This article is part of a series of twenty articles. Click to read: The Top 20 Web Marketing Concepts Your Next Website Design Company Should Know

 
Email marketing is one of the easiest, most inexpensive ways to keep the name of your business in front of your clients on a frequent, consistent basis, and has become an exceptionally popular form of advertising. If you aren’t taking advantage of the benefits of email marketing, consider these statistics:

• A study by the Direct Marketing Association estimated that email marketing would generate an ROI of $42.08 for every dollar spent on it in 2010, outperforming all the other direct marketing channels studied.
• Nearly 90% of consumers use email (2010 Digital Marketing Fact Book).
• In 2011, 88% of business-to-consumer firms and 71% of business-to-business firms are using email marketing (Forrester Research).
• U.S. online retail sales (excluding auto, travel, and prescription drugs) are forecast to reach $248.7 billion by 2014 (Forrester Research).

So – what is email marketing?

Email marketing is sending electronic mail to a list of customers and prospects to deliver your marketing messages and help you stay in contact with people on your list. Companies send regularly scheduled emails to build customer loyalty and trust, increase sales, and strengthen brand recognition.

However, a successful email marketing campaign today is not just about selling your products or services. It is important to understand: consumers don’t want to be sold. According to the Custom Content Council, 73% of consumers prefer to get helpful articles rather than ads from companies. And 61% are more likely to buy from those companies. By sending relevant, informative email communications on a regular basis, you can build a strong relationship with your readers. This relationship will set you apart from the competition, companies that send messages that are often viewed as SPAM in the eyes of the recipients.

What are some of the benefits of email marketing?

1. Save money and time – Email is an inexpensive and fast way to reach large numbers of people.
2. Build your company’s reputation as an expert – If you are too busy to generate your own content, a professional online marketing firm can generate and publish industry specific content for your business.
3. Grow your prospect list – There are multiple ways to expand your list of email contacts, from website embedded subscription forms, to social media, giveaways, events, and more.
4. Keep your company visible – Put your name in front of people often so they’ll remember you when they or their friends need you.
5. Track results easily – Numerous web analytics are available to learn how effective each email was and how to improve future email performance.
6. All marketing campaigns increase in effectiveness – Combine email with social media, website, newspaper ads, bulk mail, and radio … and multiply the results.
7. Communicate with people who want your email – Use opt-in lists and advanced email marketing tools to ensure the highest open rates and avoid being blacklisted.

There are several important ingredients that must be present in order for an email marketing campaign to achieve the desired results. Great content is only one of those ingredients, successful email marketers know that other processes must be followed closely. To create powerful results, email marketing campaigns must:

• Provide fresh and relevant content.
• Utilize regularly updated sources of email contacts.
• Brand the email message properly at time of distribution.
• Use a compelling subject line to cut through the clutter.
• Maintain proper controls over the system of email distribution.
• Empower email marketing with social media and sharing tools to help spread the message further.

Our team of online marketing experts at seenBest Web Design in Phoenix, Arizona, help your business maximize email marketing results. We help build email lists from client databases and other sources and then import those lists into the proper email marketing software, based on marketing objectives. We then help brand the email message to match your business cards, websites, and other marketing collateral. We provide content writing services that will create fresh, regular content to use in email marketing campaigns and help inform and energize your client base. From start to finish, we help your company create and manage a regular newsletter email campaign, including template design and content selection. We help embed newsletter/email sign-up forms on websites and utilize other sources, such as social networks, to expand your list and maximize the distribution of your message.

We have been helping businesses achieve their marketing goals throughout the Phoenix, Arizona, metro area since 1995. Contact us today for a free expert consultation and find out how we can help your business increase sales and maximize ROI through the use of email marketing. Call (602) 456-0150.

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Content is King

Let’s face it, the online competition for eyeballs of your target audience is tough for most industries, and it’s getting tougher every day.  How can you expect success online when facing challenges from hundreds of people all going after the same prize? The key is content and knowing your industry. So many posts and updates and blog posts days are junk. It seems like anyone will post just about anything, as long as they think someone will spend a microsecond of time to read it. Unfortunately, this leads to a tremendous amount of clutter everywhere. Facebook, blogs, email – clogged full of garbage. The way you push your message through all of this mess and reach your target is by posting quality content, based on real-life experience, and loaded with industry knowledge.

Let’s say you have an amazing new product that you would like to announce to the world. The first thing that most people think they SHOULD do to market that product is start making a multitude of posts and updates in many areas as possible. Linking to the product, talking about the product, trying to convince others of the effectiveness of that new product. However, that is not the way to win over the hearts and minds of new customers. A better solution is for you to start describing experiences. What adventures did you encounter while creating your product? In what ways did your product help a customer, or make someones life easier? People are far more likely to respond favorably to stories of others than they are to a bland, one line promotional pitch.

Blogging about your products and services services is a great way to get the word out. When generating content for your blog, think about tips, advice, and ways you can help your target customers. Engaging customers with stories on your blog is a powerful form of word of mouth marketing, similar to having a face to face conversation. It helps to use that mindset when posting, what would you say to a client if they were standing right in front of you right now? When making blog posts, try to think from your clients point of view and make postings that will appeal to their interests.

Generate your blog posts in this way and you will, over time, build traffic and build interest. Content is King, so make sure your content is relevant and make sure you have a lot of it.