Email Campaigns — People First Content
Email campaigns are one of the most powerful and effective marketing tools available to digital marketers. We have a whole post about why you shouldn’t discount emails in your marketing strategy in 2022.
Emails are among the best ways to reach your customers, promote your products and services, generate leads, and create a lasting impression. Especially if you don’t have the budget for other marketing efforts!
Okay, so you’re convinced. But that doesn’t mean you know what you’re doing.
Luckily, email doesn’t have too steep of a learning curve. Read on to find out how to have your customers rolling out the red carpet to their inboxes!
What Is the Deal With Email Campaigns?
Here’s another leg up you have with email. Unless you’re one of the-checks notes-0% without an email, you have a lot of exposure to email campaigns.
Definition of an email campaign is a form of marketing that sends emails to a list of subscribers who have opted in.
Email campaigns are one of the most popular and effective marketing channels. They allow you to communicate with your customers directly and promote your products, services, and offers.
They’re also an endless source of data. Whatever software you choose can track all kinds of metrics such as:
- Engagement. See if your emails were opened, how long the customer spent reading, and if they clicked any links.
- Effectiveness. A great day for A/B Testing! Send different emails to different clients to see which works better.
- Segmentation. Send the right type of email to the right kind of person by comparing how different people interact with your email.
Businesses send two types of emails to their customers: transactional and marketing emails.
Transactional emails are all business. They’re any message sent to a customer regarding a transaction or policy. So if you get an email telling you you forgot something in your cart or alerting you about your purchase, that’s transactional.
If it’s anything else-promotion, new product announcement, etc.-those all fall under the umbrella of marketing emails.
This difference isn’t just jargon or arbitrary. It’s a legal definition. Which leads us to our next point.
Don’t spam people! It’s against the law!
The CAM-SPAM Act very strictly moderates marketing emails if you’re in the USA. The CCPA (California Consumer Privacy Act) does the same if you’re in California, the GDPR in the EU, and the CASL in Canada.
FAMILIARIZE YOURSELF WITH THESE LAWS BEFORE SENDING ANY EMAILS.
I really cannot emphasize this enough. It’s up to you to follow these rules. You may think you can get away with fudging it if you’re a small enough company, but it’s not worth it on any level.
The CAN-SPAM Act is considered the most lenient of these laws. However, the penalty is still a gut punch: “Each separate email in violation of the law is subject to penalties of up to $46,517.” (emphasis ours).
So let that be your first step before you put finger to keyboard.
Now that we’ve put the fear of God into you let’s move on to more exciting topics!
Email Campaigns Best Practices
So we’ve said that email is a super effective form of advertisement, but that’s only true if you follow some best practices.
Email campaigns are not just about sending out a single email to your subscribers. It’s about strategically planning and executing an email campaign that will bring in more leads, increase sales, and grow your business.
The key to a successful email campaign is a well-thought-out strategy.
6 Best Practices
These are some tips and tricks for elevating your email campaign:
- Send emails at the right time
Sending out emails at the wrong time can lead to low open rates and responses. Instead, you should send out an email campaign during peak hours, usually in the morning or afternoon, when people are more likely to check their inboxes.
Start a campaign when you want to create engagement with your customers or prospects. For example, sending an email campaign around the holidays will increase customer engagement during the season.
2. Segment your list
You don’t want to send every email to every customer. It’s a quick and easy way to clog up someone’s inbox.
Segmenting your email audience is a critical aspect of any email campaign. It allows you to tailor the content to the unique needs of different segments of your list. This way, you can use email as a tool for customer engagement, not just marketing.
You can segment on various factors, including but not limited to: demographics (age, gender, location), interests, and purchase history/behavior.
3. Personalize your emails
In addition to segmenting your list, personalizing your emails can often go a long way towards making the email feel more relevant. Customer personas are helpful for this.
At the bare minimum, make sure to address the recipient by name. Then, you can track how people move through your website and send them recommendations based on that beyond that.
And don’t forget to automate, automate, automate!
This process could take forever, but it sure doesn’t have to. Any email software worth its salt will have personalization options built-in.
4. Keep it short and sweet
The content of your email should be tailored to the needs of your target audience and focused on a single message that you want to convey. It should also be concise and easy to read.
5. Use images in your emails
Are you more likely to look through an email with a few lines of cramped text or something with colorful, engaging graphics?
If you’re not artistically inclined/don’t have a graphic designer on staff, you may want to stick to text. But think simple! A few photos of your product and some graphics created in Canva can make a world of difference.
6. Don’t forget the subject line and CTA
Start and end your emails with a bang! Subject lines may seem throw-away, but there’s an entire eBook worth of strategy when it comes to crafting an attention-grabbing subject.
Every email you send should end with a clear call to action. Your CTA should be based on the specific purpose you have laid out in your strategy for a particular campaign.
Make sure some links lead to your product in your CTA!
Email Campaign Ideas
There are many ways to use email campaigns to increase your sales and conversions. Here are some ideas for email campaigns:
- Use a “freebie” offer or discount
- Offer exclusive content or discounts for subscribers only
- Poll or survey
- Links to your blog to increase readership
- Infographics!
The Dreaded Unsubscribe Button
Despite everything you’ve done right, Jane Doe has had enough and slams that unsubscribe button.
Do not despair, and do not make it hard to unsubscribe!
For one thing, it’s illegal. For another, someone unsubscribing is a chance for you to better your email marketing.
Use this to ask the customer why they unsubscribed. Provide a few pre-written options and leave room to enter their thoughts. If we’ve learned anything from review sections of websites, people like to have their feelings heard!
Also, they may not want to cut ties. Provide some options. They may want to hear less from you; they may not want to hear about sales or new products; get granular!
Preventative action
To prevent people from unsubscribing, you can do a couple of things.
- Take a stroll through your inbox.
Ask yourself, what emails do you open and which languish in the depths of your inbox? You’re already the expert as the customer.
2. Absence makes the heart grow fonder.
You walk a thin line between letting a customer forget about you and becoming a nuisance.
So err on the side of sending valuable, crafted, and personalized emails versus becoming the email equivalent of a pop-up.
You don’t want to move someone neutral to your brand to someone actively hostile toward you. Not all press is good press!
Go Forth and Conquer!
Email campaigns have been around for a long time now, and they are still one of the most effective marketing channels. They are an easy way to reach your audience and communicate with them regularly.
With some prep and strategy, you too can cash in on one of the best ways to build a relationship with your customers!
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If you want to focus on the parts of your business like email marketing, why not let someone take care of your content? At PFC, we love working with businesses to create interesting content in your brand’s voice and style. Click here to get started!
Originally published at https://www.peoplefirstcontent.com on February 20, 2022.
