Email marketing
Email marketing is essential. It all started with email, which made its first appearance in 1965. It was not until the end of the 90s that email became popular. Nowadays, email is an omnipresent means of communication. In France, more than 1.4 billion emails are sent per day. Emails are therefore not about to leave our daily lives. This is why it is relevant to send part of your communication through emails.
What is Email Marketing ?
As we have just seen, email is a ubiquitous communication medium. Together we will approach a marketing practice that allows you to develop your business via emails. This marketing practice is Email Marketing. Also called e-mailing, this solution consists of designing and sending emails to promote products and services. Many benefits arise from Email Marketing and we will see that together.
The Advantages of Email Marketing
Email is an ideal communication channel. Indeed, it is both digital and traditional, so it has many advantages. Email marketing allows you to reach a large part of the population. Email marketing brings together all mailbox users. Compared to other means of communication, the cost of an email is insignificant. Its low cost means that the email has a very good return on investment.
When you communicate by email with a contact, it is necessarily a user who gravitates around your sector of activity. He may already be a customer and wish to receive promotions or simply be a prospect and subscribed to the newsletter. Your contact is therefore targeted, making email an excellent means of communication to capture the attention of your audience.
You can personalize your speech with email marketing. This is one of the many benefits of this type of marketing. There are other advantages. Like the fact that the content of your emails is personalized according to your communication campaigns. The objective is to make your contact feel that they have a unique and privileged relationship with you.
The emails are therefore customizable. Indeed, thanks to multiple options, but it doesn’t stop there! You also have access to tracking statistics which are essential to know your opening rate, but not only that!
As you will have understood, email marketing has many advantages, however you must remain vigilant, because this process is not perfect and we have identified some of its biggest flaws for you.
The Disadvantages of Email Marketing
Despite its many advantages, email marketing is not flawless. To begin with, it is difficult to build a reliable database allowing effective email sending. Once your address list is established, you must create relevant emails that respect your graphic charter as well as your vision. Finding the right tone and the most effective wording can be very tedious.
If you want to send your emails massively, you will come up against a first obstacle. We call it SPAM, in fact you risk falling into the trap of unwanted emails if you send your emails in any way. Mass sending of emails, this method is useful if you use an emailing tool. This condition therefore implies knowing your tools well. A learning phase is necessary in order to understand how the functionalities of your tool work.
The last gray area that we would like to clarify regarding email marketing is the fact that it is impossible to modify your email once sent. This may seem obvious, but be aware that an email with a spelling or grammatical error sent to hundreds of contacts can tarnish the image of your company. So, be careful. Notwithstanding the disadvantages of email marketing, we advise you to take an interest in this communication solution and implement it. To do this, you must know the different types of marketing emails as well as the best practices related to this marketing process.
The different types of marketing emails
In order to succeed with your email marketing, it is important to know the different emails that you can send as part of this marketing process. This is why we are going to see together a non-exhaustive list of the types of emails to use.
Start your email marketing off right with a welcome email
This type of email is used to welcome customers. It is generally sent to users who have registered on a shopping site, it allows you to highlight a promotional offer or a bonus linked to a purchase. The content is intended to be welcoming and in line with the tone you use on your site. Welcome emails can also serve as a short presentation of the company to new customers.
Notify using email marketing: the email newsletter
Also called newsletters, this type of email is used to inform customers and users registered for your newsletter. The content is generally designed to highlight new products and services offered by the company. You can find the latest blog article written there, customer reviews as well as a call to action. This call does not concern one of the elements present in the email, it can be an invitation to consult the blog or access the product page.
Email marketing: transform your leads into customers with lead nurturing email
Your email address collection will allow you to establish a list of leads. These potential customers are opportunities for you. They can be turned into customers. And it is with this in mind that you must write your lead nurturing emails. Target a specific audience and convert them into customers. For example, users who gave an opinion during a questionnaire on a specific product may be led to purchase said product.
Confirmation email
The confirmation email is used sparingly. We send this email to everyone who has subscribed to your newsletter or who recently purchased an item online. The content of this email serves to reassure customers. We confirm their purchases. Or we indicate that they are registered to receive future newsletters. Other actions can be included in the email, such as offering products similar to those recently purchased by the customer.
Dedicated emails
Via the criteria of your choice, you can precisely target your audience. This will allow you to have a very precise speech to address your contacts. For example, we can cite inactive customers who may receive an email with text oriented towards new features on the store or encouraging a purchase with a humorous promo code recalling the user's activity. Here again it is up to you to find what best suits your brand image and your sector of activity.
E-mails d’invitation
Invitation emails
Promotional emails
The essential promotional email had to be in this list. Send it to a wide audience during your sales or for stock liquidation. You must encourage the reader to be interested in the products mentioned in the emails. To do this, a quick presentation may be welcome. It's up to you to find the right balance and the necessary tone to make customers want to take advantage of your promotions.
