Greetings if you have decided to incorporate e-mail marketing as part of your marketing campaign. While the decision to step into this new arena is easy, getting results requires a lot of hard work.

In order to set up a fruitful email marketing campaign that garners a wide customer base, you must focus on providing value to the recipient. If you fail to offer value and only try to sell, recipients will tend to lose interest and unsubscribe.   

Select the Type of E-mail

One of the very first steps is to identify the objective of the campaign and recognize to the target audience is. Keeping these 2 factors in mind, find out kind of e-mails your company should send out. The content must be both useful and engaging.

Begin this by looking at your personal experiences. Go through e-mails that were sent to you from other companies and read through them from the perspective of a customer. Recognize how some of them are nothing but sales pitches. This is something you want to avoid.

On the other hand, there are some savvy companies which send e-mails that readers find interesting and informative. That is your aim! You want to convey the message, without overwhelming or irritating the reader. Note that, sometimes, incentives such as coupons can excite the customers.

Focus on Quality and Frequency

You must understand no one has the time to read long emails anymore. Keep is short and simple. However, do not send multiple short e-mails. Receivers often get annoyed if companies send to many emails within a short span of time.  The frequency depends on typeof business, but it is ideal to send maximum 2 or 3 in the first week, and then gradually decreasing the number.

What You Need to Know About Auto-pilot Programs

Even if you use the auto-pilot option for your program, you cannot ignore the importance of monitoring and evaluating the program. You must analyze the statistics and go through customer feedbacks.

Analyze Results and Take Actions

Assess the situation and act accordingly. For example, if you think the number of people who have recently unsubscribed is too high, you can do the following to improve the experience for user:

1. Boost value
2. Reduce the frequency
3. Shorten the e-mails
4. Limit the amount of selling per e-mail

If you find that number of unsubscriber is low, you can increase the frequency subtly. Some spontaneous mails can be queued in addition to the scheduled e-mails.

Provide Incentives and Watch Your Database Grow

If you provide the right incentives, nothing can stop your e-mail database from growing. All subscribers are important as those who do not buy now, may be potential customers. Give customers a very strong incentive to sign up for the e-mail subscription. This could be a coupon, a discount code, or a gift.

If you can build a successful email marketing campaign, it will not only add profits but also provide brand recognition and recall to your company.

It gets better…
We know what you’re thinking, you now know what you need to do to run a successful email campaign, but how do you get more subscribers? Well we wrote a blog on just that subject right > here

The post How to Build a Successful Email Marketing Campaign appeared first on Prime Eight Blog.

Ok, so we talk to a lot of business’s starting out and looking to grow. Most first time meetings someone will mention that they have got a load of emails.

We ask:

“wow that’s great, so did you create a landing page and collect these emails through people who have opted in or bought perviously?”

The response (1 out of 10 times):

“Nope. We know a guy who scraped a load of emails”
OR
“I’ll have to check where the emails are from”

Both are bad news. First of all, how don’t you know where you got your emails from? That’s useless.

Second of all, email marketing is based on permission. Something you don’t have. So, your “list” is worthless.

The Biggest Scammer We Met

We even had a particular meeting with a scammy individual…

(Who has been reported to the Met fraud division, and has left the country, due to an unrelated business matter)

Who had access to 600K+ emails and for some reason didn’t understand why non of these emails turned into sales when he spammed them. c’mon man. What are you thinking? you don’t even understand the basics of product market fit.

Scraping email addresses can seem like a fast way to build a list of contacts, even if you think they’re relevant emails — you’re just going to introduce your website/product or service as a spammer. Not the best start. Right?

People know when they receive something they didn’t sign up for. You’re just hurting the reputation of your business.

(Harvesting emails in this way is illegal in many countries, including the United States. In fact, the CAN-SPAM Act of 2003 specifically prohibits the practice. )

There’s a very good reason professional marketers do not harvest email addresses through scraping.

Because it doesn’t work.

We know you may have read about some large business’s starting off by scraping emails, and spamming….but we find this hard to believe.

Email harvesting risks
Here’s some other issues.

• You could be flagged as a spammer by email clients and ISPs
• You could be suspended by your SMTP service. No professional SMTP service permits marketers to send unsolicited emails.
• Your bounce rate could skyrocket.
• Your company could be fined by local authorities. Each country has different laws regarding unsolicited emails, and different punishments for violating those laws.
• There’s a case that it effects your SEO badly too.
  https://searchenginewatch.com/sew/opinion/2421290/your-email-marketing-may-impact-your-rankings

CLIFF-NOTE: you know why those scam spam emails you get are so badly worded? You know the one’s — from a Nigerian Prince?

Some reasons:

• To filter out smart users who would immediately recognise the scam, thus ensuring that only the most gullible users respond.
• To read in a way that people with money might imagine a Nigerian would write
• To get past spam filters

Anyway, scraping emails?

Just don’t do it. It’s not smart & its not at all worth it. Build your business properly.

We’d like to hear your thoughts either way.

