Email marketing gets a bad rap.

Ask most business owners, and they'll tell you email is either dead or dying.

Yet the statistics around email marketing prove something much different. According to the Direct Marketing Association, for every $1 marketers spend on email, the average ROI is $40. Despite the potential for high returns, email remains a low priority for many small businesses.

That was the case for one of our clients in the travel insurance industry. Facing competition from larger companies, this client initially reached out to us for help with PPC. However, over the course of the on-boarding process, we noticed something strange in the company's analytic data. Every so often, their website would see a spike in both traffic and sales.

When asked, the client revealed that he would sporadically send out an email newsletter to past customers. Looking at the data proved that this newsletter was a profitable marketing channel that was ignored more often than not.

One of the client's main reasons for ignoring email was lack of time to invest in the channel. He was also afraid that emailing his list too often would result in fewer sales and more unsubscribers.