5 tips to improve your email marketing.

If you don’t have an email marketing plan yet for your business, I highly recommend starting one.  We should never put all of our eggs in the social media bucket as unfortunately we don’t ‘own’ any of our followers or any of their details.  If something happened to Facebook or Instagram overnight, you would lose your audience.  It is unlikely it would happen but always best to have a second path of communication.

You can start your email marketing simply by collecting email addresses from your customer orders or through your website.  It does take time but your list will grow.  And it will be worth it.

Here are 5 tips to finding success with email marketing:

Incentivise people to join your list. This could be with 10% off, free shipping, a free gift or an ebook if you are a service provider.  The best option will be different for every business so have a think about what would excite your audience.

1. Don’t make your emails all images. The industry recommendation is 75% text and 25% images. Write more and share with your audience and then add a couple of images to brand your newsletter and visually share your products.
2. Don’t only send emails when you have a sale or new product launch. Send updates and add value.  Could you share a recipe or style inspiration or a how-to guide to using your product.
3. Try to share on a regular basis. This could be monthly, bi-monthly or weekly.  If you can keep to some kind of schedule it helps your audience know when they will hear from you.  Most email providers allow you to schedule emails too so its easy to plan in advance.  Don’t try to be too ambitious though – don’t go for weekly if you will never meet that timing.  Monthly is a great option.
4. Don’t be afraid to send emails. If people have subscribed, they want to hear from you and they have given their permission for you to email them.  They can unsubscribe at any time!
5. A bonus tip: you may find you receive more orders from an email than via social media.  It is easy for people to click a button direct from your email and make a purchase.  Many people read emails from a laptop or computer which makes it easy to shop and they are more focussed on what they are doing. 

If you need some help with getting started with your email marketing, download my Get Started guide, packed full of hints and tips.  Click here to download.