Although small business owners now have many marketing method choices, focusing on email marketing is the way to go. AWeber Communications recently came out with a survey that says business marketing through the use of emails has stood its ground when it comes to providing value to entrepreneurs.

Depending on Email Marketing
Some 82 percent of the survey respondents also stated that they are cementing their plans on hiking their efforts pertaining email marketing over the remaining part of this year and the one that is coming. This is also based on the fact that 61.46 percent of these small business owners are firm in their belief that this type of marketing’s return of investment or ROI is simpler to account compared to social media’s ROI. There were only 5.28 percent who thought otherwise.

Putting Social Media in the Equation
Despite this pronouncement though, it would still be quite beneficial to make use of social media as part of your marketing campaign. According to AWeber that as social media mushrooms on the Internet, the responsiveness of marketers in using it will also undoubtedly heighten. In fact, based on the study’s results, 54 percent of the small business owners who participated are set on making use of Facebook as an email-listing generator tool.

While about 70 percent of these entrepreneurs are making use of some form or other of social media, there is 77 percent who have made it clear that inculcating this with email marketing is a top priority. This number of marketers believes that this move ranges from “moderately to very important” on their list of priorities. Many believe, some 20 percent of them, in the potency of the combined powers of social media and marketing through emails because of its ability to encourage loyalty among clients. Thirty-six percent of entrepreneurs who took part of AWeber’s study used Twitter for sending out email newsletters, while 35 percent sent blog posts through emails.

What Social Media and Email Marketing Can Bring
Tom Kulzer, AWeber founder and CEO, stated that based on the study’s results, marketing has not lost its grasp on giving out value to small business owners, no matter what kind of business they are running. He also said that these entrepreneurs are not discounting the positive effect that mixing efforts using social media and marketing through emails together can bring. Although still learning the effective way for this to be done, Kulzer said, this will bring small business owners closer to a more massive audience. Added with the using of sales tracking and behavioural targeting, which almost 66 percent of respondents allude to, the combination of social media and email marketing will undoubtedly bring in the money to your small business.

In our world of mass information, email marketing can be both a challenge and a boon. Despite the new social media age, email marketing is still a quick and cost-effective way to reach out to your target audience. Yet, all too often we see talented professionals with outstanding services to offer- but are not approaching their campaign with critical thought and execution.

Common email Marketing Mistakes

“Memail” Marketing

Sending your customers email newsletters and messages that are only about you or your company is not smart e-mail marketing. We have nicknamed this unhealthy marketing practice: “Memail” Marketing. Memail Marketing is selfish and will alienate your subscribers. They will become annoyed, see no value, unsubscribe and have a negative reaction to your brand.

And worse, if you subscribe people to your email lists without their specific permission and send them a “Memail”, this is a serious danger to your company and others! The bottom line: If your email is more about you then it is about your customers, then your marketing execution is not helpful to you or to your readers.

Lack of Strategy

Think critically about your use of email as a marketing tool. Define who you are targeting. What information can you include in your message that would be of value? Where is the call to action (why should your customer open this)? It is OK to talk about your company as long as it is helpful, relevant and educational. The goal here is to create an email marketing campaign that will:

o Serve your customers

o Support your sales message

o Sell from a place of education and value

Neglecting the Core Foundation of your email Marketing

Loren McDonald, Vice President of Industry Relations at SilverPop.com, says in his article Email Mistake No. 10: Lack of Personality, Positioning and Proposition:

“One of the biggest mistakes I see with company email programs is the lack of differentiation, personality and a clear value proposition. I call these the “Three Ps” that form a core foundation of your email program:

-Proposition (Value): What value does your email program provide for your customers/subscribers?

-Positioning: How does it differ from your competitors?

-Personality: What kind of image and tone do your email s convey? “

Tips to Building a Successful Email Marketing Campaign

Try these practical healthy marketing tips to guide your email marketing execution so it is on purpose and offers relevant value and you will win big with Web marketing.

