With the recent focus on Social Media, it is easy to forget that e-mail marketing is still one of the most effective ways of communicating regularly with customers and prospects. Tools like those provided by Constant Contact in Ireland make this much more accessible to all businesses. Regular communication with customers and keeping your company/brand in people minds has been proven again and again to generate business.
Doing this face to face can be very time consuming and is often not on the top of our daily “to do” list. Email marketing helps you achieve this by using attractive, professional-looking email communications to stay in regular touch, building strong customer relationships. So why use a service like Constant Contact– why not just send regular e-mails? Using a dedicate e-mail package provides many benefits, such as
- The ability to create very professional looking e-mails – very quickly. Whether you use pre-defined templates or create custom templates to more closely match your company branding, the results will reflect the professional brand image of your company.
- E-mail marketing tools put you in customers’ inboxes more accurately than regular email. So you’ll avoid spam filters and be seen by more people.
- They give you the ability to effectively build and manage your e-mail lists, providing you with the capability to segment lists for more effective marketing.
- E-mail marketing tools make it easy for your loyal customers to forward e-mails to their contacts – with built-in facilities for new recipients to add themselves to your list.
- One of the key differences is that tools like Constant Contact provide great information and reporting – immediately. You can see how many people opened your e-mail and track what they did.
All this sounds great, but what do you have to do to get going?
- Start by working on your e-mail list – most companies have this already is some form. But you can immediately start to ask customers and prospects for their e-mail address and also asking permission to send them then information and/or special offers. It is very important to only send information to people who have said that they want to receive it.
- Decide what you want to achieve – set your goals clearly and understand how you are going to measure success.
- Pick a platform to work with – there are a lot out there. I am referencing Constant Contact here, but it is not the only solution. Look at your specific requirements and get the tool that best suits.
- Develop or select a template – depending on the type of communication (special offers, eNewsletters, etc) there are many predefined templates or there is the ability to create a template specific to your needs.
- Develop interesting, engaging content. Make sure that it is properly planned out and that there is commitment in the organisation to support this.
- Send your e-mail and measure the results – use these results to improve your performance over time, segment you lists and continue to grow your success.
E-mail marketing is most successful when it is integrated with your other marketing efforts – linked to your website, social media and/or your offline marketing. The other good news is that Constant Contact offer a 60 day free trial – so you can see how it works before you have to pay a cent. If you would like any help in reviewing the options or getting started with e-mail marketing or with Constant Contact in Ireland, feel free to get in contact with us.
