How to use email marketing to acquire more customers
An essential introduction to email marketing – the most powerful marketing initiative the web has to offer.
There are two camps in digital marketing: those who believe email and email marketing are obsolete, and those who know what they are talking about.
Even though email is no longer a young medium, its impact shows no signs of slowing down. Contrary to what one might think, its effectiveness increases annually. This may be partly due to the smartphone, and how frequently we check our inbox when we have it with us everywhere. Whatever the reason, it is an opportunity you must exploit as a marketer.
We will cover some of the greatest benefits of email marketing, and then provide an introduction to the basic aspects you should know before your business gets started. Who are you targeting? What kind of emails should you send? And what do you measure?
Read on, and we will give you the answers you need.
Huge benefits of email marketing
Email is consistently the strategy with the highest ROI, and 38:1 is a common, relatively conservative estimate for the return on every krone invested. In fact, for some, this becomes an obstacle to earning even more; the small amount they invest yields such a high return that they fail to realise that by committing more, they could get even more back.
The inbox is also one of the few remaining sanctuaries on the internet, where you can reach customers and leads without having to navigate algorithms and requirements from Google, Facebook, or YouTube. Email marketing gives you a direct communication channel where you own your contact lists.
Furthermore, if the goal is to sell, email is clearly the channel most people prefer to receive offers through. 72% of respondents in a survey answered that they wanted to receive offers via email. For social media, the figure was under 20%. In fact, the main reason many subscribe to newsletters is precisely to receive offers. Email marketing is unique in that the recipients often want you to promote to them.
Who should you send emails to?
Email is a channel that requires an invitation, meaning you must collect email addresses from voluntary recipients. Especially since the GDPR came into force in 2018, this is vital for professional businesses. You cannot buy ready-made contact lists and send emails to anyone without potentially receiving heavy fines.
This means there are two main groups you should address in your email marketing:
Existing customers
All you need to do is encourage them to leave their email address when making a purchase. This allows you to send information, blog posts, and offers regularly, building a stronger relationship that offers excellent opportunities for upselling. See also: 8 actions you can implement to expand your contact lists.
Interested leads
By having a newsletter sign-up form on your website, or asking social media followers to provide contact information to enter competitions, you can get relevant leads to subscribe to emails from your business. Even if they do not buy immediately, there is a high probability they will do so eventually.
It is smart to segment your lists, dividing them into different subgroups. It is easy to send personalised emails, whereas changing a company's social media profile based on who visits is far more complex.
A good example is inatur.no, a marketplace for hunting, fishing, and cabin holidays. Here, newsletter subscribers can choose whether they are interested in emails about all three areas, or just one. Anglers will not necessarily be interested in updates on the moose hunting season, and vice versa.
What kind of emails should you send?
Email marketing comes in many variants, and not all emails you send out serve the same purpose. Some are direct offers, while others are about relationship building, offering value to the recipient, or reminding them of something they might have forgotten.
Below are some of the most effective emails you should utilise:
Newsletters
One of the most common and effective forms of email marketing. This is a regular publication that can be sent weekly or monthly, filled with news, popular blog posts, or offers. It helps keep your business top of mind, creates value for the recipient, and encourages purchases depending on its content.
Single offers
If you have a new product, special offer, workshop, or a particularly comprehensive piece of content, this can be a very popular email to receive. Clearly present what you have to offer, the value it provides, and include images along with a clear call-to-action button, link, or discount code.
Welcome emails
When someone joins your mailing list, it is polite to welcome them. Feel free to include a link or two to content you think they will appreciate, or important instructions for the next steps. This is a simple way to build good relationships from the start.
Order confirmations
Make it a habit to send an automatic email to confirm that a purchase has been completed, so the customer does not have to worry about whether it was processed correctly. If someone has downloaded content, you should also send this via email so it is easily accessible in the future.
Lead nurturing
If you track contact actions based on what they download, buy, or read on your website, it is smart to follow up with lead nurturing emails. This is specially selected content or offers that you estimate will appeal to individuals who downloaded specific content or bought a particular product, aiming to inspire further purchases.
Internal emails
An email tool is not exclusively for customers; it can also be used to keep your own employees updated on company news. Particularly for larger organisations, this makes sharing information much easier, whether it concerns new clients, professional development plans, or the company Christmas party.
Key metrics to measure in email marketing
To continuously improve your strategy, you should have routines for analysing how your email marketing performs. Fortunately, this is straightforward. Most professional email tools will allow you to read these figures, as continuous learning is a major part of the strategy.
These four parameters provide a good starting point for measuring your email marketing results:
Bounce rate – What percentage of the emails you send never reach the recipient's inbox?
Open rate – How many recipients actually open the email? We recommend aiming for a 20 to 30 percent open rate.
Click-through rate (CTR) – How many recipients followed at least one of the links? Five percent is a respectable figure.
Unsubscribe rate – The average percentage of recipients who choose to opt out. Ideally, you want to stay below 0.5 percent.
Advanced email marketing
Many companies do well with a newsletter and good offers via email. But if you want to take your email marketing a step further, you can consider using more advanced methods. These are things you should primarily start with once you have the basics in place.
Automation and triggers
More comprehensive digital campaigns often use automated email sequences tailored to different recipients and their position in the buying journey. The simplest variant that almost anyone can implement is pure triggers, meaning one action leads to one email – such as a purchase or a sign-up.
A trigger can also be more advanced, based on definitions you set, such as X weeks having passed since the recipient last opened an email, or if they left an item in their online shopping cart.
To take this fully on board, you can set up a decision tree of options where one action leads down one of several paths. If the recipient clicks one link, they receive a different email in three days compared to what they would have received if they followed another link, or did not click at all.
A/B testing
For those with large contact lists (10,000 or more recipients), A/B testing is a smart way to test different approaches and see how they perform against each other. Are you wondering if fact-based subject lines lead to higher open rates than emotional ones? Do .gif illustrations generate a higher click-through rate than photographs? Or perhaps a blue background colour drives more engagement than green?
Small adjustments can yield significant results, and this is the way to test them. Just remember that you need a relatively large sample size to get relevant insights, and you should only change one variable at a time.