Be Authentic and Relate to your audience.

Whether you’re a famous defense attorney, a respected marketing expert, or a shop owner, you HAVE something valuable to offer to your audience. Show that you can relate to your audience’s problems by understanding their perspective. Empathy + Personality = Good email!

Use Your Name or Company Name In the “From Line”

People are more likely to open emails from people/organizations/companies that they recognize. (Example: From: Web Marketing Therapy). Make it very clear who this email is coming from and you will get a higher opening rate.

Be Concise in Your Subject Line

You only have a few short seconds to grab your audience’s attention. Make sure your subject line is concise, to-the-point. Avoid the use of excess punctuation (Example: Read This!!!!!!) Avoid placing overused marketing words like “FREE” as your first word (Example: FREE download). Instead, draw your audience to open your email with something they can relate to (Example: Learn How to Blog at Our Free Workshop).

To not BE spam, you have to NOT spam.

Receiving a business card from someone you just met does NOT mean that you can add their name and email to your newsletter list unless they specifically agreed to it. This is about respect-if you simply assume people will want to receive your newsletters you will run the risk of being intrusive. People who did not agree to be part of any email list may feel less respected by you if they are automatically added onto your list-this in consequence, could mean they will respect YOU less.

Think BEYOND the “Box”.

Don’t stick to any prescribed “box” of marketing. Have fun with your emails, make them interesting and engaging-the result could be more subscribers forwarding them to their contacts. If you make your content interesting and fresh, your audience will be more likely to look forward to your next email.

Make Sharing Easy.

Insert social media widgets, forward widgets, and share widgets so that your recipient can very easily share your email s with friends. See if your email newsletter service can insert social media sharing widgets such as Twitter, Facebook and LinkedIn directly into your templates. Have a call to action that is clear and easy to do!

According to a Merkle report, permission-based email comprises about one-quarter of the time a person spends with email, second only to emails that are personal communication with family and friends. The converse of that, however, is that 75 percent of those in the study said they choose to opt-out of permission email because emails lack relevance; 73 percent said they opted out because emails were sent too frequently, according to the report.

So where is the fine line drawn? How do you create a powerful, permission-based, email database with key contacts and then provide them with timely, relevant information, versus obtaining qualified email leads only to lose their interest because of the negatives perceived by the recipients? The key to email marketing success is to find the balance, simply because this medium should be at the cornerstone of your marketing mix.

How to Build an Opt-in Email List – To start, creating an opt-in email list provides a foundation of qualified leads with which you can nurture and build relationships. Customers and prospects who visit your website and like what they see are more inclined to join an email list at that moment because they want more of what you have to offer. These visitors are the same people you want to target, much more qualified than purchasing a third-party list, particularly since email addresses change quite frequently. Plus those who opt-in at your website, or double opt-in through a confirmation email, are genuinely interested in your products and services so there is great chance of converting these leads into sales and repeat customers. The other downfall with third party lists is that you have no idea how many emails these contacts are receiving, from companies other than yours. With your own personal opt-in list, you know exactly what the volume and frequency is for sending emails.

Do It Yourself Versus Using an Email Marketing Company – While creating your own database and having total ownership in-house may sound appealing, it can become extremely cumbersome and time consuming to manage. If you don’t have an automated system in-house and linked to your website and databases, you will end up having to manually make changes like removing an email at a subscribers request or trying to figure out and determine your analytics for each email. Permission-based email marketing services for small businesses, like Constant Contact and iContact, manage everything for you, from utilizing your opt-in from your website to directly collect emails in a database they house to offering design templates for your communications and emails. And, because services like this firmly follow anti-SPAM laws, your emails actually make it to where they are supposed to go.

Defining Who You Are – Clearly having someone “ask you” if they can be on your email distribution list is much better than randomly sending information to third-party lists. But permission-based email marketing affords you the opportunity to also build your brand recognition with those who truly want to hear from you. Opt-ins can also be tempted to sign up with the offer of free white papers, case studies, and password-only access to special areas of your website.