Survey Email
In order to be as close as possible to our customers, we recommend collecting their opinions and comments about your products. This helps show that you care about your customers. In addition to that, reviews can help you improve your services. Showing that you take customer opinions into account helps improve your brand image.
Seasonal Marketing Emails
The seasons pass and your catalog evolves. Take advantage of the annual chestnut tree to highlight upcoming promotions such as Christmas, Mother's Day or Valentine's Day. There are numerous opportunities throughout the year to communicate events to your customers, for example you can send a special email for your contacts' birthday.
How to do email marketing
The benefits of email marketing are undeniable. Despite some flaws, this marketing process is effective. It is in your best interest to use this solution, but beware of the difficulties and defects linked to this marketing technique. So that you can be more confident about email marketing, we have selected some information for you that will allow you to do email marketing.
Collect emails legally
Comply with the principles of the GDPR (European Data Protection Regulation). To do this, you must integrate the opt-in mechanism. It allows users to obtain their consent to use their data for commercial purposes. You must also give your prospects the opportunity to click on an unsubscribe button. This button allows you to no longer follow your emails.
Segment your email list
You must segment your contact list, that is, break it down into several small lists of people with similar characteristics. The advantage is to be able to have very specific lists of users meeting precise criteria allowing you effective emailing. It’s up to you to optimize the segmentation of your contacts.
Take care of sending your emails:
Since sending email is a direct communication channel between you and your recipients. So take care of the content of your message otherwise you risk landing in your targets' SPAM folder. Avoid the commercial lexical field. Limit your visual content so as not to have emails that are too heavy to open. The image/text ratio must be 40/60 or 50/50 maximum. Beyond that, you risk being automatically sent to your recipients’ spam emails. A neat email will be more effective and will encourage readers to take action.
Create a pleasing design
Make sure you respect the image/text ratio. You must also make your text want to be read. Hire a copywriter if you want to achieve an effective result. At the same time, the images and their integration into the email must be done with a certain attention to detail. Do you feel like an artist? You can create one or more images. We advise you to work with a graphic designer who can create personalized images for you.
Personalize your exchanges
We have said it many times, email marketing is a communication channel that allows you to send a message to a mass of recipients. At first glance, it's child's play, you just need to send key information to the people to whom our emails are addressed. However ! If you don't personalize your communications, then the reader will have the impression of reading a commercial email like any other that is sent to hundreds of other people.
Your role must therefore be that of a magician who gives the illusion that despite its appearance as an email for commercial use, your mail is personalized for each recipient. The goal is to make each email unique. This makes the relationship you will have with your prospects unique. This choice helps strengthen your brand image and the loyalty of your customers.
To achieve such results, you must adjust the language of your email so that it matches your brand image. But that's not all, it is essential to personalize your emails with options. You can ensure that the recipient's first name is present in the email. Segment your emails correctly. Moreover, you can display details such as the recipient's company if you are doing a B2B activity.
Don't buy an email list:
If there is one thing we ask you to do it is to create your own contact list. Forget email list purchases, it's a bad idea. Firstly, you expose yourself to legal problems related to the GDPR. In fact, you do not know in what context the email addresses were collected.
Let's get out of the legal aspect. Simply ask yourself this question: “Are the recipients of this list interested in my activity?” You don't know where all the recipients come from. So it’s a safe bet that the majority of them don’t know what your company does. Therefore, if you send an email you are very likely to come across people who are not your targets. Segmenting these new contacts is difficult. What should you base your criteria on? You have no legal information about them other than their email address.
There may be adverse consequences for your business. A failed email marketing campaign has a chance of tarnishing your brand image. Indeed, people on the purchased list may consider you SPAM. And this even if you miraculously land out of spam.
Use a professional agency
By using a professional agency in the field of email marketing, you can be sure of obtaining positive results. An agency takes care of the choice of tools as well as the writing of your campaigns. In-house, a graphic designer can create your email illustrations. In summary, attractive text and personalized images in your brand colors will be present to catch the eye of recipients.
An agency can take care of the semantics and management of your database. This allows you to gain efficiency. This allows you to create lists consistent with your marketing campaigns and improve their accuracy. Collaborating with an agency allows you to obtain concrete results. You ensure regular email marketing that avoids common errors. In order to evolve at the pace of your contacts and their needs. To improve the email conversion rate, agencies use A/B testing phases. This aims to determine the most optimal form of your email.
Email marketing is a great way to get closer to your customers and create an emotional connection to build loyalty in your community. The image that people will have of your brand will be even more radiant. So, put all the chances on your side to succeed by contacting professionals.
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