Of all of the different business tools and strategies we teach at The Helpful Academy, email marketing seems to be one of the ones people struggle with the most.
To be honest, I get it.
Email marketing wasn’t something that came naturally to me when I started my first online business back in 2010. I collected email addresses like nobody’s business, because the sign up feature was available on my blog and people seemed willing to use it.
But, I dare you to ask me how many times I actually sent emails to my rapidly growing list…
Hmmm…
Perhaps we won’t talk about that lost opportunity.
Because the answer was, an average of about 1 per year if that…
Fast forward 11 years and I now understand just how important a role email marketing plays in my business. It’s quite simple really… If I stop sending emails, I stop making as many sales.
Funny how that works 😉
In case you missed our other recent email marketing blog post (about which email marketing system is right for your business), here are some compelling facts and figures showing how much potential email marketing holds for your business…
The average return on investment for email marketing is $44 for every $1 spent.
By far the greatest of any digital marketing channel.
Nearly half of all consumers (49%) say they would like to receive promotional emails from their favourite brands every week.
Email is 40 times more effective than social media for customer acquisition.
So, how can you use email marketing to grow your business more effortlessly?
Let’s explore some ways…
1. Nurture new customers
One of the most effective ways to use email marketing (and probably the most underutilised) is to create structure and automation around nurturing your new/ongoing customers. This can really help you stand out from your competitors and establish deep relationships with your customers.
People are looking for connections more than ever. Show your customers some additional love, and this will inspire them to show you additional loyalty.
To plan how you can use nurture sequences in your business, ask yourself the following:
- What do they want to know?
- What do they need to know?
- When do they need that information delivered to them?
- How could you go the extra mile after their purchase, to check in with them and ensure their experience has been awesome?
- What else would your customer be interested in buying from you (this is the part which can really boost profits!)
When someone signs up to your service, or purchases a product from you:
Want some help crafting your email nurture sequence?
Check out our email sequence templates:
Email That Sell
2. Nurture and Woo new leads
One of my favourite ways to use email marketing is to create what’s called a Lead Magnet. If you’re new to the term, I recommend reading this article here called: Lead Magnets – do you really need one, this will help you decide.
Put simply, a Lead Magnet is a way to collect leads from your website. But not just any way (those “sign up to our newsletter boxes only convert like 0.00000000001% of people)* (ok I exaggerate a little – but it’s well under 1%).
A Lead Magnet offers something of interest and high value to your target audience, to entice them to swap their email address in exchange for. In comparison, Lead Magnet conversion rates can convert up to 40% (I’ve seen some even higher)!
They’re really effective, because they help you convert the visitors to your website who aren’t quite ready to purchase yet, into leads that you can continue to communicate with. Once visitors have signed up for the Lead Magnet, you can then trigger an automated email sequence to send highly targeted emails, and help them build trust with your company.
You can see our wide variety of Lead Magnets available on our free resources page here:
There are several really important aspects to make this process work well at helping you grow your business:
- Whatever you’re offering for free needs to be desirable, interesting and related to your offer
- It needs to provide people a really quick win
- Your email nurture sequence needs to be well designed, and strategic, to help you build trust with your new leads, so that they’re willing to become customers.
Grab our free Lead Magnet checklist here, to guide you through building a high-converting Lead Magnet.
Or, for step-by-step help creating a Lead Magnet, see our course Lead Magnets Made Easy. It’ll walk you through how to decide what Lead Magnet to create, designing it, and setting up all the tech.
To save time crafting your perfect Lead Magnet welcome sequence, check out our popular email template: Welcome and Sell
3. Nurture your abandoned carts
How many times have you been about to purchase something, then remembered your credit card was in the other room? Or, got interrupted by something and forgot to complete your purchase. Statistics show you and I are not the only one this happens to. Abandoned cart rates can vary between 65-86%!
One way you can recover some of those abandoned sales is by having a two step cart, and sending an abandoned cart email sequence. Emails sent to a customer an hour after they abandon their shopping cart have a 6.33% conversion rate.
Because this email sequence can happen completely automatically, with no input from you, it’s a no-brainer way to boost your business profits.
Want to know what to say in your abandoned cart email sequence? Check out this handy email sequence template here.
4. Keep your business top of mind
You know the old saying “out of sight, out of mind”…
Well, this is equally true for your business.
Studies also show that 80% of sales happen between 7-12 touch points. Have you created enough touch points for your business?
Regular email campaigns are a great way to create more of these touch points and keep your business front of mind.
Most of my clients are shocked when I encourage them to send an email fortnightly at minimum.
But, with the average open rate at only 20-22%, if you only send emails every month or two, it’s pretty hard to achieve any real results. It is very easy on the other hand, for people to forget about your business and buy from one of your competitors who has made the effort to stay front of mind 😉
So, what on earth do you send in your email newsletter?
That largely depends on your type of business.
My rule of thumb is to consider what will be valuable and helpful to your audience.
Consider the same questions as before, but this time apply them to people who haven’t purchased yet:
- What do they want to know?
- What do they need to know?
Then, I like to take it a step further and consider how I can combine that with my business goals:
- What am I wanting to sell more of at the moment?
- What information will help that happen more easily?
Experience tells me that most of us overthink what to send. But, as long as we focus on these really simple questions, creating content becomes a lot easier. Referring to all your frequently asked questions is such a powerful place to start.
Want more help with email marketing? Check out our course Master Email Marketing. This will help you learn what emails to send, when to send them, and how to send them. You’ll walk away with a 12-month email marketing strategy.
You might also like our Emails That Sell template pack – it contains all of our email templates mentioned and more, to help you save tons of time crafting your words.
I hope this article has helped you consider ways to use email marketing to grow your business!
When all is said and done, email marketing still doesn’t come completely naturally to me. I can fall out of the habit, and I don’t enjoy it that much. That just shows me that it’s an important task for me to outsource! So, if that’s how you feel, it’s a great task to prioritise outsourcing! New to outsourcing? Check out our 3 top outsourcing tips here.
Happy emailing,
Kat
About the author:
Kat Soper is the Founder and Head Trainer of The Helpful Academy Online Business School.
Kat is passionate about helping start-ups and small businesses succeed and achieve their business goals so that they can achieve the lifestyle they desire (and deserve).