Email marketing on a budget
Email marketing drives more conversions than any other marketing channel – including social and search.
(source: Monetate).
If you are a small business who’s team members wear all the hats, have minimal time and budget but know you need to get out there, email marketing may be the one for you, it is virtually free like social media, but has a higher conversion rate and lower amount of time required to run it.
What is email marketing?
Put simply it is the process of staying in touch with your customers via email past the point of sale or completion of service, reminding them that you are still there with an irresistible note dropped handily into their mailbox.
Email marketing is part of the broader spectrum of Content or Inbound Marketing, this uses valuable ‘content’ in the form of copy, imagery, video or audio to engage your audience and build relationships with a good conversion rate and lower price tag than ‘outbound’ Marketing which is paid for advertising.
It is most likely a mixture of the two would work best for you, and sometimes using paid advertising to kick start a Mail List will reap the rewards, but on a budget pure Email Marketing is a good place to start.
Why email marketing?
Email marketing is not as time consuming as social media as you can set your campaign to run less frequently
Customers are more likely to buy from brands they know and even more likely to buy from brands they have bought from before
Email marketing has a higher click rate than other forms of marketing
Arriving in their inbox you do not have to rely on post visibility
Email marketing ROI is 36:1 as there are no high advertising fees
66% of the customers make an online purchase because of an email
Email marketing is a trigger for impulse buying, so there is a good chance of purchases right after viewing
Auto-responder emails encourage conversion such as if you abandon your cart
Automated emails help increase sales revenue
What is email marketing good for:
Building relationships as opposed to losing touch
Driving traffic to your website
Publicising events, with a direct link to book or add to calendar
Promoting products and offers, triggering impulse buying
Interestingly
While social platforms constantly reduce visibility of your organic post favouring ‘boosted’ paid for posts, email sends your message to all the people on your list. For example if you have 2000 subscribers on each platform, this is what you can expect (source: Mailmunch)
435 people will open your email
120 Facebook fans will see your message
40 Twitter followers will see your message
Setting up your campaign
Do your research
Email marketing gets a bad rap as our inboxes are clogged with it and email providers have started filtering them out before they even get seen, but still if you only have the capacity to do one form of marketing this is a good bet.
We can all name at least 5 promotional emails that we actually like or even look forward to receiving. What is it about these that resonate with us?
Before you start your email marketing campaign do your research, sign up to your competitor’s email lists as well as those from other industries to get a well rounded idea of tone, format, design and overall UX. Don’t copy but take inspiration; what is it about them that would work for your customers? Is it the imagery, is it the design or the simplicity of the text, is it the way they write or what they offer you each time.
Make sure you really know your customers. Knowing how they would like to be contacted and with what information is going to make your email one of those favoured 5.
How do you get to know them? Talk to them.
Choose and set up your platform
There are a number of mail campaign platforms to choose from for small businesses. These 4 that are a good start are:
They all are set up for small businesses and have low cost or free tiers, each will integrate with your website but if you are on a Squarespace platform their built in email marketing is particularly simple to use.
Follow the instructions to set up an account, and each of these platforms will take you through the basics of sending out your first email.
NOTE: it is important to use a designated platform as they handle the privacy and GDPR aspect of what you are doing, unsubscribe is set up as standard for example. Email providers such as Google, Outlook or Apple Mail will prevent you from sending bulk emails and may black list your email address if you do so be warned!
Build your email list
This is an ongoing process but should be automated. Sign-up boxes or pop-ups on your website are the norm, however be aware that this type of request is often ignored or dismissed.
Whichever route you decide, think carefully about:
What you are offering – clearly define what the subscriber can expect to receive
When you are offering it – decide your email schedule and stick to it, continuity is key
How you are offering it – the design of your sign-up
Tone and engagement of words – a generic sign up message will not cut it
Sign up forms and landing pages
Try a form of pop-up that may appear after a certain time on a page or on a certain page type. Better still create a dedicated page or section and spend time letting people know what they get in return for signing up. Even if you use a pop-up, are you offering something they can’t refuse?
Other methods of growing your email list are via online competitions, social media offers, offline flyers, in each case these channels should be offering something in return.
In person
Taking people's email addresses in person can be a good way to grow your list without the need for a persuasion tactic, Perhaps if you are a:
● Fitness instructor – let people know this is how they hear about classes and offers
● Artist – ask visitors at your exhibition if they would like to stay in touch
● Food producer – suggest they will be the first to know about pop-ups and events
The benefits of asking in person is that you already have buy-in of your product by the fact that the person is there, so you are just offering them more of what they already like and you personally are able to sell your brand. You will see chain retail shops always asking you to sign up for their ‘loyalty’ offers at the tills.
