Email marketing is a very targeted and cost-effective way to communicate with your contacts – such as sales prospects and existing customers – and generate leads throughout the year. It is especially important now because your salespeople are likely not meeting with prospects as frequently as they were before the pandemic. You can use regular email communications to stay in touch with your contacts and keep them informed about your company’s products, significant company news, industry developments, and use cases illustrating product benefits – and generate sales leads at the same time.
A high-quality, targeted, and current e-mail list is the most critical component of a successful campaign. If you are not reaching your target audience, you have not succeeded in the first step of the process. However, if you do not have your own organic email list in-house, you must “rent” a list, which can only be used once (or more often, the list provider does the mailing for you), and this is not inexpensive. You can expect to pay upwards of $500 for 1000 contacts.
Most industry publications as well as some national vendors such as Industrial Info Resources provide these lists. You will have the opportunity to select audiences based on many criteria including location, SIC code, company size, number of employees, and more. Given a 2%-3% response rate for an unsolicited mailing, this is an expensive way to obtain qualified leads. The message here is: if you are not already collecting emails, you should be!
If you have your own house list, you can use one of the email application providers such as Constant Contact or HubSpot to design a visually compelling email using hundreds of templates for different types of communications, easily develop and manage the email campaign, track open and click-through rates (CTRs) and much more – all for a very reasonable cost.
Because strict national CAN SPAM laws make it difficult to use the leading email marketing platforms (Constant Contact, etc.) if contacts have not already opted in to receive your emails, you must follow a specific process to give them that option, and the email app providers outline this on their websites or will be happy to talk you through the details.
Part of campaign development is making sure that you have completed all necessary back-end work before you send the first email. This includes updating your website with your latest information, creating and testing your landing page, and finalizing any “offers” such as a webinar or white paper. Your email should both get your prospects’ attention and drive response. On your landing page, you must provide something of value in exchange for asking for their contact information. Common offers include registering for a webinar, an e-newsletter, a product demonstration, or to download a white paper.
Secondly, plan and develop your lead nurturing campaign. Determine if it will be an email campaign, phone follow-up, or both; how it will be organized; and what messages you want to communicate for each stage of the process.
If you need any clarification about any of these recommendations, don’t hesitate to contact me at akuchinski@amtonline.org with your question.
