Email Marketing Best Practices

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Denese EakinsDenese is a lover of knowledge and puts her research skills and creative eye to good use with her infographics. When she’s not researching and designing visuals to present data, she spends time volunteering in her other passion–health education.

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Don’t Overlook the Importance Of Email Marketing In 2018!

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As a small or medium-sized business, having effective and affordable marketing campaigns is your secret weapon for increasing sales and profits.

One of the most potent marketing mechanisms that business owners can use to tap into their customer base is Email.

While you might think that Email marketing isn’t useful, the truth is quite the opposite. Currently, there are over 1 Billion Gmail users worldwide, with predictions that this could catapult to over 3 billion users by the year 2020

Looking forward to 2018, here are some Email marketing tips to help you improve your metrics, conversions, and sales.

Refine Your Mailing List

If you have been collecting Email addresses from a variety of sources such as newsletter opt-ins, website signups, recent customers, or offline signups, it’s worth taking the time to segment these lists. By doing so, you can incorporate very targeted Email messages (campaigns) to increase engagement with ‘stale’ clients and active customers

Have a Defined “Call To Action” In Every Message

Sending out an Email message without giving recipients a clear “Call To Action,” also know as a CTA, is ineffectual for you and the person who gets the message. After all, if you don’t know what action you want the recipient to take when they open the mail, how would they?

Depending on the objective of your message, there are several goals you can consider. These goals might include responding to a digital offer, requesting more information on a product or service, or downloading marketing assets. If you are making a sales offer, you might consider giving recipients a promo code and a link to your ecommerce website or direct checkout to take advantage of the deal.

Other objectives include sending visitors to blog posts or encouraging them to interact with you on major social media platforms.

Regardless of what CTA you choose, just be sure that you offer something for your Email readers to take your desired action.

Don’t Forget to Personalize!

Email personalization is something that doesn’t cost extra and can significantly improve the metrics and results you get from your campaign

By merely adding a recipient’s name in the subject field or the Email opening, you can increase the engagement – and ideally – the results you get from the communication

Send From a Legitimate Email Address

Think about the Email messages you get when you check your Inbox. How interested are you when you get a message that originates from a “no reply” Email address? The answer is probably ‘not very.’ The same idea applies when you send to your Email list.

As a best practice, don’t send emails from a “no-reply” email account. By offering a legitimate reply-to Email address, if potential customers have a question, all they need to do is reply to the message to contact a representative immediately.

Try Sending On Different Days and Times

Have you ever felt like there is a pattern to your Email sending schedule? Perhaps you send every Tuesday at 12:30 PM? It’s no secret that the middle of the week is when most businesses send their Email, so you – along with everyone else – is trying to capture the attention of readers. Instead, try posting on a Monday, a Friday, or even a Saturday.

Before mailing to your entire list, always be sure to send a test message to yourself first. Double check that all of your links are formatted correctly to avoid missed opportunities from bad links.

You might find you get exceptional results just by trying a different approach.

Undeliverables Are Unavoidable

When evaluating the results from your Email marketing campaigns, there is always going to be some amount of natural churn and shrinkage on your list. People’s tastes, needs, and interests are constantly changing. It’s natural for some people to unsubscribe. They could have moved away from the area or no longer want to get offers from you. Perhaps they aren’t interested in the services or products any longer.

Other types of undeliverable Emails include sending to inboxes that are full or getting sent to a suspended or non-existent Email address.

While none of these situations are ideal, they are part of the Email marketing game. To keep your sender reputation in high regards, follow best practices to suppress and manage undeliverable and unsubscribed Email.

Choose A Compelling Subject Line

There is an art to writing compelling Email subject lines. You want to use this part of your Email copy to capture the attention of readers and compel them to open the Email to find out more.

You want these topic lines to be honest and straightforward, without sounding – or being – clickbait. While clickbait titles might be excellent for getting people to open, if they find a discrepancy between the subject line and the body of the message, this negatively affects your click-through rates and probably your business reputation.

To get the best result, craft a message that is personalized and to the point. Always be sure to read subject lines out loud before you send it. Does it read OK? Would it make you want to click and open it?

When you vary the times and days that you Email, you’re opening up the chance that you’ll connect with someone who is interested in what you have to offer and takes advantage of it.

