Email is your post powerful marketing channel when used well. Your visitor’s inbox is a perfect opportunity for you to capture attention, communicate important updates and invite readers back to your site for increased visibility. The stats on email marketing effectiveness say it all – top marketing specialists and service providers tell us that email marketing is 40% more effective than social media, results in more sales than any other channel and is the absolute most cost-effective marketing solution for small to medium business. In this post I’ll share the top 5 email marketing tips to help you increase engagement and get fast results.
1. New Signups
To get email marketing to work for you, you need to get some subscribers! There are several effective ways to gather visitor emails on your website, from simple newsletter sign-up forms to opt-in checkboxes on post comments or a checkout process.
The best method I found for increasing subscribers and sale conversions over at Themify was to add an effective, yet subtle slide-up popup. When a visitor scrolls to 50% of the page, a popup slides up at bottom right corner. Not only is this eye-catching, but a discount code is offered to new sign-ups.
If you run a WordPress site, we created a free plugin called Themify Popup, so you can add a popup like this one to your site. Give it a try!
When creating your welcome emails, follow these tips:
- Keep your subject line conversational. Welcome messages should read as if they’re coming from a friend, not from a robot!
- Use your welcome message to let new subscribers know what they can expect from you, and how they’ll benefit from membership.
- Include a call to action button or link. Your welcome email is a great opportunity to get subscribers to engage with you further, even if it’s as simple as following you on social media.
2. Thank You Emails
Now that you have some new signups, be sure to thank them! This can be as simple as redirecting them to a thank you page on your website, but setting up a Thank You email when specific actions are taken (such as redeeming a discount code or purchasing a product), reward them with a featured offer, another call to action, or other suggested resource. This is the beginning of an ongoing conversation that sets the foundation of your campaign.
When designing your Thank You:
- Test it out first. A thank you message is a perfect opportunity to up-sell, but some split testing can really help determine which offers your subscribers respond to best.
- Keep it simple. Finimize has created a great-looking email template, but still sticks to text-based and personalized message.
3. Teasers
Teaser emails generate interest and get your subscribers excited about what is to come.If you have a new product, service or content series coming out, you can create an alluring and irresistible email campaign that builds up anticipation.
What makes teaser emails work:
- Create a story. Whether you’re launching a big website or are just coming out with a new product, build a story that draws readers in and gets them excited about your upcoming launch.
- Set a goal. What are you hoping will happen? Teaser emails can generate new subscribers, get you new leads or pre-order sales. Figuring out what you want the campain to do for you will help you design the email around the strongest call to action.
- Be mysterious! Don’t be afraid to give just enough away to get readers to take action, or give them the whole story after a call to action is taken.
4. Engagement
These are the most common emails you’ll send as part of an effective campaign. Engagement emails can let subscribers know about new content, features or promotions while keeping the conversation going with a request for feedback or social media interaction.
Some great things to add to your engagement emails:
- Your best content. Promote content, features or products that are a truly outstanding resource for your subscribers. Outside of increasing conversions, this helps generate more shares.
- Highlight underused features. If a feature or product is not being used the way you want or as often as it should, highlight it and give your readers a brief statement of why its great and how they can try it out.
- Ask for feedback. Invite your users to reply with their thoughts or desires, or to send you a Tweet. If you feel like getting fancy, setup a survey and link it as your call to action!
5. Giveaways / Contests
Rewarding subscribers is part of the foundation of great email marketing, but that shouldn’t stop you from celebrating holidays, anniversaries or other special events with targeted giveaways. Experian reports that birthday emails enjoy higher transaction rates than promotional emails, and everyone loves a free download or product.
In Uber’s campaign, they give away a free ride for referring a friend. Redeemed rides are instantly converted into a new user. When planning your own giveaways, consider these options:
- Offer a personalized coupon code. Personalizing givaways to a users birthday, for example, maintains engagement and encourages purchases.
- Give away your best selling product or trial a service for a limited time.
- Offer a free ebook made up of your most popular content, or a free download.
Going Forward
There is so much more you can do with email marketing once your subscriber list grows and your campaign begins to gain momentum and mature. Below are just a handful of other ways you can engage with your audience:
- Customer Feedback: Send a periodic text-only email that simply asks how your subscribers are doing and what they would like to see on your site.
- Digests: Roundups aren’t just for blogs – if you run an online store, a periodic email highlighting new or best-selling products is a great way to drive traffic to your site.
- Come Back Emails: Most email marketing services like MailChimp offer ways to identify who is engaging and who isn’t – creating a special campain for subscribers who haven’t stopped by in a while let’s them know you care and reminds them to check out your site again.
- Social Media: Running a special Social Media contest, or share specific content only to your Facebook page? Let your subscribers know there are other ways to enjoy your brand.
Nikhil Makwana
Email marketing is the most efficient way to communicate with your readers. Email is like a personal message on the facebook where the sender is targeting an individual user.
Among all the tips I like #5. Running a contest on your blog is the best way to optimizing your email and increase engagement with subscribers.
Gavin
Aweber and mailchimp are dominating the email marketing, but this is not only thing there are various facts which we should keep in mind for doing email marketing. Thanks for these facts !!
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Thank you for your great article. We learned a lot from it.