If you are a business with an online presence, you’ll know that effective email marketing can help to sell your products, sell your services or raise brandawareness.Atargetedandprofessional email marketing campaign can see you improve not only your bottom line but increase the number of people who know about you through Social Media.
However, just how achieve a positive return on investment (ROI) through email marketing? From the time taken to produce an email newsletter to the offers you include in it, there are many hidden costs.
Is effective email marketing all about sales? What about things like subscriber numbers, open rates, click-throughs or Social Media shares? Believe it or not effective email marketing is not all about money….
With that in mind we’ve put together five ways in which you can make your email marketing more effective to demonstrate a positive ROI through more ways than just pounds dollars and pence.
Tip #1 – Deliverability is key
By far and away the most crucial factor in providing a reliable and measurableROIfrom your email marketing efforts is to make sure your emails are seen. After all, why go to the bother of sending out thousands of emails if no-oneisreading them?If you are serious about getting your emails read, there are a few things you can do.Start off by reducing complaints by reducing the amount of people who report your emails as spam. Make it clear at the start how often they will hear from you, don’t set off content filters by using spammy keywords and monitor your delivery. The more your emails are relevant, the less spam complaints you’ll get.
Tip #2 – Target your emails to suit
Behavioural targeting is a great way of increasing the effectiveness of your email newsletters.
Say you’re a florist business. Why go to the extent of sending out a generic Valentines’ Day newsletter to your entire subscriber list when 50% (virtually all the ladies on your list!) are unlikely to buy from you?
Segment your lists depending on your offer or promotion and you’re bound to see an increase in effective (and save yourself money through wasted credits too)
Tip #3 – Increase your click-throughs
Effective email marketing is not all about making money. If you’re getting people to visit your website you’re not only showing them what you sell you’re raising brand awareness at the same time.
If you’re serious about increasing the amount of people who click-through to your website, make sure your message is credible. Talk about the benefits your product or service offers your readers. Communicate urgency but don’t be pushy. Restate or expand on your guarantee and make sure your links are easily viewed.
If you can encourage people to click-through to your website half of the battle’s been won. Encouraging them to click “buy” is only part of the story.
Tip #4 – Be personal
One thing that effective email marketing does, unlike generic adverts or flyers, is that is can be highly personal.
With email marketing you can send a reminder to people who have visited your website that a sale is about to end. You can send a post-sale email to request a review. You can use date of birth data to send personal birthday wishes – in fact the possibilities to be personal with email marketing are endless.
As such, email marketing is a great way to speak to your customers and make them feel that you respect them. By sending them information relevant to their browsing history, their age, their gender, their location or their previous purchases, you will demonstrate a level of customer service which can’t be found through traditional marketing channels – and can you put a price on that?
Tip #5 – Go Social for a positive a return
You’ve spent hours writing your email newsletter content.
You’ve spent hours segmenting your list.
You’ve clicked send and now you want the money to come rolling in.
However, you need to look past the amount of money you make to demonstrate a return, as if your email newsletter content looks like a sales pitch or spam it will only end up in the trashcan. By providing value to your readers however, you will increase the likelihood of them buying from you – be it today, tomorrow or months down the line.
Make sure your content is useful. Give tips. Give advice. Give information. Appeal to your recipient’s sharing mentality and plug your content through Social Media – the more your email is useful the more it’s likely to be shared and so increase awareness in your brand.
If you tailor your offers to a season and be personable you are on to a winning combination.
To sum up…
So there you have it. Effective email marketing is more than a money on a balance sheet – it involves lots of hard work and seeing value in things which can’t easily be tracked. But if you get the basics right and appeal to your different lists you’ll see the benefit in the long-run.
