This week we will talk about a powerful marketing tool that can help you grow your email list, grow your business and become more successful – email marketing!
What Is Email Marketing?
Email marketing is an umbrella term for the online activities that businesses and brands engage in via email. These activities include:
- marketing email campaigns
- creating email newsletters for customers
- compiling mailing lists
- segmenting and targeting audiences
- creating compelling content for email campaigns
- and more!
Because email is such a powerful tool for marketing and sales, there are a variety of tools, platforms, and strategies that you can use to make the most of this medium.
Why Email Is A Popular Choice For Businesses And Brands
You might be wondering why businesses and brands would want to use email for marketing and sales. Here are a few reasons:
- easily measurable impact = performance
- ability to target specific audiences = segmentation
- highly personal and relatively untargeted communication = relationship building
- ability to track performance and measure results = accountability
- ability to target decision-makers and influencers = leadership
- low-cost entry option = scalability
The key takeaway here is that email allows you to easily and effectively communicate with your audience – whether you’re a business or brand seeking to grow your customer base, or you’re simply looking to establish and grow a brand for yourself and your business. Email marketing is a proven tool for all types of businesses and brands, in any industry.
How to Properly Utilize Email for Marketing
Now, it’s important to note that not all forms of email marketing are created equal. There are a variety of tactics that you can use to properly utilize email for marketing and sales, and you want to make sure that you’re employing the right ones.
Here are a few of the most effective ways to utilize email for marketing:
1. Create a memorable first email.
Properly utilizing email for marketing means creating a memorable first email that will encourage your readers to take the next step and subscribe to your communications. This might mean doing something as simple as quoting a famous person, or incorporating humor into your introductory email. Studies have shown that both of these tactics can significantly increase the chances of someone subscribing to your emails – provided that you do it correctly!
Depending on your industry, you might also want to consider using a different template or formula for your introductory email. Do some research into the email marketing open rate, and make sure that your first email is memorable and compelling enough to encourage someone to open it and read your valuable content. To improve your chances of increasing open rates, you can also try using a different opener – one that’s tied to a specific event, new product, or special offer. For example, if you’re using email to promote an e-course, you might want to start your email with “Dear e-mail subscriber,” or “Hey there,” followed by a short intro about the course.
2. Follow up with a compelling content piece.
Just because someone subscribed to your email list doesn’t mean that they’re interested in your product or service. Far from it – sometimes they might even be completely uninterested in what you have to offer! When someone subscribes to your email list, they have actively expressed an interest in hearing from you – but that’s all it is, at least at this point. To encourage them to actually engage with your content, you can follow up with a piece of compelling content.
Doing this might mean that you have to put in a little more work. You might have to write a whole blog post, whip up a quick YouTube video, or go the extra mile and create an ebook. But, the effort is totally worth it – the results of which will hopefully encourage your reader to take the next step and become a customer or lead.
However, sometimes the simple act of providing good content can be enough. If you’ve already delivered an informative email with your compelling content, followed up with another email a few days later – but this time with an offer that’s relevant to your email list – you might see an increase in interest and sales without having to resort to more complicated methods.
3. Personalize your emails with relevant, targeted content.
While it’s important to keep your emails interesting, personal, and relevant to your audience – especially if you want to engage them and increase the chances of them buying your product or service – you might also want to consider catering your emails to individuals or businesses that are more likely to be interested in your content. This is where segmentation and targeting come in.
You can use a variety of tools, including email marketing software, to segment your audience and send personalized emails to subgroups.
For example, if you’re sending emails to people in a certain country, you might want to consider sending them marketing emails that are relevant to their location – like a U.S. marketer would likely receive content relevant to the U.S., and vice versa. You can also use online tools to segment your email list, and use that segmented list to send more targeted emails.
4. Measure the results of your email campaigns.
Finally, you might want to consider measuring the results of your email marketing efforts. This might mean looking into simple metrics like open rates and click-throughs – or, if you’re using more sophisticated tools – making sure that you track the results of your campaigns in depth and utilize that data to improve your efforts in the future.
Why should you bother with all of this? Simply put, if you want to increase your customer base and grow your business – especially when trying to grow a B2B audience – you should consider email marketing. The key takeaway here is that you can use email to effectively and efficiently communicate with your audience – whether you’re promoting a product or service, or you’re simply seeking to establish and grow a brand. Properly utilizing email for marketing and sales is easy and doesn’t require a lot of effort – but the results can be invaluable.