide complementary or higher-end products to increase the average order value.

Types of Email Marketing Services Businesses Need

Use a simple and clear email campaign template, follow design best practices, and implement compelling email copywriting tactics to engage recipients effectively.

Automate Your Email Marketing

Executing email automation best practices is important to send timely and relevant messages. For example, sending a welcome email as soon as someone signs up for your email list shows brand credibility.

Additionally, you can utilize trigger emails to satisfy various requirements, such as cart abandonments or sending follow-up emails.

Campaign Refinery provides robust automation capabilities, including email tags and the ability to automatically tag an engaged user.

Stay Compliant With Email Marketing Regulations

Along with email security protocols, staying compliant with email marketing regulations is critical for long-term success.

Pay attention to the following as soon as you start your email marketing business:

Understand the regulations: Be thorough with the GDPR compliance checklist, CAN-SPAM requirements, and email unsubscribe laws to avoid potential legal issues.
Provide an easy opt out option: Use a one-click unsubscribe in all emails you send out.
Respect subscribers’ privacy: Handle customer data responsibly.

Knowing the above email marketing aspects will lay a solid foundation for your email marketing business.

How to Start an Email Marketing Business? 9 Key Steps to Follow

Once you have an idea about the different types of services you can provide for your clients, it becomes easier to strategize your email marketing company. You can set up an email marketing firm with minimal costs and experiment, or use the following criteria to launch your business.

email marketing company homepage - version 8 media — Example of a successful email marketing company – Source

1. Understand the Email Marketing Landscape

From creating a professional email address to comprehending email marketing mistakes, get a good grasp of this digital channel by following the basics below.

Using Email Marketing Strategies and Tactics

Every business and client will have different marketing requirements. You must dive deep into details and create customized email strategies for each.

From email list management to outlining B2B email marketing strategy, ensure you have a solid plan of action. A/B testing, email spam prevention, and mobile email marketing must be a part of your email marketing strategy.

Email Deliverability

Multiple email deliverability tools in the market can help you secure a spot in customers’ primary inboxes. This metric is like a badge of reward for your clean email sender reputation and email management practices.

Email Analytics

Analytics help you understand email performance and fine-tune the areas that need improvements. Watch out for open rates, click-through rates, conversion rates, unsubscribe rates, and email bounce rates.

2. Define Your Niche and Ideal Clients

Don’t be afraid to pick a profitable niche, such as B2B email marketing, real estate email marketing, or local email marketing.

Although it’s possible to work with multiple niches, we recommend choosing one. Specializing helps you differentiate yourself from the other agencies.

Understand your target audience, the industry problems, and common pain points. You can conduct surveys or do social listening to gather data.

Always start with researching the current market and narrow down your expertise.

Research the Market

You must know your competitors and their unique selling propositions before investing in an email marketing company.

Firstly, find out if there is a demand for email marketing services in your chosen niche and if there are other companies serving similar industries. Analyzing the market landscape will help you narrow down and figure out if your niche is viable.

Consider Your Expertise

Comprehend your key strengths and weaknesses.

Start with the following questions:

What are you good at?
What email campaigns do you enjoy creating the most?
Which industry are you attracted to?
What’s your knowledge of using email marketing tools?

Create Client Personas

Develop detailed profiles of your ideal clients, including their demographics, psychographics, business goals, and challenges. Think about their values—are they focused on growth or creating more brand awareness? Defining the ideal client profile helps you align values with theirs and strengthen relationships.

The table below outlines the examples of niches and client profiles.

Email Marketing Niche	Client Profile Examples
E-commerce business selling sustainable products	A small to medium e-commerce business willing to scale through email marketing and is focused on sustainable products.
SaaS startup with less than 50 employees	A fast-growing SaaS startup that needs to nurture clients through the SaaS sales funnel and scale through email marketing.
Healthcare providers	Healthcare providers and medical representatives looking to send HIPAA secure emails.

Examples of email marketing niche ideal client profiles

3. Develop Your Skills and Portfolio

Getting clients without proof of work might be a challenge.

Start by creating sample campaigns to help them get a gist of your skills. Focus on case studies and result-driven examples to attract client attention. You can also offer discounted services to build testimonials and find other customers through it.

Great email copywriting and design will make it easier for clients to understand your skills and ultimately, hire you for their email marketing needs.

Writing Compelling Email Copy

Customers engage with emails even before they open them. That’s why crafting a killer email subject line can make or break your email campaigns.

Understand your audience and their pain points to maintain an engaging email tone. Use marketing power words to evoke a sense of excitement and intrigue. A good rule of thumb is to keep the content short and drive recipients to the call-to-action button.

Designing Effective Email Campaign Templates

Templates allow you to save time and keep the email branding consistent across campaigns.

Remember the following general best practices:

Design mobile-first emails since most emails are opened on mobile devices.
Use a clear email preheader text, which informs customers about the purpose of the email.
Use consistent and the best fonts for emails, logos, and color combinations.

