7 Reasons to invest in Email Marketing
Email Marketing is a very effective digital marketing strategy that consists of sending emails to a database of customers or leads. A good email marketing strategy will allow you to convert leads into customers and one-time customers into regulars. The main advantage is its ability to scale the process of personalised (one-to-one) communication.
A recurring discussion is whether we are talking about an Inbound or Outbound Marketing strategy. Most marketers have an Outbound approach in email marketing, yet when done well, it can be a good Inbound marketing tool, avoiding Spam and email delivery problems.
Some interesting statistics:
» 99% of consumers check their emails daily, and it’s far and away, the preferred way to receive brand updates. (Hubspot 2020)
» 82% of consumers open emails from companies. (Litmus)
» 59% of respondents say that marketing emails influence their buying decisions, while just over 50% buy through marketing emails at least once a month. (Sale Cycle 2020)
» 31% of B2B marketers say email newsletters are the best way to nurture leads. (Content Marketing Institute, 2020)
» 87% of B2B marketers say email is one of their top organic free distribution channels. (Content Marketing Institute, 2020)
» 80% of professionals believe email marketing increases customer retention. (Emarsys, 2018)
» By 2020, email marketing income amounted to USD 7.5 billion, and in 2023, it’s expected to cross the USD 10 billion thresholds (Statista 2023).
Although some marketing trends may change, email remains the most powerful channel available to marketers today.
So, what are its benefits?
1. A wide reach
Did you know there are 3x as many email accounts as the sum of Facebook and Twitter accounts?
Think about your online behaviour: when you sign up for a website (like an online shop), you need to enter your email address to create the account. And even to create a Facebook or Twitter account, you need an email address.
Email is the currency of the web, and anyone online has an active email address.
We also know that 90% of email is delivered to the intended recipient’s inbox, while only 2% of your Facebook customers see your posts in the News Feed. That is because Facebook limits the number of times your posts appear in the Feed as an attempt to direct brands to the paid advertising options. That means your post is 45 times more likely to be seen by email than Facebook/Meta.
And finally, your email subscribers can explicitly say they want to hear about your business by signing up for your email list. So when it comes to connecting with your prospects and customers, there is no channel with a wider reach than email!
2. Personalized content and targeted to the target audience
Email marketing allows you to segment your customers into different lists based on their preferences, demographics, previous behaviour, etc., allowing you to send highly personalised content that speaks directly to each target audience.
Email marketing is a fantastic way to build one-to-one relationships with current and potential customers. By creating well-written, engaging newsletters and emails, readers get to know, like and trust you and your company. And consumers buy from companies they trust.
3. Drive conversions
Compared to other marketing channels such as websites, social media and advertising, email marketing can be much more effective in driving sales.
A study by Monetade indicates that 4.24% of email marketing visitors buy something, compared to 2.49% of search engine visitors and 0.59% of social media.
Email marketing offers a powerful opportunity for impulse buying. To motivate a customer to make another purchase, you can:
– Display items usually purchased in combination with the products the customer previously bought.
– List items that are similar to the customer’s previous purchases
– Create a special offer or discount for future purchases
Customers often act upon impulse when they receive an email telling them about a relevant product related to their previous purchase. That is especially true if there is a prominent promotion.
4. Higher ROI
In comparison with other marketing channels, email marketing costs very little. For every £1 spent, £44.25 is the average return on investment in email marketing.
But why does email marketing outperform other channels so significantly for ROI?
It all comes down to delivering highly personalised and relevant messages. Unlike social media, where you send updates to every follower regardless of their location, interests and purchase history, email allows you to be hyper-targeted in your communications.
The more information you have about your customers, the more targeted and accurate you can be.
This segmentation and dynamic content helps ensure that the content you send is relevant to each recipient, which leads people to click, make purchases – and increase the ROI of your email marketing campaigns.
5. Optimize your time and budget
There are always time and budget constraints in any business.
Even a simple leaflet campaign can be expensive and time-consuming. Between design costs, approvals, printing, distribution… it’s possible to spend a good amount of money and waste your precious time. All that time wasted by becoming unfocused on your business is lost revenue and a missed opportunity to connect with your customers yourself on a personal level.
Planning a professional email marketing campaign is not complicated or time-consuming. Sending emails to many subscribers will also be more cost-effective. You can count on expert professionals like Link.37 to help you with this process and integration with other marketing tools.
6. Metrics easy to measure
For each email sent, metrics and reports provided show open rates, click-through rates, bounce rates and conversion rates. This information is essential to understand what’s working and what needs to be improved.
A high open rate means your customers know your brand well enough to want to hear about your business.
Next is your click-through rate (CTR), which usually gives a good idea of how many customers have spent their time analysing the content of your email to click on the links it contains. The average click-through rate across all industries is around 7%.
After clicking on an email, the next goal should ideally be to get it to convert – in other words, follow through with the action your email prompted. It’s easy to track email conversion rates, as they show how well your email’s call-to-action is performing.
7. Creates enthusiasm
There is a lot of learning involved with this strategy and plenty of opportunities to communicate with your customers in a personalised way rather than just compulsively sending emails.
Email marketing is a highly effective marketing tool which should be an integrated part of any company’s marketing strategy.
At Link37, we help companies leverage their business by working in our area of expertise – Digital Marketing. Free up your time to dedicate to what you love most, and let us help you.
LAST UPDATE ON JANUARY 2024
