Does Email Marketing Work?

​ I am often surprised at how quickly organisations look for the next ‘bright shining thing’, as the panacea for their marketing challenges in a Digital world. From Facebook to WhatsApp, Twitter to Tumblr, Instagram to Pinterest and YouTube to Vines, many marketers are behaving like that ‘kid in a candy shop’ and we all know how dangerous and messy that can be! So where should organisations focus once everyone has come off the digital sugar high?

‍

As soon as you have built that ‘to die for’ website (great content, multimedia, SEO, Social Media links - you know the drill), developing an email marketing campaign should be next on the list. WHY? Because email marketing is very cost effective, targeted and more importantly, it works. Email is still the most used, most valuable and for the smart marketers, the most prized real estate on the Internet. However, email marketing is seen by many as outdated and irrelevant.

Some powerful email truths:

Accounts: There are nearly 3 times as many email accounts as there are Facebook and Twitter accounts combined. Social Activity: The total posts on Facebook and Twitter combined add up to 0.2% of all email traffic. Searches: The total number of searches on Google, Yahoo! and Bing combined, equals just 1.1% of all email traffic. Page views: The total number of all page views on the internet equals only 25% of the total number of emails sent. Web Traffic: Nearly 4 times as many emails are sent each day, as the total number of Facebook/Twitter updates, Google/Yahoo!/Bing searches and pageviews combined. The other really interesting fact is that the power of email marketing also applies in the B2B environment. 

‍

Powerful email truths: 34% of mobile users view email on their mobile device. Is your email mobile optimized?

How do you make sure that customers sign up for your email lists - Newsletter, Special Offers, Events?

1. Ask them to do it!

There is nothing wrong with having a pop-up advert on your website homepage, that asks customers to sign up. Hoping they will stumble onto the Newsletter button, somewhere in the top right hand corner of your homepage is ambitious at best.

2. Make it easy for them to Sign-Up

If customers need to type in their name, email address etc, they will very quickly close down the pop-up advert. So make sure that you allow customers to use their Facebook or LinkedIn profiles to do all the work for them. If all people have to do is press a button, especially if they are using a mobile device (80.8% of users report reading email on a mobile device), it improves your opt in rate by 90%.

3. Try and be creative with your call to action

A simple ‘Click here for our newsletter’, is probably not going to cut it. Using phrases like ‘Free Business Building Ideas’ will improve sign-up. Some sites also offer a Chance to Win or Giveaway.

‍

If you follow these three simple steps, you are well on your way to building a great database that you can market to.

‍

Remember, email still works. It’s just that with all that email traffic out there you need to make sure you’re nailing your messaging.  Blasting out irrelevant communications to anybody with an email account just won’t cut it anymore.