I hear so many clients say they don’t have time for email marketing. That’s like saying I don’t have time for my clients/customers. You need to keep in touch with your customers, engage with them to keep informed on what they need and expect from you. So whether you have a service based business or sell a product, you need to remind them you’re there for them. Email marketing is an important part of engagement marketing which is important for today’s SEO strategies. It’s the easiest form of relationship building. You can reach out to people on a regular basis, sharing your expertise or new services.
Building Your list
Before we discuss how to send and what to send to your customers we need to discuss how to grow your list. In addition to your current customers, the goal should be to also grow the list and find new customers. We all like the sound of that. The company that provides you email delivery will also provide you with a form to add to your site. Make that form accessible. Put it above the fold. Or even better… put it in a pop-up box. Offer an incentive to sign-up with a free report or eBook. This is permission marketing, so don’t add emails without permission.
Promote, Inform, Relate
What is valuable to your customers? Don’t fall into the trap of just promoting your services/products. Help them grow and they will help you grow. Offer up tips, advice and opinions.
How should you relate? Offer special privileges to your subscribers. Acknowledge their loyalty with coupons, special offers and incentives. Then promote by informing them of new and improved services or products.
Guide them
Show them what you want them to do. Strategically place a Call to Action button in the email. Send them to your site. Drive traffic to your blog. The most successful click throughs are when you show an excerpt in the email with a Read More button. Just a little tease.
Keep it Simple
Limit the information you send and the call to actions. Don’t overwhelm them. Less is more. Stay focused on the subject. Use a clean, simple layout that is soothing to the eye. Create a format that compliments your branding and stick with it. This will take the pain out of producing the emails. Do over-complicate the process.
Share and Get Social
Some of the email delivery systems have built-in Social Networking. Include a way for your mailing list to share your information. Tell a Friend or Social Sharing will help build your list and get you new Social follows as well.
Frequency & Delivery
Be consistent! Decide what you can commit to and plan your emails in advance. You can schedule 3-4 emails at a time. Carefully plan your subject line. Keep it short, 5 to 8 words. In the beginning it is valuable to do split testing. Divide your list into two lists and send the same email to both but with different subjects. This test will help you write your subjects in the future. You’ll learn what works and what doesn’t. You can also split test different emails. Position content differently and see if it makes a difference.
Sending your email
The best time to send your email is Tuesday, Wednesday or Thursday. Monday is a nightmare. Too many emails in the inbox. Your customers will not have time to look at your email. I also don’t like mornings. I think the 2-4 PM window is perfect.
What email solution to use
I prefer Constant Contact for it’s ease of use and integrated tools like Surveys and Social Campaigns. You can try it out it out for FREE for 60 days and see for yourself how easy it is to use. If you need help with integrating the sign-up form on your web site contact me at susan@clifton.design. I can get you started in no time.