It’s One Small Step for Marketing…
by Allie Cormier
It’s morning. You have your coffee within arm’s reach as your screen glows to life. Hello inbox, we meet again. Your eyes quickly scan the latest contents of your inbox searching for urgent needs from your clients, vendors awaiting your confirmations, and other early morning fire drills. In the midst of those emails you see maybe some forwards from colleagues, a few calendar invites, and of course — a few miscellaneous eblasts. Exciting semi-annual sale here, inspirational non-profit newsletter there, cooking/tech/insert-your-preference/professional development blog update message, too. Admittedly, your email inbox might feel a little full. Of course you could always opt-out from some of these emails, but then you might MISS something GOOD!
And — just like that, with one little eblast, you’ve been successfully marketed to.
Why do they choose to eblast? Various companies and non-profits have different reasons behind their decisions to market via email. Retail companies do it to boost their bottom line by letting you know about a big sale, or reminding you that you left something in your online shopping cart without completing the purchase. Banks send emails to remind you about low rates in case you were planning on a big ticket purchase, such as a car or home. Non-profits reach out to you to support their worthy missions. Many companies send eblasts to alert you about updates from their past quarter, or to let you know about policy changes that may affect you. Often you receive an eblast as an update on an entity’s new services.
Whatever their reason(s) for sending, their goal is the same — to provide you with relevant information that lands in your inbox. “I don’t even have time to read them all, so they can’t be that effective,” you might be thinking. Au contraire! Just by making it into your inbox, those targeted emails are going to stick in your brain. The next time you need a new office printer, for instance, instead of trying to remember where you left that printed coupon from that store you were in a week ago (or was it two weeks ago?) and wondering if you can run an errand on your lunch break, you’ll remember that in your inbox is an email about a super sale on printers (with free shipping to boot!), and that you can click your way out of a trip to the store and be back focused on your projects task list in under 5 minutes.
Email marketing is a proven, direct method of marketing that allows one to stay in contact with their clients, and also introduce themselves to potential new clients quickly. (You’ve seen that little forward button at the bottom of emails? That’s what it was made for!). This form of eCommunication has been steadily pushing out its old fashioned brethren (snailmail direct marketing) because of its ease of distribution (not to mention lack of carbon footprint), success rate trackability, and of course – savings in cost.
There are currently dozens of programs available online that claim to allow you to send eblasts with the skill of a marketing team — thus adding yet another title (and associated tasks) to your name: “Marketer.” But the reality is that these sites don’t often have the expertise you will get only from working with a professional eCommunications marketing firm. When you work with a marketing team you are hiring a group of professionals who have researched the best times to send your eblast campaign to ensure a greater open rate, crafted your content so that it isn’t overwhelming to the consumer and that compels your target audience to act. We also triple check to make sure your spelling is correct, that your call to action is prominent, and that your visuals are engaging. Why? Because we here at Lentini Design & Marketing are Marketers. While we know running a successful business often requires you to wear many hats, we at LDM specialize in these specific Marketing hats. Therefore, we are able to quickly and effectively deliver your message to your audience.
So who benefits from email marketing?
Well, if you’re reading this, it means we did. Contact us today to see how we can help you with your email marketing!
Writer for this issue is Allie Cormier
Account Executive at LDM