Marketing products and services to potential consumers isn’t new. The countless examples of marketing we have today and the quest to convert prospects into sales is never ending. Marketers often use every possible weapon in their arsenal to drive sales, and today many still turn to email marketing as one possible route to success. But does email marketing work?
The Benefits of Email Marketing
Believe it or not, there are some serious benefits to using email marketing above and over other marketing methods. With nearly 4 billion email users around the world, it’s an excellent method to reach out and touch someone. In fact, two out of every three customers admit to making purchases directly because they received a marketing email. Email is also much more effective than other online forms of marketing, even social networking. In fact, research says that Facebook and Twitter together are nowhere near as effective as email.
What Else Email Marketing Can Do
So we’ve gone over why email marketing is such a valuable tool. But we have yet to touch on how email marketing can truly be effective in a more granular way. There are dozens of strategies and tactics when it comes to maximizing your return on email marketing, but here are a few of the most well-known and well-proven capabilities:
- Lead generation: offer subscribers value and they’ll be happy to provide personal information that can help you turn a cold prospect into a warm one.
- Nurture those leads: promote your newest products and services to a target audience that you know is already at least partially engaged to begin with.
- Relationship building: This engagement you’re encouraging with your target audience can be personalized, further building on your relationship.
- Increase brand awareness: Your company and its products and services will never be far from the minds of your prospects, making them likely to choose you instead of a competitor when they’re ready to engage.
- Content promotion and marketing: Email is an excellent tool for not just promoting your products and services. Using email to share value-added assets like blog content with your prospects is highly beneficial.
Getting Email Marketing Done Right
The benefits to email marketing are many, but you can’t access any of these benefits unless you approach the actual mechanics of this marketing method correctly. You don’t want your email to be lost in the mailboxes of your prospects, and that means implementing an effective strategy to send emails that people want to open and read. You need to have a clearly defined audience and have some straightforward goals for your campaign. You also need to plan out how you’re going to populate your email list, schedule how many emails you’ll be sending out and how often, and most importantly you’ll need to ensure the content of those emails are going to contain a persuasive enough call to action to bring these prospects in from the cold!
The Last Word on Email Marketing
Email marketing works. Its excellent return on investment and its versatility and flexibility make it a real contender for your next marketing campaign. Give it a try today and see the difference email marketing can make!