One of the biggest mistakes that entrepreneurs make is solely relying on social media to sell their products to their target market.
While yes, social media platforms like IG, Twitter, and TikTok are all great places to promote what you’re selling and to attract customers, the gag is, you don’t own your social media.
You are not in full control of it.
Just think about it.
Every other day, you have to pivot your social media strategy because Zuckerberg has a new algorithm in place.
Or worse, when shit hits the fan with these social media companies and their tech is down, you find yourself unable to post on IG, and can’t connect with your followers until they say so.
For these reasons and more is why having a solid email marketing strategy is needed.
In this article, you’ll learn how to use email marketing strategically to grow your biz.
But first, let’s get into a few basics.
What exactly is email marketing?
Email marketing is a type of digital marketing where you use emails to connect with current and potential customers, engage with them, and promote your business offerings.
What platforms can I use for email marketing?
Now that you have completed your website or landing page for your biz idea, selecting a company to help streamline all of your email marketing efforts is next.
The email marketing service that you choose will not only help you connect with your customers at scale, but it’ll help you learn more about the people you’re trying to serve.
Depending on which email marketing company you choose, you’ll be offered various services that’ll help you in your business including automation tools, landing page builders, pop-up builders, integration with other marketing and social media tools, A/B testing, analytics, and reporting (because we love data).
Which email marketing services should I check out?
There are literally hundreds of email marketing companies that exist.
Some of our favorites that we’ve used or researched before are:
How do I become a beast at email marketing?
If done right, email marketing can boost your sales, and can also become a new stream of income for your business. Many companies are making good money by selling advertising space in their email newsletters (but that’s another story for another day).
Once you’ve selected your email service, here are some tips to help you along your way:
Email new subscribers within 12 hours
If someone just signed up to receive your emails, they are the perfect people to connect with immediately because they either loved your landing page and opt-in offer, or they are generally very excited about your company and what you have going on. Take advantage of this momentum by talking to them early.
Think about it, it’s just like trying to date someone new. Once you give future bae your number, you definitely want them to reach out sooner than later (if not, you’re gonna feel some type of way).
Using the automated service option in your email marketing software, you can send an automated “welcome” email to your new subscribers. From there, you can send more automated messages as needed as well.
Speaking of automation, if the email marketing company that you’re looking at doesn’t offer automation services for free or for a decent price for early-stage companies, run far away.
Keep it 100
When you’re crafting your emails, be you, be real. People crave authenticity, and being unapologetically you sells. There is nothing worse than receiving an email that sounds like it was sent from a robot and that feels impersonal.
Don’t spam people
Yes, your subscribers like your brand (if they didn’t, they wouldn’t have subscribed), but they don’t want to hear from you all the time. Sending too many emails is a common mistake that businesses make and that results in a lot of unsubscribes or unopened emails.
To combat this, figure out the best day or frequency to send emails. Once you start sending them, test out various timeframes, and then utilize your email marketing reports to determine if you should stick to that timeframe or switch it up.
Be consistent
Once you’ve figured out your email sending frequency, stick to it. People are creatures of habit, and will engage better with your emails if you’re consistent.
Don’t start out sending emails consistently every week, and then disappear for months.
Have a consistent design
As you just learned, consistency is key when it comes to email marketing. By having a consistent and clean design, your subscribers will understand and better connect with the flow of your emails. Even if you’re not a designer, most email marketing companies have templates that you can use to create eye-catching, user-friendly emails.
Be creative with your subject lines (and preview text)
Your subject line and the preview text is one of the most important parts of your email newsletter. What you include in those areas can determine if your email will be opened, will be deleted, or will be opened but unsubscribed to.
The subject line and preview text are the first things that your subscribers will see when they see your email come through. Get to know your audience and learn how to talk to them in a language that they can connect with. Use these findings to craft a subject line and preview text that’s interesting and authentic to your subscribers.
Add social sharing buttons
Adding social sharing buttons to your emails could increase your email subscriber list. People love to spread the good gospel, so if your email is poppin, it’s a good chance they will share it with friends.
Help them help you out by including social sharing links in your email to passively encourage them to share your newsletter.
Add social media follow buttons
It’s a good chance that some of your subscribers found out about your newsletter through a social media channel, but it’s also a good chance they don’t follow you on all of your channels. While crafting your newsletter template, be sure to add social media follow buttons with each social media site that you use so that your subscribers can easily follow you on social.
Add CTAs
CTAs (call-to-action) are mandatory for any good email newsletter. People need direction, so you want to tell them what exactly you want them to do in your email.
Some examples of CTAs that you can include can be clicking on your blog post, clicking on a product page, signing up for a course, or in general for a new offering.
Preview and test all emails
Aht, aht, aht! Before you hit the send button on your email, test it out first. It’s important that you see what others will see before the email officially goes out. By previewing every email, this will allow you to catch any typos, and make adjustments as needed.
Batch create (when you can)
Depending on your business, you can create multiple email newsletters at once, and schedule them ahead of time to be sent. If your business model makes sense for you to do this, batch creating can save you time and will allow you to focus on other things.
Check your analytics
One of the most critical things you can do as a biz owner is listen to and study your customers. In your email marketing efforts, make sure you are reviewing your analytics and reports to see how your subscribers are interacting with your emails. The more you know, the more you grow.
When you’re looking at your analytics, you’ll receive various data, but some of the most important data points to check out are the open rate, click-through rate, and unsubscribes.
Let me break down each one for ya’.
👉🏾Your open rate details how many people click on your email to open it up. If your open rate is low, it typically means you have a lot of unengaged subscribers.
👉🏾Next, your click-through rate, or CTR, details how many people clicked on the links in your email. If your CTR is low, it means that your messaging isn’t captivating enough to persuade your audience to click on your links to learn more.
Having a high open-rate and CTR will not only prove that you’re providing value to your audience, but it’ll also help you bring in those advertising dollars.
👉🏾Finally, your unsubscribe rate tells you how many people have decided to unsubscribe to your newsletter. If you get to the point of having a high unsubscribe rate, this means you need to really take a deep look at your email copy, frequency, and overall strategy with connecting to your audience via email.
While yes, people will unsubscribe because life happens, but you shouldn’t get to a point where over 5% of your subscribers are chunking the deuce each week.
Let’s wrap it up
If you’ve been ignoring email marketing or are new to business, an email marketing strategy is a must.
With email marketing services like the ones aforementioned, connecting with customers and growing your business becomes easy.
By following the steps above, you’ll be on your way to having a poppin email marketing strategy and engaged subscriber list.
Keep in mind however, there really isn’t a cookie-cutter way to this; you have to analyze your data and analytics frequently, pivot when necessary, and ultimately, do what works best for your company and its goals.
What email marketing practices are you excited about implementing today?
Tweet us and let us know how you’ll be leveling up your email game!