The Best Reasons to Go All In with Email Marketing? Connection, Storytelling, Conversion

What is email marketing?

At its simplest, email marketing is using email to promote a business’s products or services. Because it speaks directly to the potential customer or client, it falls into the realm of direct marketing. And because it takes place on electronic devices connected to the internet, it’s also digital marketing.
Email marketing can be effective for all kinds of businesses, especially those that need to nurture their audience into buyers and those that need to communicate with their audience often or over long periods of time.

It can be a powerful tool to

• Build brand awareness

• Generate leads

• Build relationships

• Communicate special offers 

Why use email marketing?

An email list is a platform you own

Unlike other platforms where an algorithm controls (and can wreak havoc) who, when, and how much of your content is seen, you own your email list. You get to invite people to join your list. Unless there is some sort of major collapse of your email platform, you know who is on your list. (Occasional backup is a good idea!) You control what is sent and how often. You can craft your emails to specific segments of your list based on their activity. Who is in control? Yep, YOU.

Email marketing is cost-effective.

Some people may think that email is dead. Definitely not true! Of many marketing options, email remains one of the easiest and least expensive with the greatest return on investment. Tracking your ROI is relatively easy with email marketing. And the best part is how high that number is. Recent data suggests that the average ROI for email marketing is between 3,600% and 3,800%. Translation: for every $1 spent on email marketing, the average return is $36-38!

You can leverage social media to bring people to your email list. 

You probably use social media for visibility. But there’s still distance there. How many people see your posts? Are these people part of your target audience? Using social media to direct people to your email list allows you to close that distance. Joining your email list brings your audience another step closer on the path to being a client. 

Social media helps get the attention of your audience. Once they are on your email list, you can nurture them into clients. With email marketing, there is so much potential for giving them information about what you do, why they need what you do, how you can help them, and breaking down any objections. More on this in a bit!

There you can send targeted, personalized messages.

 While tech is always advancing, it is more difficult, more time-consuming, and more expensive to create large numbers of personalized messages on social media. Email marketing allows these kinds of things with much more ease.

Personalization is relatively simple. You probably get lots of emails with your first name built right into the message. This is a strategy you should use with your own email list.

Most email management systems allow you to segment your list. That means you can divide your whole list into smaller lists and send specific messages to just those groups. Maybe you want to send an email to those who have already made a purchase showcasing another offer they may be interested in. Maybe you want to send a message to those who are really engaged with your emails thanking them for their interest and support. Maybe you need to send a message to those who are least engaged to find out if keeping them on the list is a good idea.
The ability to send specific messages to segments of your email list partnered with the ability to quickly and easily personalize messages with the recipient’s name are two significant powers you need to leverage.

This helps you engage with your audience.

Being able to send specific messages to specific groups is going to make you more real and accessible to your audience. You have more control over the communication you have with the people on your list.

Email is also a great way to invite your audience to interact with you. This doesn’t always have to be a sale either. That can get tiresome. And this interaction can be more than just opening and reading your emails. Email is a great way to direct your audience to other content to help get to know you. 

Here are some other ways to drive engagement with your audience:

• Link to your blog.

• Embed your latest YouTube video.

• Include a survey or poll.

• Ask them to reply with a response to a question or to share an experience.

Now you’re building relationships!

Inviting your audience to respond back directly to you by replying to your email supercharges your connection. Plus you’ll get great insight into your target audience which will help you hone your message.

You know that in today’s world, it takes multiple exposures to move someone who is unaware to someone who is interested, to someone who is a devoted fan buying from you. Email marketing is a useful, steady step on this path.

Know, Like, Trust. Yep, those things are necessary for someone to buy. Building a relationship is building these three qualities. Because email marketing allows for long-term communication, visibility, and engagement, it is an excellent tool for building these three qualities in order to nurture your audience into client fans.

Why I love email marketing.

That opportunity to build relationships is the first and most important reason why I love email marketing. Part of how you can do that is the next reason.
A big part of why I’m attracted to email marketing is my background in teaching English. So much of literature is about characters facing their problems. That’s the story of life, right? We connect as we find similarities to ourselves in those characters and the problems they face.

Telling stories about your business, your experiences, and the problems you’ve overcome is a great way to build relationships with your email list audience. It builds that connection and allows your readers to see something of themselves in you and your business. So, I love email marketing because of the story-telling potential. And emails allow you to spread out the story over time, generating curiosity and interest.

How can a copywriter improve your email game?

A copywriter can be an asset to your email marketing because of both the storytelling and the sales aspect. Copywriters know frameworks and techniques for building relationships, overcoming objections, and making sales conversions. Having a knowledgeable writer composing your emails means you have strong copy for your emails, even if the purpose is for nurturing more than selling. And when you do send out those sales emails, you’ll have more confidence in their ability to convert.