Email marketing is one of the most crucial sales channels for large brands around the world. It’s a cost-effective strategy that has a lot to offer when it comes to building consumer engagement and boosting revenue.
In today’s post:
You’ll learn what email marketing is, what makes it so popular among expert marketers, and how you can use it to take your business to the next level.
Ready? Let’s get to it…
What is Email Marketing?
Email marketing is a form of online marketing that uses email to send promotional messages to potential customers. It’s an excellent way to develop solid relationships with existing audiences and convert new prospects.
The email marketing process includes:
- An email service provider that enables marketers to automate each step of their campaigns and make decisions based on the results.
- A subscribers list containing all the emails the business has gathered, which can be contacted at any time.
- Engaging email copy or templates that contain the message the business wants to communicate.
Is Email Marketing Still Effective?
The first email ever sent was by Ray Tomlinson to himself, which was around 40 years old. Since then, the world has adopted the technology until it became one of the most popular means of communication.
When email was new to the marketing world, there was endless potential for any small business to use it to grow. The average open rate in the 1990s, for example, was higher than 90%.
Everyone was excited to read what the next email had to offer.
Sadly, that’s no longer the case today because email lost most of its appeal. As more marketers abused this technique through spam and low-quality content, it became less and less effective.
To put that into perspective, the average open rate for most industries in 2020 was below 15%.
But here’s the interesting part:
Although email marketing results aren’t what they were decades ago, email is still one of the most popular, effective strategies out there.
In 2021:
- Over 319.6 billion emails are sent worldwide per day
- Email is valued at 8.49 billion U.S dollars
- 64% of small businesses are already using email to increase sales
And when it comes to results, here’s what you can expect from email marketing:
- For every 1$ spent on email marketing, you get an expected return of $42
- 61% of online customers enjoy receiving promotional emails from their favorite brands on a weekly basis
- Customers spend 138% more on their purchases when marketed to via email
What Makes Email Marketing So Important?
Email marketing is a budget-friendly technique to transform your brand online. It’s also easy to learn and get comfortable with if you’re consistent in your efforts.
But what is it exactly about this method that makes it super important for your company today?
Better Reach
Did you know that Facebook is limiting your organic reach on their platform?
If your business page has 1000 likes, only 100 people or less are going to see your post. That number is even lower if you have an inactive page with little engagement. The simple reason for that is that Facebook wants to push more businesses to spend on Ads instead of relying on organic reach.
While Google doesn’t do the same thing, the outcome with SEO can be quite similar.
You could wake up one day and find out that some of your highest ranking results are no longer at the top because of an update. Which puts your whole business at the risk of not getting enough new clients.
On the other hand:
Email marketing is a platform-free strategy that only requires some basic skills and consistency to succeed. It gives you full control over who sees your emails and how. Considering the large number of active email users today, you’ll never struggle to get another client with this approach.
Increased Sales and Conversions
As a result of increased reach, email marketing will help you quickly increase sales and conversions.
The average conversion rate for any email campaign in 2020 was about 15.11%, which is already higher than most other marketing techniques. With careful audience segmentation and consistent efforts to provide relevant offers, your numbers will be much better.
Personalized Communication
Personalization is the heart of modern marketing and what it has to offer. In fact, you can clearly see the difference in results between personalized campaigns and mass campaigns with email marketing.
If you gather the right details to segment your audience, your messaging will feel more genuine and relevant to all users. That allows you to develop a strong bond with your audience and keep them loyal to your brand.
Full Automation
You can automate anything from welcome emails, feedback requests, exclusive offers, or regular news about your brand.
This feature enables you to save time and maintain excellent results with little to no efforts. That’s all thanks to the wide variety of email service providers the market has to offer.
How to Get Started With Email Marketing
While the results email marketing promises are outstanding, the process of setting up a strategy for it doesn’t have to be complicated.
It breaks down into the simple next following steps:
1- Identify Your Objectives
There are many ways to integrate email marketing into your growth strategy. And that’s going to help you achieve lots of things for your business.
But before we get into any actual steps in the email marketing process, you first need to be clear about how email fits your business objectives.
Do you want to use email marketing to increase:
- Sales and profit
- Brand awareness
- Customer engagement
- Conversions
It takes a different approach to work on any of these goals and achieves remarkable results. So take your time to identify why your business might need email and how you’re going to use it.
2- Choose An Email Marketing Software
Most email service providers will overwhelm you with lots of features on their platforms. But the truth is, you won’t need most of those and should instead focus only on a few features.
Ask yourself the following questions:
- How easy is it to use?
- Do you plan on using it regularly?
- How much does it cost?
- How many contacts does it allow
- Does it offer A/B testing?
- Does it come with workflow automation?
Once you’ve found an email service suitable for your needs, set up your account and start experimenting with it.
3- Build Your Email List
Emailing is no longer the number’s game it was decades ago. Sending thousands of emails isn’t guaranteed to return excellent results if your list is of low-quality
That’s why the subscribers list is your biggest asset when it comes to finding success with email marketing. You can switch email service providers, update your objectives, or improve your templates at any time and still get good results.
But…
You can’t just build any email list and expect to drive good results. Especially when you know that a small list of relevant, highly-engaged customers is much better a large one with uninterested prospects.
Every small business will have a list of existing clients, business contacts, and prospects that they wish to convert. So you can start from there too.
After that, work on attracting more people to join your list by:
- Using lead magnets
- Including opt-in forms across various pages on your site
- Writing engaging copy supported by awesome design
- Create attractive offers your prospects can’t refuse
Be careful:
It’s never a good idea to buy an email list online as that rarely helps you achieve your desired goals. Besides, sending emails to customers without their permission will get you flagged as spam and put your business in trouble.
4- Launch Your First Campaign
For many business owners, hiring someone to develop, design, write, and monitor email campaigns is out of the question. Simply due to the additional costs they’d have to deal with each month.
But there’s always a simpler solution when it comes to email.
To get you started:
There are lots of free email templates you can use to cover for your lack of experience. They’ll save you time and ensure quick results in your marketing efforts. They’ll also spare you the trouble of writing and designing all emails on your own.
Here are a few tips to keep you on the right track:
- Use attention-grabbing subject lines to stand out and boost open rates
- Personalize each email with relevant offers to keep subscribers interested
- Include one call-to-action at the end of each email to boost engagements (but be sure to avoid asking for too many actions at once)
But the thing with email marketing is that you can always do better. So after that, you can get help from an email marketing expert to enhance your growth.
5- Automate The Process
Once you’re at this step, the possibilities for automation are endless.
Using the right tracking tools and relying on specific data, you can segment your audience effectively. That allows you to find unique ways to personalize each campaign and send the right message to the right audience.
For instance:
You can set up email sequences and autoresponders to engage new clients and potential customers based on their placement in the sales funnel.
Conclusion
Despite being one of the oldest tricks in the book, email marketing remains a super effective strategy for growing your brand online. It’s a great technique to increase reach, enhance brand loyalty, as well as boost sales and profits.
At first glance, getting started with email marketing might seem overwhelming. But it only gets easier as you familiarize yourself with the tools and find ways to integrate this with your marketing strategy.
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