Email Marketing Campaigns are still a great way to regularly engage with your audience and get your message out there. In this guide, we’ll discuss the best ways to approach the planning, design and sending out your email campaigns.
The key to success with email marketing is to build strong relationships with your readers and offer them value in every email they receive from you.
Let’s get started.
Connect with the right people at the right time.
We all receive numerous emails every hour of every day. It may have come as no surprise that people have become a bit ’email blind’. We are spending a lot more of our time online and, it wouldn’t be possible to read every communication we receive.
We’ve become highly selective with the information we digest and, finding the way to grab your readers attention is paramount. Readers that have subscribed to your list have already have found your online presence appealing. With some research and reviewing your subscriber list, you’ll be able to work out what content your readers want to see and when the best time to land in their inbox.
Creating engaging emails and then sending them out at the optimal time will help you stand out from the crowd in a busy inbox.
Build relationships and don’t be all sell, sell, sell.
The chance of catching all of your audience in a buying stage is impossible. We want to receive emails that entertain us, teach us something we didn’t know or perhaps that simply make us laugh.
Sending out consistent email content that is useful and entertaining will build positive relationships with your readers. They’ll start to look out for your next communication. Over time you’ll be able to drop in their inbox with a one-off ‘Salesy’ email notifying them of an exciting new product or service you have and why it would be right up their street.
You need to build those relationships first though. Don’t undo all your hard work by sending out an unrelating prospecting email too soon.
Watch the post-email statistics to see how well your content is connecting to your audience. Look for improved open rates and click-through rates (CTR).
Are you segmenting your audience?
Not everyone in your subscriber list may want to read the same content at the same time. Look to write content with your key demographics in mind.
By catering your messages to certain groups of readers you’ll be able to target your email marketing to where it’ll be greater received.
Once your email marketing campaign is ready, all popular online mailing services like Mailchimp will allow you to create segments from your subscriber list.
You’ll be able to target location and interests (as long as your database holds this information).
Segmenting is a great way to send targeted information to the readers that will find it useful and find value within your content.
Attention grabbing subject lines.
The subject is the first thing your readers will see. It will be seen amongst a list of other emails received in the users inbox. The key is to make yours stand out from the crowd.
A good way of this is to pose a question that will resonant with your audience. Take a look at the following example:
Title: “Information on spam filters”
Would the above title spark intrigue, probably not. It doesn’t engage or make you think. How about the next example:
Title: Are your emails getting caught up in Spam filters? We have a guide that can help you.
This is a better title because it engages the reader with a question. It then backs it up, stating that we have a solution to your issue. All the reader has to do is open the email and read.
If the title doesn’t relate to one of your readers, they won’t open it. This can be a good thing because it means that the people who have opened it have been well-targeted and will find it useful. They are more likely going to use your call to actions within your content.
Keep it relevant.
People join mailing lists because they want to receive information that is closely related to what the sender is knowledgable about.
For example:
Clook is a website hosting company. We wouldn’t look to send out an email to our readers that teaches them how to make the best Banana Loaf. All your content should closely relate to your specialism.
Clook’s email campaigns are predominately based around our new technology advancements, website development guides, server management and content that agencies, web developers and hobbyists would find useful.
Write content that your reader knows you hold authority on. You will build their trust and help them develop skills that advance them forward.
Use your email to connect your readers too many different channels.
Email newsletters should not be your only channel of communication when it comes to marketing your business. Utilising your website, social media channels and being active within groups and communities is a great way to get your messages to the masses.
Use your other channels to promote your email marketing campaigns and invite users to signup to your newsletter. Within your email campaigns, make sure to link to a broad spectrum of your online presence. Point people to articles on your blog, direct them to your latest Linkedin article and show them your recent entertaining posts on Facebook. Doing this will build your community and grow your network.
Test on as many platforms as you can.
Emails are now received on many different devices. It is important to try and test your email on as many viewports as possible. Emails are predominately read on mobile devices and desktop email clients, so it is best to focus your attention on these.
Using online mailing services such as Mailchimp and catering their templates to your brand is one of the best steps to make sure your email is viewed correctly. Send tests to yourself, friends and colleagues so they can relay their experience back to you.
Build your subscriber list.
Every email campaign guide on the internet will tell you to do this. It is important to note that building your list is important and doing so can take time. Make sure you are promoting your email campaigns through your other channels and over time you will see your subscriber list grow.
It definitely won’t be overnight or immediate success, however, you’re looking to nurture strong and positive relationships.
Avoid paying for pre-built subscriber lists. They don’t hold any valuable recipients and you can’t make sure that your emails are well targeted.
Aim for messages your readers will respond to in various ways.
Each one of your email campaigns should promote the reader to take an action. Examples of user actions are: asking your audience to click links to go to your blog and find out more information, share your email with a friend or perhaps contact you directly.
Show your readers all the other valuable content you have created for them and they’ll make sure to open your next email campaign.
Keep out of those SPAM folders.
Avoiding your email hitting SPAM filters is all about making sure you are not creating ‘Spam-Like’ content. Here are some useful pointers to help guide you:
- Make sure you have the full consent of everyone on your subscriber lists.
- Don’t mislead the reader by using headers, subject lines and false email addresses that don’t represent what the email is about.
- If your email is predominantly an advertisement, you need to state this to the reader.
- Include a valid postal address within your email.
- You must provide a way for the reader to opt-out of receiving further communications from you.
- Opt-out requests need to be actioned quickly. Automating this using services like Mailchimp makes this very easy to control.
We have an article dedicated to useful ways to avoid SPAM filters here:
https://www.clook.net/blog/6-ways-to-avoid-your-emails-ending-up-in-spam-folders/
Keep your email design clean and tidy.
Readers of your email won’t have much time to digest the whole of your email. It’s best to keep it short and to the points you want to make. Let them choose what they would like to learn more about by providing a call to action directing them to information elsewhere on your channels.
Keep the design and layout of your emails simple to navigate and understand. The design should always reflect your branding so the reader knows where they are. To keep your email looking engaging, use the right imagery, create snappy and thought-provoking titles and keep paragraphs short to aid readability.
You’re looking to create an easy to use and enjoyable user experience.
Don’t over send to your subscriber list, even when it’s so tempting.
It is important to find the right balance for your sending schedule. Over sending campaigns to your readers can put them off receiving your communications. Take the time to create well thought out and researched content to send to your readers. This approach will create natural and healthy gaps between each of your email campaigns.
The Take Away.
Email marketing will always be a powerful tool you’ll have at your disposal. By finding the right mix of valuable content, optimal sending schedules, segmented demographics and multi-channel reach, you’ll reap the rewards of email marketing. The ultimate key to success is creating value that your audience will love and want more of.
