3 Steps for Effective Email Marketing

When I start talking to clients or interested parties about email marketing, 9/10 I get a reaction like this, "that's important" or my favorite "that seems complicated." 

Plain and simple email marketing has a lot of pieces but, most likely you are in the boat where you don't need all the pieces. 

1. Have a schedule

Your emails will often not be earlier than planned so, have realistic expectations. Often, where I see this go wrong, is when you ramp up all your resources to send out an email, and it doesn't go out on a particular date, and you end up scrambling. 

Simple poor planning turns into the "blame" game. 

Have a plan A and a plan B. For example. 

Email Subject - "This will blow your mind."
Goal #1  - Goes out on January 13th at 10 am
Goal #2 - Goes out no later than January 15th at 9am

Your team will get into a routine and will eventually not need goal number two as often. 

2. Follow up 

Often times you put your whole self into one email campaign and don't have a follow up plan. Whether your marketing department involves just yourself or a team of 25, this step seems to fall through the cracks. 

If you don't have time to go one-by-one through your emails this is an example of how follow up can be easy.

Rate your leads based on their activities and have these leads go into different lists. From this you are dealing with a smaller number of leads then just following up on all who "opened" your email. Give your leads a chance to fill out forms or inquire with a webinar. 

3. Utilize resources

If you are reading this you have likely switched to a non generic email client. Such as a MailChimp if you don't need all the bells and whistles. If you are larger and have a CRM then you might have something more robust then MailChimp like a, Hubspot or a Marketo. 

Before you run campaigns make sure you have time to think out how you are using your tools and see if there are more effective ways you can be using the system.

For example:
1. Nix the custom HTML template and go for a native template in the system
2. Try out A/B Testing
3. Put your leads into a follow-up automated campaign

There are always new resources out there for marketing campaigns! I would love to hear any new ones if you have any.