Social media is EVERYWHERE, it’s often the go-to when starting with marketing a business however with a user base of over 4 billion people, email is still the KING of digital communication!
People are in their inboxes all the time so having email marketing in your toolbox is a no-brainer, but how do you get started?
What is Email Marketing?
Email marketing is exactly what it says on the tin, it’s sending marketing messages to your audience. BUT remember, marketing is not all about sales. It’s building those relationships with clients, the know like trust factor with your audience. And guess what? Having direct access to their inbox is one of the most effective ways to do this.
How to get started, Step 1: Setting Clear Goals
It’s worth taking some time to think about your goals and what you really want to achieve with email marketing, as that will dictate the type of campaigns you send, who you target, the content you include, and how you measure success.
These goals could include:
- driving sales
- driving website traffic
- building brand awareness
- generating and nurturing leads
- client engagement
- increased customer loyalty
Take a look at some examples below:
- BuzzFeed – The popular news and entertainment website earns revenue by selling advertisements on their site, so the key objective of their marketing team is to drive more traffic. With that in mind, BuzzFeed sends regular email newsletters containing links to stories on their website with the goal of increasing the number of visits they get each month and increasing the amount of revenue they generate.
- Rip Curl – The global surfing brand generates revenue through the sale of wetsuits, t-shirts, boardshorts and other surfing goods. The goal of their marketing team is to increase sales, so they use email to promote new products they’re launching to try to drive people to their online or physical stores to purchase those products.
- UNICEF – The global charity organization provides humanitarian aid and assistance to mothers and children in developing nations around the world. Success to their digital marketing team is donations, so they use email marketing to reach out to their donor base, educate them on aid projects UNICEF is undertaking, and ask for donations.
- Soho House – This prestigious members-only club is a regular hangout for celebrities and media moguls around the world. The goal of their marketing team is to keep their member base engaged in the club and regularly using the facilities, so they use email marketing to keep their members up-to-date on events and functions they can attend.
As you can see from these examples, planning what you want to achieve with email before you start sending makes it much easier to identify what to send and who to send it to, and helps you create focused campaigns that will achieve your marketing goals.
Step 2: The Tech
Setting up an EMP (Email Marketing Platform)
This is the software that helps you manage your email list, supports the design of your email and helps automate campaigns using workflows. Using an EMP allows you to automate actions triggered by your audience’s behaviours. These enable you to personalise each interaction with them, meaning engagement and conversion rates generally improve.
Examples of EMPs include Mailerlite, Mailchimp, Convertkit, ActiveCampaign, Flodesk and a load more!
Step 3: Building an Email List
Successful email marketing needs an active email list and a database of email contacts who have opted in to hear more from you. There are various ways to build your list, the easiest being through lead magnets created for your target audience in exchange for an email address.
If you plan to use email to keep in touch with existing customers, then your email list can be built largely by importing your existing customer’s details into your chosen email marketing tool making sure you have adequate permission to email these subscribers.
There are various ways to build your email list, but the main ones include
- Adding an opt-in form to your website for people to subscribe to
- Offering an incentive such as a lead magnet, giveaway, discount code or a waitlist
Just remember to make it simple for people to join your list, don’t add too many steps or hoops people have to go through to get on your list, this will put them off and you will lose the lead.
Step 4: The different types of campaigns (emails) to send
Newsletter: a regularly distributed email. If your goal is to keep in touch with a list of people you already know, then a newsletter is the perfect type of campaign to send. It will keep your business and your products front of mind and drive people back to your website.
Offers: this is essentially any campaign you send with the goal of driving a direct response. The offer email is effective if your goal with email is to directly drive sales. It presents a product or discount offer and includes a direct call to action for people to click-through to your website and make a purchase.
Announcement: an email sent to your subscribers announcing a new product, feature, or service. The announcement email is perfect if you want to keep an engaged audience up-to-date on your latest products or features. While the sharing of information is the primary goal, the email may have the added benefit of driving people back to your store or website where they can make a purchase.
Event Invitation: designed to increase awareness of your event and encourage people to attend.
The type of email campaign you send depends entirely on your goals with email. If you’re looking to drive direct sales then sending marketing offers and announcement campaigns are going to return the best results, however, if you are simply looking to keep your existing customers up-to-date on the latest projects, products or developments in your business, then sending a regular newsletter is going to be the best way to achieve that.
Step 5: Writing a Great Email
There is still A LOT of competition out there. You need to stand out in a cluttered inbox which can be quite a challenge. You have to be creative to ensure your emails get noticed and opened.