Create a positive image of yourself – Recent studies have shown that those who opt-in or make purchases from a particular business have an increased positive impression when that business sends them email. With email marketing, you can develop and foster a relationship that may have started simply out of necessity and begin to build toward a gaining a long-term customer.

More and more people are tolerant about permission-based email marketing; however, you must not overstep those boundaries of trust. Relevant and timely information, special promotions or incentives will continue to build trust between you and your customers. But, emails every other day or information that is simply off-target from what your customers want or work with on a daily basis will lead your customers to opt-out as quick as they opted-in.

Permission Based Email Marketing

Also known as opt-in email marketing, permission based email marketing is the system whereby a business or marketing individual secures the “right” to send electronic communication (emails), to potential customers who make up their list.

“Double opt-in” or “confirmed opt-in” refers to an ideal situation where the recipient of an initial invitational email, follows through and clicks the link within to confirm their willingness to receive continued communication. In this manner the company or individual builds their list of potential customers responsibly, avoiding allegations of unsolicited commercial emails (UCE), more commonly known as spam.

Some of the benefits of permission based email marketing include:

a) Your marketing emails arrive directly in the potential customers email inbox. They are then able to read them and respond to them in their own time.

b) You can “sell yourself” as well as your product. Branding your name as well as the product that you are offering.

c) You can provide gifts such as downloads or vouchers to customers, a key strategy in building good business relations.

d) You may open a channel by which customers feel that they can contact you directly with queries or special requests.

List building is a time-consuming and often expensive process, but there are affordable solutions provided by certain marketing websites.

Text Ad Exchanges are affordable and often even provide free services to those who are prepared to earn points in the credit based mailing system. At a Text Ad Exchange, the membership is your list, and every member has the permission to send emails, via the Exchange, to the member base on a regular basis. These emails are known as solo ads.

A good mailing service will not send more than 24 emails per day from its site, keeping your marketing mail efficient by not flooding in boxes. Ideally, the delivery of emails should be on a regular hour or two hourly basis. It will also ensure that all emails are carefully checked that they comply with legislation according to the CAN-SPAM Act.

A Text Ad Exchange will often provide members with the ability to accrue points by clicking on your links and viewing your websites. These points are valuable as they can be used as currency by the members to purchase further advertising, increasing the click through rate on your links significantly. Often there are a range of other advertising options available. Banners, hotlinks, surf pages, traffic links, headline ads, login ads, html ads are a few, but there are many. These work on the same credit accrual system. All points collected from clicking on these ads are pooled in the members account, and can be used at the member’s own discretion.

Text Ad Exchanges provide free advertising, as well as affordable packages and upgrades, and the option of “do-it-yourself” style advertising. Where you can choose your own colours and styles for some advert types. For the website owner, the affiliate marketer and even the hobby marketer, this provides a well-rounded, affordable, and sustainable advertising package.

Svend Erik Laustsen and Clare Bowen

If you’d like to be a better email marketer, check out these tips on mistakes to avoid, and what to do instead:

3 Things to Avoid

• Only sending email when you have something to sell

If you are in the business of selling a product or a service, your first and the most obvious instinct is to try to get people to buy with every communication you put out there. Bad idea.

This is a particularly big problem among affiliate marketers and e­commerce sites. But the result is that you’ll come across as overly salesy, and turn a large number of prospects off from actually wanting to buy from you.

• Sending email without permission

You may not intentionally be sending “spam,” but if you are sending unsolicited emails on behalf of your business more than once, you are violating ethical email marketing practices, and may well be on your way toward breaking the laws which govern this channel of communications between businesses and consumers.

• Not sending email consistently

Could you imagine getting an email from a company you requested information from three months after your initial communication from them? It happens all the time. Don’t let this happen to you and your business. Don’t restrict your emails to your subscribers only when you’ve got something to say, or you’ll be forgotten and ignored.

