|
Email
Marketing Tips and Tricks - Part One
By
following these simple, clear and common sense guidelines,
you will be on the way to managing a more effective,
consumer-driven email marketing campaign that will
reflect your business in a positive light and lead
to better brand awareness, increased sales and greater
return on investment. READ ON TO LEARN MORE ABOUT
INCREASING YOUR BUSINESS PROFITABILITY with e-marketeer.
1.
Opt-in as opposed to Spam
It is a well researched fact that if you 'spam'
your customers they are most likely to never want
to do business with you. In order to begin a successful
email marketing campaign it is imperative that you
use a clean list; a list of potential and existing
customers that are interested in your product or
service, have maybe bought before and have accepted
your offer to receive occasional email sales messages.
So
how do you create a clean list? - The easiest answer
is to start with gathering email address data on
your existing customers. A simple email address
and first name is usually sufficient - you can capture
further data later from those that respond to your
initial messages.
Most
importantly , your website needs to offer
a customer sign up form; an automated method by
which your customers can add themselves to your
online database and beging receiving your messages.
This is the first step to creating a clean master
list with which you can begin your sales promotion.
It is amazing how many websites do not have this
functionality attached. E-marketeer's hosted solution
allows you to create a form that can input data
directly into your database, online 24 hours a day,
365 days a year, even as you sleep. For more information
on this functionality, why not take a trial
account and see for yourself.
2.
Don't overdo it
A common mistake often made by email marketers is
to bombard their customers with all sorts of offers
and promotional messages in the hope that a large
percentage will take them up. This just doesn't
work. Mainly because your customers will probably
lead busy lives and won't have the time to read
and digest all of your messages and take action.
Much better to keep your messages short and concise,
plan an effective ongoing strategy that communicates
your message over time, so as not to overkill the
essence of your marketing messages.
Time
taken in the beginning to plan your campaign and
target your list effectively will be more successful,
and it is worth remembering that it may take as
many as seven sales messages for the consumer to
gain confidence in your product or service before
they make a purchase.
3.
Make it easy to unsubscribe:
Similar to our opt-in strategy, the opt-out
functionality of your messages should be plain and
clear, easy to use and most of all, happen in real
time. If you don't offer your customer the chance
to leave your list then you may as well forget expecting
them to buy from you. People will opt-out for a
variety of reasons, and this does not necessarily
mean that they want to terminate their relationship
with you. But one thing's
for sure: if you don't handle the opt-out
requests flawlessly, you not only run the risk of
losing the off-line customer relationship, but more
importantly, of coping with bad word-of-mouth and
possible fines. A sound email marketing strategy
will always ensure that the customer remains in
control, giving them what they want. We will cover
this topic and more in the next email which you
should receive within a few days.
For
more information on e-marketeer and how our
hosted solution can enhance your marketing efforts,
please call Nigel Holder on (UK) 01753 833747
|
