As a person that has lots of contact with tons business owners, I inadvertently get put on their company’s digital marketing email campaigns quite frequently. More often than not it’s a business that I may have had one or two email conversations with. My guess is they have some sort of automated sync agent that is not functioning properly and it puts me on some sort of follow up campaign for their business.
While many might find this annoying, I find it a fantastic opportunity. First off, it makes an easy case for me to make on why they should consider a better CRM system, over whatever they are currently using. Additionally though, it gives me time to survey what it is they are using to educate people in the hopes of turning them into customers. Sadly, the blunt truth of it is that most of the campaigns they are using, to put it mildly, suck.
I have found that there are some common themes when it comes to these campaigns and some things that most companies are simply off base and missing the mark on. With that in mind, today I thought I would share with you three reasons why your email drip marketing might suck, and how you should fix it.
There Is No “One Size Fits All”
You might think this would be an obvious one, but I cannot tell you how many times I run across email campaigns that take a one size fits all approach to nurturing leads. The problem is, you cannot do this. There is the obvious fact that you will come across two basic potential groups of people. Those that are seeking out the product or service your company offers and are ready to become a customer immediately, and those that are in research mode, still formulating an idea of who it is that will provide them the product and service they need.
Each of these different groups needs a distinct campaign that has been built specifically for them. You see, the whole point of an effective digital marketing campaign is not just to stay in front of a prospective customer. It’s to convince them that you are the thought leader in the vertical market you are in. To do so, you need to educate them with information that they will find valuable and pertinent to their current life situation. It is IMPOSSIBLE to do this with a single digital marketing follow up campaign that just goes out to everyone, no matter who they are.
Your Emails Lack A “Next Step”
Another problem I see with many digital marketing email campaigns is the lack of a strong call to action or next step. Again, you don’t put someone on one of your campaigns solely for the sake of staying in front of them. Educate them. The problem is you don’t want your emails to read like a novel. Shorter, more succinct emails are more likely to be read fully. So how do you educate them then? Use a call to action with a downloadable item of value at the end of your message.
Much like the CTA’s I put at the end of every blog post, you can do the same with emails. For instance, let’s say you own a vegetarian restaurant that focuses on a clean eating menu. You might send an email to your prospective customers about how microgreens are superfoods that need to be incorporated into your diet. One CTA at the end of one of your message could be offering a downloadable recipe showing how you can make a tasty mixed microgreen salad, in three easy steps.
Again, educate them, BUT specifically with items they will deem valuable and pertinent to where they currently are in their life circumstance.
Simply Tracking To See “Open Rate” Is Not Enough
Lastly, and equally important are your analytics. Your analytics help you to figure out if the messages you are sending out are on point and being well received by your potential customers. If the only thing you are doing is tracking whether people opened your email or not, you are falling short. Open rate is important, but you need to know what other actions someone is taking with your emails. This will allow you to employ a behavioral style follow up plan that will help guide you to correctly nurture that potential customer to get their business.
Taking the example of the CTA I mentioned above, a landing page is a perfect way to track these behaviors or actions. For instance, you can track link clicks (people that click on the link in the CTA to get to the downloadable item). Or perhaps you have a short form they fill out (say name and mobile phone number), in order to get the item of value. Or maybe it’s just as simple as tracking the download of the item of value. This would allow you to then put these people in a separate category and serve them more specific marketing material that will help move them further down the funnel and turn them into a customer.
Email marketing campaigns are great tools to aid in nurturing potential customers that you really want to turn into regular customers. The key though is to take the necessary time to customize, optimize and track these email messages, so you have the highest percentage chance of closing the lead and picking up a new client.
We understand and can appreciate that all these steps might be too time consuming for your regular day to day. If you fall into that category, you’re in luck! Click the button below and we’re more than happy to give you a private, one-on-one consultation to discuss your needs and put a plan together to help you grow your business.
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