Email Marketing Tips
December 29, 2009Email Marketing is cost-effective and, when done correctly, can be very profitable! It’s also a great way to stay in touch with your customer base. Here are few tips on how to be successful with email marketing:
Work with a clean list
Be sure that the customers you are emailing have opted-in. This means that they gave you permission to email them. Customers can give you permission to email them by signing up on your website, filling out an online survey you created or a filling out a comment card either at your place of business or a trade show you attended. Add wording to make sure the customers know to expect to hear from you via email now and then.
Timing
Don’t send out emails too often or you will risk alienating your customers. Your email could also get caught in a spam filter or customers will start to mark your emails as spam. Once or twice a month is sufficient for keeping in touch with your customer base.
Relevance
Only provide your customers with valuable information that is relevant to them. Are you having a sale or an event? Are you partnering with another business? Offering new services? Think about what your customer would take the time to read about.
Simple Design
Emails that use Flash animation or contain too many graphics can load slowly or get caught in a spam filter. Keep it simple. Jack Burke, author of Creating Customer Connections, recommends using flat text with hyperlinks to your Web site.
Be Courteous to your Customer
Getting permission, refraining from bombarding your customer with emails that may not interest them are all part of being courteous, but also allow customers a way to opt-out of getting your emails if they are no longer interested.
For more information, check out these articles on Email Marketing: