The amount of marketing that takes place online is increasing exponentially, leaving marketers scrambling for ways to get noticed. Email marketing has become a sophisticated field, consumers are getting more savvy, and regulations are starting to govern what you can and cannot do. The days of buying a list of a million email addresses and blanketing the Internet are over. Spam never was very effective, and its even less so now. Click-through rates for unsolicited email are abysmally low, you are likely to receive angry responses from consumers, your ISP may shut you down if too many people complain, and you may even be subject to fines under the CAN-SPAM Act. The most successful email marketers are now using opt-in email advertising techniques.
Opt-in email marketing, also known as permission-based marketing, involves sending your message to recipients which have expressly stated a desire to receive information about products or services related to your particular offer. In many cases, consumers agree to receive advertisements related to something that interests them, in exchange for something of value, such as a discount, free gift, or informational newsletter.
There are two ways to go about permission-based marketing; you can build your own opt-in list, or you can purchase one. Either way is effective. Targeted, opt-in email messages receive response rates of anywhere between five to 15 percent, while conventional banner ads usually yield only about one percent. Spam yields only a tiny fraction of a percent. Internet entrepreneurs who use personalized messages always get better results.
Alternately, you can create your own opt-in list. The most obvious place to start is with your existing customers. Offer them a discount on future purchases in exchange for agreeing to receive your promotional messages. Also, create something of value to draw in new customers. For example, suppose you sell rare coins on the Internet. Create a well-written weekly newsletter that coin collectors will enjoy reading. Offer free subscriptions for anyone who agrees to receive your promotional email marketing messages. Dont stop there, though. Consider every point where there is customer interaction as an opportunity to sign up a new member to your list. Provide an opportunity to opt-in with customer orders. If you have a brick-and-mortar store, ask for email addresses at the point of checkout.
Growing your own opt-in email list will take longer, but your results will be excellent. Some marketers optimize their results by using both techniques. Creating your own opt-in list does require a bit of technology. If you have a very small list, you can start out simply by adding each subsequent subscriber to the BCC list on your email client, but this will get cumbersome as your list grows. You will want to eventually invest in an email list management program. This is a piece of software that helps you to manage your email list, and it will include features such as the ability to handle bouncebacks, automate the subscribe and unsubscribe function, and personalize each message. The software should also have a tracking and reporting function, to allow you to keep track of your success rates and other important metrics.
If you choose to buy an opt-in list, there are many quality vendors that you can work with. Do a little research ahead of time, and find out how they acquire their email addresses: do they offer an informational newsletter or something of value in exchange for permission to receive ads Ask about frequency--an overworked opt-in list is just as useless as a spam list. You will do better with a list that is highly targeted. Find a list vendor who can provide you with email addresses of people who have indicated interest specifically in what you have to offer. The list may cost a little more, but your returns will pay off in the end.
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E-mail marketing campaigns can be integral parts of any organizations marketing strategy. Thats because e-mail marketing can be a powerful tool for differentiating a brand, driving targeted traffic to a Web site, and increasing sales. In addition, one of the greatest benefits of an e-mail marketing campaign is that online reporting tools make measuring results easy and data is available nearly instantaneously after launching a campaign.
The keys to success are the relevancy of the content provided to the target audience as well as the quality and segmentation of the senders e-mail list. Organizations that pay attention to these critical points will increase the probability of accomplishing their goals.
This article contains practical tips that you can use to develop and implement an e-mail marketing strategy.
Developing Your E-mail Marketing Strategy
Who is your audience What is your message How often will you launch a campaign Develop a clear strategy that answers these questions while remaining consistent with your overall marketing strategy. Consider the following four components when developing your e-mail marketing strategy:
Set realistic goals. What specific, tangible benefits do you want your e-mail marketing campaign to help your organization achieve Some examples might include:
Analyze and segment your e-mail list. Get to know your customers and determine what topics grab their attention. Then segment your e-mail list into smaller lists based on the identified commonalities. Remember to update e-mail addresses that have changed.
Develop relevant content based on your segmentation. A segmented e-mail list gives you the freedom to develop customized content, increasing the odds that your audience will respond. Provide your audience with content that is interesting to them. Highlight product and service features that are highly relevant to your audience and unique from your competitors. These types of features are called drivers.