But how?
Know Your Audience
The first step to crafting compelling email marketing copy is knowing your audience. This will help you better segment your list and create targeted email copy.
The all-important Subject Line
The most important element of email copy, your subject line, helps readers decide whether to open your email or not. To craft a hard-to-ignore subject line:
- use keywords
- make it benefit-driven
- use active voice
- personalise as much as possible
Get the Preview Text Right
Email preview text appears immediately below or beside the subject line. Limited to a maximum of 140 characters (email client dependent), it acts as an elevator pitch to convince people to open your email. An optimized preview text is an extension of your subject line and reinforces your value.
Make It Easy to Read
People are busy. That’s why you should write your email copy so it’s easy to read and understand. Make sure to:
- use short sentences and paragraphs
- avoid jargon and complicated words
- use bullet points
If your readers find your emails easy to read, they’ll likely engage with them more.
Leverage Storytelling
Stories are a powerful way to grab attention and get your message across. That’s why you should leverage storytelling in your email copy.
Use Psychology to Your Advantage
Human beings are wired to react in specific ways. Use psychological triggers to direct your readers towards your campaign objectives. Examples of such triggers include:
- fear of missing out (FOMO)
- color psychology
- social proof
Used well, these triggers can help you craft email effective copy.
Setting expectations
Email marketing is all about expectations, and it’s up to you to set them. Do you want to send daily updates, monthly newsletters, or regular offers – whatever it is you decide make sure your call to action is strong, and your follow-up is consistent,
Almost all EMPs give you the option to create an automated welcome sequence, so take advantage of it.
The initial follow-up email should be sent as soon as someone opts in as a way to introduce yourself and detail what you plan on doing with their email address.
From here, it’s simply a matter of living up to their expectations – send those daily tips or keep on top of your monthly updates. Don’t let your emails lapse for too long. Try to send an email at least once a month, or once a week if you can.
Step 6: Using Automation
If you’re just starting out with an email list, it’s easy to imagine you’ll have time to personally respond to every new subscriber but as your list begins to grow this becomes simply impossible.
So how do you manage to keep on top of it all? The answer is automation.
Email automation sends out emails that you have scheduled in advance.
The most common automation are known as sequences – Welcome sequence, nurture sequence, and Abandoned checkout sequence. By creating this sequence of emails in advance and setting triggers for their delivery.
These sequences keep leads warm, and makes sure you are kept in from of them in their inbox.
That way, when you do want to announce a new service or product, you can count on the fact that they are paying attention as you’ve taken the time to build up a relationship over several weeks or months in their inbox.
Step 7: Analytics
Email analytics are critical because, if you’re paying attention, they’ll give you very specific clues as to what you’re doing wrong and what you’re getting right.
First, your open rate explains how many people open your emails. It’s based on a single invisible tracking pixel that loads when someone clicks on your message.
When looking at open rates, it’ll usually tell you how well you’ve built your relationship with readers. Ideally, people are excited to read your emails and open them quickly. If your open rate is low, it usually means you have a lot of unengaged subscribers. You need to work harder on providing value and managing expectations.
Next, your click-through rate, or CTR, shows how many people clicked on a link (if any) in your email.
If your CTR is low, it means that your message is either not targeted enough, or simply not getting through. In this case, focus on improving your copy.
Finally, your unsubscribe rate tells you how many people have clicked the “unsubscribe” button at the bottom of your email.
If your unsubscribe rate is high in relation to your opt-in rate, then you’ve passed the point of building value and writing good copy… you’ve got some serious work to do.
Essentially you’ve built a sieve and people that sign up eventually leave. If this is happening, try to examine when people are leaving and take action based on those leaks.
If they’re leaving after a certain automated email, then re-work it. If they’re leaving after marketing messages, then re-work the way you present offers. If they’re leaving early on in your email funnel, then you need to fix your original call to action so that it’s in harmony with what you’re sending.
Your email list is one of your most valuable resources and if you learn how to treat it right, it will pay for itself many times over.
💙 Has getting your email marketing platform set up been on the to-do list forever?
💙 Maybe you’re all set up but don’t have the time to be consistent with your email marketing?
💙 Need extra support to make sure your system is working to meet your email marketing goals?
Using a tech VA means all of the tech overwhelm and steps to getting set up are taken care of for you! You simply concentrate on creating copy, then it’s over to me to get set up and regular campaigns out to your audience.
Book a call with Kirsty to see how our services can support you with your Email Marketing.
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