The power of email has always remained a useful tool for many companies to virtually reach out to customers and suppliers etc (Cases et al,2010). Many marketers today still try to make use of email marketing as a strategy due to its undying popularity (Mohammadi et al, 2013) as the ‘killer app’ of online marketing (Gopal et al, 2006).
So what is email marketing? It involves sending a direct promotional message to a large group of people (Mohammadi et al, 2013). However, why companies still love to use email for marketing is the fact that they can instantly send a message to all their customers simultaneously at a low cost! (Gopal et al, 2006)
Many companies still choose to implement email campaigns to their strategies to try to sell or promote their products/services to customers. However, the challenge is making an effective campaign that people will respond to. This blog will discuss some helpful tips that can go into making a successful email campaign and some of the worst campaigns (to help deter you from making the same mistakes) for your company.
Email Do’s
1 – The less words the better
A perfect example of a company applying this is Luxury Garage Sale. They tend to use pictures to illustrate their emails as they know their customers want to see the products rather than read about it! Therefore, keeping a simple yet picturesque email can help communicate yourself to customers better than words.
2 – Make your emails personalized
Another way to create a successful email campaign is to implement what AmazonLocal did. They sent a short and simple email to find out better what they actually like and don’t like, so they could personalize the deals/offers they are sent. AmazonLocal are doing it right as they are showing they care by giving customers options to choose what they like so they can get a more personalized experience with their services and products (Godin, 1999).
3 – Make it fun/interactive!
There is nothing more daunting than a boring email trying to sell you stuff. Goorin Bros takes advantage of this to show their creative and unique style through their attractive emails by including clever and warm subject lines to videos/links customers can connect to. Making use of different tools to make your email campaigns more attractive and inviting (or even enticing!) can go a long way!
Email Don’ts
1 – Do not send a pointless email!
There is nothing worse than getting an email that has no purpose whatsoever. As email is such a volatile tool for businesses to use, make sure you send emails that are relevant to your customers you do not want to fill their inbox’s with junk mail or give the impression you are spam email that may prevent them from following you in the future!
2 – Not having a referral policy
Many companies using email marketing forget to take advantage of it’s ongoing conversation. Unlike many ModCloth takes advantage of this by promoting a benefit to customers who refer their friends to the brand. This is a good way for a brand to know their customer’s loyalty by motivating them to tell their friends in order to gain more customers!
3 – Do not use other brands to make yourself look better!
Many companies such as Subway have used this tactic to criticize and compare themselves to other companies. Instead of bad mouthing your competitors, you can use this opportunity to make yourself look better by featuring customer experience stories etc!
Academics argue the factors that companies must note when considering email marketing are the automated triggers which can track customers from when they register, personalize to make it relevant to the customer, do follow-ups and gain permission ((Mohammadi et al, 2013). More points that need to be noted are the content of the email, intentional advertisement, how the email will be sent and the server submitting the email (Nosrati & Karimi, 2011).
However, this may not guarantee your email campaign will be successful as the problem with email marketing is you can’t target potential customers directly as there is not enough information provided with an email address to identify these customers. Therefore, this is why you find companies just send a flood of emails to everyone which gives them a bad reputation (as spam), thus, they would rather take the risk of this reputation rather than paying more money to advertise themselves (Gopal et al, 2006).
References:
Cases, A. S., Fournier, C., Dubois, P. L., & Tanner, J. F. (2010). Web Site spill over to email campaigns: The role of privacy, trust and shoppers’ attitudes.Journal of Business Research, 63(9), 993-999.
Gopal, R. D., Tripathi, A. K., & Walter, Z. D. (2006). Economics of first-contact email advertising. Decision Support Systems, 42(3), 1366-1382.
Mohammadi, M., Malekian, K., Nosrati, M., & Karimi, R. (2013). Email Marketing as a Popular Type of Small Business Advertisement: A Short Review. Australian Journal of Basic and Applied Sciences, 7(4), 786-790.
Godin, S. (1999). Permission marketing: Turning strangers into friends and friends into customers. Simon and Schuster.
Nosrati, M., Karimi, R., & Hariri, M. (2011). Technical and Financial Analysis of Email Marketing System.