Tweet

Email marketing is the oldest of the social mediums however is still very valuable today.

Combining email marketing with other forms of social media and traditional media works very well.  Treat your email marketing as a part of your overall marketing strategy.  However there are new challenges facing email marketers.  Yahoo, Gmail and Hotmail have recently added email screening tools available to users.  Filtering and deleting prior to ever seeing an email can now be used through these providers.  Because of these new screening techniques, it is now even more important to get your address added to the prospects contact list.  Expect more screening and filtering techniques to continue to be available.

If too many names are undeliverable, your ISP provider may label you as span.  Therefore it is critical to keep your email list up to date.

Rules for Email Marketers

• Get your address added to the contact list of the prospect
• From line should reflect your companies name and/or brand
• Be sure you are sending fresh magnetic content
• The subject line should be a compelling benefit and reflect your brand
• Make sure your list is permission based.  You could end up on a block list by mailing to people that have not opted in
• Know the email laws and follow them.  If you ignore them you can be fined, blacklisted or shutdown.
• Use first names if possible in your email
• Make sure you have a clear “Call to Action or Hook”
• Be sure to include links for your other social media outlets such as Facebook and Twitter
• In the footer you must have your address or a reminder of when they opted in
• Stick to the schedule that was promised, don’t abuse email
• Make sure your email has the right size specifications for mobile
• Resist a hard sell approach
• Never use your personal email when sending to more than 15 people. Use options such as Mail Chimp or Constant Contact.

Using an email marketing service such as Constant Contact will allow you to do things that your personal email cannot.  Depending on your needs, there are quite a few email marketing companies to choose from.  These are Aweber, MailChimp, GetResponse, VerticalResponse, iContact and Constant Contact and those with additional features include 1ShoppingCart, Infusionsoft and MonsterFollowUp (now called Instant Customer).

If you want an affordable, quality email marketing program for sending out follow-up emails, a good option might be Aweber.  If you have a low number of subscribers, want a free account and are not doing any affiliate marketing, checkout MailChimp.  If you are only selling products and you just need follow-up to be attached to the same program as your shopping cart, look into 1ShoppingCart.  When you have a large list and you need all the available functions to incorporate your email marketing with a customer relationship management system (CRM), check out Infusionsoft.  However, keep in mind Infusionsoft comes with a higher price tag because of the additional features.  If you’re using text, voice mail, webinars and more, a good option to check out is Instant Customer.

By investing in an email marketing service you will:

• Ensure that your message is delivered to an inbox and looks good regardless of the system they use
• Mass email without being blocked
• Built-in reporting for who opened it and opt outs.
• You can customize the from field to say anything you want
• Be able to add additional functions depending on what service you choose for the capabilities you need

List

The best email marketing list is compiled from your own clients and opt-ins from your website.  This takes time to develop.  Include your opt-in box on every page of your website. Post your privacy policy and follow it when asking for opt-in.  In order to get more people to opt-in, offer them something of value such as white papers, free reports, tips etc.  Remember you want quality prospects so don’t just offer something free that doesn’t have value.  Allow people to control how many times and what they receive.  Let them know you won’t sell your list and they can unsubscribe at any time.  If you buy a third party list be certain the vendor complies with CAN SPAM and only send to this list once.  Once the person opts in you have them on your list.

Never take anyone off your email marketing list unless they opt out.  Just because they don’t buy your product or service now doesn’t mean some day they might.