Email newsletters are nothing new. But now, they are highly advanced.
Using data you’ve collected from customers and from prospects (people and companies whose contact details you have but who have not bought from you yet), you can segment these lists for more targeted email marketing by creating relevant content for each segment of recipients.
There are over four billion active email accounts all over the world, and it’s growing.
Email is 40 times more effective at acquiring new customers than social media platforms so it’s crucial you capture prospect data and utilise it.
77% of email marketing ROI was a result of segmented, targeted and triggered campaigns in 2015.
By curating specialised and bespoke email lists to target prospects from geographical areas to areas of industry, you can hone in on the relevant audience.
Email newsletters can be used for the first stage of the sales funnel to introduce your company, or to touch base with existing clients.
By creating awareness of your company or product, you can then direct them in the way you want them to go.
Perhaps you schedule monthly email newsletters to keep clients in the loop with upcoming deals or offers, or if you are offering a brand new service.
To introduce your company to a considered geographical area for local business, or for a niche area of trade, you can slice and splice your email list to create the most effective impact.
Primarily, email newsletters are used to inform readers about your latest products and services. You could offer a general round-up of your current offerings or promote upcoming events and promotions.
By including snippets of articles in a ‘weekly digest’ style of content, you encourage the reader to click through back to your site – all increasing traffic.
By targeting your emails by age, gender or persona, you are able to keep your target buyer in the forefront of your mind and structure content appropriately.
Knowing what makes your buyer persona tick and why your products or services will benefit them requires carefully crafted content.
Email newsletters are important in client retention.
Segmenting your email list based on client buying frequency can increase shopping frequency, alongside creating opportunities for client loyalty schemes or reward programmes.
Scheduling email newsletters in reference to the purchase cycle is highly effective.
Do your customers only require your services at certain times of the year? Such as during the school holidays or just before Christmas? Ensure you time your newsletters right for maximum impact.
Monitoring click through rate from emails is a great way of recording changes in buyer’s behaviour.
A decreasing lead can be followed up with a dedicated lead in campaign, to gently remind a customer of your products and services.
Generally speaking, depending on what point in the sales funnel a potential customer or existing client is, the email newsletter should be relevant; for example, more general lead in emails can be sent to those at the awareness stage, as opposed to regular customers who would benefit from touching base with promotions relevant to their buying history – the consideration stage.
Email newsletters have the ability to make it or break it.
Make sure yours don’t flop – include relevant information for the targeted audience, ensure it is timely, keep the copy relevantly formatted, but above all, manage your database of email addresses with as much information about the customer as possible. Segmenting allows your data to be in the best possible shape – therefore keeping the target firmly locked into your contact.
Although email subscriber lists can be your bread and butter of connecting with your customers, it’s important to consider them within the whole picture of your marketing strategy.
The most commercially engaging brands are fully aware of the holistic approach when it comes to communication.
The fact still remains, however, that email subscriber lists are the holy grail of marketing data.
Email marketing still works because people still like it. We can access our email when we choose to, so we are not interrupted from our usual life. This creates more of a positive feeling around the advertising we put out, therefore hopefully increasing chances of selling our services.
72% of consumers prefer to receive marketing from a company in the form of an email newsletter.
It can be argued that this method works because the reader has taken action previously to sign up to your company.
This means they do have a genuine interest in you and will likely be keen to keep tabs on what your brand is up to.
Your initial email subscriber list will be created by offering something in exchange for the reader’s details. Generally, an initial offering such as an eBook or whitepaper relevant to your company is a good starting point.
Once you have the data, you can show off your various platforms within the curated email. Your social media platforms can be subsequently promoted, for example, resulting in community building and increased awareness.
It’s important you consider the value for the subscriber. There has to be something to benefit them, otherwise its likely they will disconnect. Some fun ideas include video content, games and quizzes, or competitions.
According to Mark Fairlie, head of marketing at UK B2B marketing agency More Than Words, an increasing number of the enquiries they receive are for email newsletters as opposed to opt-out email marketing campaigns.
“We came to the email newsletter sector pretty late – later than a lot of our competitors.
“Our traditional email marketing agency activities were focused on working with top suppliers and whittling down their lists so that we could present our clients with cold prospects with the highest likelihood of wanting our clients’ products and services.
“But then, one day, a client came to us with the email addresses of 13,000 customers, some of whom were active and some of whom were inactive. He sent me a link stating that the cost of sale is five times higher finding new customers to buy from you than selling to existing ones.
“And he asked what can you do about it. We created buyer personas, a 12-part email sequence, a customer ‘learning’ programme, and it got much better results than our opt-out campaigns. And the rest is history”.
90% of customers prefer receiving updates from brands with an email newsletter as opposed to 10% who looked to Facebook instead.
And it seems that Facebook wants to get in on the act as it announced the launch of its own email newsletter platform for independent journalists and writers hot of the heels of Revue (now owned by Twitter), Medium, and Substack.
We asked Mr. Fairlie for his top 4 tips on creating successful email newsletter campaigns and he shared the following with us.
- Separate email lists by your buyer personas. It’s no longer an option to send a blanket email to everyone. It has been shown that readers are more likely to click through an email which caters for their specific interest
- Encourage your customers to share the emails. By including a ‘share’ option on your email, you increase the likelihood it will be passed around friends and family and therefore increasing awareness
- Refresh your data regularly. Ensure your information is professionally cleansed as routine, alternatively create an ‘opt-in’ email which allows engaged readers to keep in the loop whilst removing inactive contacts
- Strive to create your best content every time. You want your readers to look forward to your email, not delete it without even looking!