You must have heard about email marketing from your friend, read on the internet, and during various strategy meetings. All these talks focus on one sole element i.e. it helps in augmenting the business communications, aims at important markets, and the best part is that it is cost-effective and environment-friendly as well. But, the burning question is what exactly email marketing is? How email marketing is effective than television ads or radio broadcasting and why should a business spend extra time & efforts to maintain an email list?
Email marketing happens when a group of people is sent a commercial message by a company via electronic mail. Email marketing comes handy in building customer loyalty in a product or a company. It is also considered as an effective way of staying in touch with the clients while promoting your business.
Using email marketing, you can easily reach your target customers without spending much on print media and electronic media. With the help of email marketing, you can easily maintain a list that has been segmented on the basis of various elements such as – likes & dislikes of the customers, spending habits, and various other key elements. Emails are then sent to the individual customers on the email list, offering them with a personalised email containing details they are interested in. This helps in promoting loyalty & trust to a company whilst giving a boost to the sales.
With email marketing, not only it is easier to reach your target customers, but it also gives you an effective way of staying connected with the purchasing base. This form of marketing helps in retaining current customers while also tapping new markets. You can easily judge the effectiveness of a marketing campaign and judge if your ROI (return on investment) is higher than other conventional marketing campaigns.
Despite many years of predictions that email marketing is going to fade or will be replaced, it is still going strong. In fact, email marketing is one of the effective methods through which you can reach your target customers. Yes, the fact cannot be denied that necessary changes can be made to any marketing method. So, here are best tips how businesses can increase the effectiveness of the email marketing.
Having Effective Subject Line
The subject line has been a topic of various discussions and research. Just like the title of a book, this one should draw the attention of your target customers and most importantly make them explore the content of the email. So, what is the result of all these research and discussions?
● It has been found that all those emails having ‘You’ are less opened, on the other hand, emails with ‘Free’ in the subject lines are opened more often. The key here is that incentives should be offered but without fake personalisation.
● It is imperative exclamation signs and brackets are being used in good taste, just to separate the subject line.
● An email with less than 10 characters have the chance of being opened more often. Make sure you maintain a 50-60-character limit.
● Yes, brand name should be used but avoid making it look like an advertisement. People do prefer opening mails from their favourite brands, but they will avoid blatant advertisement at any cost.
Having Updated Email List Helps
Unopened emails and high bounce-back rate shows that your contact list is out of date. Around 40% of the customer prefer to change their email addresses annually which begets lot of wasted time and energy sent to the abandoned inboxes. Make sure you update your list biannually; this will help you save all your best efforts. You can also use unsubscribe options in your emails in order to inactive the subscribers to streamline the whole process.
Mobile-Friendly Emails
You may not be aware of the fact but 40% of your users prefer to read emails on their smartphones. You will end up losing significant customer base if your emails are not mobile-friendly. You can also use various tools making it easier for you to design a campaign for both tablets and smartphones.
The landing pages and various other links should also be mobile-friendly. It won’t be of any use if one of your customers clicks through your email just to land up on a blank page.
Split Test And Analyse
One of the tools offered by various email marketing tools is split testing along with analytic reports. With the help of split testing, you can easily do in-house marketing tests on your existing subscribers. You get to test all the newsletters, welcome emails, and varied forms of promotion to find out the ones which are successful and try to find the reasons why other didn’t work.
These programs are only limited in offering you statistics and information. It is up to you to use this information to make a better and effective campaign. You can split test on templates, subject lines, and landing page links.
Effective Segmentation
Segmentation means organising your contacts as per the list of specifications. Segmentation can be done on the basis of customer’s history, demographic information, why and when they subscribe. Segmentation really comes handy in sending probable customers customised content that they can relate to and will open as well.
Concentrate On Inactive Subscribers
You don’t need to be ashamed of your inactive subscribers, it’s a common struggle for both small and large businesses with an average inactivity rate of around 60%. The best way to reach out your existing contact list is to send them personalised emails containing a clear message that you are interested in reconnecting.
You must have even receive such emails where the companies send emails having subject lines such as “Come see what’s new”. Such companies will also offer incentives if you revisit their sites. It is important you have given a serious thought before you develop a reactivity campaign. Are you looking to get a sale or you are just asking them to open their emails? You can also take another route by asking them to follow you on varied social media platforms.
Sending Time Of The Emails
Understandably, there has also been extensive research done on the effectiveness of the emails being sent at different times during the day. Are you aware of the fact that if an email remains in the inbox for more than 24 hours then the open rate falls below 1%.
So, are you wondering what it the best time to send emails? Try sending the emails between 12pm and 6pm, during these hours the opening rates are much higher.
Adam Smith is a content writing professional at Qwikfix, an inbound marketing and sales platform that helps companies attract visitors, convert leads, and close customers. Previously, Adam worked as a marketing manager for a tech software startup. He graduated with honors from California University with a dual degree in Business Administration and Creative Writing.
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