E-mail marketing is as relevant today as it ever was. Not building a list of prospects or buyers, is marketing suicide.
Relying on social media followers or fans is like driving your car without insurance and hoping you never get into an accident.
With an email list you also have the benefit of direct access to people inboxes rather than a feed or an ad that has a lifespan of a few minutes to a few hours at most.
Now you can argue all you want about spam filters, deliverability, and all that jazz, but I am talking about a buyers list, or prospect list of people that have opted into your mailing list hoping to hear from you or waiting for you to follow-up with them.
When you have your own e-mail list you have an instant audience, on top of all the other sources, and built-in authority that you can leverage to your benefit and contact as often as you like... assuming to provide good content and 'real world' value.
In other words, spamming people with endless, useless offers, will kill your list just as fast as Facebook can shut down your fan page or limit the reach of your posts due to lack of engagement indicating poor quality content.
With the right balance of content, relationship building, and sharing of good offers, your email list can become your own personal fan base looking forward to what you have to say and offer them.
Imagine having a full-time second income just from a press of a button with only a few thousand people on you list. Igor Kheifets, a top internet marketer makes well over 1 million dollars a year from his humble e-mail list of only 16,000 people. Yup, he is proof that is is never about numbers if the quality is there...