The email is one of the greatest inventions of the internet age. By using a simple message, anyone can communicate with anyone else in a matter of seconds. This near instant communication makes it a great marketing tool. Here is a bit of advice that will show you how to harness the power of emails for marketing purposes.
Minimize traditional email marketing activities during the holidays. Customers are preoccupied with family and friends, and are less likely to be paying attention to business email. Your odds of ending up in the spam box are considerably higher, which could have longer term implications for your bottom line. The major exception to this would be a business directly related to the holiday activities. Otherwise, give yourself a break and enjoy some downtime yourself. Business will be back on track in a day or two.
Offer a coupon to customers who sign up for your marketing email list. Put a form on your website where customers can sign up and set the form to email automatically new customers a coupon when they submit the form. This encourages customers to agree to allow you to send them marketing materials so that you won’t be accused of sending out spam.
Consider using a template that allows for each recipient to receive a personalized message in the greeting. People respond more favorably to emails that address them personally, and are less likely to reject the message. This personalization is simple to accomplish, and will grow a greater relationship with your customers.
Do your best to create emails that are personal. As with other types of marketing, customers will be more likely to purchase items from you if you add a personal touch. It could be highly beneficial to find out the reason why they opted in, and use this information in your email.
Data mine your email list and bucket your audience into various segments based off of any profiling data you have. This will allow you to be more strategic with your messaging and effectively increase your chances of higher open and click through rates. Even if you don’t have profiling, look to geo-targeting. Various regions respond differently to different types of messaging.
If you have images or graphics, put them on the left side of the email message. Make sure that your call to action element is always on this side. Research has documented that this location produces almost double the number of clicks to your product, service or website than placing these elements anywhere else does.
While you want to use your email marketing to improve your sales. The only way to get potential customers to read your emails is to convince them that they have value. To do this, your emails should always contain concrete, useful information and relevant links, and not just generic sales fluff.
Be sure that your landing page lives up to the customer’s expectations. The subscriber is obviously interested in your product if they have clicked on the link in your email. You do not want them to be disappointed by clicking on the link, and finding the page to be other than what they thought it would be.
Make sure that your customers give you permission before sending them correspondences via email. Being known as a spammer is the worst reputation a company can have online and will lead to a loss in customers and sales. Certain Internet service providers will blacklist you which will harm your marketing efforts and ultimately your business.
Have a strong call to action in your email marketing campaign and position it to be seen. You shouldn’t make it difficult for your email readers to know exactly what you want from them. If it’s too hard to figure out, then your email will most likely be quickly deleted. Instead, offer a clear call to action and deliver it in a way that can’t be missed.
Do not send too much information in one email. Customers will get frustrated and overwhelmed if there is an overabundance of information in a single email. Instead, put a sufficient amount of information in a series of emails and be sure that each one contains a few paragraphs. This will keep their attention.
When following up with customers, try following up with a sale schedule. Include a link in order for them to view this schedule. The end of the email could inform them that they can get all the specifics on this sale schedule by clicking on the link that was provided to them.
If one of your customers is not happy with your products or services, you could send a follow-up email to this person that apologizes to them. Include a link on the email that tells this person to click on it in order to listen to the apology with their own ears. The concluding postscript could inform them that they can get a free sample by clicking on the provided link.
Avoid using the character string “$$$” in your marketing messages. Many spam messages use this character string either in the subject line or body of their emails. If you use it, people and email servers may treat your emails as if they were spam, too. Your emails may end up ignored or even blocked.
Due to its speed and simplicity, the email is a great invention that allows people to communicate with little time or effort. Thanks to these attributes, emails have unlimited marketing potential. Hopefully, you will keep the advice from this article in mind so that you can use email marketing in the most effective manner.