3 Things to Do Instead:

• Offer a mix of content in your emails

Instead of constantly selling, mix things up a bit. In some emails, simply provide value based content. Perhaps it’s sharing a tip or providing a link to a great article or a video you found somewhere. This will help train your audience to open your emails more often, because they are not always filled with sales ­related content.

Affiliates and bloggers often break this rule the most. E­commerce sites do too, but they have a better excuse. Even if you are an ecommerce site, try to occasionally send an email that is not all about the sales. Maybe it’s a gear list or maybe it’s a tutorial or how­to piece. Just add some element of “give” to balance out the “take” of all the sales emails.

• Get permission to send emails before you add someone to your list

Adding people to your email list who have given you their business card is a common practice, but it’s not okay in this day and age of aggressive anti­spam laws. The same goes for automatically adding someone to your list when they purchase something.

You must make it clear, when someone provides their email to you, that it will be added to your mailing list, and also provide them with the means to easily opt ­out should they desire.

• Send regular emails

Email works best when it’s consistent. Now you don’t need to be sending an email every day or even every week, but the more consistently and frequently you communicate, the more likely it will be that your name or business name will be remembered. And if your email content is good and engaging, your subscribers will look forward to receiving your content regularly.

Prepare to be confronted! In fact the digital marketing world may claim that we are borderline insane, however the powerful variable which continues to influence the serge of the digital marketing industry into the 21st century is simple – Statistics don’t lie.

We are about to expose the most common sense yet alarming statistics that will prove to business owners worldwide why they must ditch their email marketing and list building efforts, in exchange for a social media strategy that will reduce your online marketing costs and will take your business right to the cutting edge.

This strategy has the potential to even explode your lead generation!

The buzz around social media and the willingness of Facebook to welcome the business world into their community is not news, but let’s take a closer look at why your social media strategy SHOULD replace or at the very least work in conjunction with your email marketing efforts.

The Microscope on Email Marketing

You cannot deny the fact that online businesses have been the beneficiary of billions of dollars in revenue that has been generated and directly attributed to email marketing campaigns across the globe. But it’s time to look at the cold hard statistics which would suggest that these numbers are rapidly declining and identify the obvious reasons why.

According to a recent July 2010 Edition of the Email Marketing Benchmark Report released by marketingSherpa, the average open rate of emails in the USA dropped from 14% in half 2 of 2007 to a humble 11.2% in half 2 of 2009.

The decline in email open rates has been attributed to factors like image blocking, increased use of email handheld devices and list fatigue, but the biggest reason is being grossly neglected. It is what we are calling the era of social advocacy – Social Media.

Like that is not bad enough, let’s delve even deeper into this alarming report and analyse specific email sectors and how they have performed. It would be fair to say that most email marketing efforts are generally motivated primarily by a “Marketing” or sales driven message, and if we where to compare the experience and interaction on face book to a specific email sector then that would be “Entertainment” – correct?

Well get a load of this, 2 of the 4 most under performing sectors in the report was the Entertainment sector at 9.2% and even worse, the Marketing sector at a dismal 7.4% open rate.

Why you ask?

In a nutshell, Social Media. Nobody wants to hear about your independent opinions about your discounted products or latest business moves via email, nor do they want to read an email about the next big concert to hit your town. What they want, is to see your news and interactions on social media platforms which is then backed up by the social advocacy and interaction of their family, friends and face book buddies. This is why email marketing is dead and it’s proof – Let’s move on!

Social Media Statistics

So we discussed earlier in this article about the fact that the social media buzz was not news, and you’re all well aware of it. It may well be the case that you just don’t realise how massive it really is until we stack up the statistics to prove it.

