So, you want to venture into the waters of email marketing? If done right, email marketing can increase brand awareness, drive traffic to your website, and even increase leads or conversions. If done wrong, you might remain a series of unopened emails, lost in the depths of a spam folder. But don’t worry, we won’t let you drown! Here are our seven tips for beginning your email marketing campaign.
Build your Contact List
The first step in any marketing campaign is defining target audiences. This will help ensure your message gets in front of the right people. When building and maintaining relationships via email, keep in mind that the quality of the contact list matters more than the quantity of contacts. It is better to have a short contact list with interested readers rather than an extensive list of contacts who have little interest in your brand. Begin with existing customers, and then build upon that list through email opt-in subscribers. Add opt-in links on your brand website, order forms, or offline marketing collateral to make it easy for users to subscribe.
Create Separate Contact Lists
Once a solid master contact list is created, it is essential to utilize data and separate these contacts into sublists with specific titles.Separating contacts will ensure that the email content is relevant to the customer’s needs and interests. Some lists separate contacts by location, open-rate, and how active the customer is with the brand. Use this information to separate contacts into categorized lists which will then determine the types of emails they receive.
Have a Clear Purpose
Relevancy is critical to the success of an email campaign. So, before writing a promotional email, define its purpose. A successful branded email discusses only one or two topics and contains a cohesive message or theme.
Before hitting ‘Send’ ask yourself, how will this content benefit the audience and the brand?
If the email’s purpose can be easily interpreted based on its content and relevant user segment, then it is appropriate to send out.
Reel ‘Em In
The digital world gives people constant access to different paths of information at their fingertips. Brands now only have about 3 seconds to “catch” readers with a subject line before they continue to scroll through other emails. As with any hook, try to make the subject line intriguing. The average person can receive up to 100 emails daily. Therefore, it is important to cut through the clutter and capture attention in the subject line. Try to keep subject lines under 50 characters to be device compatible, and avoid spam words such as “free” or “order now” that may incite skepticism.
Keep It Brief
Emails should be no more than three short paragraphs with only one call to action (CTA). You might argue that you have a great deal of exciting information to share, but with too much content, the reader will likely get overwhelmed and stop reading. Break down information into bullet points when applicable for easier reading.
Considering 53% of emails are opened on mobile devices, it is imperative to ensure your email content is mobile-friendly. The mobile screen offers less space, which subsequently makes the body of text to appear more lengthy. Keep this in mind when determining content and strive to limit word count between 50-125 words.
Maintain Frequency
Frequency plays a key role in maintaining relationships with your contact list. You need to “breadcrumb” your contacts with emails. Pop into their inbox just enough to maintain their interest, but not enough to overwhelm them or cause them to ignore or unsubscribe. Ideal frequency should be once a week or once every two weeks depending on on the industry and purpose of the email campaign.
Monitor Data
The most exciting part of email marketing is monitoring the success of your emails with analytics. It is important to analyze the success of the campaigns by tracking specific landing pages to ensure your CTA is effective. Analytics will help determine the efficiency of your subject line by looking at the open rate. Use this data to continuously refine messaging to meet your target audience’s needs.
Email marketing campaigns allow you to take your promotional efforts one step further by entering the virtual world,and building relationships and brand loyalty in a customized, user-friendly fashion. If you need assistance with your digital strategy and email campaigns, we would be happy to help you swim above clutter.