Of all the marketing tools, e-mail marketing easily has the highest return on investment. This means that marketers would be wise to keep up with the latest proven email marketing best practices and maximize their profits through this channel. Below, I’ve listed four best practices that can help marketers make the most of their e-mail marketing campaigns.
List Building
Email marketing is more than a numbers game. Successfully engaging consumers isn’t as simple as sending a barrage of emails out and hoping that a few people open your marketing materials. Sending more emails doesn’t necessarily equate to drawing in a larger audience; in fact, it often guarantees the opposite. The biggest mistake new marketers can make is purchasing a pre-compiled email list instead of building an engaged audience organically. Put yourself in a potential reader’s shoes – what would make you want to subscribe? Try advertising an email opt-in through the website, or using one of the many free tools that provide pop-ups and advertising sidebars.
Metrics
With all of the new technology available, savvy marketers are using analytics to help guide their email marketing strategy. What’s important with metrics is consistency. The same metrics should be measured at a consistent length of time. If a different metric is measured each time, it’s impossible to track progress and use it to make decisions.
Some metrics marketers may want to consider include:
Open Rate
Click-Through-Rate
Conversions
Permission Marketing
For decades, marketing used an “interruption” strategy. This tactic involved utilizing the visibility of billboards and commercials to promote a brand or products. In doing so, marketers were essentially “interrupting” a consumer’s commute or entertainment programming to put a branded message in front of them.
But today, it’s all about “permission” marketing. And it’s not just the most efficient form of marketing, but it helps build an authentic relationship between the brand and its customers. Permission marketing goes hand-in-hand with building an authentic list. When a user signs up for an email list, they’re essentially giving the brand permission to advertise to them. This permission should not be taken for granted, and brands should work hard to continue to grow the relationship.
Testing
Using the metrics they measured by following step two, marketers can identify areas that need to improve and test changes. But it’s important to test carefully. Only one component of an email should be changed so that marketers can be certain that’s what’s making the difference. Email marketing provides a higher return on investment than any other marketing tool. Therefore, marketers need to make the most of this channel by following the best practices in this post.