Reach your market with an email campaign

Email marketing can often be overlooked in terms of importance to a business Not only is it important for shouting about products and services to try and encourage a sale, it’s also great for customer service and press releases to keep your customers up to date with your businesses developments.

An email census released in March by Econsultancy (sponsored by Adesta) found that 78% of the 1000 respondents rate email as being excellent or good in terms of return on investment (ROI). The same report found that 54% of the responding organisations send a minimum of 50,000 emails each month

So if you agree that email marketing is a powerful tool what does your company have to do to set itself apart from the millions of other emails flying about the ether at any given point and why bother with a campaign in the first place?

Why bother?

It’s cheap and fast to create and send a campaign.
It’s measurable – Amongst other things you can see how many have read the email, clicked a link and forwarded it on.
It can spread – Your mail can be forwarded on at a click of a button and reach further than just your initial database.
It can encourage impulse buys and reminds your customers that your company exists!
It can appear more personal as you can customise the mail to include your recipients name etc

How to run a successful campaign

Make it worth their while

Consider including a special offer or discount code to encourage readers back onto your site with any luck it will be forwarded onto their friends and you will reach a whole new audience! Not convinced that a discount is worth it? Well, an e-dialogue survey found that 42% of their respondent would be encouraged to make an impulse online purchase when prompted by a time limited offer.

Reach the right audience

Get yourself a good database and tailor your campaign to be relevant to the audience. If you’re mailing current customers then try a thank you email and maybe a new product launch to remind them of your company. If it’s a whole new database then try a special offer to encourage them to visit.

Eye catching and go easy on the info

We get on fantastic e-mail newsletters through every month, is’s basically just a postcard with minimal information but great graphics on it. It’s eye-catching and doesn’t take long to read – in fact, with the point of the newsletter being the majority of the text, they usually only take 5-10 seconds to read. Now, although that doesn’t seem like much attention (before you could possibly delete it) but it’s either going to tell you straight away that it’s something you’re looking for or not.

I am spam, delete me right away

Take care over your e-mail subject and make it something eye-catching and intriguing. Saying ‘Hi [insert name] save 10% on viagra’ will (in most cases) make the recipient delete the mail straight away as it is obvious it’s spam and will be more than likely taking you to a dodgy website!

Oh, and while we’re on the subject of spam, schedule your campaign so it trickles out slowly. Sending out 5000 mails in one go will probably see your account blocked!

Make sure they can receive it (and want to)

Test your mail before sending it out. Sending in HTML nowadays shouldn’t pose a problem but there will always be the odd exception. One option is to test yourself but some e-mail newsletter programs will have an inbuilt tester to save you time (and lots of effort).

Always make sure you are sending e-mails to people who what to receive them and give them an opt-out option for the chance for them to stop receiving the mails.

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