Automated email campaigns have become fairly common these days, which is both good and bad: good, because we know it works; bad, because you’re fighting everyone else for some inbox coverage. You’ve probably seen how-to tips and suggestions about when the best days and times are to send those messages, or what words you should and shouldn’t include in your subject lines to increase your open rates. But we’re here to give you a breakdown of the absolute, barebones essentials we’ve learned that you need if you want your campaigns to be more successful.
First…
Make your message relevant
We’re gonna throw out a couple more numbers for this one: 2, the number of requirements an email needs to improve its chances of being opened; and 3, the number of factors to consider when drafting its core message.
Open requirements include: segmenting your database of contacts, and personalizing the messaging that goes to each. For example, if you sell to hospitals and manufacturers, you can’t talk about patients with both and expect the same level of engagement.
Content factors include: discussing the pain points of your leads, identifying industry trends that affect their business, and relating both to how customers and followers are currently interacting with your brand.
Let’s dig a little deeper into this last part. Industry trends are typically easy to learn through a simple Google search. Addressing pain points usually relies on your sales team’s feedback that they’ve collected from current and former customers, as well as leads that didn’t pan out.
But brand interaction? That’s the most involved. It requires you to evaluate all of your digital channels to get a feel for what’s working, and what isn’t. So, even though we’re focusing here on what makes a better email campaign, keep in mind that website design and social media can also influence that success. If your website analytics tell you that most people spend time on a specific landing page, write emails that use those same keywords. Repeat that process for social posts that get a lot of impressions, likes, or comments. Then review the results of your email campaigns to see if doing so benefited your open and click rates.
Include a call to action
When email automation was still fairly new, marketers touted less selling and more educating. That education aspect is still important today, but it’s also become apparent that leads need a call to action to help them understand what they need to do if they’re interested in taking the next step in the buyer’s journey. That call to action doesn’t have to be a hard sell or come with the expectation of an immediate response. It doesn’t even have to be included in the same email. At some point, though, you need to encourage your leads with prompts like:
- Click here to read more.
- Can we have a conversation?
- May I send you a quote?
- Do you have time for a brief demo?
Send consistently — but not too often
There’s a fine line between persistence and desperation. Your leads won’t mind if you email them consistently (e.g., once or twice a week), because it’ll likely take several touchpoints before they’re ready for a call. But when you hammer them daily, don’t be surprised if you see more of them opt out of communication with you. If you have a long sales cycle, or your customers have already told you that they aren’t currently looking for your services, it also doesn’t make sense to continue inundating their inboxes. That just runs the risk of looking like junk mail or spam, which can hurt your sender reputation and search engine ranking.
One thing’s for certain: you won’t find a shortage of tools out there when it comes to automating your email campaigns. But what you may still need is the knowledge and expertise on how to draft effective email messaging. If that’s the case, we’re ready to help. Click the link below for a free digital marketing consultation.
