Email Marketing Grows Up

Years ago, a business could appear online and start sending poorly written email messages to millions of prospects every month. Their open rate might be abysmal, but they'd make some sales because no one else was doing things differently.
But if your firm is still using this old school email marketing strategy, please stop now! When the Internet was an infant, customers might have responded to these tactics. It's a whole new world now, and there are plenty of smarter ways to do business. Let's talk about how email marketing is best done in a mature Internet business environment.

Grown Ups Don't Abuse Their Email Lists

It should go without saying that spamming your email list is unacceptable. In the first place, your reputation online will crumble as the spam filters start blacklisting your messages. In the second place, why would any reputable company want to give itself a black eye?
There are other ways, however, that email marketers abuse their lists. Sending misspelled, badly formatted messages tells prospects and customers you're willing to waste their time. And what does that practice say about your company? If no one bothers to proof your email, what are your products going to be like?
One more major error some Internet firms make is failing to update their lists. The best email handling applications build in automatic unsubscribe processes, and allow clients to update their information. Investing in a good list handling software or service is definitely a grown-up thing to do.

Grown Up Companies Look Professional

A mistake some online businesses make is taking less care than brick-and-mortar companies to create a professional image. Commerce may be quicker and the overhead lower on the Internet, but customers are still looking for reputable firms from which to buy products.
What does this have to do with email marketing? Produce an impression of reliability with potential clients and you'll move past the obviously fly-by-night firms. One way to do so is consistently sending attractive, well-written marketing messages.
It admittedly takes time and money to develop a mature email marketing strategy, but it's nowhere near as expensive as losing potential customers to sloppy practices.

Grown Ups Don't Skimp on Talent

So, how does an online business create a mature targeted email marketing & email advertising campaign strategy? The first step is hiring talented people to plan and create your campaigns. If your webmaster is still valiantly trying to write autoresponders and strategize when to send them, repent now and start looking for someone with creative background to design your messages.
A team approach is best. Include people with technical, marketing and creative talent. Sound a bit pricey for your online company? Then look for a marketing firm that specializes in promoting online businesses to help you create engaging, effective messages.

Grown Ups Use Multiple Approaches

Here's another grown up Internet marketing approach for building sales through email campaigns. It's multi-pronged, and requires careful planning and execution:

1. Create Localized Campaigns: Back in the day, Internet marketers loved big lists and sent every message to every contact. Mature online businesses now know that sending customized messages to smaller groups based on buying habits, geographic locale or any number of distinguishing demographics is a much smarter way to do business.

2. Send Messages Triggered by Customer Interest: What this means is creating series of messages to be sent in response to any type of customer interest. That could mean people who enroll in a training course or download your latest whitepaper. It should definitely mean anyone who buys something from your website. Like localized email marketing, triggered email campaigns are much more successful overall than generic messages sent to large groups.

3. Mix in Some Broad Brush Messages: Sometimes, you'd like everyone to receive information at the same time. Perhaps you have an exciting new product with broad appeal. Those first messages about new products and services can definitely be sent to your entire list, but watch open rates and clickthroughs by group and plan second-wave messages accordingly. For example, if prospects from one part of the world don't respond well to your product launch message, the second series sent should contain more localized text and images.

4. Test, Test, Test: A mature email marketing strategy should include time for testing different approaches. Any good email handling application should include reporting capability. Run reports after each wave of messages to learn which content, formatting and products draw the best response. Tweak message components and test again. By spending the time to test and refine message content, you'll save the time and expense of sending ineffective messaging.

The Internet is a great place to do business! The trick is to offer great products that you market using grown-up tactics. Once you commit to being part of the mature Internet business community, you'll be much farther up the road to success.

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