4. Set Up Your Business Essentials

Make sure your business essentials are done. Register your agency, obtain necessary licenses, and abide by the local tax regulations. Think about the company’s ownership structure — will it be a sole proprietorship, an LLC, or a public limited company?

Then, you can move on to building your brand.

Building Your Brand Identity

While the legal structure of the company plays a key role, your approach to branding can affect the way people perceive your email marketing business.

Build a memorable brand identity:

Design a professional logo and create a simple and effective brand name.
Set up a professional online presence; build a good-looking website with essential company details and social media handles.

5. Set Up a Pricing Model

Setting the pricing structure for your email marketing company will lay the base for profitability and client acquisition.

Key considerations to choose a pricing model are:

Analyzing overhead costs,
Assessing client acquisition and retention costs,
Considering recurring expenses, such as the costs of email platforms and other marketing tools.

Decide whether your business will operate on a monthly retainer, per-campaign basis, or you will have performance-based pricing strategies.

6. Attract Clients Through High-Value Services

Attracting the right clients is the first step to building a profitable email marketing business. Identify the services you will offer. For example, you can provide bundled services like list management, email copywriting, and A/B testing.

Ensure you choose high-value services, such as:

Automation and segmentation,
Lead nurturing,
Follow-up and re-engagement campaigns,
Email strategy consulting.

Offering unique email marketing services will automatically enhance your marketing and sales efforts. If you’re new to marketing, the following steps will guide you.

Marketing and Sales Strategy

Find a way to let people know that your email marketing company exists in the market.

You can do this through:

Content marketing: Create valuable blog posts, case studies, and testimonials.
Networking: Attend industry events and connect with potential clients.
Online and testimonial advertising: Use email advertising, paid ads, or testimonial ads to attract potential clients.
Word of mouth marketing: Encourage existing businesses to refer your business to others.

If you’re acquainted with social media channels, enrol in marketing groups to direct your strategies correctly.

7. Automate and Scale Your Business

Besides having strong email marketing knowledge, you must understand how to navigate the sales and marketing arena to find ideal clients.

Use the following tips to grow your email marketing company:

Use email automation platforms to send timely and relevant messages.
Offer upsells, such as lead generation services, SMS marketing, and email marketing funnels to help you scale your business.
Offer tiered service packages to help clients pick the most resonating pricing.
Use email marketing to promote your own business.

Developing essential sales skills will help you acquire clients without overwhelming them. Once your email marketing company grows, it’s time to think about scaling it. It’s important to hire and train a team, automate regular tasks, and invest in tools and resources that help you scale your email marketing business.

8. Stay Consistent and Keep Learning

Email marketing is evolving, so keep up with the latest email marketing trends, join communities, attend webinars, and take online courses. Maintain consistency with client outreach, marketing, and service quality for long-term success.

9. Choose the Right Email Marketing Tool

A reliable email marketing platform offers advanced tools and features, allowing you to gain email marketing skills even before you can handle real clients.

Consider the factors below before choosing a platform:

Ease of use: Ensure the email service provider has a user-friendly interface and drag-and-drop editors for easy campaign creation.
Email deliverability: Find a platform with consistent and high email deliverability rate.
Automation: Look for robust automation features to help you segment the audience, create trigger emails, and personalize campaigns.
Scalability: The email marketing tool should accommodate your growing email list and marketing needs as your business expands.
Integrations: Ensure seamless integration with your CRM, social media, and other marketing tools.
Pricing: Choose a plan aligning with your budget and offering the necessary features.
Analytics: The platform must offer detailed reports on email marketing metrics.
Customer support: Reliable customer support is mandatory for troubleshooting issues and getting assistance.

Most importantly, look for a platform with the best deliverability rates. While advanced automation and segmentation are important, prompt inbox placement determines the success of your email marketing.

In essence, if the emails never reach your recipients, they will not engage with them, automatically affecting your brand reputation.

Here’s a list of the most popular email marketing tools and resources:

If you’re looking for all the above features in a platform, Campaign Refinery is the one.

Choose an ESP With the Highest Email Deliverability Rate on the Market

Campaign Refinery was built on a single core principle: to offer the best email marketing experience.

We provide the highest email deliverability rate in the industry

— our clients notice a 600% increase in inbox placement after joining us.

Campaign Refinery testimonials — Happy users and their positive reviews about Campaign Refinery

With advanced automation and email deliverability management, Campaign Refinery is the finest choice for your email marketing needs.

We focus on:

Email deliverability: We prioritize email deliverability by implementing strict authentication protocols, such as SPF protocol, DKIM records, DMARC authentication, and bounce management.
Reputation management: Clients can maintain a positive reputation through email list hygiene, engagement tracking, and integration capabilities and by sharing the platform with other vetted senders.
Content optimization: Our user-friendly interface and email editor offer a flexible content optimization process.
Robust analytics and reporting: Access all campaign metrics in real-time, adjust easily, and watch your company grow.

Our support team is available 24/7 to assist you with your marketing needs.

Set up a profitable email marketing agency with the best deliverability rates — apply to become Campaign Refinery client today!