Why Smart Business Owners Don't Put All Their Eggs in Zuck's (or China’s) Basket
If you're a business owner who relies on a social media platform for a majority of your sales (maybe even all), I want to remind you that social platforms falling off the face of the earth is a lot more common than you may remember:
MySpace was huge before Facebook.
Facebook was huge before Instagram.
We are 1 month away from TikTok being banned in the US again.
Vine fell off the face of the earth.
Twitter gets bought, completely transforms the entire app and algorithm.
Threads almost has as many monthly active users as Twitter (X).
Clubhouse was a pandemic fad.
Google+ totally failed.
Crazy to think about right?
But as you can see with my list here…
There’s a very big history of something New! and Better! coming along. And I don’t know if you’ve partially caught on yet, but people in our world very much enjoy New! and Better!
Who’s to say that there aren’t a bunch of 23-year-old kids in a silicon valley basement using AI to build the next Instagram right now?
Not only that…
But the past has proved to us that we all tend to get comfortable with a platform, then over time start nitpicking every single thing wrong with it. Then, right on cue, some shiny new competitor comes in, everyone jumps ship, and the cycle starts all over again. One could argue that Instagram is going through this right now.
Mark understood this back in 2012 - that's exactly why he bought Instagram in the first place. It's also why his company (Meta) purchased WhatsApp for $19 billion and Oculus VR for $2 billion.
Mark Zuckerberg communicating with his Facebook team back in 2012 via email about the purchase of Instagram.
Now…
I do not want you to think I am writing this article with the intention of lecturing every single business owner about how:
“You’re building on rented land!” & “There’s a possibility Instagram could die tomorrow!”
That’s totally not my goal here and I really don’t see Instagram going anywhere for the foreseeable future (I hope).
That being said, the fact that some “established business owners” are out there generating all of their sales from one sole platform is absolutely mind boggling to me.
This is exactly why I'm writing this article - to share one actionable strategy you (the business owner/smart marketer) can start implementing today.
That way, if Instagram ever falls victim to the Next best thing! and disappears tomorrow, you wouldn't even flinch. Not only would your sales stay consistent, but they might even increase over time.
The platform sitting right under your nose the whole time that *smart businesses have been using since 2004 to dominate:
While all these social media platforms have been fighting for popularity throughout the 2000s, email has just been sitting in the corner of the room in a recliner drinking a beer (Guinness) laughing at everyone else:
4.48 billion people use email worldwide in 2024
88% of users check their email every day
39% of users check their inbox between 3-5 times daily
58% of users check email first thing in the morning - before social media or news
The average email user receives 82 emails per day
Not only that, but email has the highest ROI of any marketing channel (shown below) - the average business that invests $1 earns an average of $36 in return.
Business owners rating the effectiveness of different marketing channels.
Test it out for yourself if you don’t believe me, go to google and type in: ‘what’s the highest ROI of any marketing channel?’ Email marketing always tops the list.
Several reasons why I believe email marketing is beating out social media & everything else in terms of selling:
#1 It's a 100x better frame.
When someone gives you their email address, they're saying "I want to hear from you directly." When someone follows you on social media, they're saying "show me your stuff along with everything else I follow.”
#2 Better targeting and personalization.
You can segment your email list and send highly targeted messages based on behavior, interests, and purchase history. This level of personalization is impossible to achieve on social media platforms unless sending DMs to every single one of your followers.
#3 Better storytelling.
Email forces you to rely on words alone, which I believe actually creates a deeper connection with readers. Without videos or images as crutches, people use their imagination to connect with your message personally, drawing from their own experiences to visualize what you're describing.
#4 Familiarity > algorithm.
Unless someone is searching for you daily on social media or they're perfectly tied into your algorithm, they'll hear from you far less often than through email. With email, you can reach people every single day since your message lands directly in their inbox, and they're opening the app specifically to read what you have to say.
#5 Email creates customers, social media tends to create one-time-buyers.
One thing I tend to see with people who are only selling through social media is a customer retention problem - they get impulse purchases from posts, but these buyers rarely return.
People who buy through email, however, develop a deeper connection with your brand/product/service through regular touchpoints, making them far more likely to become repeat customers who continue purchasing for years on end, rather than one-off buyers. That's why smart businesses treat social media as lead capture and email as their primary selling and nurturing platform.
All of this curates a better frame for selling, plus if you're sending emails correctly (with good copy), it's no wonder why people are seeing a 36:1 average return on investment with email marketing and having it consistently outperform any other platform for marketing a product/service.
This is *not* a social media hit piece.
As I mentioned early in this article or blog or whatever you want to call it… I do NOT want anyone reading this and thinking social media is the devil.
Social media is great for all businesses.
I just advocate for ALL businesses to treat email marketing as importantly as social media. If business owners were to take the time to develop curated daily emails for their list with strong, engaging copy, they would enjoy the results… a lot.
Speaking on that, business owners who are curious to learn about how they can write emails that are insanely engaging - like a moth to a flame - and get their audience ecstatic every time they receive an email from them can book a call with Gavin here.
Gavin
Gavin Johnston is a seasoned copywriter & marketer who's worked with some of the biggest & best across many different niches. If you enjoyed this blog, you’d probably also enjoy his email list. You can sign up for that right here.
Sources:
Additional ROI data: Litmus, "The ROI of Email Marketing [Infographic]," July 16, 2025, https://www.litmus.com/blog/infographic-the-roi-of-email-marketing
Daily email checking habits: EmailTooltester, "How many email users are there in 2025?" April 8, 2024, https://www.emailtooltester.com/en/blog/email-usage-statistics/
Email marketing ROI: Constant Contact, "What Is the ROI of Email Marketing?" November 17, 2023, https://www.constantcontact.com/blog/what-is-the-roi-of-email-marketing/
Email user statistics: Oberlo, "How Many People Use Email in 2024?" https://www.oberlo.com/statistics/how-many-people-use-email
Oculus acquisition: Facebook, "Facebook to Acquire Oculus," March 25, 2014, https://about.fb.com/news/2014/03/facebook-to-acquire-oculus/
WhatsApp acquisition details: Facebook SEC Filing, "Facebook to Acquire WhatsApp Press Release," February 19, 2014, https://www.sec.gov/Archives/edgar/data/1326801/000132680114000010/exhibit991_pressrelease219.htm
Zuckerberg's strategic intent: Sarah Frier, "The Inside Story of How Facebook Acquired Instagram," OneZero, August 5, 2020, https://onezero.medium.com/the-inside-story-of-how-facebook-acquired-instagram-318f244f1283