Consistency Matters

The most critical thing to keep in mind is that Email is a dynamic way to build trust and rapport with new, existing, and potential clients.

By maintaining your Email list and contacting them with relevant offers, your clients know that you are still out there providing products and services if they need them.

Additionally, by Emailing regularly, you keep your company or brand fresh in the mind of the people who are interested the most.

The best part is that you don’t even need to wait until 2018 to start implementing these best practices to fine-tune and extract more value from your engaged Email lists.

Master the Basics of Email Marketing and Launch Winning Campaigns

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Let’s take a look at the subject of email marketing. There are a few essential terms worth defining at the start. Once you understand the basics, you’ll be in a position to start your first email marketing campaign. Marketing specialists hold this type in the highest regards. Email is a quick way to find conversions and to boost your current sales channels.

Lead magnet

You need to have a way to entice people to give up their email address. The most common way is to use a “lead magnet.” This keepsake is a giveaway (or bribe) that relates to the company’s primary product line. For example, a company that sells mortgage loans could give away a free informational report on getting a great deal. Or they could provide an incentive on a specific product.

Once a subscriber opts in, the company knows they have a marketing asset. The person has an interest in their product. At this point, they’ll add the customer to an Autoresponder to send timed messages.

Autoresponder – A series of timed messages make up an Autoresponder. These messages go out when you schedule them. Using this tool in your email marketing as a convenient way to follow up with prospects and warm them up.

Newsletter

Newsletters contain information about your organization’s products and services. They are similar in format to the old school offline newsletters of decades past. They’re a solid way to keep in touch with customers. When you have a new product or service to announce, building it into your email marketing is easy. Links to specific landing pages help clients take action.

Maintaining is a decent amount of work, but it’s worth the effort. You’ll find yours is a reliable source of conversions, especially when you make announcements. You can build subscriptions online and off. Many organizations use incentives to get people to subscribe. If you have walk-in traffic, a banner could tell them to sign up. What matters most is that you continually attempt to induce people to receive further updates. If you don’t, you lose out the most powerful tactic available to digital marketers.

Email Service Provider (ESP)

This entity is the actual specialist provider that helps you send the email in your email marketing campaign. MailChimp, Aweber, GetResponse, Constant Contact and many others allow businesses to maintain email lists. They handle the heavy lifting that goes into successful deliverability. The software from ESPs is simple to use. You’ll be able to dig in and create beautiful autoresponders and newsletters that get results. The interface also handles all of the scheduling and marketing automation. Detailed reports are available that show every aspect of your email marketing campaigns.

Managing your email marketing campaigns at an ESP is straightforward. Take the steps necessary to quantify key marketing metrics. Take corrective action to improve deliverability, open rates, and click-throughs. Even tiny changes have enormous consequences. Track all your changes until you get a good feel for how things work. Managing your list is time-consuming, but it’s also the best source of sales you can find.

Triggers

You get to specify whatever email triggers you want. They are a series of automation rules that have marketing outcomes. You may set a particular trigger when a visitor visits a web page. Perhaps you’ll send them a link to a free, downloadable PDF. You may send a discount coupon to someone who abandons a cart.

The basic idea is that you automatically message someone based on their actions. Marketers find this feature to be compelling because it allows them to send an email when it has the most impact!

Sequences

These emails serve a different purpose. They are a series of emails sent in increments to subscribers. On day one the marketer will probably introduce herself and cover basics. On day three she may unveil an exclusive offer. On day seven she may offer a discount. Marketers construct the series in a way to increase sales every step of the way. There are various schools of thoughts on the best way to proceed, but it’s up to you. You know your clients better than anyone else. Structure your series in a way that gets people who are on the fence to opt in.

It takes a bit of effort to get an email marketing series right. You can follow existing suggestions, but you’ll still need to tweak it yourself. Like most things in marketing, it takes a lot of testing to gain reliable results.

Email List

At its core, your email list is merely a database of the email addresses you collect. You’ll need to maintain your list to keep it fresh and deliverable. Most ESPs suggest that you have your subscribers double opt-in. The reason they do this is to ensure the email is legit. Any list that has lots of bad addresses on it suffers from poor deliverability. If the people on your list aren’t responsive, you also have a problem. If your open rates are very low, most mail providers will automatically mark your messages as spam. If this happens too much, you’ll end up in the Bulk, Promotional, or Spam folders. That means your prospects will rarely see your messages!

