If your marketing emails aren’t converting potential customers, it could be because you aren’t saying what leads really want to hear (or read). While some of that can depend on factors specific to each lead — their industry, company, or job title, for instance — a big reason that many of them can lose interest is that you aren’t telling them something new.
Why “New” Matters
“New” is what keeps leads engaged, because new is interesting.
Pretend you’re a member of your target audience. Imagine you, as a lead, get an email from your company talking about a product or service, followed by a call to action that prompts you to buy. You decide now isn’t the right time, you respond “no, thank you” (we assume), but then get another email the following week about the same product or service, with the same CTA.
Would you lose interest? Probably. Would you read another email from your company the week after that? Debatable, since you can already guess what its message will be.
Your leads will start to act the same way if you’re constantly telling or asking them the same things.
We’re not saying that you have to keep coming up with different products and services in order to keep your offering fresh. What we are saying is that you need to change your tactics for how you present that material.
That’s where follow-up and content emails work to your advantage.
Follow-Up Emails
Follow-up emails are important for engaging leads regardless of where they are in the buyer’s journey. We’ll be focusing on those for marketing, but you can learn how they — and the concept of newness — also apply to your sales, courtesy of Sales Hacker.
Follow-ups are meant to be more personalized than the other types of emails you typically send. They rely on direct language that asks leads about their businesses, and prompts them to have a call. Are these emails automated? More than likely. Will leads recognize that they’ve become part of an email list? Probably, because unsubscribe options should be visible to comply with CAN-SPAM. Does automating follow-ups decrease their effectiveness? Not if you use them correctly.
Most leads know that the emails they receive from other companies are automated. (They probably use some form of email automation themselves!) But that automation shouldn’t matter as much if email message bodies contain what leads really want: material that they can relate to that’s timely, helpful, and different.
Does that still sound like a tall order? Let’s consider how you might go about doing this without making it overly complicated.
Follow-Up Examples
A follow-up sequence of emails usually works better if you incorporate pain points that your leads are experiencing, or share bits of industry knowledge.
We’ll start with a basic outline that you can apply to your own business. Please note that this is merely one example series of many, many, many combinations, and that the intent is really what matters.
Email 1
Hi Jane,
Has your team been having trouble with [x] lately? We’ve seen a lot of success by implementing [y], because it [explain how ‘y’ is a solution].
Would you be interested in trying the same with your team?
(Since you don’t want to sound like a broken record, try sharing knowledge in your next email.)
Email 2
Hi Jane,
I wanted to make sure you were aware of the recent changes with [aspect of the lead’s market]. Does your team have any questions about them?
(Next, you might try mentioning the lead’s competitor or market counterpart to establish your knowledge of their industry.)
Email 3
Hi Jane,
You will not believe how [company in the same market] was able to fix their [pain point]!
They used [solution]. Seriously.
Has your team tried that one before?
Again, your emails don’t have to mirror this example series exactly. They can be more formal, longer, or include links to webpages and content. They can include images and buttons, too, if you find those helpful. The main takeaway behind all of these options is that they aren’t the same, and they don’t focus on the same things each time. Their calls to action are different, and they’re written to sound like a person is talking to them.
And they certainly aren’t the only emails that can benefit from this approach.
Content Emails
Content emails also offer what leads really want, and they’re arguably easier at doing so. Why? They allow for much more variety and newness.
Ideally, content serves three purposes: educate your audience, establish your credibility, and prompt your leads to take some kind of action. That action might be responding directly to your email, or clicking on a link to a specific landing page to make a purchase. Regardless of what that action is, there needs to be one. And regardless of what information you deem to be educational, it needs to be interesting and different each time you send it out.
Content emails may or may not be as personalized or direct as follow-ups, but they’re often longer than them in order to share details, knowledge, and solutions.
Content Example
Say that you wanted to write an email about this blog post. Here’s what that might look like.
Hi Jane,
Are you frustrated that your leads don’t respond to your marketing emails like they used to? The problem could be that your messaging has become too predictable.
Your follow-up emails and content are still important to a successful lead generation strategy, as long as you’re always sharing something new. Here are a few examples you could try.
How about a call later this week to talk about them?
We Can Help You Share What Leads Really Want
We’ve helped other organizations like yours improve their lead management when it comes to inbound marketing and outbound prospecting, website design, social media, and content development. If you’d like assistance with your own outreach, we’d love to hear from you! Click the link below to contact us.
