Even in 2022, email marketing is an essential part of your marketing strategy. In an age where everyone is increasingly online, you need to be following the latest trends and using your email marketing list thoughtfully to get the best results. There are plenty of trends that you can take advantage of right now to bring in those new leads. Try these tips to get ahead in 2023.
1. Personalizing Your Email Messages
When you get an email from a company, are you going to open it if it opens with ‘Dear Customer’? Of course not. It makes the recipient feel undervalued, or worse, that the email is just spam. To get the very best out of your email marketing, you need to get the recipient to open the email first. Companies are ensuring that happens with personalization.
This can be as simple as using the customer’s name in emails, but it goes much deeper than that. With modern AI powered tools, you can take advantage of your market segments. Send personalized emails to different segments at the right time, offering them just what they’re looking for. They will appreciate these messages more, as you’ll be giving them exactly what they need. Thus, it will be beneficial to create transactional emails and marketing emails that are relevant to the email recipient’s needs.
2. Put AI To Good Use
On the subject of AI, if you’re not already using it in your email marketing, you need to start using it this year. Once the realm of sci fi, AI now can be used by all businesses to get the most bang for their buck in marketing. It can be used to track and implement all kinds of strategies. For example, AI can use analytics to predict outcomes, and process large amounts of customer data at once.
What does that mean for your email marketing strategy? You can use AI to do things like write subject lines, optimize sending times, and check for people on your marketing email list that aren’t engaging with you. It essentially saves you a lot of time with repetitive and basic tasks, so you can focus on the more important things in your campaign.
3. Use User-Created Content In Your Emails
You already know how important user-generated content is. Customers will trust your brand much more if they can see that other customers trust you too. That’s why it’s so important that you have reviews available for others to read, and interact with your customers through them.
“You can implement this content into your emails, again generating that brand trust. You can include all kinds of things, such as polls, reviews, photos, etc. Your customers can see that this is genuine content and that your product is worth buying,” explains Felix O’Brien, a writer at UK Top Writers.
When doing so, make sure you include a Call To Action. This will push customers to answer a poll or share a photo, giving you more data to work with next time. It’s essentially free content for you as a business, so make sure you’re making the most of it.
4. Make Your Marketing Interactive
On a similar note, marketing is often more effective if it’s interactive. When your customers can get involved, they get a lot more out of it and so are more willing to engage. This is something you can implement in various types of email marketing. For example, you can add in those polls and email surveys mentioned above, give them design options such as choosing between light and dark mode, and more. One popular method that businesses are investigating is gamification.
This is something that’s still in its early stages, but it will give you a lot more interaction from your customer base. Gamification is implementing game-style elements into non-gaming platforms. For example, adding a quiz to an email, with a prize for anyone who gets all the answers right, is a form of gamification. Also simple prize draws are another example. As you can see, it’s not as difficult as it looks, and it brings a lot of value to both you and your customers.
5. Make Emails Privacy Friendly
In this day and age, customers are more aware of their privacy needs than ever before. With PCI and GDPR in effect, you need to ensure you’re complying with these rules when you’re engaging with customers via email. When you’re open about how you comply, it engenders a lot of trust within the customer base that will help you convert those leads.
“You can see how important this is, with other companies falling foul of the rules. Even giants like Amazon have recently come under fire, thanks to their subscription page design that made it very difficult to cancel. They’ve actually faced legal challenges for the way it was set up, so you don’t want to fall into that trap,” says Gerard Colman, a social media writer at Custom Writing Services.
As a business, you need to keep an eye on legislation changes, and update your own policies when needed. It’s a very good idea to keep your customers informed of this, too. When you do this, you’re showing them that you value them as customers, and that you’ll always respect their privacy.
6. Optimize Email Across All Platforms
This may well be something you’re already doing, but it’s important that you’re ensuring all customers get the same experience over emails. This is because every year, the number of people using mobile as their main way to get online rises. As such, you want these customers to get the same experience as those who mainly use desktop services.
In some cases, you may need to bring in outside help in order to do this. There are plenty of tech companies out there that specialise in creating a smooth mobile experience for your customers, so look around and see who can help you with this task. It’s money well spent, as the easier it is to engage with your emails on mobile, the easier it will be to convert those leads into paying customers.
7. Send Customer Appreciation Emails
Here’s a trend that doesn’t take much, is very simple, and yet can get great benefits for you. It’s something that a lot of businesses are already doing, and they’re seeing great results. After all, who doesn’t like being appreciated for being a customer?
There’s a few ways you can do this, so you can pick a method that works for you. For example, a popular method is to send an email on the customers’ birthday, with a birthday message and a discount or gift card they can use on your site. You can also offer early access emails, for example for a new range you’re bringing out so they can get first pick.
Doing this can be very simple as you’ll already have data on your customers that you can use. In the birthday example, you already have their date of birth so you can easily set up automated emails to go out on the right date. It’s a simple and easy system, but one that will have a big impact on your sales figures.
8. Get Input From Everyone On The Team
Finally, one of the most important things you can do for your email marketing strategy is to get the input of everyone in your team, not just the marketing staff. This doesn’t sound like it makes sense, but it’s something a lot of companies are doing now. If you’re talking to your whole team, you’re getting a much more well-rounded picture.
How does this work? When you’re talking with other members of the team, you’ll get more insight into what’s working and what isn’t. For example, when you’re implementing a new strategy, the sales team will be able to tell you whether sales have increased or not.
Plus, getting everyone involved helps a lot when people are working remotely. It’s so easy to feel isolated from others in the group, and miss out on what’s going on. When everyone is pulled into the decision making process, you’ll get the experience of everyone and help keep the team together, too.
2023 is the year you should put these tactics into action with your email marketing plan. Making some small changes can make all the difference, so try these ideas in your marketing schemes going forward. You’ll soon start seeing the difference, and start increasing your sales and marketing reach.
Author Bio
Jenny Han is a content marketer and editor. She works with companies to improve their marketing strategies, and writes about her experiences for numerous publications.
