Email marketing is a powerful tool in today’s tech oriented, internet-based world. It can be used to interact with a customer base to increase profits, as well as gain new customers. As powerful as the tool is, it can be easily misused. There is a very thin line between email marketing and spam. Luckily, the following article will help you use email marketing without spamming unnecessarily.
Email only those you know. If someone receives unsolicited email, it feels like spam. They’ll consider your email spam, defeating your marketing strategy. Oftentimes, these suspicious emails go straight to the trash and you see no benefit from them.
Before sending out emails to your subscribers, try to let them know what you will be sending them and how often they can expect to hear from you. This way, they know when to expect your email and they can prevent it from getting automatically sent to their spam folder.
Be especially careful when crafting your first three emails to new customers. A new customer should get an introductory email inviting them to join your marketing list. Once they accept your invitation, the next email should tell them about discounts or special offers they can expect to get now that they’ve signed up. The third email should contain their first newsletter and their special offer.
Keep in mind that the ultimate goal with email marketing is to get your product sold. What you want is for every email to entice the reader to buy. This can be accomplished by writing an email filled with information regarding new product offers, old product offers, or special deals that are available to them.
Find out who your competitors are and sign up to their emails. You will be able to see what content, they are sending to their subscribers and figure out what aspects to use and which to stay away from. Just be sure not to steal their content, as this could constitute plagiarism.
Make it easy to unsubscribe. Make the unsubscribe link clearly visible in your email, allowing someone to stop getting email marketing. This way you are less likely to get reported for sending spam. Also, if someone has unsubscribed, don’t make the mistake of continuing to send them email: that is likely to cause them to complain.
Automatically unsubscribe customers who don’t respond to your marketing materials after a certain number of emails. If your customers aren’t responding to your emails anymore, they most likely have lost interest in your newsletter but aren’t annoyed enough by it yet to unsubscribe. By unsubscribing them, you avoid generating bad feelings that could hurt your business.
When someone subscribes to your email marketing list, confirm that this is what they really intended to do. Implementing this double opt-in strategy will make it much less likely that your email provider will receive spam complaints about you. Also, you will be assured that the people receiving your emails are actually interested in what you are sending them.
You may find that it is a good idea to devote a small portion of every marketing email you send out to briefly reviewing what your subscribers can expect from you. By demonstrating that you have a plan for your emails and you are sticking to it, you can encourage your readers’ trust and make them less likely to grow tired of your messages.
Don’t get yourself in trouble by not getting permission. This is spamming and you could be penalized for it as well as having all your mail refused, which could damage your business irrevocably. By getting permission to use email marketing, you will be creating positive relationships with customers who will keep coming back.
You might want to consider following up to your clients with some type of surprise bonus that you are providing them. Include a link on your email that tells them to click on it. The concluding postscript could inform them that they can get all the details on this by clicking on the provided link.
Let customers know what to expect from the get-go. When a new subscriber opts in, send an immediate confirmation email that details what the customer can expect to receive from you and how often you will send emails. Filling customers in upfront can prevent future opt-outs and complaints and keep subscribers active.
Test and design your messages to be readable and functional even if the images and graphics get blocked. Many email clients do this automatically. Make sure that any images you do use have descriptive text substituted via the Alternative attribute that should be available in your email composition software interface.
As stated before, in a world dominated by the internet, email marketing is a powerful tool. Though it can be used for good purposes, such as interacting with potential and current customers, it can be misused as well, taking on the form of spam. When you use email marketing, keep this article in mind and your messages won’t end up in your recipient’s spam folder.
