Introduction
How many times have you received an email from a company that you deleted without even reading? Quite a lot, and there’s a reason for that.
Companies sometimes send newsletters via emails to update their clients whenever they feel the need to promote something. Rare are the ones that send targeted emails to their clients knowing the type of content that the latter is interested in.
If you are the company sending newsletter-type emails to your clients on a regular basis, what type of emails do you send them?
In this blog we will explore the different types of email marketing campaigns and examine what you should be doing moving forward to ensure your emails are effective.
- Learn about Email Marketing Personalization Tactics to enhance your email campaigns.
- Discover Content Marketing Automation Strategy Tools for effective marketing efforts.
How Many Email Newsletters Per Month?
The first question asked is the number of emails a company should send per month. While that is important, what we believe to be a more crucial factor is the open-rate results, also known as click-through rate (CTR). Measuring the impact of every email sent through analytic findings will be your indicator as to how many newsletters to send.
Keep in mind that the company should be careful in the amount of newsletters they send, even if they are relevant to the customer. Sending too many emails would make it no different than spam, a form of outbound marketing that should be avoided, as it gives a feel of digital clutter. Keeping newsletters as regular and timely events is key as not to test the customer’s patience.
What Should the Message Contain?
The second important factor is the content that is being delivered. What information are you sending your clients? How important and pertinent is that information to them? All these questions would be answered while collecting data on the customers before the campaign begins.
As part of any Inbound Marketing strategy, your email campaigns should contain content relevant to the reader. For example, towards the end of last year, we had scheduled an email campaign reminding patients at the Cambridge Dental Centre to use up their dental benefits before their coverage expires for the term.
How to Find the Data
We all live in a digital age, everything, anything, and anyone has an online presence, so collecting information has never been easier than it is today. The only trick here is to sort them to certain groups and identify which newsletter would be most effective to who. A group that mostly consumes content about social media advertising is less likely to respond well to a newsletter about healthcare marketing strategies, but thankfully the information needed would already be in the palm of your hand.
The information available is a valuable resource, and with the right people, all that’s left to do is to conduct an effective email marketing campaign with the data provided.
Are Newsletters Effective?
When newsletters are done right, of course they are effective. The response rate to the aforementioned email campaign of the Cambridge Dental Centre was phenomenal. Why? Because patients deemed the content of that email to be of interest. The turnout of patients applying their dental insurance that year increased by over 60%.
If that wasn’t enough to convince you, keep in mind that former American president Barack Obama, for his 2012 campaign, raised 690 million dollars mostly from his newsletters, with only 20 writers and a sophisticated, yet effective, analytical system to know who to target and how to do it.
The Presentation of the Newsletter
While the content inside the newsletter is important, thought must also be put into how the customer absorbs the information. Things such as a concise subject line that lets the customer know what it’s about and the preview message so they understand the tone you’re speaking in are indispensable pebbles on the path to successful newsletter email marketing.
The language of the message is important; no customer wants to feel as though they’re talking to a robot. The body of the message should have a professional, yet personal, tone to it. This would make the content of the newsletter sound more interesting, and increases trust in the company.
What’s more, every newsletter must end with a call-to-action. It could be as simple as ‘please read the updated terms and conditions’, to ‘upgrade your subscription today!’. Newsletters are ways to update the customer or to promote a product, and thus concluding with a call-to-action is a must. An email newsletter is most effective when the customer answers the call-to-action, and it would be more efficient to provide that when possible.
A/B Testing is Key
Have you tried A/B testing before? It’s a great way for you to diversify the type of content you’re presenting, especially the emails you are sending. Thing is, you cannot predict what your clients like or don’t like to read. Yes, you may have an idea of what they expect from you, but you can never tell what will or won’t work. The best way to do that is through A/B testing.
How effective is A/B testing, you might ask? Health insurance company Humana conducted two seperate A/B tests to make their banner more effective, changing where their call-to-action button appears on their web page. After cleaning up the banner, they found that the chance resulted in a 433% in clicks, and a further 192% when they changed the wording on their call-to-action.
The Humana A/B tests prove not only are they key in an effective marketing campaign, but simply a single test is not necessarily enough. To collect data, you would need further tests, and the more data gathered, the more information that can be used for an effective marketing campaign.
What is A/B Testing?
A/B testing for newsletters means you create two email campaigns delivering the same message, but composed differently. It could be as simple as the color of the call-to-action button being different between the two, or even having the body of the text appearing on the right as opposed to the left.
These will be sent to two groups in your client pool for an eventual performance evaluation. After receiving the results, they can be compiled into data that would eventually lead into a more efficient inbound marketing email campaign strategy.
Consistency
It’s all about dedication. Repeating, scheduling, and following up with newsletter campaigns are essential pillars dictating the success of your campaign. Don’t get discouraged if you don’t see results right away, though – This process requires time and patience.
As long as you take the initiative to understand your client base – what they like and don’t like – you will witness more effectiveness in the email marketing campaigns you run.
Final Thoughts
Take home this message: your job as a business owner is to understand what your clients like to read, and deliver the quality content they are expecting of you. Your job is also to do so in the most effective and efficient way possible with the inbound tools provided.
Here at LetsMarket.It, we are experts at the inbound marketing method. In the digital age we live in today, nothing is as cost-efficient to reach a wider audience and increase your brand’s value to your audience than through inbound marketing. If you wish to learn more about or want to start your own newsletter campaign, contact us through our website!
