Myth: People hate being marketed to via email. In all actuality, research supports that people read most of their emails and do not mind frequent emails as long as they are relevant, interesting and specific to their needs.
Email marketing gets a bad reputation as one of the more spammy marketing channels. The Federal Trade Commission even governs how businesses can send emails to consumers via its CAN-SPAM Act, which establishes requirements for commercial messages, gives recipients the right to unsubscribe and spells out tough (read: up to $41,484) penalties for violations.
Europe is even tougher. On May 25, the European Union’s General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) went into effect, which will significantly enhance protection of EU citizens' personal data and require "businesses to protect the personal data and privacy of EU citizens for transactions that occur within EU member states."
So, what is one of the biggest ways this will impact marketers? Under GDPR, organizations can only email those who have consented (opted-in) to receive email. Failure to comply could mean fines exceeding 20 million Euros or 4% of annual global turnover (whichever is higher).
But this does not mean email is dead. A whopping 59% of B2B marketers report that email marketing is their most effective channel for generating revenue, and marketers continue to find ways to innovate (emojis in subject lines, anyone?).
In 2016, we began working with property management software provider ResMan to focus on improving its online conversion rate and drive more traffic to its website. To improve conversions, our company outlined a strategy using social media, online advertising and email marketing to pull qualified prospects to the ResMan website. The result? Website traffic increased 268% year over year.
If you are not getting the same returns you used to in your email campaigns, it may be time for you to evolve. Consider the following:
Opt-In List
Are you used to purchasing lists that your competitors have already blasted over and over? It's time to start revamping (or building, if you have not already) your opt-in email list.
The easiest way to get a good opt-in email subscriber base is to offer visitors something of value, such as a content download like an infographic, webinar or a discount on a product or service in exchange for their email information.
Email Segmentation
As mentioned earlier, consumers do not mind being targeted by email as long as that email is relevant and specific to their needs. One way to make sure your message is relevant to your company’s prospects is through email segmentation.
Email segmentation involves dividing up your subscriber list into smaller segments based on specific criteria. It is generally used to personalize emails, making them more relevant to subscribers based on criteria such as geographic location, interests or behavior (such as purchase history), just to name a few.
According to the Direct Marketing Association, "segmented and targeted emails generate 58% of all revenue."
Email Autoresponders
An email autoresponder is an email or sequence of emails that are automatically distributed to your subscriber list after being triggered by a certain event, such as when consumers sign up for your email newsletter, abandon their shopping cart, download an e-book or purchase a product.
Email autoresponders help nurture your leads, turn them into customers and free up your time to focus on other important tasks for your business. Combined with email segmentation, email autoresponders are an extremely powerful tool.
Retargeting
Retargeting works by dropping cookies into your website visitors’ browsers. When they leave to visit other websites with retargeting ads enabled, your ad will be displayed, keeping your brand top of mind.
Website visitors who are retargeted with display ads are 70% more likely to convert on your website. And the great news is that retargeting is not just for websites. You can also retarget prospects who open your marketing emails.
Retargeting networks (including Facebook) also allow you to upload email lists to their servers, which is a worthwhile strategy for testing with old, dormant emails that have been sitting in your company’s CRM for years.
Other Ways To Use Your Email Lists
There are other unique things you can do with your email list, such as taking a list of your current customers’ emails and uploading them to Facebook using the Facebook Custom Audience tool. Then, use the Facebook Look-a-Like Audience tool to advertise to Facebook users with similar characteristics to your current customers.
A Multichannel Approach
Some businesses make the mistake of always looking for the next hot thing in marketing and advertising. One month it's Instagram, and the next month it's Snapchat.
But the best digital marketing strategies do not involve putting all of your eggs (dollars) in one basket (channel). Instead, they focus on a multichannel approach. And in terms of multichannel, email’s not going anywhere anytime soon. Maybe we can revisit when your C-level executives start sending each other Snapchat messages instead of emails.