Avoid all of this by pruning the people who don’t open after a certain number of mailings. They’re just not that into you so letting them go should be no problem! Lists with no hard or soft bounces that you clean often will have open rates higher than the industry average. Many marketers aren’t ruthless enough about cutting the uninterested. They think that more is better, even though the opposite is true in email marketing.

Email marketing is not as easy as most people think. If you decide on hiring a third party, there are many freelancers or digital marketing agencies that can do the work. The choice is yours and is simply a matter of what will get you the most bang for the buck. If you decide to do it yourself, start with the basics and work your way up. You’ll get the hang of sending winning email campaigns soon enough.

Reaping the Rewards of Winning Email Campaigns

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Email campaigns and email marketing in general have long been the workhorse of digital efforts. Sure, other methods may seem more exciting, but emails create conversions. In fact, a robust program is crucial to reaching out to people at the perfect moment.

Reach People at the Right Times with the Best Message

There are two primary types of email marketing that most organizations use. Newsletters are periodic updates about a range of subjects and products. Autoresponders are custom-crafted email series, which warm up prospects until they’re ready to buy. Both tactics are effective and are in use by millions of enterprises daily. If you’re building a digital marketing strategy, incorporating email funnels from your first day is a smart move!

Close More Sales with Well-Crafted, Timed Messages

Email is useful anytime a prospect is close to becoming a customer. Many people who visit your website won’t remember to come back. That’s why it’s worth enticing them to subscribe by offering some gift. Depending on the nature of your site, it could be a coupon or an informational brochure. What matters most is that you remain in contact with your prospect. Those who are not ready to buy can receive messages in a “drip” fashion that will answer their questions and objections.

In fact, the entire basis of marketing automation relies on this ability to send targeted messages when needed. Think of an abandoned cart reminder email to understand why this tactic works. A customer who was interrupted while making a purchase has a convenient link sent to them. That triggers their memory, and they complete the order. The same concept works for other industries too. Converting the people who are on the fence is a quick way to increase sales and raise your conversion rates instantly.

Experience Impressive ROI with Winning Email Campaigns

Year after year email marketing tops the charts for ROI. Even better news is that people are not abandoning email because of using mobile. In fact, mobile email usage continues to grow. Marketers who use responsive designs in their email continue to thrive. There’s no indication that this revered form of marketing will slow down anytime soon. That’s why developing your winning email marketing program is essential to your success.

The success of your program relies on several factors, including:

  • Adherence to relevant technical details.
  • Crafting messages that your subscribers want.
  • Using compelling call-to-action links to induce the proper response.
  • Well-written copy that answers questions and makes sales.

Monitor and Tweak Your Email Campaigns to Achieve the Best Results

If that sounds like a lot of work, keep in mind that’s just the beginning. You’ll also need to track and monitor your results to make adjustments when necessary. Like many other elements of marketing, tweaking your email campaigns is the most crucial piece of the puzzle. It’s easy to analyze data using most email list management programs. Once you get a knack for the type of content that gets opened, you’ll have no problem extending your program. Never forget that you’re attempting to convince and persuade people to do business with your organization. Once you give them a reason to buy, they’ll become long-term clients.

Decide on Doing It Yourself or Delegating

If you feel that you don’t have the time to do a fantastic job of your email marketing, you can outsource it. Digital marketing agencies, or freelancers, can handle every aspect of your email campaigns for you. There’s no right or wrong answer on whether to do the work yourself or not. If you have more time than money, a DIY approach may be possible. If you have more money than time, choose to hire professionals instead. Anytime you work on a project yourself, keep track of the time spent. You may cost yourself more money than you’d pay to someone else.

Professionals also have the training and tools to get the job done. Factor in how much it would cost to learn how to use and purchase the tools you need for the job.

There Are Lots of Steps to Configure Successful Email Campaigns

You’ll need to setup and configure direct emails, transactional emails, and triggers to complete your sales funnel. Each type of message will have a different set of requirements. That’s where experience comes into play. Email marketers who have been emailing for years begin to get a knack for what works and what’s not useful.

