There have been a significant number of studies released recently indicating that email marketing is doing quite well. Epsilon shared some findings about how email marketing is driving offline purchases. The same firm also found that email open rates increased for the fourth quarter in a row (up 18% YoY according to the most recent study). Forrester Consulting and ExactTarget found that email marketing is the most popular channel for consumers. Earlier this year, Forrester Research reported that email marketing in the U.S. alone was expected to reach $2 billion by 2014.

Is the email landscape changing? Yes, without a doubt. Social media has become a very large part of the online lives for many Internet users. Earlier this year, social sites were even said to have surpassed email in usage. That said, Facebook has come significantly close to matching Google in terms of unique visitors, but that doesn't make Google any less important does it? The two can co-exist, and so can email and social media. They are co-existing.

We personally have been trying to push more for online newsletters.  Everyday less and less people are paging through newspaper ads and more and more are signing up for email ads.  It's easier, less clutter, and if you want to purchase something, it's 1 click away instead of a drive to the store.  A few of our clients see it's a good idea, but their first objection is, "How do we capture the emails?" We tell them that this is actually one of the most painless and easiests tasks.  Think about it, unless you are capturing emails in a sneaky fashion, people will want to sign up.  They want to hear about your special deals and promotions.  So a simple button "Sign up for our monthly newsletter" would do.  Or, you can add it to a sign-up feature with the option to opt into receiving the newsletter.  The second objection is some business owners relate email marketing to spam.  There is a complete difference between the two.  Spam is un-wanted emails.  In my mind, email marketing is the same as putting an ad in the paper.  People will be looking for them.

Some information from: http://www.webpronews.com