Everyone who has a successful email marketing campaign knows they can’t just sell, sell, sell in their emails.
In order to get leads through your email marketing campaigns, you need to share useful and insightful information. Offering something of value to your target market is key.
Once prospects know you’re there to help them learn your niche, they have a much easier time hearing you tell them all they need to know in order to move forward with their purchasing decisions.
But how do you create an email marketing campaign that drives leads?
Get to know your target first
Before you start a marketing campaign of any kind, getting to know your target audience is crucial.
You may be thinking… “shouldn’t I target everyone I can?” Well, maybe. But, it’s hard to create a message that appeals to everyone. In order to dig down into those who fit your niche perfectly, your efforts must be more targeted. After all, focusing on a direct message will get you more qualified leads in the long run.
Here are a few things you might consider asking yourself when researching your target market.
- What is the general age of my customers? This question can harbor the biggest gaps in your answer and you may have customers at all stages in their life. But, if the majority happen to be in a particular group, you may want to appeal to them the most with your email marketing campaigns.
- Does a specific gender prefer your business? Obviously, we’re not saying you need to claim to be a women’s or men’s only brand. But if the majority of your customers happen to be women, you may want to focus on appealing to them rather than overexerting too much effort on appealing to men. You can quite possibly appeal to both too, it just depends on your industry.
- What are your customer’s needs? How can your product benefit your customer’s needs? If you’re promoting a course on how to build your email list but your target market is more interested in learning about social media hacks, you’ll miss the mark, and likely won’t have a good turn out.
- What is the general income of your target market? This can be tricky to determine, but it’s totally necessary. If you are targeting small start-ups or mom and pop shops, but you’re using enterprise pricing, there is a problem. You need to figure out what your target market is willing to spend and showcase that in your pricing. This can also be a great point to discuss or advertise in your email marketing campaigns.
By getting to know your target audience first you are helping to build a better user experience all around.
Hacks on getting leads from your email marketing campaigns
As you can imagine there are plenty of different things you can try in order to get leads from your email marketing campaigns but here are a few worth mentioning.
1. Newsletters
Most websites and blogs have a newsletter sign up that either pops up or displays on their website. Chances are if someone stumbles along an article of yours and likes what you have to say, they would also likely want to see what other information and updates you have to share in your newsletter.
The best part of this is, subscribers who are not actual clients are getting a glimpse into your company. And they might be more likely to become a client down the line since they have a familiarity with your brand.
You can imagine how newsletters and these type of email blasts can be a driving factor for leads.
Just make sure your newsletter isn’t too salesy. No one wants to be pitched your business over and over. Rather be informative, provide a solution to a problem, and give them insights to behind the scenes action.
2. Call to Actions (CTAs) that drive referrals
Most email marketing campaigns are used to inform readers of industry topics and what’s going on with your business. But you’ll see that as the email discusses a ‘problem’ or talks about something related in your industry, a CTA ties it all together.
For example, an invoice software company may share a newsletter with their subscribers that talks about invoices, the SaaS industry, and maybe even small business success tips. At the end, they might include a CTA that drives subscribers to sign up for a demo to view how their product can help their small business. They can then change this CTA to match whatever theme or topic they are covering to help drive people to sign up for their service.
Always make sure to include a CTA at the end of your marketing emails! A CTA that follows resourceful tips and advice can have a strong driving factor and produce serious leads.
3. Ask for reviews
Asking for reviews can give you a major competitive advantage. Customer ratings and reviews are a major influence in the purchasing decisions for many people. In fact, in a study by Merkle and Levo, showed that 62% of people reported that they try a product based on recommendations.
Your reviews can help you build your brand’s reputation, and it helps give you a trusted voice. People trust the experience and stories people share over regular marketing tactics. Meaning, if someone is looking for the type of product you offer, you better believe they are reading reviews on you before reaching out.
Many people gauge whether or not you’re worth their time while sifting through what others have said.
You may have an email sequence that you send to paying customers. If so, use this as an opportunity to ask for a review. Because it’s your happy customers who are going to give you the best reviews. And reviews bring in leads.
Tip: You don’t always have to make this a CTA. You can ask for a review in the footer of your emails or even in your email signatures. This way every time you email a customer, they are given the opportunity to write you a review.
4. Offer something they can’t refuse
If you want people to be interested in you, you have to offer them something they want. Your subject line can play a huge role in this. Because let’s face it, we’re not likely to open an email if the subject line can’t even intrigue us.
For example. Databox knows how to grab the attention of marketers. By adding ‘get featured’ in their subject line, most marketers would be intrigued to see what they are talking about.
This is an absolute must, especially for those who are not yet customers. If you offer something like an incentive, coupon, or even a freebie of some sort, people may be more inclined to open your email. And possibly make the next step to becoming a customer.
5. Use emotion to drive word of mouth
People respond well when there is emotion involved. Whether it be something that is happy, sad, or funny. If you can tie in one of these emotions you’ll stand to be quite intriguing.
These types of emotions can play well in your subject line. You can grab someone’s attention quickly by using thought-provoking or sensitize language. From there, you can use that to fuel the content for the rest of your email.
Your email subject line is the single most important thing when attracting people to open, and furthermore to become a paying customer.
Meet Edgar is a great example of a B2B company that uses emotion in their email subject lines. Recently they sent out an email inviting people to join an event they will be speaking at. The subject line, however, plays with emotion asking, ‘Ready to be a BOSS?”, giving the reader a little spark of excitement.
6. Encourage referrals upon content download
You can get email subscribers to share your content with their friends too. If you are offering something like an e-course, a content download, or an ebook, you can prompt a share to happen after they click download.
We’ve all seen thank you popups, but you can encourage this to happen via a thank you email too. Using a simple link or CTA, people will know that they can ‘share with a friend’ easily.
Summary
Your email is an owned media channel. You can add whatever message you want. But, to get leads from it, you have to put in a little work.
Remember, you can’t just send an email to anybody. Following the CAN-SPAM Act you need permission from your audience. If someone thinks your email is spam or they are not sure how they have been added to your email list, they will likely unsubscribe and write your business off.
Asking for permission to send is a great way in of itself to get leads. Interested people will subscribe, and those are the people who make great leads.
Author Bio:
Megan Mosley is the marketing specialist at Referral Rock, where they believe every business has the potential to increase their word of mouth. When she’s not working, she enjoys sipping on coffee and hanging out with her family.
Twitter: @megsmosley
LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/megan-mosley/
