Email Marketing 101
One of the most important and beneficial marketing strategies all businesses can implement is email marketing. It’s the most direct and effective way of connecting with your leads, nurturing them, and turning them into customers, consistently winning out over all other marketing channels. But, if you’re fairly new to this scene, it’s crucial to grasp the basics, like why email marketing is important, what are the benefits, and how to start.
What is Email Marketing?
Email marketing is the highly effective digital marketing strategy of sending emails to potential buyers and customers. Effective marketing emails convert prospects into customers, and turn one-time buyers into loyal, raving fans. It is important to build your email list with a target audience in mind who can benefit from your products or services. Doing so is a sure way you’re email marketing will become a significant revenue stream for your business. Email marketing has been around for a long time, and it continues to lead the pack as it comes to ROI.
Why is it Important?
Email is the marketing tool that provides you with the ability to create a fluid, interconnected, and undisrupted buyer’s journey. More importantly, email marketing allows you to build relationships with leads, customers, and past customers. It’s your opportunity to speak directly to them in their inbox, at a time that is convenient for them. Here are some more reasons why email marketing is important to implement into your marketing strategy:
- Did you know that at least 99% of consumers check their email on a daily basis? That can’t be said of any other communication channel.
- Email marketing is more reliable the social media accounts. Since your social media accounts can be suspended or deleted at any time, for any reason, without notice. However, you own your email list. No one can take those leads away from you.
- People who buy products marketed through email spend 138% more than those who do not receive email offers. In fact, email marketing has an ROI (returns on investment) of 4400%.
How to Get Started
Wondering how to get started with email marketing? Email marketing is made up of several moving pieces, but that doesn’t mean it has to be so complex. You don’t need to cover everything at once – you can include more areas and details as you go.
Your email marketing strategy should cover areas like:
- Key long-term objectives – Decide what you want to achieve with your email marketing in the long run. Your objectives should be business-related and measurable.
- Target audience – Who are the people most likely to become your customers? Make sure that you know your target audience well. The more you know about their needs and preferences the more effective your email marketing campaigns will be.
- Resources – Define the resources you need to make your email program happen. Think of people (e.g. email marketing specialist, graphic designer, content specialist) and tools (email marketing platform, project management tool, etc.) that will help you plan and execute your strategy.
After these steps, you should refine your lists and message so you’re reaching your audience and really connecting with them. Plus, you’ll be able to set up some automation in your email service which will make things much easier for you. Once you have your email list, content, and copy completed for your emails, it’s time to choose an email service provider. Some examples of email marketing providers are MailChimp, Constant Contact, and Campaign Monitor.
Since email marketing has been around for a while now, don’t let people fool you and think that “email marketing is dead.” If you are able to optimize your strategies by knowing your target audience and integrating appealing content, you will be sure to see your ROI increase massively!