Most businesses, whether big or small, have an email marketing campaign running on some platform to keep in touch with customers and generate new leads. But what if you could do more than that? What if you could develop a more integrated strategy that not only included email but also mobile and social media?
Well, you can. With a little imagination and some focused effort it’s possible to grow your email list, gain more customers and increase your conversion rate, all while developing a closer bond with your audience.
Let’s take a look at how you can do that.
The Basics Of An Email Marketing Campaign
Every business, no matter the size, should have an email marketing campaign. Whether you’re sending bulk emails to customers that have bought a product from you or you’re using an email marketing service such as MailChimp or HubSpot, you’ll always need to have some kind of presence in the form of an email address. That way, when someone wants to get in touch with you about your business, products or services, they can do so via email.
The first thing you’ll want to do when setting up your email marketing campaign is to choose a username and password for your email account. In addition to this, you’ll want to make sure that the email address you provide is valid and that you will actually be able to send mail to that address. Most email providers will allow you to set up filters so that you can screen and organize your incoming email – this can be a real time-saver if you receive a lot of email.
One of the first things you might want to consider is what list you’ll want to use. There are a number of different ways to do this – you can either use a tool to generate a buyer list, use a list that you’ve previously compiled or use a service that specializes in generating email lists.
Once you’ve got your list ready, you can start segmenting it into groups and crafting distinct campaigns for each of these groups. You might, for example, want to create a campaign for new and existing customers, or for those who’ve bought a certain product or service from you.
Email List Growth
If you’ve never generated leads before, the concept of getting in touch with past customers to see if they’d be interested in buying something from you can seem a bit daunting. But it’s important to remember that every business, no matter the size, needs to generate leads. So even if this isn’t something you want to focus on right now, it’s important to set up your email marketing account and get the basics down.
Having an email list allows you to stay in touch with your audience and let them know about new products or services that you offer – it also means that you can continue to market to them even if they’ve opted out of receiving emails from you. This is important both from a legal and practical perspective. If someone decides that they don’t want to receive any more emails from your company, it’s a legal obligation to remove them from your list.
Keeping in touch with your audience is a great way to build and maintain relationships, and it can also bring a steady stream of leads into the top of your funnel. So long as you continue to keep in touch with your customers and maintain a presence on social media, your email list will continue to grow.
Mobile Marketing
Mobile marketing is all about using smartphones and other mobile devices to reach consumers with your brand or message. If you’ve got an Android phone or tablet, you can take advantage of the fact that Google Now and other similar apps can remind you of events and appointments via text message or alert you to new emails, messages and events via email, text or social media.
You might also consider using a tool like Google Analytics to track the effectiveness of your mobile marketing efforts – whether through email, text or social media marketing. With this information readily available, you can identify the most successful channels and continue to build on that success.
Social Media Marketing
If you’ve got a relatively popular social media account – whether that’s on Facebook, Twitter or Instagram – you can utilize this platform to gain more traction for your business and generate leads. Twitter and Instagram allow you to target your audience based on the content that they’re already engaged with – whether it’s a product review or an article about something that interests them. By taking advantage of this, you can create highly targeted content that’s designed to attract a specific audience.
If you’ve got a fairly large social media account, you can also use a tool like Hootsuite to manage and schedule your content across different platforms – whether that’s Facebook, Instagram or Twitter. This can be a time-saver if you want to maintain a consistent presence across different social media platforms.
By taking the time to understand your audience’s needs and designing content that they’ll value, you can generate leads and support your business.
Customer Retention
Once you’ve got some leads coming in, it’s important to keep those leads engaged with your brand. This is where customer retention strategies come in – making sure that your customers are always aware of the value you offer, while also reminding them of the importance of remaining engaged with your brand.
For example, if you notice that a lot of your leads are coming from people who’ve followed you on social media, but aren’t necessarily buying your product or service right away, you can engage with them via a poll or survey to see what they’re looking for or how you can best help them.
The key takeaway from all of this is that establishing an email marketing campaign doesn’t necessarily mean that you need to focus your efforts on email alone. By taking the time to understand your audience’s needs and the value you provide, you can harness all of the various tactics available to you – including email – to grow your business and establish yourself as a leader in your industry.