Much like a boxer’s right hook, email has proven time and time again to be successful and should be one of the staples in your marketing playbook. In fact, email marketing is, and for the foreseeable future will continue to be, your number one direct lead channel.
Here’s why:
- 91% of consumers aged 18 to 35 still would rather see marketing messages in email vs. social media.
- On average, up to 37% of your customer leads come from email marketing.
But, before you begin firing off messages to your customers, you should know what truly is the goal of a marketing email:
What your goal in an email is not is to sell a call or get someone to your website.
The goal of an email is to get your customer’s attention, get a click and land the customer on your offer.
“Hit your customers hard with an email that will reach them on a personal level and allow them to take action.”
Just as a right hook is a wake-up call to a fighter’s opponent, an email is a direct, actionable offer to your customer. In boxing, after the punch has landed, fighters who are scared to get hit again back off to play more defense; fighters with the most success lean into the punch, taking advantage of the energy being dispersed.
Your marketing emails should be the wake-up call for your customers. The main goal of email marketing is to obtain a click, and that click is wasted if it is not directed to a dedicated landing page. Lean into the message with a strong call to action to get the click and have a clear, compelling, and credible offer on your landing page to get the lead.
Draft your message to provide an impact that the customer will want to lean into. This should be the first step in the ongoing conversation you have with your customers. It opens the door to a mutually beneficial relationship, creating an ongoing dialogue and building trust.
Elements to an Email Wakeup Call: Relevancy & Call to Action
Relevancy
Personalization is not a recent phenomenon. In our hustle-and-bustle world, we tend to focus on information that is relevant to us or our needs.
Effective email communications will reach people on a personal level, grabbing their attention with statements that mean something to them.
Find out what your customers need or what they are looking for through the data they provide. Track consumer behaviors and purchasing trends to help identify who is in the market to buy, what they are looking for, and how they like to shop. The data used when constructing your message significantly improves the success of your communication.
Think of what would make you open an email from a retailer or service provider. Create a genuine connection between your content and the audience. This is your chance to start the conversation and begin forming a relationship with your potential customers.
Call to Action
When people open your email, you also want them to take the next step: the click. But, where they click through to is also important to the success of your message.
When you direct your digital marketing efforts to your main website, you risk visitors getting lost and breaking the connection of that personalized communication.
It’s better to use a landing page, which is a single web page created to draw attention to a specific aspect of a website. Landing pages are created to supplement other digital marketing efforts, such as email marketing.
Landing pages work in conjunction with email marketing because of the focus the landing page has on the specific offer or action. For maximum effect, your landing page should match your email’s headline, copy, and content.
Once people have clicked to your landing page, what do you want your visitors to do? Provide them with a single message that is clear and concise. Landing pages focus on converting visitors into leads.
Conclusion
Given the choice, almost 70% of consumers, regardless of age, want to communicate with brands via email. Considering the majority of those people will check their emails before they go to work, and oftentimes before they get out of bed in the morning, email communications should be a constant in your marketing strategy.
Hit your customers hard with an email that will reach them on a personal level and allow them to take action. Create a message that will allow them to lean in and take advantage of the energy being dispersed. Entice them to follow through to your landing page so you can stay in the fight to win their business.
Attend Larry Bruce’s session “Why Your Marketing Still Sucks – Move Beyond Talking at Your Customers to Talking to Them with Marketing Automation” at the 22nd Digital Dealer Conference & Exposition. Welcome to Marketing Automation, where communications and customer interactions are bridged together to create a space for increased engagement. Are you equipped to keep up with the marketing evolution?