Part 1 of a three-part series on email newsletter best practices that explains effectiveness, including compelling statistics, defining your goals and audience, and how to use competitive benchmarks to inform your overall email newsletter strategy. We've covered the core basic elements of a typical email newsletter. In Part 2 of the series, you'll learn strategies and tactics for growing your email newsletter subscriber base and how to design email newsletter templates that engage your recipients and facilitate the communication of important company news and information. I will explain.
Create an email list
One of your company's greatest assets is your contact email list. At least that's been my experience, dating back to the early 2000s when I was responsible for internal marketing for an e-commerce brand. Based on that experience, I learned that the easiest way to increase an organization's reputation is to increase the size of its email (newsletter) contact list. Based on over 20 years of experience developing email marketing programs for our clients and in-depth research, we've compiled a list of best practices that will increase subscription rates and overall list growth, leading to improved company reputation. In a specific industry (like home appliances in my case).
First of all, value is not implicit and you need to “sell” your leads on your newsletter, so be clear about the value your subscribers will receive. Messages should be consistent and carried through all marketing and promotional activities. For you, a common “hook” is an exclusive discount or promotion as a baseline. To maximize registrations, minimize the amount of information required as much as possible. We recommend that you only fill out the name and email address fields in your newsletter subscription form. You can add postal code as an option, but we recommend securing additional information downstream through surveys or contests, rather than upfront, before building trust.
In addition to adding reminders to subscribe to emails within your website template (usually in the footer), embed reminders on key pages of your website, such as your home page and contact page. Don't forget to add a promotion to subscribe to your newsletter to your employees' email signature files.
Another way to dramatically increase your subscriber numbers is to add a pop-up window to all new website visitors (with a cookie set so that it disappears once viewed and closed). Pop-ups can include messages like a dedicated page, as well as unique offers (usually discounts on products, parts, or services in the form of discount codes or coupons).
Another way to increase subscriptions to your email list is to run a limited-time contest or giveaway where participants are automatically added to your newsletter. Relevant prizes (branded goods, industry-related products, and services) generate the best subscribers. Active and consistent promotion of your email newsletter through social media channels is essential for healthy list growth. Also, consider offline promotions such as in-store signage (for retail businesses). Repeating exclusive offers is especially useful when moving your offline audience online to sign up.
If your goal is to aggressively grow your email list, consider targeted advertising on Google and Meta (Facebook and Instagram). These are usually associated with unique offers. Depending on your audience and industry focus, consider sponsoring additional social media platforms or industry newsletters or podcasts.
Create an effective newsletter template
Email newsletters that rely on a standard template design but still provide useful information are likely to generate opens, clicks, and some conversions. However, a well-designed and customized template gives you the best chance of significantly improving performance across the same metrics.
Best of all, our professionally designed templates clearly articulate your brand promise while engaging your subscribers.
One of the elements of a high-quality email newsletter template is a responsive design that looks great on a variety of screen sizes (since most readers are on mobile devices). Make sure your email platform allows you to create mobile-friendly versions of your email newsletters. It is also important that your email marketing practices comply with the following standards: can spam Data protection regulations include obtaining explicit consent to send you newsletters and providing clear opt-out options.
Design is important from a branding perspective, but content is still important. Make sure each email contains valuable information, exclusive offers, or engaging content that encourages opens and clicks. The most common content sections for trailer dealer newsletters include new or sale products or services, featured products or services (based on inventory, popularity, margin, or strategic value), customer stories, ratings, Reviews (which help convey value through news) should be included. buyer's eyes) and company news (special events, new or expanded locations, new hires, awards, etc.).
Successful email newsletters often include a variety of content, so talk to your employees and customers to narrow the focus of your content.
Visuals play an important role in capturing your audience's attention. Competitive benchmarking therefore provides useful context for the design of your email newsletter template. From a best practices perspective, email newsletter templates should include the following features and assets:
- Company logo and related branding (consistent fonts, colors, iconography, etc.).
- A branded masthead and visual division of content into sections using bars or context boxes to improve readability (assuming your newsletter is in HTML format; (highly recommended).
- Embed images or videos to increase engagement.
- Think carefully about CTAs, including links to your website, contact forms, videos, and social media posts. Highlight your most important CTAs to the front or repeat them within your template.
The best email newsletter templates are designed with the end user in mind, but balance the need to clearly communicate valuable content, brand attributes, and encourage clicks or other desired actions from recipients. I am.
When properly integrated, the above content and design components create a seamless, professional newsletter that meets the objectives of all parties.
In the next and final installment of our three-part series, we'll discuss how to improve your email newsletter performance using A/B testing, segment your audience, and future optimizations to maximize your ROI. We outline data analysis methods to inform our efforts. e-mail magazine.
