What the Tactic Can Do and the Best Practices for Your Business
Through the rise and fall of numerous social media channels and the comeback of paper mailings, email marketing remains one of the most effective and consistent ways to connect with your customers on a personal level. However, not all email campaigns are created equal. Businesses can use email marketing to sell products or services, generate brand awareness, gather insights on their target audience, or simply connect about a common interest. No matter the goal of your email campaign, we’re detailing the ways this tactic can help advance your business by implementing current best practices.
What Email Can Do for Your Business
Email campaigns can provide a personalized digital experience when connecting with your audience. The medium allows you to send targeted marketing assets directly to thousands of customers’ inboxes efficiently, making your message easier to see and more relevant. What is even better is that email campaigns are built to be responsive, to be easily viewed from a phone or laptop, and can drive various call-to-actions by pulling the reader through the content with eye-catching visuals, color, animated graphics, and even video clips.
For eCommerce businesses, email marketing can be used to directly sell products to customers who have already shown interest, or “opting-in”, by supplying their email address through pop-up windows, landing pages, and/or even contesting. When offering a service, email marketing can help increase brand awareness, create trust through educational materials, and even offer a convenient outlet for potential clients to contact you. For organizations offering memberships or promoting a group experience, email is great for delivering information around events, value-added offerings, monthly blogs, case studies, testimonials, and everything in between. Finally, don’t forget that email marketing can be automated to power email drip campaigns that can speed up engagement and pull a customer through a sales funnel faster.
Best Email Marketing Strategies
Now that you know the benefits of email marketing based on your business goals, keep reading for Rizco’s top recommendations for optimizing your email strategy so you can start seeing results.
1. Subject Line
You’ve probably heard the term “spam” emails, but did you know that the emails that a reader WANTS to receive are considered “ham” emails? Your subject line is an essential piece of your campaign because, with just one line, you need to convince your reader that your email is “ham!” So, be sure you’re using effective subject lines that draw in your reader and entice them to click. Here are some quick tips:
- Try to keep your subject under 35 characters or 6-7 words.
- Ask a question to engage your reader or ensure you use words with emotion, action, or power.
- Avoid spam triggers such as special characters, words in all caps, and cliché sales language.
2. Simplicity
Let’s face it, we all scan emails, and your audience will too. So, when it comes to your email content, remember to keep it concise by breaking the email up into scannable and digestible sections. We understand wanting to have every detail to grab the user’s attention; however, sometimes it’s best to use email to hook your reader’s attention before sending them to your website or landing page for more information.
3. Segmentation
Segmenting your email list is a great way to deliver personalized emails to a designated group of people. You can segment your lists by location, interest, age, gender, job titles, and more. For example, if you are hosting a local workshop or seminar in person in New Jersey, it wouldn’t make sense to send that email to all of your national subscribers who most likely won’t be attending. So in this case, it would be a best practice to segment your list to only include subscribers in that region.
4. Analytics
You’ve set a goal for your email campaign and sent your first email blast to your subscribers … now what? You should track the success of your campaign, of course! Your campaign will produce data and analytics that will be valuable to enhance future marketing efforts; but how do you do that? A good rule of thumb is to seek out your industry standards for a baseline and then use the reporting tools that are provided through your email distribution software. For example, if you’re in the construction industry, we recommend researching your industry’s average open rates, CTR (clickthrough rates), and impressions so you can compare them to your metrics.
A lot of research, conceptualizing, and analysis goes into an email marketing campaign. Yet, too often, we see businesses neglect the platform altogether because they don’t have the time. This can be a major mistake as email is one of the most lucrative marketing tools available. According to HubSpot, email generates $42 for every $1 spent on average!
If time is your dilemma, then consider enlisting the help of our team at Rizco, as we’ve been curating strategic and effective email campaigns for over twenty years. We do the email legwork so you can experience the results; it’s that simple.
Interested in starting a campaign? Let’s chat.