Leadmagmantes
Are giveaways in return for personal details such as an email address to subscribe or a sales call. Lead Magmates need to be worth it to your customer for them to hand over these details so must to be well turned out. Examples are:
How-to Guides
Checklists
Templates
Webinars or Short Courses
Online tools
Opt-in forms
Asking people if they would like to sign up to your marketing email at the point of buying a product or service online or filling out a form, is a simple, legal way to encourage subscriptions. Remember if you are offering something good, they will want to sign up.
Plan your email layout
Be honest with your subscribers and tell them truthfully what they should expect from you. Do not send what they did not sign up for. Tell them what kind of content, message, and information they should expect from you and how often. Be very clear about your schedule and try not to make false promises. Think carefully about what it is that would make you sign up to your newsletter.
Choose your template, from those offered by the platform, to fit with the style that your research tells you will work. When structuring the format of your email consider:
Something eye catching – a good stat, funny sentence, grabbing image
Something interesting – an event, nugget of knowledge, shared interest
Something that appeals to my inner bargain hunter
Products or services that may suit me that month
NOTE: always add synopses for each element with a link through to your website or booking /purchasing platform, this drives click through rates, traffic and ultimately conversion.
WIIFM
Remember marketing is not about self promotion but what your customers want. The ‘What's In It For Me’ statement is worth bearing in mind. Your customers will let you know if you are giving them what you want by conversion, and they will let you know if you aren’t by unsubscribing so it is definitely worth checking the progress your emails are making and where you can improve.
Ask yourself
What is the goal of this email? Are you giving the recipients a chance to fulfil it? Be that a purchase or sign up.
Link directly to products on your website or through to Eventbrite to sign up for an event. Take them to your blog to find out about your success stories, knowledge and education or share related content to become a hub for on brand information.
There are five main types of emails:
Blast emails for events or announcements
Monthly newsletter for your core offering
Welcome emails for new subscribers
Reminder emails for abandoned cart purchases
Promotional emails for offers, benefits, and incentives
NOTE: Don't forget to Personalise your emails this is simple to do via your email marketing platform, such as adding your recipient's name, sending different emails for different locations or interests.
Use responsive design
More than 50% of people use mobiles to view emails, before sending out your email send a test to yourself and check on all devices, remembering to click each link.
Email marketing automation
Triggered emails result in 8 times more opens and greater earnings than typical bulk emails.
(Source: Experian)
This is clever, and although a little time consuming to set up, think of all the emails that will automatically be sent out keeping your customers coming back whilst you are busy getting on with running the business.
Each platform offers automation as standard and will have instructions to set up but the flow is;
Step 1 – person subscribes, downloads a lead magnet or enters a competition
Step 2 – a welcome email is received, happy to have you onboard, perhaps with a discount voucher
Step 3 – a few days later, another email is automatically pinged across to them, this is then followed by a few more.
Each of these emails in the flow need to have been carefully written to tell a story and compel your prospective customer to take action. This automation starts at the beginning for each new subscriber not, as with manual newsletters, in the middle somewhere.
The biggest marketing automation benefits are:
saving time
lead generation
higher revenue
customer retention
Use the tools
Most mail platforms are built for ‘everyone’ not just highly technical Marketing Managers so explore the tools they offer, they are there to help you.
Try A/B testing your subject for valuable insight
Send out your campaign at certain times of day, the platform will indicate for your industry
Link up with your social media channels to reach further
Subject titles
There is a science to getting your email subject right and varying hypotheses on how to do that from whether or not to use emojis, caps, exact word count or personalisation in the title. Each platform will give you pointers on this, but just be sensible, be descriptive, write something you would want to open. It should be relevant to your customer’s demands, interests, and likes. It should have elements of value and emotion, so the subscribers feel the need to click on it and read the text.
Housekeeping
Always keep your email list up to date, sending emails constantly to email addresses that have never been opened, or not in the last 6 months, or not removing bounced emails will increase your chances of people adding you to their spam folder. This in turn will tell email providers to move your email straight to spam for all. It is better to have a smaller engaged list than be relegated to spam for, well, spamming, and cheaper mail out fees!
Questions to Ask
To make sure you are measuring your KPIs correctly and keeping track of your email metrics, ask yourself the following questions (source Mailmunch):
Was your deliverability rate high compared to previous campaigns?
Was your open rate lower as compared to your last campaign?
How did your CTR compare to your open rate?
Were your unsubscribe numbers consistent with other emails?
Did a specific subject line perform better than others?
Does the length of email make a difference in CTR?
Did images and videos make a difference in your CTR?
Could another style of CTA perform better?
Was the offer appropriate for the list segment?
Further reading
This article was written for the Digital Springboard