Before we get into essentials for email marketing, it is necessary to understand what email marketing really is? Of course, you are probably reading this because you are already a marketing whiz. Yet, a recap: Email marketing is the process of directly communicating a commercial message to a group of people using email. This can be done using a customer database or sold lists and the main objective is to encourage customer loyalty and repeat business, customer acquisition or advertisements/offers.
Because of its personal nature and its ability to reach the target audience right up to their inbox, email always proves to be a strong tool for marketing, no matter how many social networking sites may rise and fall. But still, generating the required response to an email marketing campaign can be a challenge. Chances are this is because the brands are unable to identify and rectify their mistakes.
These points may help to rectify some issues and improve click rates:
Be More Human
Nobody likes to communicate with a cold dispassionate bot. Emails that are one-size-fits-all do not appeal to an audience with multiple mentalities, tendencies, likes and dislikes. As a brand, you need to be more engaging with an audience by having a catchy subject line, visually attractive content preferably specific to the demographics and the gender of the audience. A typical marketing mail with a message that practically orders the customer to obey the message in the mail can lead to a defiant customer who will deliberately ignore the message, therefore defeating the purpose of the marketing email.
Studies have shown that an email with a crisp subject line is likely to gain 20% more clicks, and a personalized greeting 129% more clicks. You do the math!
Understand the Target Audience
When you are more in touch with the audience you are dealing with, you know their pulse, and that is what you must capture in your email marketing campaign. For example, unless you are a company or a professional organization, no ecommerce customer really cares for the nature of your business and operations, unless you are offering a discount or a sale. Bottom line, if you are targeting an ecommerce customer base, stick to your objective: offer discounts, provide information about the current deals, and keep the customer’s interest piqued. Have a mixture of original content but keep up the visual appeal. Up to 40% more marketers have reported to have had successful leads generated through email marketing.
Email Marketing for Ecommerce Websites – An Infographic
Infographic Source: Pardot.com
It is not only important to understand the content your audience would like to see, but also important to understand how often they would like an email from you. Allowing the customer to choose the frequency of emails from you adds another feather in the cap of customer loyalty and engagement. But this is not an easy parameter to judge and it varies for every brand and for every customer base. This takes a lot of experimentation and a lot lies in the customer’s hands.
Other factors that come into the picture to understand your target audience is timing your email – that is, sending the email at the right time of the day to capture the customer’s undivided attention. Most of the marketing emails get their highest click rates when people are at work or when they are commuting home (at around 5 or 6 pm).
At the same time, do not forget the Rule 1 of a successful email marketing campaign: Less Promotion, More Emotion.
Optimize Emails for Mobile
While the smartphones cannot yet compare with the comfort offered by a wide screen laptop or a computer, as a brand, you cannot ignore the efficiency with which it is successfully capturing the customer’s attention. Studies have shown that up to 66% of the customers use their smartphones to view their emails. Marketing via phones has gone way beyond SMS marketing and you cannot lose out on this massive opportunity to appeal to your audiences by being stubbornly old school and insisting that the customer find a laptop to view your marketing email.
Instead, optimize your email to be compatible to a mobile/tablet screen. This is a very popular trend now and that’s why it is not very difficult to achieve technically. But your work doesn’t stop at optimizing the emails. Take a step – or a few hundred more – ahead and ensure that the landing pages related to your email are mobile optimized too. Otherwise it is just not worth the effort for the customer – instead it is just a headache, and, as a result, a total waste. Seamlessness between devices is the way to retain your audience and keep them engaged in your brand.
Follow up on Missed Sales
As an e-retailer, it is a very common occurrence for a customer to browse your website, add items to the cart and leave it as it is without buying anything, for reasons such as an interruption, indecision, or unavailability of a credit card in the vicinity.
Surprisingly, only one-third of the e-retailers are known to follow up on an abandoned cart via email. As you are aware why a customer may have abandoned a cart – because e-retailer you may be, you are also human – it only makes sense to remind the customer of an incomplete shopping experience. Maybe remind them via a mail or two.
However, smart strategy lies in recognizing the thin line of difference between nagging a customer and gently pulling the customer back to your e-retail experience. Timing your mails correctly and offering an incentive at the right time might just do the trick. Marketing experts recommend that you use the opportunity of the second email to offer an incentive for completing the online shopping expedition.
Why is following up on a missed sale important? It all comes to the Rule 1. Being human. It tells the customer that regardless of the number of the customers you have as an e-retailer, they mean something to you, and their transaction is not only monetarily significant to you but also personally important. It gives the customer the friendly feeling of visiting the neighborhood store – a comfort level which encourages customer loyalty.
Studies have shown that up to 40% of abandoned carts are recovered because of an email sent between 24 and 48 hours of abandonment, and 80% of the sales have been made on the fifth of the twelfth contact made from the e-retailer’s side.
Email marketing is a very powerful tool and should be used smartly and cleverly. This can be done mainly by understanding the audience and taking the time to perfect your subject lines and messages for maximum impact.
Zahoor Bhat has over 10+ years of experience as an online editor and media manager. He has worked with major online news and content sites as a media manager. He is well versed with major content management systems and web platforms such as WordPress and social media networks including Facebook, Twitter, Youtube, Google Business, Yelp, Instagram & Linkedin. He is an expert in content creation, proofreading and finally making it live. Being a social media expert, he is able to make relations with social media influencers and make sure to generate leads and grow business via different social media platforms.
