delivra beginners guide ebook
TRANSCRIPT
THE BEGINNER’S GUIDE TOEMAIL MARKETING
Whether you’re a new entrepreneur, a recent marketing convert or a veteran business owner, an email campaign could be one of the
most powerful tools in your digital marketing strategy.
Email marketing is not new. Actually, it was more than 40 years ago that a guy by the name of Roy Tomlinson sent the first email. It’s gone through many evolutions since then, but today’s emails are proving to be a formidable method of catching the attention of prospective customers as well as maintaining your existing ones.
If you’re able to leverage it appropriately, you can use email marketing to increase engagement with your targeted audience. This guide will walk you through the basics of getting started on an effective email marketing campaign.
CONTENTS
Why use email as part of my marketing strategy?
Why do I need a service provider?
Developing an overall strategy
Developing a content strategy
Developing permission messaging
Developing a strategy for growing my list
Scheduling mailings
Writing great emails
Testing, testing and retesting
Segmenting an email marketing list
Glossary
4
7
9
12
15
18
20
22
26
29
31
5
The Beginner’s Guide toEMAIL MARKETING
It’s more personal to your audience.
You may already have a fairly effective marketing plan. Maybe
it includes social media outreach, word-of-mouth referrals,
and ads in local publications. You may have regular customers
and a few new ones coming in every once in a while. But if
you’re not taking advantage of email messaging, you could
be missing out on opportunities for repeat business or
getting new clients who are looking for the types of services
or products you sell. In fact, 65 percent of marketers at B2B
companies say that email is the most effective tool they use.
Thanks to recent technological advances, today’s email
marketing campaigns can come across more personal. It is
now possible to directly target the interests of the various
groups of people in your audience. This type of personalization
is called segmentation. It allows you to tailor messages that
are more relevant to a particular group of people. It’s a great
way to maintain communication with your audience without
coming across as if you’re talking to thousands of people at
the same time.
It’s more effective than social media.
According to a recent study by SocialTwist that involved 119
referral campaigns, more than 50 percent of those who
became new customers were referred through email, 26
“51 percent of people
are discovering new
websites through
email (compared to 32
percent for social, 18
percent for PPC, and
54 percent through
organic search).”
- Conductor, 2014
WHY USE EMAIL AS PART OF MY MARKETING STRATEGY?
6
The Beginner’s Guide toEMAIL MARKETING
percent through Facebook and 22 percent through Twitter.
“Email remains a significantly more effective way to acquire
customers than social media — nearly 40 times that of
Facebook and Twitter combined.” - McKinsey & Company, Why
marketers should keep sending you emails, Jan 2014
Not only that, but with mobile email open rates steadily
increasing within the past few years, a marketing plan that
doesn’t include email won’t be nearly as successful as it could
be. Your content is also less likely to be shared, as B2B users
are 88 percent more likely to share content via email.
WHY USE EMAIL AS PART OF MY MARKETING STRATEGY?
8
The Beginner’s Guide toEMAIL MARKETING
Sure, you could craft emails by hand and try to tailor them
to various audiences, but a service provider allows you
to measure ROI and gauge your successes and failures –
something sending messages through your personal email
account won’t accomplish.
There are a number of different service providers with helpful
features like 24-hour support, analytics, auto-response, user
segmentation and tracking history, to name a few. Make a list
of specs you absolutely want or need from a service provider
before making a decision. A good service provider simplifies
email marketing while fitting your budget.
Laws like the CAN-SPAM Act regulate the types of messages
businesses can send and require that you allow subscribers
to opt-out of your mailing list. Your service provider can
suggest how frequently you should email subscribers or
how easily they should be able to unsubscribe to emails, but
it’s ultimately up to you to decide the best features for your
messaging.
“... a service provider
allows you to measure
ROI and gauge your
successes and
failures ...”
WHY DO I NEED ASERVICE PROVIDER?
10
The Beginner’s Guide toEMAIL MARKETING
You wouldn’t reveal a new product or service without first
developing a marketing and advertising plan, right? The same
goes for starting an email marketing campaign. You’ll need to
decide what you want the campaign to accomplish, who you
want to target and how you’ll succeed.
Determine your goals
First of all, you should have a clear idea of what you want
the campaign to accomplish. Do you intend to advertise new
products and discounted items in order to increase sales? Are
you focused on educating your audience and gaining upsell
opportunities? Or is this simply a campaign designed to create
brand awareness? The tone and frequency of your messaging
depends on your goal.
