Articles

Email Campaigns: Accelerate your sales through relationship building

21st November 2006

Emails. They can be your best friend or your worst enemy in your marketing efforts. With a well-planned email campaign, your business can increase sales by establishing a personal relationship with your clients. But they can also alienate your clients if you don't plan them carefully.

Some businesses maintain that email campaigns are a waste of advertising money. But large global corporates use them every day - so they must work for them. In the UK, a growing number of small and medium-sized businesses are adopting email campaigns as part of their promotion mix because they are relatively inexpensive and let you reach majority of your target audience with customised literature. But unfortunately, spamming has taken its toll on the image of the email campaign. The following guidelines will help your precious email avoid the vicious trash bin.

No pain no gain

Advocates of email marketing campaigns say that to win the game, you have to play by the rules. With effort, you will succeed.

1. Research, research, research. Identify your target audience and make sure that they benefit from the information you send.

2. Segmentation and match. Every individual has unique needs so it's important that your products and services match at least 70% of their profiles.

3. Be law compliant. Current regulations stated that all recipients of an electronic marketing campaign must be opt-in, aware and given their permission to be included in the list.

4. Content is King. Investing in good copywriting. Research shows that an email is given five seconds to be read or trashed, so the words are vital.

5. Customised your email. People like to know that they are valued customers. So make sure they are! Put some effort to personalise your email by greeting the recipient by name, just like a friend.

6. Stick to the basics. Thanks to technology, systems have the ability to detect emails that resemble spam mails, or have the slightest possibility of containing a virus. Leave the fancy flash stuff behind and stick to good old HTML and text.

7. Pull, don't push. Allow your recipients to unsubscribe from your mailing list. This shows mutual respect between you and your clients. Let your content convince them.

8. Keep track of your emails and harvest results. It's vital to review the reports of your email campaigns. Performance reports reveal customer behaviour, preferences and trends that will help you refine your marketing strategy. Take note of what links they clicked, who has unsubscribed, who they have forwarded your email to. Engaged a professional agency to help you.

Long-term relationship building

Always remember that the benefits of email campaigns today will not necessary be reflected on your balance sheets tomorrow. The common misconception about email campaigns is that they generate immediate sales. However effective it is, this marketing tool isn't going to boost your sales today but it will help you build a consistent relationship with your clients and generate loyalty which turns into profit in the long term.

If you are interested in knowing more about email campaigns, feel free to contact elaborations at info@elaborations.co.uk . We will be happy to help you, anytime.