When you are running a marketing campaign, a guaranteed win can never be assured even if you are using the most tried and tested digital marketing channel like email. Additionally, marketers are no longer being evaluated on parameters such as brand awareness and customer acquisition but rather on issues like customer engagement and impact on revenues, according to the Economist Intelligence Unit. Because focusing only on creative initiatives is likely to have minimal impact on the viability of the business, marketing organizations need to ensure that they concentrate on building engagements that result in a revenue impact that is quantifiable.
The secret to delivering well on these expectations is combining appropriate technology with data. While by using modern tools, marketers can send as many emails as they like, it is not necessary that the increased mailing will actually result in improving conversions. This can only be achieved by ensuring better customer engagement with personalized content delivered to a highly-defined segment. In fact, too many emails can hurt the relationship and make customers opt out of the email campaign or consign the emails to the junk or trash folders. Some useful tips on how to ensure revenue impact through email marketing:
Strong Content
As an email marketer, you should focus on sending emails that not only have high-quality content but are personalized too. While acquiring and refining databases that will allow customized communications can be expensive, the investment will more than pay for itself with increased conversions. According to industry reports, emails that have personalized content achieve a click-through rate that’s better by 14% and conversions to sales by 10%.
Email Frequency
Rather than sending off emails according to a frequency without any rationale, you should attempt to segment your recipient database based on the level of engagement the recipients have displayed; high, limited or not engaged at all. You need to engage in testing out for the optimal number of emails that need to be sent to each group and determine a threshold level beyond which, emails to prospects should not be sent as the exercise will not be productive. The focus should be on maximizing the level of engagement by smartly leveraging the segment data available instead of resorting to blasting away with emails with sweeping content.
Prioritize Messages
You need to appreciate that all emails cannot be accorded the same importance. You need to determine which of the emails are more significant. That conclusion can be drawn by analyzing several parameters such as the content of the email, the buying cycle, and even the business unit owning the email. Maintaining open communications within the marketing organization is extremely important, especially when there are separate marketing teams involved that are talking to the same set of customers or prospects. By sharing campaign information internally not only do you prevent the customer from being overloaded with emails being sent by bulk email marketing services Mumbai but also improve your conversion rates significantly.
Standardize Data
Instead of using text in free-form you should ideally use lookup tables or pick lists as that will assist you to personalize your emails far better. For example, using the job function instead of the title field will help you get better results. Ensure all the data captured are populated in fields that are standardized and when you have non-standard data, you should create appropriate processes for converting it. It is always recommended that the fields be standardized right at the stage of data capture itself so that subsequent data cleanups are not required.
Availability of Key Segment Data
For the emails to be effectively personalized it is essential that the segment data is clean and accurate. For example, if the segmentation is being done by job function or industry, it is necessary for you to have accurate data. If you believe that the data is missing or even out-of-date, then you should engage a third-party service for refreshing your data and kick off your campaign with data that is clean.
Monitoring and Optimizing
It is imperative that after conducting a round of your email marketing campaign the results are analyzed according to pre-determined metrics so that the results can be validated. You should additionally conduct tracking at a lower level for monitoring the campaign effectiveness and contact engagement. The lead-score analysis will yield information that can be used for tweaking the content or frequency of the campaign.
Conclusion
As a marketer, you have a lot on your plate – from brand awareness and revenue generation to overall experience of the customer. You need to ensure that all your efforts produce the maximum impact. Email marketing, being among the most-proven of communication techniques really leaves no room for results that are sub-optimal.