Did you know that Facebook proudly claims to have over 500 million members on board (at the time they last updated their statistics page), they are growing at a rate of over 700,000 members per/day at times. We know the younger generation are on there and that is great news for marketing to future consumers. But even more exciting is the recently released figures which are current as of January 4th 2010 which suggest that the fastest growing demographic of people joining face book right now are those people aged between 35 -55 with an increase of over 625% making the membership tallies go from 7.94 million to over 39.6 million in a single year.

These people are business owners, money earning consumers that are looking for your business offerings now. Combine that with the ability of marketing on one platform which is speaking to current consumers and also the youngsters who will be buying tomorrow.

Now let’s look at the growth rate statistics for businesses using Facebook as a means of communicating with their customers. If you are a business owner and not quite convinced yet, then this should remove any shadow of a doubt. A report summary released by emarketer highlights the percentage of businesses in the USA using face book as a means to engage their customers.

The statistics and forecasts by year are as follows;

2008 – 42% of businesses (statistics)

2009 – 58% of businesses (statistics)

2010 – 73% of businesses (statistics)

2011 – 80% of Businesses (forecast)

2012 – 88% of businesses (forecast)

Can you afford not to be using Facebook and Social Media for your business?

The Comparison in Plain English

So the statistics stack up, and we are confident of the fact that we are delivering a cutting edge proposition to the online business community that offers massive benefits. But let’s go even further, much further. For those of you who are not so web savvy, or for that matter don’t control the marketing or creative side of your business then let’s have a look at an obvious, real life scenario to make a comparison.

Let’s say the bullet points below relate to a building company who is running a promotion for a free holiday giveaway:

Email Marketing Method

You write a structured email, and send it to your database/email list

It may or may not make it past the Junk Folder (chances are – if you are email marketing regularly you may be already going to junk folder & don’t even realise it!)

You make it to their inbox – now competing with possibly many other promotional emails

The statistics prove as outlined above that the chances of them opening the email are declining.

The offer is perceived as too good to be true and they delete the email.

You are only reaching out to those people who currently exist on your list.

Social Media Method

You post an update on your face book fan page notifying your audience of your promotion.

Your advocates (clients, customers, family, friends and beyond) begin to comment on such a wonderful promotion. Saying things such as – “You built me a great home Peter, now your offering a holiday? I’m in” or “My house is 1 week from completion, you have done a great job I hope I win the holiday now”

The promotion get shared amongst friends and goes viral (spreads rapidly online)

Your potential customers have engaged your promotion and the telephone starts to ring!

This is a cold hard comparison of why you need to employee a well structured Social Media Strategy and ditch the email marketing. Email Marketing is widely viewed in the modern era as an independent, biased voice of the business which is quickly approaching the point of being worthless.

The new era of social advocacy via Social Media platforms brings credibility, using word of mouth advertising which is only one click away and can be accessed by a worldwide demographic of people which suggests that if Facebook was a nation it would be the second largest country in the world and growing rapidly.

The Obvious Objection Answered

The theory has always been that the value is in the list (email database). And right now, many of you would be fighting a raging debate in your mind over common sense coupled with statistics and comparing that against putting the lifeline of your online customer engagement in the hands of face book and other social media platforms.

What if Facebook bans me you ask?

Well for some time now, businesses globally have been investing billions of dollars each year on digital marketing, and more recently defying broader declines in traditional marketing expenditure around the world. According to a report released by Forrester Research in the USA, in the upcoming year of 2011 it is forecasted that 48% of total retail sales in the USA will be Web-Influenced (as a result of digital advertising) and that amounts to a mammoth gross earnings of over 1115 billion dollars.

So why is this important you ask? Well consider how these sales in the USA and abroad are being generated, according to netmarketshare as of December 2010 Google held a staggering 84.65% grip hold on the global search market.

But guess what, you have and will always be at the mercy and control of Google and it’s leniency as long as search engines remain the priority way to navigate the world wide web. It’s fair to say that 84.65% of all search marketing expenditure belongs at the mercy of Google.