The post Why You Shouldn’t Mass Scrape Emails & How Doing So Can Ruin Your Business Before You Even Get Started appeared first on Prime Eight Blog.

It’s likely many of your audience members are suffering from email overload. When you’re receiving tens or hundreds a day, it’s hard to stand out. If you use email as a campaign tool, you need to differentiate yourself from newsletters, other organisations, and other emails that your audience is receiving.

It’s imperative that your emails spark interest, starting with your subject line, and ending with the content inside. You need a great subject line to get the open, and you need the content to prove to your readers that your message is worth their time.

How can you boost click through rates?

1.Numbered lists

Lists are great to use to help your audience understand the information provided. When you make it look easy for the reader, there’s a better chance your emails will be opened. The number also signals how much content there is in there for the reader, so make sure you’re providing enough information to get them reading! It also tells them how much time they might need to read the email, which can help produce quality opens, as people won’t be opening, seeing all the content, and clicking away because it’s too much.

2. Using questions

Engaging your audience is a great way to facilitate more opens; posing a questions has been proven as a great method. Using questions can spark engagement with your readers and improve click lines.

There is a line, however, when using questions — something like “What do you have to say?” would likely perform better than a spammy-looking subject like “Would you like to make $100 instantly?”

3. Focus on audience interests

Knowing the personality of your target market can help, as you can utilize information you know about them to engage. For example, a headline that uses a favoured sports team can garner more attention than one that uses a generic sports headline.

Depending on the amount of information known and level of outreach, it’s possible be incredibly detailed with your emails, customizing them for your customer. This means you can take advantage of visible customer segments and tailor emails to the audience.

4. Use symbols

Using symbols can help your emails stand out more. Some may even use emoji if it suits their message or demographic. Unicode symbols are also recognized by a wide range of email services, and can help you add some visual interest to your subject lines.

As an example, if you have the correct information, you can connect with your audience on a cultural level. Using information you know, (e.g. you’re sending a birthday email out to a segment of your audience) use the zodiac symbol to help your message stand out.

5. Use wit

Puns, rhymes, and jokes add interest and can increase your open rate. Make it company-relevant as well — e, g. if you’re in the pet business, you can try a play on words, such as “You’re Pawsome!”

6. Timing

The saying tells you that timing is everything, and it’s true. Being strategic with your send time can help you see results. If you’re in the restaurant business, for example, sending a message to your audience just before a meal time that you’re open for would likely result in increased engagement due to the likely hunger levels of your readers.

7. Pretend it’s Twitter

If you’re on Twitter, you know how to say a lot with a little. The 140 character limit has probably made you frustrated at one point when you try to talk about the latest in your world.

However, this is a great approach to take in your email marketing strategy. You want your emails to be short, precise and to the point. For example, if you want to promote your newest products, imply introduce the topic, add a preview, and indicate where those that are interested can go to see what you’re promoting.

8. Use a Call to Action

Adding a Call to Action can incite urgency in readers, which can lead to higher opens. If you can’t fit it in naturally (e.g. Don’t Miss Out! 50% Off), you can add it in brackets at the end of the subject line. Something like “Shop Our Shirt Sale [Ends Tomorrow]” uses both a call to action and sparks urgency.

9. Utilize Preview Text

When viewing emails in an inbox, both the subject line and a preview of the email content are shown. Using the preview to further elaborate on your subject line or adding more information can help increase your open rate.

It can help complete the hook of the subject line — for example, Buzzfeed commonly uses a generic statement that is explained by the preview text, starting the engagement with their audience that much sooner.

10. Adding Trigger Words

Certain terms can appeal to readers in that it triggers an action like an open. For example, using terms like ‘free delivery’ can increase open rates, as compared to emails that don’t use those terms.

11. Be Specific

Make sure your audience knows why you’re contacting them! If your subject line is vague and uninspiring, your audience will not know the purpose of your email, nor will they feel compelled to know more.

As an example, LinkedIn is incredibly specific as to why they’re reaching out. Whether they want to let you know about new posts from your connections, or if a contact has joined, you’ll know immediately based on the subject line.

12. Incentivise

Saying thanks may not be enough when someone opts-in to your email list. Turn a casual reader into an engaged customer by giving them another reason to engage with you. Examples include a discount with a first-time subscriber code, an immediate call to action, and drawing attention to the benefits of receiving your emails.

Need some headline inspiration?

1. “Jane, You Might Like These” — personalization is a great way to grab attention!
2. “You Only Have 6 Hours Left!” — create urgency with your subject line
3. “6 Tips To Accelerate Your Clicks” — provides a preview of your content without describing any one tip in general.
4. “How To Be Productive” — touting benefits is a great way to get people reading.
5. “You’ll Love What We Have Today” — emphasizing personalization without having to use a name.
6. “Surprise! 24 Hours Only” — intrigue your readers with something that’s unexpected.
7. “Where to Eat, Now” — combine this with a strategically scheduled send out time and capitalize on how your readers are feeling.

The post 12 Hints to Boost Your Email Clicks (and 7 Strategic Subject Lines) appeared first on Prime Eight Blog.