Your mailing list is an incredibly powerful content marketing and monetization tool. It is in your subscribers’ inboxes by permission, pushing your content to them, day-in, day-out. Seth Godin says he gets ten times more engagement from his email list than any other source.

Why? Because you are actually delivering a one-page mini website to subscribers every single time you mail them. And it takes work to get onto a list in the first place – your email subscribers are committed.

It’s much more important than a casual “drive by” visitor, or a tweet that’s flying past on a follower’s Twitter app.

So while it’s very, very web 0.2, email is quite possibly the most neglected and most important part of your social media marketing armory.

It’s time to pay attention to the most engaging medium you have!

Recognizing Yourself: The Accidental Email Marketer

The problem is that very few bloggers are actually experts in email – it’s not what you do. You’re a specialist in creating content, finding deals, making a difference. You know what it is your audience wants and needs, and they derive value every time you push a piece of work out.

This is as it should be. You don’t want to deep dive into deliverability, domain reputation, authentication, spam traps, bounce handling, sender scores, black, white and grey-listing – the minutiae of my day job go on and on!

Nevertheless, though, you have become an accidental email marketer. More than likely you’re not getting the value that you should be getting from your marketing list. You’re possibly committing at least one of:

The Seven Deadly Sins of List Building

Here are the classic seven deadly sins are, in all their glory:

1. Wrath
2. Greed
3. Sloth
4. Pride
5. Lust
6. Envy
7. Gluttony

Committing these deadly sins will potentially affect your list’s deliverability, its viability, lose you visitors and potentially cost you money. Are you saint or sinner? Let’s find out! I’ll talk about these seven deadly sins in my next post, and show you how you can avoid them when it comes to list building and email marketing.

Phil Hollows is the Founder and CEO of FeedBlitz, the email and social media marketing automation service and premium FeedBurner alternative. Phil is also a regular partner and sponsor for SavvyBlogging.net and The Savvy Blogging Summit.