Know your audience
Being aware of your audience’s needs is another key factor in
how you’ll strategize and frame your messaging. For example,
a consumer-based audience likely wants to hear about
new products and discounted items, whereas a business
audience will be more interested in new services and software
updates. Also consider how often you should send emails to
subscribers. Keep them informed, but don’t be a nuisance.
“According to
Outbrain, 44 percent
of email subscribers
purchased an item
they first saw in an
email, and 35 percent
of email subscribers
open emails based on
the subject line.”
DEVELOPING ANOVERALL STRATEGY
11
The Beginner’s Guide toEMAIL MARKETING
DEVELOPING ANOVERALL STRATEGY
Analyze your competitors
Take a look at how your competition is doing with email
marketing campaigns. What are their strengths and
weaknesses? How can you improve on their tactics? Are they
using software that makes them more efficient or organized?
If you notice that your competitors are more successful with
their email marketing campaigns, it may be because they’re
sending quality content to their audience. According to
Outbrain, 44 percent of email subscribers purchased an item
they first saw in an email, and 35 percent of email subscribers
open emails based on the subject line.
13
The Beginner’s Guide toEMAIL MARKETING
Once you’ve developed an overall strategy for your email
marketing plan, it’s time to map out the most important detail
– the content you’ll be sending to subscribers. Here are just a
few topics you should discuss:
Develop a mix of messages
Switching up your messaging keeps readers interested and
less likely to hit the “unsubscribe” button. Try using messaging
that includes helpful advice, free or discounted merchandise,
service information, updates, etc.
Determine intervals
There’s a fine line between too few emails and too many
emails. How frequently you message consumers determines
whether your emails will be helpful or annoying. Sending one
email a day is enough to keep most readers informed and
interested, but unless the email serves a purpose for you or
the subscriber, the best option is not to send it.
Place content ideas in a calendar
Keeping a log of ideas you’ve come up with will help you stay
organized and ensures you won’t miss an opportunity for
sending out successful messages. Using Basecamp or Google
Calendar allows you to share ideas with higher-ups or product
developers and gives them a chance to send feedback.
“ Switching up your
messaging keeps
readers interested
and less likely to hit
the ‘unsubscribe’
button.“
DEVELOPING ACONTENT STRATEGY
14
The Beginner’s Guide toEMAIL MARKETING
Regularly review your content calendar to tweak & update
Touch base with key stakeholders regularly so you have an
opportunity to hear new ideas or gather updates. This also
gives you an opportunity to discover what type of messaging
has been working and what needs improvement.
DEVELOPING ACONTENT STRATEGY
16
The Beginner’s Guide toEMAIL MARKETING
Permission-based messaging is when a user actively signs
up to receive emails from a business, rather than unwittingly
giving their email addresses to someone and getting
bombarded with spam. Of course, getting people to willingly
hand over their email address isn’t easy, so here are a few
suggestions:
• Offer something free at sign-up
• Say you won’t send spam or sell their email address
(and mean it)
• Create a survey they can fill out to make your emails
more relevant to their interests
• Allow them to sign up for specific mailing lists for
service updates, new products, discounts, etc.
When you ask permission to send users emails, make it very
clear as to what you’ll be sending them and what you’ll do (or
not do) with their personal information. Subscribers will want
to know how many messages you’ll send and what types of
emails (promotional, updates, discounts, special offers, etc.)
they’ll receive.
While a service provider strives to ensure your emails aren’t
blocked, some emails may still end up in the junk folder when
sent to certain addresses. To prevent this from happening,
“ When you ask
permission to send
users emails, make it
very clear as to what
you’ll be sending them
and what you’ll do
(or not do) with their
personal information.“
DEVELOP PERMISSION MESSAGING
17
The Beginner’s Guide toEMAIL MARKETING
DEVELOP PERMISSION MESSAGING
immediately request to be whitelisted – or added to a list of
approved IP addresses (or senders) – when someone first
subscribes. Prompting subscribers to add you to their address
book or list of contacts should prevent future emails from
being marked as spam.
19
The Beginner’s Guide toEMAIL MARKETING
If your email marketing efforts have hit a plateau – or you want
to prevent yourself from reaching that point – you’ll need to
make a plan for growing your mailing list. One surefire way
to do this is to offer your audience a free product, service
or piece of content in exchange for becoming a subscriber.
People are a lot more willing to join a mailing list if they know
they’ll receive a gift.
Another method for growing your list of subscribers is to offer
rewards for referrals. If a current subscriber refers someone
to sign up for your mailing list, reward them with a free or
discounted product or service to make them more likely to
refer someone in the future.
