If you’re wondering how your business can benefit from email marketing and how to get started, then this article is for you.
Many businesses get quite excited by the idea of email marketing, but in practice it’s assigned to the ‘too hard basket’. Or things start out with a hiss and a roar, but despite everyone’s best intentions the newsletters become less frequent and eventually die out entirely. This is all too common, as writing content is hard work and it’s often left to the last minute.
You may also be wondering if you really need to do email marketing now that social media are becoming such a hot marketing tool. It’s certainly true that sites like Twitter and Facebook can provide businesses with many additional marketing opportunities (such as viral marketing and very targeted advertising), but email is still the primary means of online communication and we very much doubt it will ever be taken over by micro-blogging.
So now that we’ve established that email marketing is still very relevant in today’s online world, let’s look at some reasons why it is such a useful tool for your business.
- It’s one of the best ways to passively market your services to your existing clients without doing the hard sell. People often keep their emails for a few weeks, so they will come back to the email offer once they are ready.
- With today’s technology, it is very easy to track the success of email marketing campaigns, so you can work out if it is worth the time and money you’ve invested (some systems even integrate with Google Analytics).
- Email marketing is relatively inexpensive, in fact some email marketing systems allow you to send emails for free (up to a certain subscriber limit).
- It’s a great way to build a relationship with potential clients that add themselves to your list. It may take a while before they actually buy from you, but each month you are quietly reminding them that you exist.
- Many email marketing systems let you link your blog with your email marketing system, so you publish once and have your blog post delivered to your email list.
- You can run different campaigns to different lists to test the success of different marketing messages.
- You can segment your list or lists into interest groups so you are tightly targeting your marketing messages.
- Emails can be forwarded to many people and most systems can track this – so email has a viral component to it.
So now let’s look at the options you have for email marketing:
- Your normal email software. You can add your contacts manually to a distribution list in Outlook or your choice of email program. Most email programs have the ability to do this; you create the list and assign contacts to it. Make sure you send the email to your own email address and put the distribution list into the blind carbon copy (Bcc) address field. This last point is vital, as you don’t want your recipients to see everyone else’s email address. This method is inexpensive (you just need the software and the internet connection), but it’s time consuming as you have to manually manage subscriptions to the list. You’ll also make yourself quite unpopular if you keep emailing people after they’ve asked to be removed.
- Start a Facebook group and use the built in email system.
- Use a specialised email marketing system (the best option). There are many very good web based email marketing systems out there, and most of them will give you a free trial so you can take it for a spin. They all offer very similar functionality so it often comes down to personal preference and budget. Email marketing systems are designed to meet the needs of non-technical users, so they will step you through the process. You’ll also be assigned a web link that goes to your newsletter sign up form (which you can add to your website or email signature). You’ll also get a snippet of HTML code so the sign up form can be added to your website. Subscriptions are managed automatically, which will keep you on the right side of New Zealand’s anti-spam laws. This also frees up time so you can really focus on your content. These systems also provide a lot of reports for tracking things like how many people have opened the email, forwarded the email, and clicked on links within the email.
Email marketing systems for you to try:
- MailChimp (our top pick) www.mailchimp.com – accounts with less than 500 subscribers are free of charge, integrates with WordPress and Google Analytics.
- MadMimi www.madmimi.com – $8 US a month for up to 500 contacts.
- Constant Contact www.constantcontact.com – has a free 60 day trial – accounts with up to 500 contacts cost $15 US a month.
To find more email marketing services search for ‘email marketing’ in Google. However in our opinion you can’t go past MailChimp for value and ease of use. The team at TML Web are also very familiar with the system and can help you set up your campaign properly, write your content, link your sign up form to your website, and design an HTML template for your emails.
