Building on my previous post, let's take a look at what the steps in your email marketing programme mean in a little more detail.
Strategy
A consistent & long-term strategy is essential for successful email marketing. After all, if there is no overall plan as to the WHY & WHAT, then you can't really manage it effectively. Your strategy should be in line with the company's overall goals, taking into account its application in your industry & competitive context. By way of example, an email marketing strategy focusing on customer acquisition would be different in a fast-growing industry compared to a mature industry. You should also operate a process of continuous improvement - e.g. an analysis of past campaigns, adjusting campaigns to changing circumstances, etc. - should also underpin your email marketing strategy.
Segmentation
Successful email messages are relevant to the user, well-timed to coincide with the customer-experience life-cycle and personalised to build relationship loyalty. Segmenting will ensure that the right message gets to the right recipient at the right time.
Layout and Content
Best practice shows that the email success mainly depends on the layout & content. Ideally, these are tailored to specific customer segments & consistent with the broader programme (long-term customer engagement). Your content & layout should evolve & change as the customer's engagement with your company evolves & changes. That is going to require thinking around elements of tone, size of paragraphs, links out to other content (including a self-service portal into Sage CRM potentially) and more.
List Growth and List Management
Investment in the right methods of list growth should grow the ROI of your email program. Detailed analysis of lists should focus on customers' ROI potential, while removing those that add cost to the programme. Don't be afraid to remove the low or non-responders from your list - particularly thinking about compliance with data protection (GDPR, CCPA & similar) regulations.
Automation and Efficiency
As your email marketing programme grows, your list will grow. It will become necessary to consider automated, intelligent email programmes (e.g. drip marketing). You can enable campaigns to be triggered (typically based on time or data-changes) and activate different email marketing elements for different customers.
Analysis
In order to grow your ROI, you need to analyse & test regularly - your analysis will allow you to adapt your program in line with your company's overall strategy. Designing programs requires investments in time & thinking but with the building blocks in place, you will begin to see the real value in email marketing.