Companies are sometimes reluctant to use email marketing for fear of being perceived as spamming their audience(s). Let’s be honest, wouldn’t we all like to declutter our inbox? But, used correctly, email marketing can be beneficial for both the sender and the recipient.
For your business it’s a critical part of the sales process – it can help nurture existing leads, generate new ones, turn prospects into customers, and keep existing customers engaged. 53% of marketers say email has been the most effective channel for early-stage lead generation. (Demand Gen Report, 2021) (Source: https://www.hubspot.com/marketing-statistics)
Targeting email marketing to the recipient means it has value and is of interest. It can be used to share exclusive offers, inform customers and prospects about new service or product launches, share relevant industry news or legislation changes, or as a friendly and informal way of engaging and building long lasting relationships with your audience.
So, how do you create an effective email marketing campaign and avoid spam culture?
1. Campaign goal
First and foremost, what is the purpose of the email? Is it educational? Are you letting your subscribers know about a new product or service? Are you offering an exclusive deal?
Whatever it is, make sure it is tailored to the audience that subscribed.
2. Content
Once the goal of the email campaign is defined, you’re ready to create the content. Use strong imagery, well written content and include links that direct the audience to your website for more information.
Plan your content ahead of time, and use a formula to make it easy.
When it comes to email marketing you can break it down into simple tasks. For example, take an email newsletter…
What is the frequency of the enewsletter? How often do you want to engage with your audience? Or, how often do they want to hear from you… How much content do you need?
Breaking it up into categories makes it easier e.g.
- A company news story
- Something relevant to your customers, possibly from a third party news source
- A selling opportunity.
Next consider where your content is coming from? Does it need to be written in full and published online ,or will you be pointing people to other external sources? Remember, you don’t want to do too much of this, it’s better to point them at YOUR website.
Typically an enewsletter contains short introductions to news stories that then link to the main story on the company website, helping to drive traffic to the site. And whilst you might worry that you don’t have enough to say, it is often a case of repurposing content that you have already already written e.g a press release or blog post.
TIP!!
Adding photos, videos, or other visual elements will make the copy more pleasing to the viewer’s eyes. It also provides a large clickable area to direct them to additional content on your website.
3. Subject line
Arguably, the most important part of your email. This is what is going to capture your audience’s attention and entice them to read it. Remember, if people have signed up to your newsletter they actually do want to hear from you, so don’t feel concerned about “spamming” them because you are not.
Keep it genuine though – you are trying to build a relationship with your audience so think about what will appeal to them while fitting with your brand message and the content of the email. Don’t mislead.
Here are some great subject line ideas we came across:
- “You asked, we listened”
- “Increase conversions by 25%”
- “Everything you wanted to know about email copy but were too afraid to ask”
4. Email Platform
There are plenty of free and paid for email platforms that allow you to create seamless templates, organise your subscriber categories, provide reporting metrics and importantly ensure you are GDPR compliant.
We will always recommend the best one for the level and type of integrations that you require for your business. Our favourite free one is mailchimp and Campaigner is a great paid for option. You might subscribe to a system, such as Salesforce, that already has an email platform linked to it – why not start making use of it?
5. Call to Action
Finally, what is your Call To Action (CTA)? You want your audience to engage with you so let them know.
The CTA will depend on the first step – your campaign goal. In most cases, you will want to lead your audience to purchase, to view/read more at your website or to download resources. Where possible, give them something of value and make sure you can track it. Maybe it’s a downloadable info sheet, a free trial or product demo.
This is where you lead your audience to take action in what you would like them to do.