Also consider following up with subscribers who receive your
emails but haven’t responded to your offers or CTAs for a
while. Making them active again may be as simple as switching
them to a mailing group that’s more relevant to their interests.
Utilize social media, word of mouth and other channels to
promote your mailing list as well.
“People are a lot
more willing to join
a mailing list if they
know they’ll receive
a gift.“
DEVELOPING A STRATEGYFOR MY GROWING LIST
21
The Beginner’s Guide toEMAIL MARKETING
How often you should email someone depends on why they
signed up in the first place and what they expect from your
messages. Don’t send emails simply because you can – each
message you send should have a purpose that informs or
otherwise benefits the reader. If you can’t answer why you’re
sending an email to your subscribers, it’s best not to send it at all.
One useful tool for ensuring that messages are sent at
appropriate times is an auto-responder feature. If your email
service provider offers this feature, you can create messages
that automatically go out when someone first subscribes
to your mailing list. Some also allow you to send automated
messages based on a subscriber’s unique opens and
downloads, or interest in specific whitepaper topics.
“ ... each message you
send should have a
purpose that informs
or otherwise benefits
the reader.“
SCHEDULINGMAILINGS
23
The Beginner’s Guide toEMAIL MARKETING
What makes a great subject line?
Your subject line is arguably the most important aspect of your
message. It’s the first thing subscribers read, and it’ll determine
whether they even bother to open the email. There are quite a few
ways to make your subject line stand out, like:
• Make headlines short – Around 6 to 10 words; you should
be able to read the entire line without opening the email.
• Be clear and concise – The email message should quickly
get to the point, and should have a beginning, middle
and end. Avoid rambling. The subscriber may quickly lose
interest.
• Write comprehensive email campaigns – If a subscriber
has downloaded a whitepaper before, anticipate the topics
they will be interested in as a follow-up. Your email service
provider can give you tips on how to develop subsequent
emails that will be of interest to your audience.
• Provide value – Whether providing useful resources or a
discount, make sure that the email delivers some type of
value to the recipients.
• Personalize – If possible, insert the person’s name in the
subject line. If that’s not an option, you can still use “you”
and “your” to make the message more personal.
“Your subject line is
arguably the most
important aspect of
your message.“
WRITINGGREAT EMAILS
24
The Beginner’s Guide toEMAIL MARKETING
What makes great copy?
Similar rules apply to the actual email copy as the subject
line. Keep it personal, keep it short and sweet, and inform
subscribers of updates or discounts that are useful to them.
Following is a summary of do’s and don’ts when writing email
content:
DO: optimize for mobile. According to Litmus, 53 percent
of emails are opened on mobile devices, compared to just
22 percent on desktop programs. Needless to say, how your
emails will look on mobile devices should be a big factor in
your content layout. Simple things like making the font larger
or narrowing the email down to one column will make it easier
for mobile users to read.
DO: use proper grammar and spelling. Ensuring that your
content is free of errors not only makes your messaging more
intelligent, it shows you put a lot of effort into making your
emails as flawless as possible. Some subscribers might not
bat an eye at the occasional misspelled word, but an errant
misplaced apostrophe may be enough to make someone
unsubscribe.
“Keep it personal,
keep it short and
sweet, and inform
subscribers of
updates or discounts
that are useful to
them.“
WRITINGGREAT EMAILS
25
The Beginner’s Guide toEMAIL MARKETING
WRITINGGREAT EMAILS
DON’T: forget the CTA. A call-to-action gives readers a
clear idea of what they should do after they read your email,
whether it’s downloading a new e-book or checking out a
description of your latest product.
DON’T: ramble. Again, emails should be short and sweet,
as subscribers (especially the ones who primarily use mobile
devices) don’t want to scroll through a dozen lines of text to
get to the point of your message. Focus on why you’re sending
the email, what you want the person to do and how your
message will benefit your audience.
27
The Beginner’s Guide toEMAIL MARKETING
Measuring the success of your email marketing campaign
can be done multiple ways depending on what you want your
campaign to accomplish. For instance, if you simply want to
find out how many subscribers are even opening your emails
or clicking on the URLs, you’ll want to measure the open rate
and click-through rate. If you want to know how many emails
fail to reach subscribers, measure the bounce rate.
