Email Marketing
Stay in front of your audience.
Email Marketing Overview
Email marketing remains one of the most effective digital strategies for businesses to connect with their audience, drive sales and leads, and build lasting relationships. With its direct line to interested customers, email marketing offers a powerful tool for businesses of all sizes. However, creating engaging content, managing lists, and optimizing campaigns can be time-consuming and complex.
That’s where OEPMA’s Email Marketing Management Services come in. We leverage our skills to help you build and segment your list, craft compelling messages, and implement advanced strategies like drip campaigns and personalization.
We stay on top of industry best practices, ensuring your emails are optimized, concise, and relevant to your audience. Whether you’re just starting with email marketing or looking to improve your existing efforts, OEPMA is ready to help you harness its full potential.
Reach out today to discuss how we can elevate your email marketing strategy.
Frequently Asked Questions About Email Marketing
What is email marketing?
Email marketing is a powerful digital strategy that involves sending messages directly to subscribers who have chosen to receive communications from your business. This method allows companies to:
- Maintain contact with interested customers
- Drive sales and revenue
- Remain prominent in customers’ minds
- Deliver valuable information and insights
- Promote events and special offers
By leveraging email, businesses can tailor their messaging to suit various goals, from boosting conversions to building long-term customer relationships. The versatility of email marketing makes it an essential tool for businesses across industries, enabling targeted and personalized communication with their audience.
Why is it important for my business to use email marketing?
Email marketing is a important tool for businesses for several key reasons:
- Direct communication: Reach out to people who have already expressed interest in your business.
- Cost-effective: Engage with potential customers at a fraction of the cost of other marketing methods.
- Deepens engagement: Guide interested prospects further into your offerings and value proposition.
- Ownership of data: Your email list is first-party data that you control, unlike social media followers.
- Versatility: Promote products, services, events, or share valuable information directly with your audience.
- Relationship building: Maintain regular contact with customers and prospects.
- Measurable results: Track opens, clicks, and conversions to refine your marketing strategy.
We believe all businesses should implement email marketing consistently, either through in-house resources or by partnering with an agency.
How do I build my email marketing list?
Building an email list is the real challenge in email marketing. Sending emails isn’t terribly difficult, and while it takes skill to write effective emails, that doesn’t matter if you don’t have anyone to receive them.
To get people to sign up for your email list, you need to offer something valuable. Think about email lists you’ve joined. Most likely, it was because you felt the content would be valuable, you wanted a discount, or you entered a contest, or you thought the content would improve your business or life in some fashion.
You must provide similar incentives.
While contests and giveaways can quickly increase subscriber numbers, your primary focus should be on providing great content to email recipients. This approach attracts your most engaged, transaction-ready subscribers.
Other ways to boost your email list include collecting addresses at community events and asking existing subscribers to forward your emails to others who might enjoy them.
Always maintain ethical practices when building your list. You don’t want to be labeled as a spammer!
What is email marketing segmentation and why is it important?
Email segmentation is the practice of dividing your email lists into groups based on interests or actions. This approach is crucial for maintaining an engaged audience.
Sending the same email to everyone on your list isn’t always effective. Consider a veterinarian’s email marketing campaign as an example. Their client base typically includes both dog and cat owners. If they send a general email with tips for both, people might open it, but engagement will suffer due to the lack of tailored content.
However, if the vet’s office tags each client as either a dog or cat owner, they can send detailed, targeted emails specific to the type of pet the client owns. This strategy significantly boosts engagement and leaves recipients feeling they’ve received valuable information.
You can take segmentation even further. For instance, the dog category could be broken down into small, medium, and large dogs. While they’re all dogs, their size impacts their health, allowing the vet to tailor emails accordingly.
This level of personalization reduces unsubscribe rates because people feel they’re getting value from content that’s relevant to their specific situation.
To implement effective segmentation, take 30 minutes with a legal pad and pen to brainstorm every possible way you could segment your email audience. This exercise will pay off in the long run, leading to more engaged subscribers and more effective email marketing campaigns.
How long should my emails be?
Keep your emails brief.
People are busy, so getting to the point quickly will be appreciated.
Unless your email list is specifically built around long-form essays, it’s best to keep your content concise and focused.
Make your emails scannable and guide the reader through the content. Remember, it’s an email, not a web page.
While content length may vary slightly depending on your industry, the general rule is to keep it short.
How frequently should I send emails to my audience?
It depends on your business type and audience.
Consider two different businesses: a restaurant and a law firm. A restaurant can send emails more frequently, updating customers on new menu items, events, drinks, live music, and discounts. For them, one or two emails a week won’t seem excessive.
On the other hand, a law firm sending two emails per week might be overkill, depending on their practice areas and audience. For a law firm, a good interval would be biweekly to monthly.
The key is to understand your specific business context and your audience’s expectations. Adjust your email frequency to provide value without overwhelming your subscribers.
What are different ways I can use email marketing?
Email marketing isn’t just about sending emails to a large group of people at once. You can set up a series of emails, often referred to as a drip campaign. You’ve likely been on the receiving end of this type of email campaign. It involves guiding the person who signed up through a journey of emails that accomplish a business goal.
For example, let’s consider a veterinary office. To gain subscribers, they could offer a PDF titled “10 Things to Know To Raise A Happy Healthy Dog” to people who’ve just got a puppy. The person enters their email to receive this PDF, which is delivered by email as the first in the series.
Two days later, assuming the person hasn’t unsubscribed, another email is sent. This one could be a personal message directly from one of the vets, thanking them for downloading the guide and offering to answer any questions.
Two days after that, an email invites the person to visit the vet office to pick up a sample package of treats recommended for puppy health. The series concludes with an email directing them to a page where they can become a client of the vet office.
After this email series, that person is added to the “dog” segmented list to receive future emails. This approach allows for targeted, purposeful communication that guides potential clients through a carefully designed journey.
What are some common email marketing mistakes businesses make?
Some common email marketing mistakes we frequently encounter include:
Lack of personalization / segmenting: Many businesses add everyone to a single list and send blanket emails, even when the content is irrelevant to a large portion of the audience.
Not optimized for mobile: The majority of emails are viewed on mobile devices. Including many large image files can lead to poor user experience, resulting in more unsubscribes and an unengaged list.
Bogged down with text: An email isn’t War and Peace. There’s no need for massive text blocks. It’s overwhelming. Keep it short and get to the point. For extended information, provide a link for users to learn more.
Irrelevant Content: Stay in your lane. Your subscribers signed up with certain expectations. Don’t stray too far from that content.
Inconsistency: Nothing’s worse than signing up for a newsletter, receiving a couple, then going months without one, only to suddenly get three in a week. Maintain a schedule appropriate for your business.
While there are other mistakes, these are the most frequent issues we encounter when consulting with clients. Avoiding these pitfalls can significantly improve the effectiveness of your email marketing campaigns.
Should I be concerned with unsubscribes from my email list?
No, it’s going to happen. We have an article about this very subject. Check it out at the link below:
How much does OEPMA charge for email marketing management?
For established platforms and lists, OEPMA’s email marketing management services range from $300 to $500 per month. This includes ongoing management and optimization of your email campaigns.
If you’re starting from scratch, there’s a one-time setup fee of $300. This covers:
- API integrations
- Landing page creation (if needed)
- Assistance in choosing the right email provider for your needs
The monthly fee also includes help with building and segmenting your email list, ensuring your campaigns are targeted and effective.
Please note that this pricing doesn’t include the cost of your email service provider, which you’ll pay directly. Your provider costs typically depend on the size of your email list.
