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With all the forms of online marketing and communication around today, it’s easy to forget that the classics never go out of style. Email marketing remains one of the most effective forms of digital advertising to this day, despite being the oldest.
The first marketing email was sent all the way back in 1978. Yet almost 45 years later, email has a $36 return on investment (ROI) for every $1 spent. You can attract new customers and keep existing ones coming back! In this post, we will explore why you should be using email marketing, how it helps to raise awareness for your business, and best practices.
When starting your business, the most important thing you have to do is get eyes on it as soon as you can. While Facebook marketing gives your business access to over 1 billion users, that number is dwarfed by whopping 4 billion daily email users. This number is expected to climb to 4.6 billion by 2025. This gives you the opportunity to reach people in a place they visit every day – their inbox. Email Marketing is proven to work and is almost 40 times more effective than social media in helping your business acquire new customers.
An overwhelming 90% of marketing emails sent are actually received by the recipient. This is in stark contrast to social media advertising, wherein 2% of your Facebook followers will see your organic content.
Additionally, using email marketing also gives you unlimited access to customers at all times, as an astounding 53% of all emails are open on mobile phones, these days.
Building Relationships With Customers
Whether new or returning customers, you can build meaningful relationships with readers through your emails, especially when your business is starting out. Using personalized emails for targets is a step in the right direction. Personalized content is far more likely to drive conversions than a spray and pray approach.
People do business with those they trust. Keeping your clients informed on what’s going on with your business and what you are promoting will help build your credibility.
Increase Brand Recognition
The importance of building your new brand with your customer base can’t be overstated. By consistently providing direct content to your audience, they will begin to recognize, and even anticipate your emails. Providing clients with engaging content will keep them coming back to your brand.
Netflix sends out constant emails to their subscribers to help build hype for their new original series. This is an excellent way to build brand recognition because it keeps you on people’s minds while giving them reasons to use your service.
Getting More Website Traffic
Emails are a great way to get customers to visit your website. You should always include relevant links to your website to help drive conversions. Including relevant information in your emails that link back to your site or blog is a great way to get eyes on your business.
SEMRush sends out informative emails to get traffic back to articles on their site to great effect, targeting those in the marketing industry with tips and tricks to help them with their jobs.
Establishing Authority
Your customers want to know they’re in good hands, this is a bit difficult to do as a startup. Sending out informative emails about the services your business provides helps give them insight. You want your customers and potential clients to think of you as their go-to source for information about your field, email marketing is the perfect way to do it.
Building Interest in Your Business
There are a few ways to build interest in your startup via email marketing. Offering customers a reason to utilize your services is key. A good example of this is Starbucks, which offers discounts via email to its customers. People love a deal and they want to be excited at the prospect of using your services. Aside from offering discounts, consider something like free consultations or free shipping via email promotions.
Keeping Customers Informed
It goes without saying that one of the primary functions of email marketing is to keep customers informed on what’s going on with your business. Be it upcoming events, sales, or a new campaign, you need your clients to know about them so they can participate.
Take for example Target, a business with thousands of locations, which utilizes email marketing to great effect to promote upcoming sales.
It’s important to follow best practices when engaging in email marketing.
A/B Testing
You want to be sure that your email campaign is working. The best way to do this is A/B testing. This is the process of creating two different emails with separate links you can use for tracking purposes. You simply find what’s working and what isn’t and continue from there.
Finding The Proper Frequency
It’s the unwritten rule #1 of email marketing – don’t be spammy. Nothing gets people clicking on the unsubscribe button faster than spam emails. You will also avoid your emails being pushed to the junk folder by finding the proper frequency to contact your customers and clients with. Something close to once or twice per week is ideal and will increase the chances of your emails being open.
Use Compelling 40 Character Subject Lines
With 53% of all emails being opened on mobile phones, it’s best to optimize your subject lines with compelling text clocking in at 40 characters. That’s the number of characters displayed on mobile phone subject lines. You want to be concise and convincing in your subject lines. Utilize CTAs and incentivize readers to open them.
Personalize Your Emails
Among the most basic of best practices is email personalization. Use the data you have and open emails with something like “Hi, [Name]”. It’s the simplest form of personalization and triggers a subconscious response when someone sees their name written out. It lets them know you’ve taken the time to tailor your message directly to them.
Optimize Preview Text
Just like your subject line, your preview text should be optimized to draw people in and get them to open your email. This is the line of text that’s displayed alongside your subject line. Consider using strong incentives in your preview text to get people interested.
Have A Clear Call-To-Action
Like in all forms of marketing, your message must contain a clear CTA to get conversions. CTAs are designed to promptly get an immediate response or encourage an immediate sale and should be included in all communications with clients. Something like a “Buy Now” or “Signup Today” button is a good example of a clear and effective CTA.
Allow your audience to unsubscribe easily
It’s never the end goal, but you should always allow clients to easily unsubscribe from your emails without jumping through hoops. Annoying them is one surefire way to make sure they don’t read your emails or utilize your service.
The bottom line is that for better conversion, you should be communicating with customers and clients consistently, especially as a startup. Email marketing allows you to build better relationships with your clients through personalization and effective branding efforts. It is an absolute must if you are running a new business.
Pacific 54 can handle all the hard work for you. Contact us today to launch your next email campaign and take your startup to the next level. We will build a successful email marketing campaign from the ground up, track conversions, and utilize best practices to help your business succeed.
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