Email marketing has earned its place in any marketing hall of fame. In the nearly three decades since its first use, email marketing has probably done more to personally connect business to their customers than any other avenue. Does that mean email marketing is all you need to promote your business successfully?
Absolutely!
No, no, sorry, I’m lying. Sadly, even I have to admit that email marketing is not the absolute be-all and end-all of good marketing. No, it’s just a piece of the puzzle. But what a piece!
The Power of Email Marketing
Let’s take a look at what email marketing is key for:
- Nurturing leads - A lead is only worthwhile if you follow it up and carefully coax it to become a customer. Email marketing leads here, providing a fast and effective means of delivering engaging and enticing personal content.
- Driving conversions - Through email marketing your customers are reading tailored content that helps turn a mild interest into conclusive action.
- Creating customer loyalty - With patient and regular email campaigns, customers retain an awareness of your business and from that grows brand loyalty. Before too long, you’re the business that they trust above all others.
With its strengths in personalisation and targeted messaging, email marketing can be carefully shaped to connect with your customers in ways that other marketing methods can only dream about. It’s what makes emails excel in creating:
- Newsletters
- Sale announcements and information
- New product launches
- Targeted offers
- And much more...
Modern email marketing isn’t just throwing messages out into the dark, either. Thanks to comprehensive metrics, email marketing returns measurable results and campaign performance tracking.
It’s also cost-effective – how many other marketing tools can be deployed effectively for such a small budget?
Hail to the king! Long live email marketing.
The Marketing Mix
Let’s be honest, though; email marketing is just one part of a far bigger picture. While it’s a powerful tool in itself, it is when you mix marketing techniques that you really see success. Using email marketing alongside other marketing methods will reap the real rewards.
Marketing is split between online and offline activities. Online includes:
- Email marketing
- Social media marketing
- SEO campaigns
- Blogging
- Website and landing pages
- Adwords & digital ads
- Podcasting
- Video
Offline covers:
- Paper advertisements
- Flyers
- Articles in publications
- Personal attendance at events and exhibitions
- Public speaking
- Networking
Alone, none of the above will really reach their potential. Instead, they work best when supported by other aspects. For some examples:
- Speaking at an event? Make sure you have marketing collateral to hand out, a banner for people to see, and a method to collect email addresses from interested attendees.
- Running a digital ad campaign? Ensure you have created a strong supporting landing page to track engagement and deliver relevant content for a better conversion rate and remember those contact forms to gather vital email data.
- Blogging? Link to your website or landing pages to hook your reader in with more content - and don’t forget that content grab for your future email marketing.
How Email Integrates with Other Marketing
Where does email marketing fit in with everything? What tools mix with it to really make the most out of both?
Contact Acquisition
The first step is getting that all-important contact information to build your email list. Use:
- Website sales pages and contact forms - A compelling online shop front will either make sales immediately or get customers to leave contact info.
- Landing pages - Like a microsite that has tailored content, landing pages can present a lead magnet that offers something exclusive in exchange for their email data.
- Social media - Want people to get to those landing pages? Promote yourself and your content on social media networks.
- Pay-per-click ad campaigns - Another surefire way to get new leads to visit your website and leave their email address for you.
Creating Content
Once you’re ready to use your email marketing, it’s essential you write great emails and utilise the power of the other marketing tools you have – like social media and your website.
- Make sure you make a mix of nurture content - which is all about building rapport with your current subscribers and showing authenticity to onlookers - and promoted sales content.
- Run campaigns that highlight certain aspects of your business with links to landing pages.
- Deliver newsletters that encourage engagement with your social media to build brand awareness and loyalty.
- Promote offline content, such as invitations to events.
Gather Data
Your email campaigns and other online marketing sources will curate a wealth of data to help you tailor future marketing. Ensure you analyse all this data regularly to stay ahead of the game:
- Email engagement statistics
- Social media comments, likes, and shares
- Landing page hits
- Online advertising click-throughs
With all the information in front of you, you can continue to improve, growing your understanding of your audience and their loyalty to you.
Creating a Marketing Strategy That Works
It’s not just email alone – for a marketing strategy that truly works, you need a solid understanding of all its component parts. Don’t get bogged down though; not every marketing method applies to every business, so test things out and evaluate what works for you.
Each part helps inform and improve the others – seeing what does well on your social platforms will direct you to create content that gets read; understanding which speaking event gathered the most email enquiries helps you see what your customers are looking for; and analysing the content for adverts that get the most click-throughs will help you make better copy for future email engagement.
Your email marketing will be a thread that links it all together, so it’s important to get it right and let it form the core of a broader marketing strategy. Let me, Nathan Littleton, help you do exactly that. Book a consultation today to see just how the power of well-integrated email marketing can propel your business to success.
