How Email Marketing Can Contribute To Your Startup’s Growth in 2018

In an increasingly tech-focused field, staying on top of new trends and strategies is vital to a company’s success. Any good marketing agency will highlight the necessity of SEO, but email marketing is the newest/oldest way for startups to reach a new audience and maximize profits. Not only does this digital strategy allow a startup company’s promotional emails to stand out in a consumer’s overflowing mailbox, but it’s also crucial in turning ‘sometime shoppers’ into loyal customers.

In fact, studies show that as a personalized and specific form of advertising, email marketing is pivotal for customer retention. Because email generally encounters a 30X ROI, it is imperative for startups to take advantage of this overworked line of communication. Keep in mind that while it may seem tempting to send out generic emails, you should be nurturing an email strategy in order to develop it into an efficient and productive growth avenue. As a matter of fact, email marketing trends for 2018 contend that ‘the old marketing funnel’ is being replaced by a new one, in which email marketing is a vital component that will be in play at every stop along the way.

To make the most of this new funnel, there are a few easy tips that you, as a startup, can take advantage of in order to increase traffic on your website and turn bored viewers into loyal customers. Let’s get started!

Make Your Emails Mobile-friendly

How can someone find or buy anything from you if they can’t even read your emails properly when they’re on-the-go? Easy, by ensuring that your email templates are mobile-friendly. In doing so, you’ll dramatically increase the chances of a consumer spending time on your website because they’ll be able to access your content on whatever device they happen to be when they get that email notification. Additionally, receiving unoptimized emails while browsing on our phones tends to leave a bad taste in our mouths, so do try to avoid that.

Use Your Customer’s Name

No one likes being forgotten, and addressing a consumer directly will ensure a personalized feeling that serves as a reminder you know them and that they have connected with you before. In other words, while a generic dear valued customer greeting immediately makes that delete email button seem bigger, including the customer’s name in the subject line will increase open-rates by up to 16%. Make your customers feel valued and they’ll stick around.

Segment Your Audience

No one wants to get an email that has nothing to do with them, so decide who your startup’s target audience is and how they can be contacted. For example, if you’re trying to sell medical equipment, send an email to people who have listed themselves as medical professionals, not teachers or businessmen. This type of targeted contact will definitely pay off in the long run. As a study by Hubspot demonstrates, email list segmentation actually increases open rates by 39%, revenue, sales lead and deliverability by 24%, and transactions by 18%.

In fact, after Marriott segmented their email list and content according to who had already stayed in one of their hotels, how many points they had earned and how many cities they had already visited, they generated 86% more revenue in that year alone than they had in the two previous years combined. This type of specified advertisement worked so well because they promoted their business to people who were already interested in staying at a Marriott in the first place.

Personalize Content

We’ve all opened an email and immediately seen something we JUST NEED to have. This is because good email marketing includes advertising something you already know your consumer is going to love. By basing future email content on previous purchases and search histories, you can offer your consumers something you already know they’ll appreciate. You’ve done the searching for them, now all they have to do is click and purchase. For example, The Clymb, an outdoor clothing provider, saw a 71% increase in email revenue after personalizing their newsletter according to data they had already collected from their subscribers.

Send Automated Emails

Common ‘welcome and purchase’ confirmation emails may seem minute, but they have an open rate 95% higher than traditional emails, and more than double the click-through rate. Not convinced yet? Well, Forrester proved that trigger email campaigns “can generate 4 times more revenue and 18 times greater profits!” If that doesn’t scream send automated emails!, I don’t know what will.

Final Thoughts

As we wrap up, although simple, these five email marketing tips and tricks will help optimize your creative content marketing plan, as well as prove absolutely dynamic for your startup’s customer acquisition and retention. Let’s take one more look: