When people think “digital marketing” they commonly think of two things: websites and social media.
Paid ads, like pay-per-click campaigns with Google and Facebook, as well as SEO, are on their minds, too.
And of course there’s always the trendy new automated video platform of the day, podcasting, AI, and the latest way for you to tell people what kind of sandwich you’re having for lunch today.
And then there’s email.
So old-fashioned and yesterday, young marketers say. There’s nothing trendy or sexy about email.
Unless, that is, you happen to find “making a lot of money and enjoying your business” to be sexy.
(At least, we do)
In that case, email is sexy as all get-out. Here’s why.
Email is private and intimate
When you and I spend time on social platforms like Instagram, Facebook, Twitter, or LinkedIn, we’re more or less in public.
These are social spaces where people like to congregate.
Email, on the other hand, is where you connect, one one one, mano a mano.
Messages on social channels are like trying to shout your message to your prospects from a rooftop with a bullhorn, where a really good email campaign is like whispering in their ear.
Email is all-inclusive
Not everyone likes email.
Plenty of people dislike it. Especially when you’re trying to leave the office at 4:30pm on any given Friday.
But virtually all of your prospects and business professionals use email and are connected to their inboxes.
Your prospects and buyers know how it works.They check it every day and often every hour. They don’t forget to look at it for weeks at a time, like social media, and it’s a constant in their busy lives. Blogs and other mediums, on the other hand, can be ignored while email cannot.
Email, for a lot of your prospects, is the communication path of least resistance. It’s the easiest way to get a message in front of your audience and you can be reasonably sure they’ll see it. (Especially with email tracking tools like Yesware)
Email converts visitors to leads and leads to prospects
This is the big one.
You certainly have the freedom to make sales and marketing offers from your blog, website, and from social media. And when you do, you’ll find that email annihilates every other communication channel when it comes to converting prospects into paying customers.
Most, not all, marketers are savvy about how to get attention online, yet clueless about turning attention into business. Email has consistently proven itself as the digital marketing tactic that will get you from interest to implement.
Which is why the Direct Marketing Association recommends it as the best tactic to getting ROI with your marketing, year after year.
If it’s so awesome, how come everyone isn’t doing it?
Most email marketing and email campaigns are pretty awful, if we’re being honest.
Most of it is spammy, heavy handed, salesy and boring.
We don’t want that for your digital marketing strategy, and we’re sure you don’t either.
Great email content builds deep levels of trust and credibility with your audience through effective subject line writing (getting prospects to open your emails), your core messaging (getting prospects to read your emails), and delivering high-quality content your prospects need and want to share with others (amazing referrals).
What’s the best time to start leveraging email marketing?
The best time to create compelling and persuasive email content happens before you write a single word.
That sounds like an exaggeration, but it’s true.
The last thing you want to do is waste a bunch of time growing your audience if you have no way to capture their attention and harness it to meet your sales goals.
The first thing to do, as your homework, is to reach out to your existing customers (and even some prospects) and ask them if they’re constantly connected to email. You want to identify if your audience finds content that’s delivered to their inboxes as relevant or not.
From there, identify your next step in building your email marketing strategy, whether it’s choosing the best email marketing provider or by curating some of your best content for your very first email drip or autoresponder email campaign.
As a tip, look through your own email inbox this week and identify email messages peak your interest. What kinds of subject lines get you to click through? Pay attention to what makes you feel good about a business….and what leaves you cold.
Email may be old-school, but it’s a fantastic digital marketing tactic to build trust and credibility while increasing your profits.