There is a saying in internet marketing that “the money is in the list,” but your list is pretty useless if your emails are not getting opened, no matter how big it is. According to the Radicati Group, the average person receives 90 emails per day, and only a small portion of those actually get opened. To get your emails opened, you need to send people something they want to read or receive.
What Do Customers Want?
Not all emails are created equal. Some emails are doomed for the spam folder before they are even created while other types of emails have a much better chance to be opened, mainly because of the content they offer.
In a study by Technology Advice, 31.6 percent of the respondents cited irrelevant content as the main reason they flag emails as spam, and 48.1 percent said businesses could improve by offering more informative content and personalized offers. People want something that is of a direct benefit to them, so here are five types of emails you need to be constantly sending to your lists.
1. Special Offers
Thirty-nine percent of users read emails to receive information about your latest promotions and discounts, so regularly update your customers on these. Everyone loves a good deal, and will always be looking forward to your emails that help them get a good bargain.
Special offers do not have to be necessarily selling a product outright; you could just announce an event you are about to have that customers are bound to get a bargain from, or you can send out coupons and discount codes.
Discounts should not be the backbone of your emailing campaign. The main reason for an emailing list is to build relationships, and if you are always selling or trying to push some products in front of customers, you won’t get to form a bond with them. Eventually, they’ll just categorize you as the “sales email” person, and your emails will go straight to the trash folder.
2. Product Update Emails
These are very necessary but one you should be very careful of. People are not always keen on receiving these, but once in awhile, product update emails will get opened. They receive 15 percent of the preference rate in the EmailMonday survey.
The trick to product update emails is to keep them as simple and straightforward as possible while you engage the reader and make the content informative and worth their time. Send weekly or monthly product updates, and instead of sending an update on each product, consolidate it into a periodic roundup of product updates.
3. Relationship Building
The purpose of email marketing is to primarily build a relationship with your audience. Use your emails to provide your audience with quality content that offers them important information and value. It can be complicated to select which type of content is right to use for relationship building. But the trick is to consider what the audience gets from it.
If there is no real value and strong takeaway by the time the audience finishes reading, then it is not worth sending. Technology Advice’s study found that 48 percent of email list subscribers would like to receive more informative content.
With relationship building emails, you can provide solutions to common problems faced by your audience, and inform them of how your product can help them solve it. You could also send emails on current industry trends that impact your audience, adding your perspective on the matter.
4. Lead Nurturing
These are among the most important emails you should send but also the trickiest to get right. Lead nurturing emails target a particular audience who has a potential of becoming customers.
For this type of email, you want to send consumers information about a particular product or service. The right way to do it is pinpointing a problem they are currently facing that can be solved by your product. Focus on a problem, show how it is setting them back, and explain what they can achieve if they solved this problem. Only then should you introduce your product as the solution.
To successfully send lead nurturing emails, you have to use segmenting and personalization. Divide your audience into small niches based on their similarities and interaction history. Through segmentation, you can send the right information and product to the right people, bringing to them specific products that address their specific situations and preference.
5. Tool List
Everyone likes quick fixes and easy solutions, but with a horde of products to sift through to find the best, it can be very tiring and discouraging. Imagine if someone could filter it out for you?
With this information, you already know the average consumer will be thrilled to have a toolkit of products that meet their various needs. Create a list of tools that are relevant to your audience. For example automation tools, autoresponders, web hosting platforms, etc. Create a mix of free and paid tool lists with the aim of benefiting the audience.
Conclusion
The biggest mistake you can make in internet marketing is leaving your subscribers hanging. You have to start building your relationship with your audience immediately after they subscribe, then work at nurturing it every day.
If you neglect your subscribers, they might forget why they subscribed to you. The Internet is a fast world, and people subscribe to many lists every day. Don’t ever go more than a few days without building your relationship with your customers; it’s too important.