Email Marketing: Want to triple your return on investment?
Digital MarketingIntroduction:
One of the biggest mistakes most marketers make today is thinking that email marketing is dead. Today, many marketers are ditching the email marketing scheme to go with social media. Come to think of it, social media looks a lot sexier than email. But is a social media post really as effective as an email? Before answering that question, let’s state a well-known fact. It’s easier to send a friend request on Facebook than it is to collect an email online. But believe me, email marketing is worth three times more than social media marketing. So what is email marketing?
Email marketing is the targeting of customers through emails. Every email sent to a potential customer can be considered email marketing. Email marketing involves sending a promotional email or advertisement to a subscriber. Through your email address. Today, a large number of organizations use email marketing. Even more bloggers use email marketing today than ever before. For example, have you ever been browsing a website and see a field that asks you to submit your name and email to get a free eBook or update? That’s the front end of email marketing.
Most bloggers use email marketing because it improves the customer experience. With a well-targeted email list, you can reach established customers and potential customers as well. Any given subscriber will be better and more easily informed via email. Email will have higher visibility than a Facebook post. The Facebook post will drown in a stream of content in the minutes after it is posted.
Do you really need email marketing?
If you want to improve the experience of your customers or readers, then you need email marketing. Forget the glamor and flashiness of social media marketing. We are talking about efficiency here. We are talking about a greater commitment. Greater range. Higher click-through rate and more. As many experienced sellers say, “the money is in the list.” Some even say that “your net worth depends on your network.” In the following lines I will explain the advantages of email marketing. In these explanations, I will use statistics. The sites that produced those statistics will be mentioned at the end of this article. So, let’s get into the advantages of using email marketing:
Potential range:
Did you know that in 2013 around 3.2 billion email accounts were created in the world? 95% of online consumers use an email address. The most interesting fact is; 91% of those consumers check their email accounts at least once a day. Today, we browse more with our phones than with our computers. As a result, we are more easily notified when we receive emails. Our phones place notifications right in front of our eyes.
Today, it’s easier to check an email than a Facebook or Twitter post. This is because when we post content, so do a million other people. As a result, finding a particular post that you liked 3 weeks ago can be the most daunting task.
actual range:
Before we explain this part in more detail, let’s get some interesting numbers. In the first half of 2013, research conducted using email as a marketing channel revealed some surprising facts. The one that stands out the most is this; 18% of emails sent during a campaign never reach their destination. 4% of emails sent are sent to the spam folder. That means that 22% of emails sent do not reach the intended recipient.
On the other hand, 78% of emails sent during an email campaign reach their destination. Think of it this way: if you send 1,000 emails, 780 emails will reach their destination. On top of that, 91% of recipients check their emails daily. This means that around 709 recipients will actually see your email. This is a huge efficiency as less than 30% of emails sent are lost.
Now, let’s compare these numbers with those of a Facebook campaign done in the same way. This revealed that 74% of Facebook posts are actually lost within the great flow of content. That is a problem. That means that for every thousand Facebook posts, 740 are lost in the content stream. That leaves us with 260 posts viewed by our target readers. Another bad thing is that everyone who sees your content will not click. Less than half will really do. That leaves us with less than 130 people actually interested in our offerings.
Click rates:
In the previous point, we talked about what percentage of people see and like your posts and emails. Now let’s talk about the people who actually complete the actions and do what you want them to do. Let’s say you click on a link. This link can take them to a landing page or website.
Click-through rate is the percentage of people who receive your message and actually click on it. The click-through rate for a tweet is 0.5% vs. 3% for an email. These numbers seem small at first. But this means that 6 times more people click on an email link than a tweeted link.
Let’s continue using our example of 1,000 emails and 1,000 social media posts. A click-through rate of 0.5% means that for every thousand, 5 people will click on your link. This is for social networks. Sometimes click rates are higher, but those are particular cases. The numbers we use here are average.
A 3% click-through rate with emails means 30 clicks per thousand. That’s the best click-through rate you’ll get on average. The numbers aren’t amazing, but the efficient numbers aren’t always. The difference is such because when people give you their email addresses, they actually want to know more about you.
Your readers want it like this:
Most people use social media to communicate with their friends first. They are rarely used to receive business news and reviews. There are specialized websites for that. 77% of users during an online survey said that they prefer to receive promotional messages in their emails. 4% said they prefer these posts on social media. This speaks to the fact that by sending an email, people literally provide you with a business meeting place.
Emails are private:
It is easier for a reader to express their problems privately than openly. Everyone is not comfortable when it comes to expressing their shortcomings openly. When a user wants to express her problems and cannot meet with you, what does he do? He writes you an email. This way, he can tell you everything. You can respond specifically to him.
Soon I will create a page where I will publish content requested by the user. Every weekend.
Email marketing and newsletters
Conclusion:
You want to use emails if you want to show off your online presence. Also, this is for you if you want to improve the reader experience. Setting up an email marketing campaign is really not expensive. We’re talking $6 to $20. Per month. Some services like MailChimp even offer free services for your first 2,000 subscribers.
Email marketing is not dead. In any case, kill that silence between you and your subscribers. In an upcoming post, I’ll talk about building an email list. Thank you for reading. We’ll talk soon guys.