How to Use Email Marketing to Convert Customers and Build Loyalty

Email marketing is one of the best tools to build an engaged audience that relates to your brand. It can help put you in close contact with your leads and customers, and it has a great ROI. 

For every $1 spent on email marketing, you can expect a return of $36! 

In this post, you’ll learn how to use email marketing to build customer loyalty, and other key factors that are essential to your growth as a digital entrepreneur. 

What is email marketing? 

Email marketing is the use of email as a tool for direct marketing. It can be used to keep customers updated, to build a relationship with your audience, and, of course, to sell.

What makes the email marketing strategy so effective and special? 

Besides being a relatively cheap marketing strategy, there are a variety of factors that make email marketing effective:

Studies have proven that email marketing is the best marketing strategy on a cost-benefit basis

Email marketing has a great ROI and is much better than converting compared to social media. In fact, many companies consider it to be the best marketing channel. 

Email marketing allows you to segment your audience

Emails can be segmented for your users based on their interests. This means that, unlike social media, you can send different content to different customers based on their interests. You can customize your messages according to the demographic and behavioral profile of recipients. 

With an email marketing strategy, you get to talk to a more qualified audience

An email list gathers leads and customers who have subscribed to receive your content. 

An email marketing strategy makes your relationship with potential customers easier 

Emails with quality content are valuable to your customers and increase your chances of turning them into promoters of your brand. You can connect with your audience and, in exchange, get sincere feedback that will be useful for future strategies. 

 

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Email marketing strategy services

Before you create your email marketing campaign, you need to sign up for an email marketing service.

Unlike your personal email account, these services allow for the registration and sending of mass email messages. They provide reports that will be essential for you to better understand your audience and improve your sales strategies.

You should understand that paying for an email marketing service is a necessary investment. And it’s worth it! Below, you’ll find a list of the email services most commonly used by the Hotmart community:

MailChimp

Mailchimp is one of the most recommended email platforms. It’s both effective and easy to use for people who are just getting started with email marketing. 

Mailchimp lets you design different automatic email flows and tag users according to the actions they perform. It also offers several layout options to create your emails, which can be customized according to your needs. 

Mailchimp offers a free version of the platform as well as several paid plans.

GetResponse

GetResponse is an online marketing platform that offers email automation services, the creation of landing pages, and tools to promote live streaming transmissions, among other services. 

Just like Mailchimp, it allows you to create automated email sequences and customizable layouts, which are useful for people who have no design and coding knowledge. 

E-goi

In addition to sending automatic emails, E-goi offers customizable templates for newsletters that are responsive, meaning they adjust to different kinds of mobile devices. This is something that sets it apart for users that are constantly updating their blogs and want to keep their audience well informed. 

It’s worth mentioning that there are many other services you can use. Do research to find the one that offers the best solutions for you and fits your budget. 

How to capture emails

Beyond just sending good emails, you need to send good emails to the right people. This means your email list needs to be made up of an audience that enjoys what you’re talking about and, at some point, was interested in being contacted by your company. 

We advise against buying email lists as they often don’t convert as much as a list you’ve built yourself, and your emails will often be flagged as spam. 

Below, we’ve listed some tips to help you build your own email list. 

Use a capture opt-in on your website

Capture opt-ins are form boxes on your website that invite users to sign up for your mailing list.

These boxes can be displayed in many different ways. On the top of the page, on the sides, and inside blog posts. For blog posts, it’s important that the text in the form relates to the content you’re discussing on that page. 

Most importantly, they need to be inviting, and they shouldn’t request too much information from the user: name and email address are enough. They also shouldn’t be overused because they can really interfere with the user experience on your page. 

Offer free content

One of the most efficient ways of getting a potential buyer’s email address is by offering free content in exchange for it.

The free content can be an ebook, an infographic, access to a webinar, or any other kind of relevant content that can be distributed for free.

Have a capture page

Offer your content on a capture or landing page. it should be a simple page focused on the opt-in to capture email addresses. Don’t put a lot of information in it, and put some effort into the title you’ll use to lure visitors.

Keywords such as: not to be missed, now, unique, you, and exclusive, are excellent to include in your copy and help you capture email addresses. Check out this post for more copywriting tips. 

How to use an email marketing strategy to build customer loyalty

According to Philip Kotler, it’s 5 to 7 times more expensive to attract a new customer than it is to convince someone who already knows you to make a new purchase.

A recurring customer is also more likely to recommend your product or service to a friend, while an unhappy customer might badmouth your brand on social media. 

So, using email marketing is important not only to convert leads into customers but also to turn them into loyal customers and delight them. 

Segment your user list

When you create a business, whether it’s physical or digital, different kinds of customers contact your brand. Each of them is looking for a specific piece of information or has a different objection that needs to be broken down to continue on their sales journey. 

To ensure your email marketing strategy is successful, you need to segment your email list according to what stage of the sales funnel the recipient is in. This will allow you to write more personalized messages and offer more valuable content. 

Create engaging content

From the moment someone subscribes to your mailing list, you need to think of content that will keep them interested until they are ready to be introduced to your product. 

Example of content you can offer: 

1st stage: A blog post with 10 foods that help increase vitality.

2nd stage: An ebook showing users how to cook or grow these foods at home. 

3rd stage: A case study showing how a woman recovered from depression just by changing her eating habits. 

Remember to adapt these suggestions in line with your business model. 

Email flow

No one likes to be bothered with emails all the time. To avoid this, structure your email flow before you establish any contact. How many emails will be sent? How often? 

To find out the ideal frequency, consider your product. If you’re offering something more complex, it’s likely your leads will need more arguments to be convinced, resulting in a longer flow. 

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Common terminology in email marketing strategy

Some terms show up frequently in the world of email marketing. It’s essential that you’re familiar with these terms to be able to make the most of our tips. Here are some of the most common words you’ll see:

Alternative text (Alt): Text used to describe an email’s images. It’s shown when the HTML doesn’t load properly, or for users using screen readers. 

Blocklist:  Email lists, domains, or IP addresses recognized as sources of spam. These domains are automatically blocked in a user’s inbox. 

Bounce: Emails that are returned to the sender due to an error in the recipient’s email address or inbox. 

Click-through rate: The ratio of users who clicked on links in the email and the total number of users who viewed the email.

Opening rate: The percentage of how many sent emails were opened. 

Opt-out: The number of people who unsubscribed from your list. 

Squeeze page: The page that includes an email capture form. In most cases, it’s the main strategy to grow a mailing list. 

Subject: The title of the email, which is shown in the user’s inbox. The subject line is one of the items with the greatest impact on email opening rate, so it needs to be clear and to the point. 

Unsubscribe: When a user asks to be removed from a mailing list.

Now, just get started with your email marketing strategy

This was an overview of all the basic information you need to create a successful email marketing campaign. 

To conclude, here’s one more tip: use Automatic Lead Management (ListBoss) in your email marketing strategy. With this free, exclusive tool from Hotmart, you get to automate the management of your leads in a completely integrated way on our platform. The result might mean 8x more sales. 

This article was originally posted in September 2014, and has since been updated to contain more accurate and complete information.