What you should know about email marketing today

Email marketing might not be the most exciting channel to use when doing digital marketing, but it should definitely not have any less priority for that reason. Emails are actually one of your most important, and most reasonable, channels you can use to reach your target group.

Studies find that emails are still a more effective tool to use to be seen, to convert and to increase sales (also per customer) than other channels, like e.g. social media.

Automate your marketing

Automating your email marketing does not only save you time, it also makes it possible to increase your conversion rate and income.

Automated emails have both significant higher open rates and click rates than non-automated emails.

This can be explained by the following reasons:

Automation offers the opportunity to trigger campaigns by one or several set actions, as a great alternative to sending a general email to your entire list.
Automation makes it easier to send leads and customers emails according to where they are in the buying process, and the emails are therefore more relevant for them.
With the help of a great automating tools you can personalize and customize your emails (see more below).

75% of income from email marketing from trigger campaigns according to DMA.

How many emails should one send?

A study by WholsHosting finds that you increase the possibility for one or more emails to be opened if your send four emails a month. This might however vary depending on your target group and the content of your email. Some testing might be needed.

Stand out and ensure that your emails are personalized

Emails with a personalized subject line, as well customized content, are both more likely to be opened and have a higher click rate, and therefore as a result lead to higher sales than general emails.

Use first/last name in subject line and customize the introduction and content to their tagged interests and/or previous activities and sales.You can, if your branding allows, also use emojis in the subject line to stand out in what is most often quite dull inboxes.

Make sure your emails are mobile friendly

According to Campaign Monitor, about 53% of emails are opened on a mobile device. If one email private customers/email addresses the percentage is probably higher.

Gmail find that 75% of their users open/read their emails on a mobile device.

One should also expect this percentage to increase, as the number of people with a smart phone are increasing rapidly. Don’t forget to take this into account when you add links in your emails, e.g. to landing pages, these must also be mobile friendly.

E-mail marketing compared to social media

It is more likely that your email will be seen and opened than someone to see and click on a link in a tweet.

You should be able to expect that 90% of emails reaches peoples inboxes, compared to Facebook showing about 2% of your followers your post in their feed.

Emails has also been found to have a higher conversion rate, and are 40 times more efficient than social media to get new customers. Sales through emails are also likely to be larger than e.g. from sales through social media marketing. According to DMA do email marketing has an average ROI of 3800%!

Take care of your customers!

82% of businesses say client retention is cheaper than client acquisition.

By using automated email campaigns and trigger campaigns you can easily ensure that customers receive a follow up and customized information.

Some simple examples:

Send an email a month after their latest purchase to see if they are happy with the product
Remind customers a certain time after their purchase when they are likely to buy again or need refill
Congratulate them on their birthday
Send them relevant information about other products they are likely to be interested in.

Let your customer know you appreciate them, this is likely to keep your customers loyal and even tell their friends and family about you.

Data Protection compliance

Choose an email system that is compliant with international regulations. Even if you do not yourself operate in a region where you need to be compliant, you are still required to comply with the regulations if you have email addresses from such countries.