You have invested in SEO, Pay-Per Click, Digital Strategies and so forth. All in the hope that Google allows you to continue to exist on its platform and helps you see a return on your investment. There are some amazing horror stories of small internet marketers, companies and even large corporations whose entire businesses have been held to ransom by Google and there code of ethics.

The reality is, if you operate your online business in an ethical way and apply a holistic approach to your digital marketing you have nothing more to be concerned about, than what already exists. An infinite amount of global business funds has for many years been at the mercy of online giants such a Google and Facebook.

2017 has kick-started with a good repute for several businesses. As everyone is familiar with Email – as a powerful marketing tool, Direct Marketing Association states that marketers can expect an ROI of $38 for every $1 being invested in email marketing. Email considered as the most powerful marketing tactic when it comes to conversions as it has email traffic has converted more than both search and social traffic combined. Whilst Facebook, Twitter are booming, and Video Content taking over other digital channels, even as more digital products are launched than ever before email marketing isn’t often as easy as it has been.

Today search engines and other online sites have become smarter and understand every language tweeted by the people. Even as marketers have developed better marketing plans, strategies and tactics for a better ROI and lead generation, email marketing in businesses have remained unchanged.

In online marketing, marketers need a list of the existing and prospective customers for email marketing and more. Even though email is the single most powerful marketing strategy to get a higher number of conversions with minimum efforts, it can cause more losses than benefits if not done properly.

While the biggest challenge marketer’s face is gaining subscribers and making a list of people for email campaigns, below are few effective list building techniques you can use in 2017:

1. Upgrade the Content: Several experts believe that the content promotion will be more effective in the upcoming years as it helps users get relevant offers and helps marketer segment people to boost their conversion. In fact, content upgrades will be even more effective in 2017 for two reasons:

It allows users to get relevant offers.

It allows you to segment people. In fact, this is so powerful that many email service providers now actively include automation in their package.

2. Expanded Guest Posts: Similar to the content upgrade is the expanded guest post: it is basically you offering a content upgrade inside your guest post on another blog. In fact, ‘Expanded Guest Posts’ also have benefitted many influencers. To gain most benefits by upgrading the content, make guest posts more impressive and practical

i. Make content upgrade a resource for the audience

ii. Create desire by giving early hints in the guest blog about upgrade

3. Run a Contest: Running a contest is an effective tool for list building as it can hastily boost the size of email list. This also creates a better relationship between subscribers and the marketers. Perform a survey to find out the major struggles among the audiences and run a challenge around the same. Ask your audience to subscribe to the email list to participate and win the challenge.

4. Incentive for the subscribers:You can encourage readers to subscribe to your emails by offering them some benefits in the form of a coupon, discount or gift vouchers. While offering incentives just make sure that: Your incentive is relevant to your site and the audience You make it clear to the subscribers that they will get regular emails You deliver the incentives immediately after people sign up for the newsletter.

Conclusion

Just as it has always been in the past, email will still be very important in 2017. Hopefully, you’re able to record a massive increase in the size of your email list by implementing the above techniques.

Never before have we been able to reach more people in less time than now, and all of this by leveraging the power of the Internet and that great application called email marketing software.

E-mail marketing software is very flexible; it can be used in almost every industry you can think of, from the travel industry to law firms. Email marketing is evolving as one of the main marketing mediums of the 21st century. This is really not surprising is it? After all, industry analysts estimate that people in more and more countries have internet access. However, a bulk email program does need to be used with a permission-based email marketing effort. Which means using bulk emailing software which will contact only people in your database who have agreed to receive such emails from you.

So what are the benefits of email marketing software for your business?

Templates anyone? Bless the guy who thought of templates. Nowadays, you do not need to think of mind-boggling color themes, designs and graphics to carry your email message. Any decent email marketing software should have a wide selection of templates you can choose from. However, do not stop here. E-mail marketing software should also provide the leeway for you to come up with your own stationery or designs. Don’t like the templates yet you are not good with designs either? Don’t worry; some providers have an in-house design team that can create an email template just for you for a small price.

