While other marketing methods have shot to the top of company outreach strategies, email has often been left behind. Perhaps its “bad rap” comes from the consumer tendency to view marketing emails as spam—even if they contain valuable information or deals—and either ignore or delete them unread.
But when crafted correctly, an email outreach campaign is an invaluable tool in the marketing toolbox. The key is to make the email matter with a goal, clear message and memorable word choice. So what can marketing teams do to make their email outreach more effective? Below, 13 members of Forbes Agency Council share their best tips for ensuring that email campaigns capture leads.
Members of Forbes Agency Council offer tips for crafting marketing emails that capture leads.
Photos courtesy of the individual members.
1. Segment Your Audience
It doesn’t matter when you sent an email—if it’s irrelevant, it’s annoying. The first thing you should do before starting any outreach campaign is to segment your audience. Each of your marketing messages should be tailored to a particular recipient if you ever want your messages to be opened. Start personalizing from the subject line and make a message so personal they can’t ignore it. – Solomon Thimothy, OneIMS
2. Provide Helpful For Each Reader
Providing helpful content is the most important consideration for your emails. You need to provide relevant and useful information for your audience so that you are considered a resource for them and not just another email in their inbox. The next piece of this is to ensure your content is aligned with that specific segment. Remember that not all content is relevant to your entire database. – Elyse Flynn Meyer, Prism Global Marketing Solutions
3. Steer Clear Of The Spam Box
When it comes to capturing email leads, first things first: Avoid the spam box. If your emails are landing in the spam box, there is absolutely zero chance of capturing email leads. Webmail providers are cracking down, and spam filtering is becoming more rigorous. Taking the necessary steps to ensure your emails are not getting flagged would be the first step. – Randy Soderman, Soderman SEO
4. Use A Customer Resource Management System And Follow Up Regularly
We make sure that the form itself is created in a program that will automatically populate the company’s CRM and also email that information to the inside sales team. As a marketing agency, we meet with that sales team regularly to gain feedback on the quality of leads and ensure they are being followed up. The regular, ongoing personal interaction with the sales team makes all the difference. – Francine Carb, Markitects, Inc.
5. Provide Value
Give, give and give more. Every email that hits an inbox should offer so much value for free that the recipient can’t help but wonder how amazing your paid product/service must be. Based on the value you send free of charge, email recipients should feel indebted to you as soon as they hit open. By playing the email version of the giver’s game you win credibility, trust and fans. – Katie Harris, Spot On Solutions
6. Stick With The Basics
Email outreach is bound by the same rules as other channels: The audience should be targeted, the content should be relevant and the call-to-action should be strong and clear. If your email outreach isn’t checking off those three boxes, you’re doing it wrong. Most underestimate the effort required to create an effective program. The key is to produce regular content to resonate with your reader. – Kenny Eicher, The CSI Group
7. Use Punchy Subject Lines
Every email needs a punchy subject line to give a reason to read. Email campaigns need to be short, quick to the point and visually interesting and offer true insights into the subject. No one needs to read email advertising. Make it smart and deliver information that has true value to your audience. Make your email less promotional and more knowledge-based. Give just enough to get a call. – Pat Fiore, FIORE
8. Have A Single Clear And Simple Call-To-Action
The quickest way to end up in spam is to add multiple links to your email newsletter directing to different landing pages. A common theme among our most successful email campaigns is a clear call-to-action. Whether it’s to download a white paper or register for an upcoming event, we always make sure that our emails only ask recipients to take one simple action. – Darian Kovacs, Jelly Digital Marketing & PR
9. Understand Your Objectives
Be crystal clear on the goal of your email. Is it nurture, lead generation or qualification? Understanding the objective of your email will help you determine your tone, content and calls-to-action. If it’s a quarterly newsletter, for example, include relevant resources and CTAs focused on education. If it’s lead generating, include content that is qualifying and sales-oriented CTAs. – Natalie Nathanson, Magnetude Consulting
10. Get To The Point
Getting so many emails can be overwhelming, so I’m always very aware of what kind of information they need to read to get what the message is about at first sight. Forget about objects that do not reveal the content of your message. Work the layout and get to the point. A beautiful image, nice fonts and consistency with your branding as an agency is key. – Sarah Hamon, S2H Communication
11. Be Thoughtful
Email marketing can be an invaluable tool; however, it has lost some of its luster. It’s a “free” way to market, so it can be abused. Keep your list clean—make sure you’re making it easy for people to unsubscribe and removing unsubs, and remove inactive prospects. If you can personalize your message to your list, time where they are in their journey and use email sparingly, you’ll be successful. – Jacob Hanson, PR with Panache!
12. Make It Personal
Give your audience something real to grab onto and genuinely connect with. We’ve had the best success when we’ve taken a much more natural approach to storytelling, as opposed to using it simply to toot our own horn. Keeping our narratives short and simple and sharing real stories about real people allows for a deeper human connection than marketing-speak or cold, dry case histories ever could. – Leslie Licano, Beyond Fifteen Communications Inc.
13. Map Out A Conversation
When you’re building out a new sequence, approach it as a conversation—as if you’re walking up to them at a networking event. Introduce yourself, address their problem with a solution, offer up something free, make sure they’re the right contact and close the deal or gain their trust. From there, it’s just nurturing your relationship and making sure they’re happy with the results. – Matt Bowman, Thrive Internet Marketing Agency
