As we know, social media is a very popular and effective way to engage with your audience. With that being said, email marketing should not be left on the back burner because it is still an important avenue to communicate with your customer database at a very targeted level. If you are collecting a database, great! However, if you’re not regularly in contact with that database, then what’s the point? Are you utilizing email marketing to its fullest potential? Read below for some quick tips and strategies on how you can boost and best utilize your email marketing.
AUTOMATED RESPONSE
How often have you signed up for a newsletter and not heard anything from that brand until weeks later? Usually people are left wondering who the hell they were and how they got your email address. If too much time passes, people generally forget what they signed up for and if they even signed up in the first place. However, it’s not exactly ideal to manually send an email response every time a person signs up to receive your newsletters. You can combat that issue and ensure a follow-up by setting up an automatic response to go out as soon as a new user signs up for your database (this is offered with most CRM platforms). This auto-response doesn’t have to be an in-depth email, it could simply welcome and thank the new subscriber for signing up with a link to your website.
CONSISTENCY IS KEY
The auto-response email is a great way to initiate an engaging digital relationship with customers. However, to maximize these relationships you must remain consistent. Sending out a weekly email blast for the first month is a great way to keep new users engaged. Once you’ve established a connection with that consumer group, you can likely afford to space the blasts out a bit more. Whether it’s once a week or once a quarter, create a schedule that you can follow to release email blasts and be sure to maintain that consistency. Your database will begin to expect your emails around a certain time, making it more likely that they will read and engage.
HEAVY ON IMAGERY
We live in a time where most people are immediately turned off by a large amount of reading, especially if it’s text on a computer or mobile screen. Video is more popular than ever and images are much easier on the eyes and brain, making it easier to retain information. Engage with your audience by creating e-blasts that are visually intriguing and at the same time, get to the point so the recipient can understand the information as quickly as possible. If there is too much information and it will crowd the newsletter’s space with too much text, link it from the newsletter to your site where the additional information lives. In fact, this should be done as much as possible to increase traffic. Just ensure you are including CTA’s (preferably above the fold), and visible contact information.
TARGET YOUR CAMPAIGNS
Yes, it’s more work, but not everyone on your list should be receiving the same email. If you think about it, not every person in your database is in the same position in terms of their buyer's journey. By measuring metrics from your site, you can categorize your list into specific groups to ensure the right information is reaching the right people. A couple different ways to measure this is by identifying which users visit which blogs, click on specific links, etc. to understand their interests. If your email content is particular to a specific buyer profile, it should only be sent to those in that buyer profile! You are putting yourself at risk for a higher rate of un-subscribers by not curating more targeted email campaigns. There is also a personal level involved in targeting email blasts, and customers will feel like you get them and understand their needs. Overall, targeting your email blasts strengthens your customer relationships, which leads to retaining those customers and potentially (free!) brand ambassadors.
Set up an auto-responder so that users hear from you right after they sign up to receive your emails
Create a consistent schedule to shoot of email blasts, create a reading habit for your audience!
Less is more when it comes to text content in email campaigns, load heavy on the imagery and entice viewers to link out to create more website traffic
Targeting your campaigns to different groups will pay off, big time!
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