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Email Marketing Landscape- A Detailed Overview of a $2.81 Billion Industry

Moeez — November 29, 2018 7 Minutes Read
email marketing landscape

Of all the marketing channels you use, it’s email marketing that ties your business marketing strategy together. Email remains as one of the most effective and lucrative marketing channels when we talk about generating returns on investment. Given its ability to engage customers and drive conversions, good email marketing practices are known to have significant impact on business’s bottom line.

Marketers across all sectors turn to email marketing to engage their audience and produce higher ROIs. In order to maximize return, marketers must manage their email programs strategically and discover new ways to optimize their campaigns. But what strategies are working?

A Look at the Industry’s Horizon

Email marketing is the primary communication channel preferred by 89% of marketers. Yet, it’s inevitable that many take this tried-and-true digital marketing channel for granted, with the rise of trendy tactics and flashy new tech available to modern-day marketers. The urge to focus on the next big thing is quite irresistible. But is it worth it to jump to machine learning and other technology strategies without first mastering the fundamentals of email?

In today’s marketing landscape, knowing where we are and where we’re going as an industry greatly matters. Marketers need to have a full grasp on the key email marketing aspects and insights to keep up with competition and engage their audience further in the customer life-cycle.

What trends and techniques are currently used? What strategies are working? What’s on the horizon for technology? Knowing and understanding these things can help you define your email marketing goals and steer your program to the path of success.

Email Is Still the King of Digital Marketing.

Email marketing wears the crown in the marketing kingdom. Businesses have identified it as the most effective digital marketing channel in generating ROI. If the marketing world has an MVP, it would be email.

There’s an abundance of marketing channels to choose from, and yet 89% of marketers consider email marketing as their primary communication channel. Who wouldn’t? Email has been the most consistent performer among marketing channels for three years and running.

The impressive facts and figures don’t end there.

According to a report by Campaign Monitor, 59% of marketers see the most ROI from email – a number that shows how email places far ahead while other digital channels trail behind.

Timely and relevant email marketing is the key to a successful digital marketing program. But underlying factors that hinder marketers in achieving that are always present. The rise of flashier channels and digital saturation makes it harder than ever to compete for the consumer’s attention.

If you’re not getting the results you’d hoped for, then it’s time to take action and bring it to the next level. First, you need to have a strong email marketing strategy in place. How do you do it? Where do you start?

Focus on growing your email list.

The best marketers understand the value of their customer base, so you should, too. Focus on maximizing the lifetime value of your existing customers as they’re the lifeblood of your business. Your current customers are more likely to engage with your content and buy your products and services.

To maintain a good relationship with them, make a positive connection from the start. Send an automated welcome series to introduce your brand and set the right expectations for content, etc. Another is to build loyalty by delivering content based on their behavior. Look at the links they clicked, website pages they visited, the list goes on. Lastly, listen to and learn from them. Pay attention to their every response and adjust course from there.

Make sure you have a mobile-optimized email template.

We live in a mobile-first society. Most consumers read and send emails directly from their smartphones. In fact, email opens on mobile devices growing to 30% over the past 5 years. This signifies the importance of making your emails mobile-friendly – or risk losing clicks, opens, and conversions you need to deliver revenue.

Have a single, focused CTA for each email.

Calls to action are a crucial part of your email. Optimizing your CTA can increase your metrics and conversions, so you have to take this button seriously. When it comes to creating CTAs, steer clear from text links and use buttons. Effective CTAs that resonate with your subscribers, are well-designed, specific, persuasive, and in line with the rest of your subscribers.

It’s Time to Get Personal with Subscribers.

One-size-fits-all messaging is a thing of the past. Targeted, personalized messaging is what makes your email stand out within the inbox. Personalized emails give consumers the impression that it’s custom-made for them, thus adding more relevant value to the content.

It pays off to personalize your emails. Businesses believe it can improve email marketing performance and conversions. But personalization goes beyond putting your recipient’s first name in the subject line. It involves using your data to create and deliver a truly personal experience to every subscriber.

What holds the key to sending your most targeted, relevant messages? Segmentation. According to Email Monday, personalization and segmentation highly impact email marketing strategy.

Segmentation Should Be a Primary Focus.

List segmentation is essential if you want to share dynamic, relevant and engaging content that leads to big-time results. Segmented and targeted emails generate 58% of all revenue, deliver better open rates, lower opt-out and unsubscribe rates, and drive better email deliverability.

If you want the best email marketing program, let segmentation take you there. Some key things to segment include how customers signed up, their location, engagement, and purchase history.

Begin Using Tools like Testing and Automation.

Imagine the revenue possibilities email can bring to your business if your email campaign’s open, click and conversion rates improved?

Email marketing has been around for some time. Despite the impressive ROI results it brings to your business, marketers could still squeeze more from their email marketing through continuous testing. Two key tools you can explore further are A/B testing and automation. A number of top 10 email marketing software are also available in the market to help you in this process

A/B testing your email campaigns – from the subject line and copy on your call to action button down to the sender name and send time – can do wonders in increasing your emails’ open and click-through rates. Use every piece of data you can gather about your email audience to further improve your strategy.

Another effective way to stay connected with your audience is through automation. Marketers who use automation get conversion rates as high as 50%. It’s an efficient way to send more timely, relevant messages to your subscribers while helping you save precious time. Start by planning and setting up your automated emails – perhaps begin with a welcome series and follow with some valuable offers, and don’t forget to test and refine your efforts.

Marketers Struggle with Competing Goals.

As businesses set higher standards for marketers and bring in more dollars, it leaves marketers asking one question: What does successful marketing look like?

Success is possible if it’s measurable. About 58% of marketers say increasing sales or bringing in leads is their most important indicator of success. In order to do that, marketing and sales teams work hand-in-hand in developing campaigns that deliver brand awareness and deliver a measurable impact on their organization’s bottom line.

Scratching below the surface helps you learn more about your audience and your marketing strategies. Doing so not only helps you connect your efforts to real business results, it also paints a clearer picture of how your marketing contributes to the overall success of the organization.

For the Most Part, Industry Buzzwords Are Just That.

Thought leaders love to talk about possibilities – AI, chatbots, live video, influencer marketing. But most marketers don’t have the resources to adopt these new and trendy tactics yet. While it’s tempting to focus on the next big thing, we need to get better at what we’re already doing – case in point, creating the highest possible return for our efforts through email marketing.

Email marketing has been around for decades, but it still takes time to get it right. You have to leverage your data to provide the type of relevant experiences your consumers expect while using the tools you have. Turning to new technology like AI or live video can amplify those experiences.

Wrapping Up

With its power to drive high ROI, email marketing is still the leading tool for digital marketers. But there’s plenty of room to improve on your email marketing strategy to deliver maximum results. Personalization and using the right tools are great tactics to achieve email effectiveness. To add, today’s marketers need to master the fundamentals first before shifting to new tech and trends. These insights help marketers to fully understand what they’re doing and be successful.

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      Moeez is ‘The’ blogger in charge of WPblog. He loves to interact and learn about WordPress with people in the WordPress community. Outside his work life, Moeez spends time hanging out with his friends, playing Xbox and watching football on the weekends. You can get in touch with him at moeez[at]wpblog.com.

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