Strong email marketing lets you reach your audience directly, personally and effectively. But how do you get the most out of it? We share practical tips to make your email marketing campaigns even more effective.
What does email marketing actually involve?
Many people immediately think of a newsletter when they hear email marketing. But it goes much further than that. You can use email in all kinds of smart ways to reach your audience. Automation plays a big role in that. A few examples:
- A follow-up after an order
- A discount code for a user’s birthday
- An email when a product is still sitting in the cart
- A job alert when new vacancies are posted on the website
An important aspect of email marketing and one of the essential tips: make sure you have permission from customers before you send emails. That has to do with current legislation.
So whether you want to start a newsletter full of news and discounts or set up automated funnels for your online store: email marketing is the ideal tool for it. These days we read many of our emails, if not most of them, on our phone. In this era, responsive email marketing is no longer a tip but a must.
Tips for the most effective email marketing
• Personalize your emails
We like receiving emails in our inbox that are meant for us. Information or offers we can actually do something with. By personalizing your emails you not only catch the attention of your audience, you also improve the chance of turning a reader into a loyal customer. It starts with choosing the subject and the right users. Make sure you know what your (potential) customers need and tailor your content to that. Split your mailing list into groups with shared interests, behaviors or needs. That makes your campaigns more targeted and more effective.
Make sure your headline and description appeal and activate; after all, they determine whether someone clicks your email or not.
You can add personalization at the detail level too: use merge tags, for example, to address users by their first name or company name. Personalized emails raise your open rate and help you build a relationship with your users. So avoid generic mailings and personalize your emails.
An example of merge tags in a newsletter.
• Do not make it too commercial
Of course you want your newsletter to generate leads or sales, but your audience is not waiting for pure promotion. They are looking for valuable tips and in-depth information within your industry. Not just a sales pitch about the newest sports shoes, but also advice on how best to clean them or what to look for when buying a new pair. Offer added value, not advertising.
Too many calls to action can distract. Decide up front what your main goal is and make sure your readers are guided there effortlessly.
• Use automation smartly
Smart automation is the key to effective email marketing and one of the most important tips for getting more out of your email campaigns, especially for online stores. Send an automatic confirmation after a purchase, remind a customer about an abandoned cart or offer a discount code after months without an order. Set these emails up once and see the benefits right away, such as more conversion and stronger customer loyalty.
• Add interactive elements
To create more interaction with your recipients, add interactive elements. Stand out among the static emails of competitors and raise reader engagement with things like a hover element, a form or a slider or carousel. Check carefully whether all these elements are well supported. It would be a shame if a large part of your audience could not see them properly.
• Keep improving with A/B testing
Keep optimizing your emails continuously to get the best results from your email marketing. You do that with A/B tests: you make two versions of an email with just one small change and compare which one performs better. That way you can test different elements, such as the subject line, the content or the sender name. Find out what works best for your audience and keep improving.
JKC gets to work for you
Beyond these handy tips, we are happy to support you with your email marketing. We take the technical part off your hands, work with the email marketing software Mailchimp and create engaging content that fits your audience. From strategy and design to execution: we make sure your emails stand out in the inbox. With the right tone of voice and effective calls to action we move your audience to convert, again and again.
