3 Email Marketing Challenges and How We Got Personal

Introduction: 

Email is not dead. Actually, it seems to be alive and kickin’ based on recent emarketer benchmarks for email marketing.  Good news for all you marketers out there.  But, we know there are struggles to making sure your campaigns are not only read, but create actions that deliver quality leads for your sales team.   Here are some of the challenges that we have faced and what we did to combat the problems.

1.     The most talked about – Open Rates.  Some say that this number doesn’t reveal an accurate picture.  Depending on which type of computing device you use or how you go about deleting your email, you may open something that you don’t even read.  We agree. Often times this number has no bearing on true ROI.  However, we can’t raise our CTR without folks opening emails as step one.

2.    Low CTR or Response Rate – This relates back to messaging. If we don’t offer our leads and clients something they want via timely messaging, promotions or giveaways then we end up in the trash very quickly.

3.    How Many Emails Are TOO Many? How Many Emails Are Not Enough? – This is an issue of timing.  Have we figured out when and how many emails to send during a week, during a month?

Can you relate?

We saw the answer to our problem being an issue of relevance.  And, we aren’t the only ones who think so.  Hubspot recently released a report from the Science of Email Marketing to reveal that relevancy was the main reason for choosing to follow certain company’s emails.

Here is what we did to solve some of our challenges:

First, we implemented event data and triggers to let us know what is happening with the company lists we are currently following. We added an extra layer of granular segmentation into our process. We made it personal. 

The Problem of Open Rates: We created targeted subject lines that highlight personal achievements based on temporal event data. This means that some individuals get emails when they had a sales win, or an M&A, or a new management change.  Using event triggers, we have been able to hone in on the relevant messaging for our leads and clients. 

Example:

Subject Line: Your CFO named 2012 Smart CXO

Subject Line: Your New Sales Executives

Subject Line:  Congrats on Your Sales Win

Low CTR: We offered a webinar that was relevant to their sector. Our CTR improved because our lists felt that our email was sent to them personally, not just based on their behavior on our site, but because we were paying attention to what happens to them and their affiliating companies.  We have done our research, but spent very little time researching.  We received alerts that allowed us to target our messaging. See some email responses we received from our targeted messaging:

How Many Emails Are TOO Many? How Many Emails Are Not Enough? We implemented emails to go out to our lists only when we had something to offer based on their company’s events.  The timing worked itself out because we focused on our leads and clients and not on the timing we thought made sense, but based on THEIR events.

Share some of your challenges and solutions.  We are always listening.

To learn more, visit: www.ilantern.com

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