There are many ways to reach current and potential customers when it comes to marketing, but one of the most effective is email marketing. While it may seem a bit old school when it comes to online marketing, it is still widely used for two simple reasons:
- It’s affordable.
- It’s effective.
When you are looking to develop and implement an email marketing campaign, there are a few crucial components you should keep in mind.
Email Marketing is Affordable
The cost of email marketing is significantly lower than traditional media marketing such as TV, radio, and direct mail. It can also be less expensive than other types of digital marketing like purchasing ads or Facebook, Google, or other marketplaces or websites.
However, it’s important to understand that there are still some costs associated with email marketing. You will need to invest in using an email marketing automation solution. While you can buy and implement your own solution, hosted cloud-based solutions are much more popular and affordable.
These systems allow you to automate email sending, track and evaluate results, and manage your lists, including functions like compliance, unsubscribing, etc. While there is a cost associated with sending thousands of emails at a time, email marketing costs are far lower than other traditional or even digital marketing channels.
Market to an Engaged Audience
Email marketing is one of the only marketing channels that your audience has opted in to receive. When developing an email marketing list, most businesses use an opt-in email campaign designed to get potential customers to provide their email and agree to be sent information.
Using opt-in email lists results in significantly higher conversion rates as your list is targeted to those who have already shown an interest in your company or brand’s products and services.
While it is possible to send unsolicited email marketing messages, the return on investment and conversion rates are generally very low. In many cases, you can end up doing more harm than good when taking this approach.
You may annoy potential consumers, damage your brand image, and even be blacklisted by internet providers, which would result in you not being able to send out any emails. Developing your own opt-in list organically is a much more effective email marketing strategy and will result in much better results for your efforts.
Deliver Customized Messages
Another key benefit of email marketing is the ability to customize and personalize your marketing messages. When you gather information on customers as they are opting-in to your email marketing list, the more data you can collect on them and their interests, the better. This allows you to segment your lists according to geography, interest, age, and more.
You can then personalize your email messaging by using their name and any other information that you have to personalize the message to that individual. Most email marketing services allow you to easily create variable fields in your message where names and other information can be easily merged into each email before it is sent.
If your product is only available in some geographic regions, you can specifically send emails to people living in those areas. If you have a sale on beauty products, you can send emails only to those who have shown an interest in beauty products.
Using email list segmentation works excellent for those who collect information about their customers or potential customers when they opt-in to receive emails. Studies have shown that personalized messages result in increased engagement rates.
It has been proven time and time again that companies that segment their customer data and marketing messages can then send the most relevant email messages to their customers and prospects, which will typically result in higher conversion rates (as well as increased deliverability of your emails).
Simple to Measure Results
When creating an email marketing strategy, another advantage is the ability to measure your results quickly and easily. Most email marketing solutions have reporting that gives you the ability to see your marketing activity.
This includes email opens, click-through, and conversion rates, making it easy to evaluate how successful your email marketing campaign was and quickly adjust your content or message as needed.
Most email autoresponders also allow you to easily do A/B testing to try different messages or prospect segmenting and determine which marketing message is more effective.
When it comes to any kind of marketing, it is essential that you use your data to measure your marketing campaign’s success. This will allow you to develop an effective email marketing campaign.
Choosing the Best Email Marketing Autoresponder Company
When choosing an email marketing service, there are several essential features to look for:
- Easy to use user interface ideally with a drag-and-drop editor
- The ability to easily customize or personalize bulk emails through marketing automation tools
- Easily manage your email lists
- Segment your email lists by various categories
- Track the performance of your email marketing campaigns
- Ensure that your emails don’t end up in a SPAM folder
Below are 5 of the most popular email marketing service providers in the market today.
- Constant Contact
Constant Contact is one of the most popular for small businesses and startups. It has grown significantly over the past few years because it’s easy to use and affordable while still providing all the premium features business owners seek to get an ROI from their email marketing strategies.
- Drip
Drip is an email marketing platform used by many eCommerce, bloggers, and digital marketers. They have a robust set of tools that allow you to create and implement marketing automation, sales funnels, and personalization simply and easily.
A unique function of Drip is its intelligent marketing automation tools. These tools allow you to easily segment your emails, use A/B testing, and create list groups with an easy to use visual workflow builder.
- Mailchimp
Mailchimp is a top-rated email marketing service provider and who offers a forever free email marketing plan, which is very popular. Mailchimp has an easy to use drag-and-drop email builder, email autoresponders, segmenting tools, as well as robust tracking and reporting tools.
Mailchimp easily integrates with WordPress, Shopify, ClickFunnels, Magento, and many other website platforms.
- GetResponse
If you’re a beginner and have a tight budget, GetResponse may be the right email autoresponder for you. This platform offers many simple to use features that will get your email campaigns running flawlessly in no time.
- ActiveCampaign
One of my all-time favorite autoresponders is ActiveCampaign. Although I still love Keap (previously Infusionsoft as well), ActiveCampaign offers tagging techniques that are simple to use and extremely targeted to your list.
Behavioral-based email sequences allow you to really dial in when it comes to email marketing. This will take you a bit of time to master (not more than a few weeks), but once you do you’ll subscribers will feel as if you know exactly what they want.
Conclusion
When it comes to your business, results matter, and developing and implementing an email marketing strategy is a great way to drive results. The benefits of email marketing are clear, which is why it continues to be a marketing channel used by many successful businesses.
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