Email Marketing Introduction

One tool for Customer Relationship Management is email marketing. This form of direct marketing delivers commercial messages to potential consumers. It may be considered as one of the earliest digital marketing practices, it can still deliver high returns on investments (ROI). Email marketing is also an extension of permission-based marketing that can be more effective than other digital marketing strategies. It is powerful because of the following characteristics:

• Cost-effectiveness because of the low cost per contact
• Highly targeted
• Customizable
• Measurable

One of email marketing’s strengths is how it uses the customer’s inbox, which is their most prolific touchpoint with the internet. Some principles of email marketing are also applicable to other permission-based marketing activities.

Email marketing is for potential and existing customers to maximize their retention and value. 

Planning the Email Marketing Strategy

As with other campaigns, the first part of an email marketing strategy is planning the goals. What do you want to achieve? 

You can achieve your goals with email marketing, as long as you take your overall business, marketing, and digital strategies into account. KPIs play a vital role in this.

For instance, promotional emails usually have KPIs such as user purchase, content download, and a request for more information.

On the other hand, newsletters usually have a more extensive list of KPIs. Why? Because they are more fixated on long-term goals. Newsletters also aim to create and retain a long-term relationship with their reader. Some newsletter KPIs include the following:

• Open rate
• Clickthrough rate
• Number of emails forwarded
• Social shares
• Database growth
• Bounce rate
• Conversion rate

Email Service Providers for Email Marketing

An email service provider or ESP assists in managing your email marketing activity. Larger companies may acquire their very own software and server. Most of the time, they choose to  partner with an ESP. This makes more sense if the organization sends more than 50 emails at a time.

Here are some considerations for choosing an ESP:

• Is it easy to use (especially if you are managing the digital campaign by yourself)?
•  Is it automatically managed or self-service?
• Can you upload and move the contact list?
• Is reporting convenient and efficient?
• Is the ESP recommended by ReturnPaths, Trust-e, or other authorities?
• Do they manifest good direct marketing practices?
• What is the process of storing data?
• Who owns the data?

Email Marketing for Mobile Phones

More people are using their mobile phones to view their emails as smartphones innovate at a faster rate. In fact, 42% of emails were opened on mobile devices as of 2013.

Many companies have to keep up with their email marketing strategy since the mobile screen is very different from the desktop screen. This means the display is also very different. More importantly, mobile devices have different operating systems. The standards, default settings, and other features are not the same. 

Recent studies also state that many people view their emails on more than one device. This means that the email should display well across different consumers using different devices. Because clients switch from their smartphone to their laptop, a responsive email design is essential. Another reason is that sending two or more versions of your email is not a great option.

When you’re crafting an email for a mobile version, keep in mind that people will see this through small screens. This means that the inputs may also vary. While some render HTML emails and auto-fit, others don’t.

Aside from size considerations, try hosting an email newsletter. Do not forget to use a preheader linked to the email and website . A straight click to an HTML is easily done once the recipient opens your email. You also want to design using a grid system. Lay it vertically and horizontally with blocks so the email will be scaled down to fit a phone screen.

Another important tip is to make sure that the most important content is on the left side of the email. This is because some mobile phones don’t automatically scale down your email display. Include alt texts for images and button links that are at least 44px.

Policies

Always take note of the laws that protect recipients from receiving unsolicited emails. There are also policies on preventing businesses from abusing email. These laws vary across countries, although one remains common. If a subscriber asks to unsubscribe from the mailing list, accept their appeal or face the consequences. 

How to Use Email Marketing Strategy

Now that we have those out of the way, we can move on to the step-by-step guide on starting an email marketing campaign. 

Grow a Database

This refers to the names of subscribers who have followed you and are receiving emails with marketing messages. 

As mentioned, do not abuse the communication channel may be reported. Track the permissions that each user grants to protect you from reports and spam. 

Include the following in your database:

• Full name with the title
• Date permission granted
• Permission source
• Gender 
• Birthday
• Nationality
• Telephone or mobile number
• How often the customer wants to receive your message

These are the most basic information required, although you can always ask for more so you can customize the marketing messages.

Plan your sign-up form well and ask permission to send emails.

Design the Email

As mentioned, it is better for the email to be viewed as HTML for desktop and mobile. 

Also, consider the parts of the email:

• Sender information
• Subject line
• Preheader
• Header
• Personalized greeting
• Body
• Footer
• Unsubscribe link

You can use an email template to organize your content properly. Some ESPs offer these free or paid. Remember to test it with some email leaders and browsers first to guarantee that it displays correctly. 

The look and feel is also an important factor in design. 

Avoid using images for important content. Otherwise, use alt text for the image can still be communicated despite the image being invisible.

In order to produce ROI from your campaign, CTAs or call to actions should be present. These can be hyperlinked. But make sure that your email is not filled with buttons for links.

Create the Content

The content is key behind every email marketing campaign’s victory. Its most important quality should be informative and the ability to address problems. In addition, newsletters can include humor, research, information, promotions, and exclusive content. 

Other factors to consider when writing the content include the principles of good writing and scannable language. Two elements in email marketing include the in-email link and the subject line. Many of your potential and existing consumers decide to open an email depending on the subject line.

© Image credits to  Anni Roenkae