Many businesses have recognized the importance of email marketing, and have invested heavily in automated marketing tools to grow, nurture and engage their email subscribers. However, sometimes it’s not what they expected.
If your email marketing efforts are going unanswered, or worse, you’re being ignored, it’s time to re-evaluate your strategy. Maybe your leads aren’t interested in what you have to say; or, you’re just not converting optimally. Whatever the case may be, it’s important to understand what’s going on so you can fix it. In this article, we’ll discuss how to get the most out of your email marketing efforts, and how to get the attention of your email customer service.
Set Up A Welcome Mat
Your first, and perhaps most important step to effectively marketing through email is to set up a welcome mat. Just like in real life, when a guest comes to your door, you want them to feel welcome and appreciated. Once you’ve confirmed their email address, create a welcome email that details the many awesome things your business has to offer. For example, you might use bright, vibrant, eye-catching fonts, and images that appeal to your target audience. Make sure you follow-up with a couple more communication within one week to make sure they understand what their role is and how they can benefit from your email marketing efforts.
Find Your Niche
To ensure you stand out from the crowd, you need to find your niche. That is, you need to figure out what kind of content performs best for your target audience, and begin creating content that will appeal to them.
According to HubSpot Blogs research, the top three niches that marketers are targeting are:
- Health (e.g. diet plans, gym memberships)
- Homeschooling (e.g. curriculum, parenting advice)
- Fitness (e.g. running plans, weight loss)
Once you’ve found your niche, you can tailor your pitch to be as appropriate and helpful as possible. For instance, if you’re marketing towards gym-goers, your pitch might include information on the newest gym trends or styles, or it could emphasize how your products or services can help you reach your fitness goals.
Your niche doesn’t have to be overly scientific. For example, if you’re marketing towards parents, you might want to use your blog to provide tips on how to raise your child physically and mentally healthy. You can also use your blog to provide advice on job searching, or to offer career opportunities within your industry.
Build Your Email List
Now that you’ve attracted some interest, it’s time to build your email list. This is the group of people you’ll be communicating with directly via email. The more subscribers you have, the more powerful your campaign will be.
There are several tools you can use to grow your email list. We recommend using a combination of methods, which include:
- Wondering how to grow your email list? (1) (a) Use an opt-in box (or a sign-up form built into your website) to collect email addresses.
- Did you know… (2) (a) You can also use your website to invite people to follow you on social media? By doing so, they’ll be added to your email list.
- Did you know… (2) (b) You can use a tool like GetResponse to send out personalized emails based on their previous behavior? This forms of email marketing is called retargeting and it allows you to send messages to people who have shown interest in your product or service.
- Did you know… (3) (a) You can use your website to collect emails for your email list? Simply put, an opt-in box is an indispensable part of any website.
- Did you know… (3) (b) If you’re worried about security, you can use a tool like Mailchimp to send out mass emails. The problem with this option is that you have to be mindful of your email sending limits. Otherwise, you’ll be charged extra.
- Did you know… (4) (a) You can also use an autoresponder to get automated marketing in advance of your mailing. This can save you a lot of time and ensure you don’t forget to follow-up.
- Did you know… (5) (a) You can use an A/B testing tool like Optimizely to test different versions of your pitch and see which one converts best. For example, did the shorter version of your pitch work better? Or, did a video enhance your email’s openness and interactivity? There’s no wrong answer, just different results based on your tested hypotheses.
- Did you know… (6) (a) You can use a conversion optimizer like HubSpot to get automated marketing from A to B. This is pretty much like a task manager for your marketing efforts. You can set it up to send out automated campaign whenever a new lead comes in.
- Did you know… (7) (a) When someone subscribes to your email list, you’ll receive an email from them individually thanking you for the information. This is a great moment to remind them of your brand and what they’ve previously signed up for.
- Did you know… (8) (a) You can use an analytics tool like Hootsuite to track the success of your email marketing efforts. Simply put, with Hootsuite, you can see the performance of your campaigns across all platforms (i.e. web, mobile, and social media). This way, you can easily monitor the effectiveness of each campaign, and make changes as necessary.
When it comes to growing your email list, there’s no silver bullet. But, with a little bit of effort, you can ensure you stand out above the rest. Use these tips to get started, and soon you’ll be celebrating the success of your automated marketing efforts.