How to do A/B testing
One way to find out if one message will be more successful
than another is to try A/B testing. A/B testing for email
marketing is when you send two small test groups the same
message, but written differently, to see which one is most
effective. An example of this is writing two subject lines that
basically say the same thing, but have different tones, like:
“How to Measure Your Email Marketing Campaign’s Success”
“Is your email marketing campaign failing? Find out today”
As you can see, both have the same message, but one
will likely resonate with your subscription base more than
the other. When you’ve measured which one garners the
most responses, send that message out to the rest of your
audience.
“Measuring your
email successes and
failures should give
you an idea of how
you can improve your
messaging.“
TESTING, TESTING& RETESTING
28
The Beginner’s Guide toEMAIL MARKETING
TESTING, TESTING& RETESTING
What to do to tweak your email marketing campaign for
increased effectiveness
Measuring your email successes and failures should give you
an idea of how you can improve your messaging. If you see
an increase in the number of people opening your emails
or visiting your site, you know that the type of messaging is
relevant to your audience.
On the other hand, if you have a portion of your audience
unsubscribing, it could be because your messaging is
no longer relevant to that group of people. Always give
unsubscribers a short survey asking why they no longer wish
to receive your emails. This can help you prevent further
opt-outs for the same reason.
30
The Beginner’s Guide toEMAIL MARKETING
What is it?
List segmentation is when you divide your mailing list into
groups based on the type of audience you want to target for
a particular message, promotion, etc. This can be extremely
helpful for sending the right message at the right time to the
right group of people.
Why is it effective?
Segmenting allows you to automate emails with targeted
messages so that they are more relevant to a select group
of users. An example of this would be to send a calendar of
scheduled webinars only to those who have signed up for
webinars in the past or requested more information about
them. A subscription list of business clients would most likely
read your emails from 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. on weekdays, whereas
a list of consumers are more likely to read emails at nights
and weekends.
“Segmenting allows
you to automate
emails with targeted
messages so that they
are more relevant to a
select group of users.“
SEGMENTING AN EMAILMARKETING LIST
31
The Beginner’s Guide toEMAIL MARKETING
GLOSSARY
Account: Your database where
contacts, content, mailing data and
reports are stored.
Account overview: A commonly used
report that gives you a snapshot of your
account with standard mailing statistics,
which you can customize by time range.
Blacklist: A list of spammer IP addresses
whose emails are blocked.
Bounce back: When an email fails to reach
the recipient. This can be due to issues like
an incorrect mailing address, disconnected
email or full inbox.
Campaign: A report tool that
allows grouping of mailings sent so all
grouped mailings can be viewed in one
report.
Category: A static subset of the contacts
database. Categories do not use queries.
Click-through rate: The percentage of
unique recipients that click on a URL in your
email message.
Contacts: Database of email addresses and
demographic fields.
Content: The HTML message sent to
contacts
Custom fields: Available database fields
that can store contact information such as
Name, Address, Phone, Dates etc.
Draft mailing: A saved mailing that has not
yet been sent to contacts or a subset of
contacts.
Engagement: Open, click and
forward reporting, rolled into one
calculation. There are two types of
Engagement - contact and mailing.
Google Analytics: Additional
tracking function that allows sent
mailing activity to be reported back to
Google Analytics used on your website.
HTML email: A type of email that can
include various fonts, colors and designs.
Media Library: A place to store image files
(gif, jpg, png), PDF documents, Word
documents and other HTML files.
32
The Beginner’s Guide toEMAIL MARKETING
Open rate: The definition of this phrase
can vary, depending upon the ESP you’re
working with. In general terms, an open
rate includes images downloaded by a
recipient and the number of clicks on a
link. On the other hand, a unique open rate
calculated by dividing the number of unique
subscribers that do either of those things
by the unique number of recipients in the
entire campaign.
Opt-in: When a user subscribes to or gives
a business permission to send emails.
Opt-out: When a subscriber cancels an
email subscription from a business.
Plain text email: An email that doesn’t use
HTML; often making it easier to read, but
less creative.
Scheduled mailing: The ability to schedule
your mailings at future dates and times.
Spam: An email that’s sent to someone who
hasn’t subscribed or opted-in.
SMS: A separate interface that
allows communication to subscribers via
text messages to cell phones.
Split test mailing: This mailing
feature allows two or more pieces of
content to be sent to a segment or
category where results can be compared
to determine which mailing performed most
favorably.
Subscribe form: An HTML form hosted on
your website that feeds back to your Delivra
contacts database.
Template: Stored content that allows
to create text and HTML email designs
and store them for future use.
Text to subscribe: A feature that allows
new subscribers to simply text a keyword to
a shortcode to join your contacts database.
Unsub: An email address that has
unsubscribed from email communications.