Way back when, predating the Internet and email marketing by some years, I used to be part of a team that designed corporate imaging. We provided logos, letter headings, pretty but threatening invoices and colour coding for vans and retail outlets. It was lucrative but the inevitable predictable recession came as something of a surprise.

Oddly enough, at least to me, there was a number of companies which still wanted a corporate redesign, but not enough, it seemed, to keep the whole team on the payroll. Heads had to roll, and one of the ones chosen was mine. I, you see, was part of sales.

I produced a rather plaintive business report, as it would be called now, to justify my paltry basic remuneration. Every pound I took from the company was returned with considerable interest. I took a certain liberty with the way I calculated the totals, but there was no doubt about which way the scales balanced. I lacked creative talent, not value.

There was a certain illicit pleasure in the fact that the company which so unceremoniously sacked me went broke a little while later due to their lack of customers. What did they expect cutting back on sales? Therein lies a warning for email marketing in the post Covid-19 marketplace; we need to identify the essentials and ensure we do not damage them.

Subscribers to email marketing lists are our lifeblood. Some suggest there’s a harsh world just around the corner, with a lot of companies after the same customers, and we must not fall behind.

Our core business model is effective use of data. That doesn’t just mean the data from our email marketing software; it’s data on all our functions and procedures. You should know the cost of gaining a subscriber. You should also know how much each subscriber costs to retain. Then there’s what profits they bring.

Be careful. If you do choose to cut costs, ensure that you don’t reduce your ability to make a profit. Increasing the size of your email marketing list requires investment. Cutting back on investment in your main method of gaining subscribers is not sensible.