5 Tips for Successful Email Marketing Strategies

Online marketing is constantly evolving and it's getting faster and faster. Meanwhile, no week goes by without news. At Google, for example, there is always something going on, but also on Facebook , the speed of innovation is increasing more and more. This also applies to various other areas. And where topics such as SEO or social media are among the

subjectively most interesting priorities, the classics are often neglected. One of these classics is e-mail marketing, In addition to telephone marketing and letter mailing, e-mail marketing is now very clearly part of the marketing mix for many companies. However, nothing works without a good strategy if you do not want to burn your money senseless. So time for 5 tips that should not be missing in a successful e-mail marketing strategy.

Define target correctly

Basically not that difficult, you should think. But even at this point lurk dangers, if you do not know exactly what you really want. It is therefore very important for the successful e-mail marketing strategy to know the goal of a campaign.

What should be achieved? Is it really about selling? Anyone who wants to reach existing customers, of course, has an advantage. After all, you are known as a seller. It looks

different when you want to get excited about new customers.

The way to the goal is not always easy. For the right e-mail marketing strategy, it is important to know in advance exactly who belongs to the target group and where this target group can be found. The better the knowledge of all the facts that lead to the goal, the easier it will be later to implement a campaign meaningfully.

Get good e-mail addresses

Nothing works without quality. This does not just apply to content though high-quality content is also vital to the e-mail marketing strategy. The focus here is on the the e-mail addresses that you will be using in your email marketing campaigns.

First question to ask: how big is your own stock of e-mail addresses? What data do you have? Can the recipients be addressed personally? How old are the e-mail addresses?

The older an address is, the sooner it can "annoy" you. Sometimes it is no longer valid, sometimes the owner does not remember that he / she has even released their own e-

mail address. The consent must therefore exist. This works best with the "Double Opt-In" procedure.

And of course you can also buy e-mail addresses. That is then a question of budget, what you want to spend. However, if you really want to target your own audience, then your own channels, like the website or newsletter subscriptions, are more suitable for getting those email addresses.

Matching content

Also important for a successful e-mail marketing strategy: the content must be right. When it comes to existing customers, for example at an online shop, then the matter is relatively clear. These people should be offered similar things that they have already purchased in the shop. So you have to know the interests, which requires more extensive data sets. This can be implemented when generating e-mail addresses.

Appropriate content is so important because e-mail is a very fast medium. Once the sender has been able to catch the attention of the potential customer (for which, among other things, the design of the e-mail and, in particular, the subject line is important), a few seconds (if at all) decide whether the content of the e-mail campaign is considered useful.

If you make a mistake here, then you give away opportunities. When sending out an email marketing message the most accurate knowledge of the recipients and the appropriate coordination of the content, together with the design of the e-mail and the time of delivery are crucial. Here you should do your homework.

Use professional email marketing software

This may sound trivial on first hearing, but Outlook is not suitable for e-mail marketing campaigns. In the context of a perfect strategy it is useless. Critical features like list management, automatic opt-in and opt-out procedures are missing (just to name a few).

Things like personalizing a newsletter can determine the success and failure of a campaign. Even the design of an e-mail is affected. Although Outlook can help a bit in terms of design, it is not really convincing.

Good software for sending e-mail campaigns is much more helpful . Meaningful bounce rate management can automatically sort out emails that no longer exist. This ensures that the

distribution list is always up to date and that you spare your own resources.

Correct measurements are half the battle

It is also worthwhile to use appropriate software for measuring success. Or failures, as the case may be. In any case, it is a fact that in the context of a meaningful e-mail marketing strategy one has to know which contents, methods and delivery times work and which do not.

This can only be experienced if you make correct measurements. And no matter which tool you use, it's important to draw the right lessons from it. For example, at what times did my newsletter have the best opening rates? Which of my existing customers ordered again during the last campaign?

Technically, this can be challenging. For starters, it is enough to work with special URLs to understand the customer's path. Landing pages that are specifically designed for campaigns can also be useful. This way, it can be seen whether a potential customer who has reached an offer via e-mail has also found exactly what he was looking for.

Conclusion

It's not easy to find the right email marketing strategy for yourself, your product or service. It is important that one tests and keeps testing. Classic A / B tests can help, for example, by leading 50 percent of the recipients of a newsletter to one landing page and the other half to a second.

Basically, however, the basis must be right for the e-mail marketing strategy to work. The right preparation, target group-specific content and suitable tools are absolutely necessary and must not be missing. Incidentally, this also applies to the source material - the e-mail addresses.

It is possible, as said earlier, to buy external lists. In my view, however, the organic generation of e-mail addresses is much more useful. It results in less wastage and helps to make the email marketing strategy really successful.