Save time and overhead costs. It does not matter if you need to send 10 or 1 million email messages. It only takes one mass email marketing campaign to reach all of them. As such, great email marketing software is one that has good email blast rates. You don’t want those emails taking a week to be sent right?

Ask a question. E-mail marketing software can ingeniously serve as survey software. When you send out an email blast, ask your subscribers or customers questions. Email marketing software can help you come up with these questionnaires. And because everything is done online, your customers are more likely to reply because it only takes up minutes of their time.

Get in touch. Research reveals that you are more likely to retain your clients by simply keeping in touch. Send mass emails about upcoming promotions and discounts and you will see your clients knocking at your door in no time!

Do not guess. You need to know. A marketing campaign is really nothing if you do not even know if you are reaching your target audience. This is one of the great benefits of email marketing software, knowing that email is tracked. Know if your customer received the email, check if he or she opened it, track if they subscribed or un-subscribed to your newsletter. Knowing how your clients are reacting to your marketing effort is key to being able to project sales or planning where your business is headed.

Thousands of people are already reaping the benefits of their email marketing campaigns. Shouldn’t you be too?

Email is common way to communicate and contact customers and is accepted by most people. Most consumers see it as standard practice to give their email address to a business entity when they make a purchase online. But once a business has an email address of a customer or prospect, how can email marketing benefit the business?

An Email List Of Prospects Helps A Business To Grow

To grow your business you need to build a list of emails of both customers and prospects. The best way to do get the email of a prospective customer is to offer something of value for free in exchange for their email address. If a prospect provides you with their email address it shows that they are interested in your business and want to hear more from you.

Email Marketing Increases Conversion Rates

Email marketing is one of the most, if not the most, effective forms of marketing. Email marketing still enjoys a higher ROI (return on investment) than any other online marketing method. The conversion rate for email marketing is shown to be 4% to 7% over time. That’s because a prospect needs to see your message 7 to 8 times before they trust you enough to buy something. Email is the perfect way to do that.

Email Marketing Creates Repeat Customers

The best way to increase sales is to keep your customers happy so that they become repeat customers. It costs 6 to 7 times more to get a new customer than keep an existing one. When somebody has purchased a product from you and you have their email, you can now email them special deals and more value. Email marketing tells your customers about other offerings that they may be interested in. We all love to feel special and everyone loves a bargain.

Email Keeps You Super Close to Your Customers

How often do you check your email? Once a day, twice a day, every hour or more? Email marketing gives you the ability to send messages to your customers any time of the day.

There is no set formula on how often you should send an email to your subscribers. You need to find a pattern and frequency that works best for your business. Your emails should always provide value to your subscribers. If you constantly keep trying to sell to them, they will start to regard you as an interruption and start to unsubscribe from your list.

Email marketing is one of the most effective forms of advertising for small businesses. In order to be successful on the internet and maximise the benefits of the internet, a small business needs to implement a result driven marketing strategy on the internet. The real benefits of the internet can be realised only if a business is able to use the internet to market its products and services.

Email marketing is one of the most effective and fastest growing marketing channels. One of the first steps in a successful email marketing campaign is to build an email distribution list of potential customers. A business can build an email list from a variety of sources including its website.

Managing a substantially large email marketing campaign will require a well planned strategy and may involve the services of a professional marketing company. If you do not have a large email list then it can be purchased easily from a direct marketing company that specialises in email list management. A business can also collect email addresses from potential customers via a newsletter registration form on the website.

Following are some 12 email marketing tips for a small business:

1. Start building an email marketing list of customers

If you do not have an email marketing list you can start building one now. Whether you have a small or a large client base, you can start by first including your existing customers on your email marketing list which you can build upon with time. A small business can start an email marketing campaign from a relatively small list which can expand with time. As new enquiries are received, the list can be expanded. It is a common practice to purchase targeted email list from a professional marketing company.

