Implementing a successful email marketing campaign

Successful email marketing

Web-Clubs have been involved in email marketing since 2000, it’s early days. During that time we have sent millions of emails for thousands of organisations. Not surprisingly, we’ve learnt what works and what doesn’t. Whilst we can’t share with you all of our secrets, here are some tips to help you build a successful campaign.

Remember, Emailing succeeds because we are all addicted to checking our inboxes. But if at first sight, it doesn’t grab attention, it will be ignored!

Emails top five uses are;

• Promote, useful for promoting new products, services and capabilities
• Inform, confirming orders, updating delivery status, sending statements
• Contact, maintaining contact with existing clients and prospects, maintaining mindshare
• Knowledge, demonstrating your expertise, providing useful tips all aimed at raising awareness
• Confirm, Confirming actions, meetings and contact

Tips for success

There is of course a catch: Like most things in life, to work it needs correct implemented. Here are the key areas for success;

Strategy

It may seem obvious, but before emailing or for that matter, undertaking any form of marketing, you must know what the strategy is. What you want to achieve, who you want to reach, the offer and how you are going to measure results. If time is spent wisely here, returns will be improved. All too often, campaigns fail because they are too general, not focussed and lack direction.

All proactive marketing tools like emailing work best when there is an attractive offer or something useful to be gained.

We are more likely to respond to an offer of a free drink with our Pizza than to an advert simply saying “We sell nice Pizzas!”

Targeting

Whatever marketing tool you use, reaching the right audience is essential. Email contact databases should be structured so that they can be targeted as required be it industry, age, location or whatever. Databases need continuously updating to retain effectiveness.
In-house databases are used for maintaining contact with existing clients and prospects.
External databases allow you to reach new prospects and to target new areas. Specialist email marketing companies like Web-Clubs invest in their databases to ensure they deliver results. Email lists offered for sale are often outdated and inaccurate yielding poor results, they may also conflict with the forthcoming GDPR legislation.

Getting Noticed

Your message needs to stand out in the inbox. Invest time in choosing the right subject line. Test it with colleagues before going live with your campaign.
The email needs to be attractive so it grabs attention and should follow your business’s branding. Promotional emails should be graphical.
Keep it brief, there are only seconds to get noticed, make your message clear and have a prominent “call to action” button.

Conform

The email should follow industry standards and best practices, this reduces the likelihood of it being blocked. It must be fully compliant with EU directives on direct marketing to consumers.
All emails should have senders details and a clear unsubscribe capability.

Convert

Sending the email is just the start, think about what happens when someone clicks for more information. The email buttons should be linked to relevant pages of a website or to dedicated landing pages. Landing pages demonstrate continuity and attention to detail, research indicates they significantly raise conversion rates.

Implementation

Specialist emailing software manages the data and the sending of the emails.
The campaign effectiveness should be measured. Key indicators include; delivered, email opens, click throughs and actions (such as filling a form or placing an order

Email Marketing Check List

Here is a quick summary of the key points you should have in place;

• Setting campaign objectives
• Content and subject line strategy
• Email artwork design
• Provision of dedicated landing pages
• Targeted sending to contacts on our Consumer and Business databases
• Campaign tracking, management and optimisation
• Reporting of results

If your emailing activity is ineffective or non existent, speak to us!
Web-Clubs are experts in the field. We can fully manage your email marketing activity.