What Is Email Marketing and Why Do You Need It?

What Is Email Marketing and Why Do You Need It?

That is too big an opportunity to miss, for any marketer. And don’t forget, for every dollar invested in email marketing, marketers can get a return of over $38. That’s an ROI of 3800%.

What Is Email Marketing and Why Do You Need It?

Email marketing is the use of email to promote your brand and grow relationships with both current and potential customers.

Email marketing allows you to build trust with customers, and over time make them loyal. You can keep them informed on promotions, product launches, or new sales.

It also allows you to reach a wider audience.

Why is this?

Well, first, consumers prefer brands to communicate with them via email over other forms of communication.

Image viaSmarterHQ

It’s ROI is also easy to measure with the help of email marketing tools. You can tell who opened your emails, who visits your site from emails, and more.

You also only send emails to an audience that’s permitted you to by giving you their contact information. It then becomes easier to send the right information to your target audience without having to spend money on ads.

But how do you determine what email marketing service is the best?

How to Choose the Best Email Marketing Service?

Email marketing services help you manage your email list, connect with your customers, and manage your email campaigns. Some of the factors to consider when choosing the best for your business include:

Integration

Does the email marketing service integrate seamlessly with your customer relationship management software (CRM)?

It should also integrate easily with other third-party apps and social media platforms. Seamless integration allows you to handle customer data and view key metrics. You will also have an easy time determining what campaigns perform better and which ones need reworking.

Mobile-Optimized

According to studies, more consumers prefer to read their emails on mobile. 49.1% of all emails in the world are opened on mobile. Compare this to 33.3% read on webmail and 17.6% on desktop.

Image viaIBM

Choose an email marketing service that has mobile-optimized templates. This way, your audience can view your emails clearly both on mobile and desktop.

Automation

Before you can settle on an email marketing platform, consider these:

• Does the service provider allow you to do more than create drip campaigns?
• Can you use it to run abandoned cart campaigns?
• Can you track order and tracking info
• Can you automate newsletters with relevant product promotions?
• Can you customize customer responses based on each request received?
• Can you effectively track, monitor, and analyze campaigns during and after completion?

Choose these options depending on the size of your business, the number of emails you plan to send, and the number of campaigns you need to run.

What Are the Benefits of Email Marketing Platforms?

Why should you bother using an email marketing platform?

Well, there are many advantages to using these platforms. They include:

Predesigned Templates

You do not have to design a template every time you need to run a campaign. Email marketing platforms provide you with numerous templates you can customize to suit your brand colors and themes.

These templates also work across all email client programs including Yahoo, Gmail, Outlook, and others.

Manage Your Email Lists

The email service provider automatically manages your email list. They make it easy for you to segment your contacts and track the performance of your campaigns.

You can also send bulk personalized emails to your target audience without getting flagged as spam.

Analytics

With the platforms, you can tell who opened your emails and which one they opened. You also know how many links a customer clicked, what subject lines were most effective, and so on.

This information allows you to adjust and tweak your strategy for better results.

Follow the Rules and Protect Your Reputation

The providers help you followset rules and regulations within the legal landscape. For example, with an email marketing service, your audience has the option to opt-out of future emails from you. They can also see your contact information with each email sent.

If you send bulk emails with a Gmail or Yahoo account, you run the risk of having your account shut down for running spammy practices. Email service providers, on the other hand, allow you to send bulk emails and not get flagged as spam.

What Are Some Email Marketing Best Practices?

Are you ready to boost your email marketing?

Here are some best practices to take your marketing to the next level:

Know Your Audience

Your audience is more than their first or last name. You must understand

• Their demographics
• The kind of communication they prefer
• What sets them apart from others in the general population

You can get this information from your analytics. Data collected can help you make improve your email marketing strategy. It can also help you personalize communication with your audience.

Send Your Emails at the Right Time

There are numerous studies on the best time to send emails but therein lies the big problem.

If the best time to send an email is Tuesday at 10:00 am, then everyone will be waiting to send their emails at that time.

And the result?

Your target consumers get emails from different subscription services at the same time. Your email could easily disappear in that crowd.

So what’s the best time to send emails?

Choose the best time for your email list. Conduct tests and use analytics to figure out what time your target audience reads your emails more. What days do you also get the most open rates?

Keep testing until you find the best time for your brand, then become consistent with it. This way, your audience can expect to find your email on a particular day at a specific time. Consistency in sending emails can also help you improve open rates.

Choose a Sending Frequency

How many emails should you send your audience?

You may want more traffic to your website, but sending your audience too many emails may put them off instead of increasing sales.

In this case, less is more. Make sure that every email you send your contacts adds value to their life.

Use Great Subject Lines and Clear Calls-to-Action

Your subject line should drive the reader to open your email. Make them eye-catching, personalize them, and be creative.

You should also have calls to actions that direct your reader to convert. Let your recipient know what to do next.

Make the call-to-action easy to see and powerful too. For example, you could have a timer or an expiry date for an offer.

Accept Feedback

Make it easy for your audience to send feedback after reading your content. It could be an email address, your social media accounts, or an address.

If possible, try not to use the noreply@address mailing system. The many responses you get may overwhelm you. But, the few you manage to respond to, maybe the few who make all the difference.

Test, Track and Measure

Test your subject lines, calls-to-action, and messages to see which one drives the best results. Find out if your current tactics drive results in your campaigns.

Are you achieving your email marketing goals? Do you need to change some of the tactics?

As you can see, using email marketing opens numerous opportunities for your brand. However, to run effective email campaigns you need email marketing tools that can help. This week, we bring you 31 of the best email marketing software services, to run successful email campaigns.