2. Email registration on your website

Offering customer with a way to register via your website is probably one of the easiest ways to build your own email list. A registration form can be added to your website with ease. The placement of the email registration feature on your website is important and has an impact t on conversion rates. It should be placed on a prominent place on the website. If your website uses a content management system then most likely the newsletter registration feature will be built in.

3. Start a Marketing Newsletter

Sending newsletters to your customers is one of the most effective email marketing techniques. You can start a newsletter on a topic related to our industry. The newsletter can be weekly, monthly or even quarterly. A newsletter provides an excellent opportunity to communicate with your customers on regular basis. You can use the newsletter to subsequently market your own products or services.

4. Improve awareness of your email marketing list

You can take some simple steps to increase the popularity of your email marketing newsletters and growing your email list. Creating a quality marketing email or newsletter requires time and effort so it is best sent out to as many people as possible.

Following are some simple methods to improve awareness about your marketing newsletter or email list and encourage people to register:

o Include a link to register for emails in all email correspondence.

o Include information about your email newsletter in invoices, purchase orders and other company documents.

o Include email registration link in a prominent place on your website and blog.

o Let your team know to inform customers about your marketing newsletter at every opportunity they get.

o Create an incentive to subscribe to your email or company newsletter e.g. discount coupons or prize draws.

5. Follow data protection act

It is vital that you respect customer’s privacy and take all steps necessary to protect customer data collected by your email marketing campaigns. You should not share information without prior consent from the customer. Your email marketing list should be opt in. When customers register their email address they are agreeing to receive marketing emails from you. If you purchase opt-in email marketing lists, you should do so from reliable sources only.

6. Send quality marketing emails

Nothing can be worse fro your branding than sending out a poorly designed marketing email to customers. You should research the content of your marketing email and plan your marketing campaign in advance. The content of the marketing email should be well researched and offer value to customers. It is OK to promote your products and business in your emails but you should try and offer a variety of information. A well balanced email is more likely to succeed than a purely promotional email. If the email you send is full of self promotion and does not offer real value then customers are likely to un-subscribe or opt-out form receiving emails in future. Focus on quality over quantity.

7. Select an appropriate subject for the marketing email

A good subject for the marketing email plays a vital role in deciding how many emails are opened and read by customers. It is important to choose the subject of the email with careful thought and consideration.

8. Design and Layout:

You should plan the structure of the email with care. The layout should be clutter free and easy to read. The design should be clean and minimalist. Use images carefully. Any images used should be optimised for fast loading time. The design should reflect your brand. You should also Include your logo and contact information.

9. Clean-up your email marketing list from time to time:

If you are maintaining your own email list then you should perform basic list maintenance tasks periodically. Any un-subscribed user should be removed from the list immediately. Similarly all old or not working email addresses should be removed. It is better to categorise your list in to different categories so you can pan your emails and send specific information to specific groups. At the same time any new contacts should be added so they are not left out in the next email you send out.

10. Test your marketing campaigns

Whether you send out regular emails or send then less frequently, it is vital that you test your email marketing campaign properly before you send them out. A spell check should be performed. Any links in the email should be checked to see if they are not broken. A good technique is to send a copy to yourself first.

11. Measure the performance of your Email Marketing campaigns

It is important to measure the success or failure of your email marketing campaigns. There are many ways to monitor the performance. The ultimate measure of success is the number of enquiries you receive as a direct result of your marketing emails. Statistics related to your campaign can provide a useful insight. Most email marketing software will allow you to monitor deliver rate, response rate, click rate and so on. You can find out how many emails were delivered, how many were opened and even how many links in the email were clicked. You can use this information to judge the effectiveness of each email that is sent and to plan and improvise on future campaigns.

12. Call to action

An effective marketing email should encourage users to take an action. Including a call to action statement in your marketing emails can improve the chances of conversion. A call to action can be anything from a request for more information to a link to buy a product.

The Internet marketing blog discusses email marketing techniques and other ways and to market your website.