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Market This | Marketing For Local Business Owners
Are you a local business owner who's spent money on marketing and still isn't seeing results? You might not have a strategy problem. You might have a messaging problem.
Market This is the podcast that helps local service businesses fix what they're saying so their marketing actually works.
I'm Lindsay! A messaging strategist and website copywriter with 20+ years in journalism and advertising. I've written for CBC Radio and led copy on million-dollar campaigns, and now I help local business owners compete on clarity, not budget.
Each week, you'll get practical marketing strategy and content marketing tips you can actually use, like how to write website copy that converts, what to say (and stop saying) in your marketing, and how to build a local business strategy around messaging that's clear, not complicated.
Inside each episode, you’ll learn:
⚡️How to write website copy that actually converts
⚡️How to build a marketing strategy that fits a local business
⚡️What to say (and cut) from your homepage, about page, and social content
⚡️Simple content marketing that doesn't eat your whole week
⚡️When to DIY your copy and when to bring in help
If you’re ready to stop second-guessing your words and start using copy that actually sells, hit subscribe and follow along. And come hang out with me on Instagram too: @lindsaysmithcreative
And if you want expert eyes on your website, you can book your copy audit here:
https://www.lindsaysmithcreative.ca/audit
Let’s turn your words into your hardest-working salesperson.
Market This | Marketing For Local Business Owners
S1 #26: Stop Overthinking Email Marketing: Build Your Local Business Email List in Days
Use Left/Right to seek, Home/End to jump to start or end. Hold shift to jump forward or backward.
A lot of local business owners don’t struggle with marketing, they struggle with staying remembered.
And email marketing often gets pushed aside because social media feels faster, easier, and more visible. The thing is, those platforms don’t belong to you.
Email marketing changes that. It gives you a direct line to your audience without algorithms deciding who sees you and when. And for a local business, that shift is the difference between being occasionally noticed and consistently booked.
What you’ll hear in this episode is a grounded breakdown of how to build a simple, sustainable email list without funnels, complicated systems, or overthinking every word. Because effective email marketing isn’t about complexity. It’s about clarity and consistency.
You’ll learn how email marketing for local business owners works differently than online influencers or digital-first brands. Instead of chasing volume, you focus on relevance, relationships, and repeat customers who already know your name or are close enough to become regulars.
We break down four simple ways to start building your list quickly:
- Creating a simple, no-pressure signup offer your customers actually want
- Placing opt-ins everywhere your audience already interacts with your business
- Treating email as relationship-building, not performance marketing
- This is where most people overcomplicate things. But marketing for local business doesn’t need to look like a tech startup funnel. It needs to feel human, consistent, and useful.
You’ll also hear real-world examples from service-based businesses like bakers, estheticians, and contractors who use local business strategies to stay top of mind without relying on social media alone.
And this is where content marketing becomes practical, not theoretical. Your emails don’t need to be long or polished. They need to be useful, timely, and real.
If you’ve been stuck in overthinking mode, this episode connects the dots between simplicity and results. Because copywriting isn’t about sounding perfect, it’s about sounding like yourself so your audience actually trusts what you say.
And if you have more questions about email marketing, go listen to Episode #18: The 3 types of emails every small business owner needs, which builds on this foundation and shows you exactly what to send once your list is growing.
By the end of this episode, you’ll understand why email marketing for local business is one of the most underused tools for sustainable growth, and how to start using it in a way that actually fits your time, energy, and business model.
If you’re ready to stop guessing and start building something that compounds over time, you can book a free call with me to map out your next steps and get your email strategy working properly for your business.
This episode was mixed and edited by Cardinal Studio.