It’s important that your project manager understands how to use various email marketing tools. They’ll also need to learn current best practices for list building. Perhaps most importantly, they have to know advanced strategies that are up to date! Experts will be able to improve your opt-in rates quickly, while also maximizing both your open and click through rates! While they do this, they will also have to pay strict attention to technical details to keep your deliverability as high as possible.

Implementing This Strategy Is One Detail You Have to Get Right

Sure, all of this will require massive effort! That’s why you either have to devote your own time to doing it or hire a team to handle it all for you. You cannot simply skip building an email marketing program if you plan on succeeding with digital marketing. In a sense, it’s the glue that holds all of your efforts together. No matter what you sell, from small items to high-end big-ticket products or services, you benefit from sending emails. Your customers are busy people. They will forget all about you if you let them. Timely reminders can help jar their memories and push them back towards your organization. Failing to do that is like allowing them all to find new vendors. They aren’t mad at you; they simply haven’t thought about you in a long time.

There are lots of details to make your digital marketing work. Implementing a winning strategy for your email marketing is at the top of the list.

What Not to Do in Your Email Pitch :: An Open Letter to “Alex”

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With the digital marketing landscape shifting the focus more on email marketing, I seem to have been getting more and more email pitches.  Some of them are from spammers and some are legitimate.  Some make me laugh.  Some make me cringe.  Some get my attention, but most end up in the trash or flagged as spam.  My biggest pet peeve is receiving an email that is generically addressed “hi.”  I think it is fairly easy to figure out my name…the domain and name of my business is Colleen Eakins.

Last week I was reading about how writing better email pitches helped Ryan Luedecke increase the revenue of Sumo Jerky and then I received the following pitch from a possible spammer named Alex:

Hi,

My name is Alex and I am an Online Strategist.

I’ve been tracking the success of your website while doing some research on your industry—I’m impressed with your company, but there are some real opportunities for growth that you currently are missing.

Are you interested in several proven strategies to use content and social media to drive relevant traffic to your site? In 20 minutes I can show you how to fuel your brand and generate more revenue from search engines and social networks.

This is a $500 value free of charge.

I’d like to follow up about this with a quick phone call. Can I call you this week to discuss your campaign?

Thank you
Best regards,

Alex

This guy could have really learned something if he had read about Ryan’s methods!  I started to trash it after reading the “hi” greeting, but I then I thought I would write “Alex” back.  Here is my reply:

Hi Alex,

I don’t typically respond to cold generic pitches because they tend to beguile the message they contain.  I actually find it offensive and usually mark them as spam and trash them.

You sent me a generic pitch, but I will send you a customized response.  If you really were “tracking the success of [my] website,” you would have at least addressed the email to me by name.  After all, you are sending the email to a “name” at my domain name dot come…also my actual name.  A quick Google search could have confirmed that for you.

A quick search and read of my site to include my blog would have also kept you from wasting your time since these proven “strategies to use content and social media to drive relevant traffic to [my] site” are what I am already doing.  I have even written a few blog posts on your “proven strategies.”

Just some friendly advice:  The above extra steps will help your pitch go over better and net you more conversions.  Also think about expanding your sentence, “but there are some real opportunities for growth that you currently are missing,” to point out a few actual points.  You do not have to list all of them but some bullet points work well to pique a potential client’s interest.

You have to let the potential client know WIIFM and acronym for “what’s in it for me?”  Telling me your service has a $500 value does not do that.  What will this value bring me?  It’s like handing me a mystery box and telling me it’s worth $500.  $500 of what?  Fish roe? Snake skin?  I have no use or interest in either.

I know you have probably sent hundreds of these types of emails out and making them generic and automating a response as a follow-up makes your life easier.  However, it can’t be good for your sales conversions.  As an “online strategist” you must know that is pretty important, right?

Best of luck to you!

Colleen

After I was done writing, I decided not to send the email.  After all if he is a spammer, I do not want to provide validation to his list that my email is a working one.  So instead, I decided to write about it and post it here.  For more tips on how to successfully write a cold email pitch, check out Ryan Luedecke’s post, “How I grew Sumo Jerky to $10,000 a month.”

 

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