Despite the arrival of mobile and social media marketing, email marketing tool remains to be one of the most reliable digital strategies. Why not? There is more to email marketing that no other type of marketing can offer digital marketers. In fact, email marketing is regarded as one of the best tools to use nowadays. Here are the reasons behind this claim.
1) Customer acquisition and retention
Based on various surveys, such as the one commissioned by Marketing Sherpa, 73% of 2,057 consumers in the US prefer to receive communications from a company through email. Also, email marketing is a very dynamic venue wherein you can send email messages in the form of newsletters, promotions, social opt-ins, etc. As such, you can manipulate these messages to gain repeat businesses at the very least. you may build your sales by sending notifications about new products and services.
Indeed, there are several ways by which you can use emails in acquiring and retaining customers. Aside from offering rewards, you may email your customers about promotional codes, freebies, contests, etc. These are for promotional purposes, but you can also send non-marketing materials such as general information, breaking news and current trends.
2) Synergy with other marketing campaigns
Nowadays, email marketing doesn’t exist in a vacuum. It is used as a gateway that paves the way for introducing your other marketing efforts to your customers and prospects. For example, you may email them snippets of your recently-published blog. You may also include social sharing buttons below the snippets so the readers can easily share the content through their own social profiles. That’s email marketing, content marketing, and social media marketing in one.
On the other hand, you may post shout-outs on your social profiles regarding email subscription. For example, you may offer a coupon for those will subscribe to your email blasts through their Facebook accounts. The process results in a more cohesive and holistic digital marketing campaign with one goal of nurturing your customer base.
3) Objective measure of results
With email marketing, you can easily decide whether to increase or reduce the budget. Online is a plethora of apps that tracks emails from the time they were sent up to whether they are read or shared online or not. Aside from delivery, open and share rates, the apps can also show the click-through rate that the email generated. You would know if the conversions are because of your email marketing or not.
The ultimate goal of this marketing method, as with any other marketing efforts, is to enable profitable returns. If it is not working, you may choose to eliminate the campaign entirely.
4) Easy and affordable tactic
In yet another study conducted by Ascend2, email marketing is considered by 333 digital marketers as the easiest and most effective tool to use. With the help of email service providers, it would only take an hour or so to create an email. These providers offer templates that business owners can use. Also, designing an email simply requires drag and drop. The best part is you can schedule when the messages should be sent. Some email providers allow users to save the customized template which can be used for your next email blast.
Cost is also not an issue. There are free email services such as MailChimp that allows sending unlimited emails. For paid services, you only need to spend around $20 per month and lower if you choose to pay an annual plan.
5) High ROMI
Since the investment is very minimal and the associated risks are very few, the return is almost always positive. That is according to Direct Marketing Association which claims that the ROMI (return on marketing investment) is 21 to 23% higher than other marketing campaigns such as telephone, social media, direct mail, mobile and paid search.
Further, the returns could be continuous. All you will ever need are low-budget updates to your campaign such as in your email designs.
Conclusion:
Online marketing strategies come and go, but some stays like email marketing. However, be reminded that email marketing tool is not all about sending emails. You must know who your target audience is. Through this, you may be able to create emails that resonate with your target market’s needs. It is all about providing value to your audience that can be achieved through solving their problems. If you cannot do this, then your email marketing efforts are doomed to fail.
This article is written by Jeric. He is a Filipino blogger and a digital marketing enthusiast, currently working at Optimind Technology Solutions, a digital marketing agency that provides different services such as SEO, social media marketing, mobile app development and web design in the Philippines.