Providing relevant content also reduces the risk that your audience would consider your e-mail marketing campaigns to be distractions, or even worse, spam.
Measure your results. Most leading e-mail marketing distribution tools provide real-time data as part of their package. The AVS Group uses Constant Contact for our campaigns. For a broader view of your Web sites performance, Webtrends is a leading Web analytics tool that generates detailed traffic statistics.
Differentiating Your Brand
Can e-mail marketing be useful in differentiating a brand Absolutely, and heres how.
Focus on drivers. Earlier we recommended highlighting the features of your products and services that are highly relevant to customers and unique from competitors. These features are called drivers. Drivers are any organizations true points of differentiation. Drivers are so powerful, they actual drive customer choice toward one brand versus another. Your e-mail marketing campaign should communicate your drivers.
Share your expertise. Share your organizations knowledge with your e-mail list. Offer recommendations based on your experience. Write papers based on your organizations research. Comment on industry or marketplace trends. Sharing your expertise makes your brand different you are not communicating the same message as competitors.
Brand consistency. Your team has invested time and effort toward developing your organizations logo, tagline, graphic standards, and overall brand identity. To protect this investment, create an e-mail template that can be used for all of your e-mail marketing campaigns. Your audience will receive a professional looking message that is consistent with the positive attributes that your brand identity represents. For each issue, you simply update the content.
Timing consistency. Set specific intervals to distribute your e-mail marketing: weekly, monthly, quarterly, etc. and stick to them. It takes a commitment to consistently develop and distribute relevant e-mail marketing campaigns. Remaining consistent will provide your organization with differentiation from all of the organizations marketing themselves inconsistently.
Driving Targeted Traffic to a Web Site
E-mail marketing is a proven method for driving site traffic. In fact, experiencing traffic increases of 100 percent or more on days that an e-mail marketing campaign is launched is realistic.
Targeted e-mail marketing campaigns can also deliver impressive open and click-through rates. For example, 50 percent of the recipients of an e-newsletter may open the e-mail and 30 percent of those people may click into the Web site to learn more.
Why are these numbers so high The sender provided relevant content to people who already knew of the organization. The recipients may not have been very familiar with the organization, or even current customers. However, they at least gave the organization their e-mail address.
Use teaser content to trigger interest. Do not provide all of the information within your e-mail marketing message. Support the content in your e-mail marketing campaign with more content on your Web site. Encourage people to click and learn more.
Intuitive design. Drive traffic by using a layout and design for your e-mails that is intuitive. Are the links easy to locate Is the navigation and overall layout and design simple Is the content easy to read
Use references to build credibility. People generally do business with organizations they trust. Highlight your work, press releases, or case studies to serve as evidence of your achievements. Your audience may be more apt to click into your Web site if they perceive your message to be credible.
Increase Sales
We have witnessed e-mail marketing campaigns that have generated online sales within minutes after being sent. These campaigns created a sense of urgency and promoted relevant products. However, if online transactions are not a good fit for your organization, consider using e-mail marketing to generate sales leads.
Create a sense of urgency. With a segmented list, you will be able to create special offers based on what will appeal to each segment. For one segment, you might offer free shipping. For another segment, you might offer a discount. Get it right, and you could experience sales increases of 100 percent on the days that e-mail marketing was used.
Promote relevant products. Because your list is segmented, you have the opportunity to feature the most relevant products. Create multiple campaigns based on the product preferences of each segment within your overall list.
Generate leads. Encourage your audience to go online and fill out a contact form or upload a request for proposal to you. For example, we receive requests for proposal from customers and prospects visiting AVSGroup.com. To help facilitate this process, we added a Discuss Project form making it easier to connect with our team.
In closing, any organization can be successful with e-mail marketing campaigns by implementing the right strategy. Developing an e-mail marketing strategy will lay the groundwork to reach your goals. E-mail marketing can be a powerful marketing and brand-building tool for your organization.
is a marketing, training, and communications company. AVS is in La Crosse, Wisconsin. AVS helps clients communicate and market effectively. AVS can be found online at