 If you’re looking for email marketing copywriting services, you need to understand the landscape in which you’re playing first.
Similarly, if you want to maximize open-rates and click-through rates of your marketing emails, you need to follow best practice. In this article, we’ll address many of the basic—as well as some of the not-so-basic—ways to drive in the most business every time you click “Send.” The three main factors of marketing email success Pretty much any direct-response pro will tell you that the success of your outbound email campaign depends on the quality of three different factors:
This is true. Whether you think of these factors as a three-legged stool or links in the chain, you need all of them to succeed. And while this article will address mostly Number 3 above (since that’s what we’re often tasked with creating), we can offer you insights, as well as some counterintuitive tips, for Numbers 1 and 2 as well. The quality of the email list for outbound email campaigns Obviously, you want to reach out to people who are amenable to your offer; ideally, you want to reach out to people who are dying to get your offer. There are sources, such as ZoomInfo (and plenty of others), where you can get lists. The prices, and the quality, vary widely. If you’re using a service that lets you filter for the results you want, then filter carefully. And create a few different lists so that you can A/B test. Vary the results by, say, company size, geography, or seniority of the recipient. Similarly, you’ll want to filter out whatever you possibly can. We often work with clients on campaigns to reach C-level executives, so do you think that “All ages 18+” would be appropriate here? Of course not. Do a little thinking, and save yourself lots of time, effort, and wasted impressions. Incidentally, the whole exercise of list-filtering isn’t just for email banks. It applies just as well to tools such as LinkedIn Sales Navigator. Un-linked on LinkedIn We have a client that has a big list of LinkedIn connections and would like to email them periodically. But LinkedIn does everything it can to keep you inside its “walled garden,” so they don’t like to deal in email addresses (or outside websites, like ours). In other words, you can have—as is the case with our client—a ton of LinkedIn connections, but not many email addresses to show for it. This is because the connections themselves don’t often post their email address on LinkedIn, and even when they do, they often use, say, a personal email address, rather than a work one, either for business-privacy reasons, or because that’s simply the way they’d originally set up LinkedIn and never gave it a second thought since. So what do you do in this instance? You can go to Upwork, that’s what. There, you can find inexpensive resources who specialize in researching and finding email addresses for LinkedIn contacts for you. It’s so inexpensive that it’s often worth the investment. Now, once you get these email addresses, you need to be careful. The CAN-SPAM Act outlines what you can and can’t do; for our purposes, know that your list should be either current or former customers, and/or those who have opted in to your list. Your Upwork work might yield a “gray area” of results. What do you do? In this case, proceed very conservatively. Add a few of these names to your scheduled emailings, and carefully monitor the bounce- and unsubscribe-rates. If they seem to sail through, you can trickle more of them into your list over time. You don’t want to get dinged by, say, Constant Contact for violating their terms of service. Offer the offer We won’t dwell on this topic, but suffice to say we’ve seen too many bad ones to mention. A prospect will want to know your proven technique/solution for solving a pressing problem of theirs, replete with easy-to-grasp ROI. Then they’ll want to “Click to learn more,” or download your free white paper, or book a screen-share demo, or whatever. So the offer must be simple. And compelling. That’s a huge ask. It speaks to your business’ basic value proposition. As such, it goes beyond the scope of this article. But be sure to check out our other blogs. We have lots of posts that address this issue; scroll down to the “Categories” in the sidebar and have fun! Marketing emails that increase business Assuming you’ve got 1) the list and 2) the offer optimized, now comes the fun part. Because you know 1) who you’re addressing and 2) what they need. So give it to them! You need to open with the can-you-relate-to-that problem. Can you get that down to a single sentence or provocative question? Did you know that 85 percent of logistics executives see “automation” as their most pressing challenge? The more focused, the better. The shorter, the better. That's the hook. Once you’ve got them hooked, you can start to pile on the problems and the pain-points. Note that all of the following italicized copy (just like the copy above), is completely made up, just for illustration purposes: It gets worse. When asked how they would surmount this challenge, most executives suggest “handing it off to their internal teams.” But aren’t their internal teams already overloaded? Aren’t yours? See where this is going? I’d like you to kindly read the little PDF I’ve attached from ABC Enterprises. In just two minutes, you’ll see how we’ve solved this problem for logistics pros just like you, with 4x ROI in as little as 12 months. (If you’d prefer to read it online, it’s available right here.) Have you detected the shift? The email drilled down from “All executives” to “You.” And the speaker shifted from third person (“Their teams...”) to second person (“Your teams...”) to first-person (“I’d like you to learn...”). It also went from formal (“85 percent report...”) to conversational (“In just two minutes, you’ll see...”). All of this is intentional. You’re starting as an authoritative stranger. You’re transitioning to a trusted friend. After you’ve reviewed it, simply write back. I’ll then be happy to book your no-obligation demo.... etc., etc., etc. Flying under the radar We have some clients whose email systems limit their outreach. It’s not just numbers, i.e., how many emails they’re allowed to send in a given day. It’s also context, i.e., the exact language that’s sent. In other words, if their email provider detects that they’re sending out too many emails that say the exact same thing, they’ll get dinged. Similarly, there are recipients’ email providers that have algorithms for detecting what they perceive as spam, and then blocking “known spammers.” You do not want to be tagged with that label. Remember our “trickle the Upwork results into your email list” suggestion earlier? This falls under that rubric. So does the “alternate verbiage version” trick. Simply take your first email, and do a “Save as...” to make Version 2. Alter the language enough to make it different enough to avoid getting trapped. For example, you can take: After you’ve reviewed it, simply write back. I’ll then be happy to book your no-obligation demo.... and change it into: After you’ve read it, write back. I’d be delighted to schedule your zero-obligation demonstration.... How much should you do this? It’s a judgment call. We’ve seen success by altering the copy just a little, maybe ten to 15 percent. Get help with email copywriting and marketing services We know about this stuff because we toil in this realm daily on our clients’ behalf. And we’re seeing the sometimes stunning open- and click-through rates that result. Need help with this challenge? We’d be happy to assist. Contact us today for a no-obligation initial consultation.
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