In an era of rapidly evolving marketing strategies tailored to in-today-out-tomorrow social media platforms, email marketing occasionally carries a quaint, dated aura. Surely email marketing is dead by now, you might be thinking.
Check your inbox.
Odds are, a brief survey of your personal and work email will remind you that email marketing is alive and well. In a collection of recent email marketing statistics from HubSpot:
- 93% of B2B marketers use email to distribute content
- 40% of B2B marketers say email newsletters are most critical to their content marketing success
- 73% of Millennials prefer communications from businesses to come via email
- 59% of respondents say marketing emails influence their purchase decisions
- 78% of marketers have seen an increase in email engagement over the last 12 months
And the clincher? Email marketing isn’t just ubiquitous, it remains highly successful. According to research by the Data & Marketing Association, well-designed email marketing campaigns show strong ROI: an average of $42 in revenue for every $1 spent.
Why Does Email Marketing Still Work?
While the cost-effective medium has evolved (and it will continue to evolve—so don’t neglect to keep up with the latest email marketing trends), it holds a number of core advantages that keep it at the forefront of effective marketing strategies.
Everyone has an email address
While social media adoption rates vary widely by platform and demographic, email is nearly universal. There were nearly 3.9 billion email users worldwide in 2019, and over a quarter of a billion in the US. And 99% of consumers check their email every day. Email remains a way to reach a very large percentage of your target audience.
Email marketing works for many types of businesses
B2B and B2C. Professional services and retail. Experiences and hard goods. Your campaigns will be tailored to your clientele, but no matter what you do or what you sell, you can craft a campaign that will reach your target audience. And if you’re a small business, there are extra reasons why you should be email marketing.
It’s easier to sell to an existing customer
Increasing your customer retention rate by just 5% can increase your profits by 25–95%. Email marketing is an easy way to nurture the relationships with your customers and keep them coming back for more.
People sign up because they want to hear from you
While people give out their email address a little more easily than, say, their phone number, nobody wants to get spammed. If someone signs up for your mailing list or otherwise provides you with their email address, they either want to hear from your regularly or are willing to provide it to get something you’re offering, such as an e-book or article download. Or they have purchased your product. However you get their email address, they have a point of contact with you that opens the door for you to provide them with valuable content to keep them engaged. (P.S. We have a few more tips for growing your email list organically if you’d like to learn more).
Email marketing is versatile
Not all campaigns are created equal. There is no end of objectives email marketing can serve, ensuring it remains a viable option for many goals and phases of customer development. Some useful functions include:
- Automation, such as sending a welcome message when a customer signs up for your mailing list
- Abandoned cart emails, to prompt purchases from customers who began the checkout process but didn’t complete it
- A nurture series of emails to draw potential customers down the funnel, closer to making a purchase
- Segmented campaigns, to separate audience groups (such as prospective clients, current clients, and past clients) and send a targeted message leading to up to a 760% increase in campaign revenue.
- Easily solicitation of reviews from customers and clients to bolster your brand reputation
- Promoting current offerings and sales
- Leveraging content, such as blog posts, to display your industry knowledge and leadership
- Offering exclusive deals to list members
On top of the specific function each of these perform, each newsletter, campaign, or “touch” serves to keep your business top of mind for your customers and gives you opportunity to refine your marketing through analyzing results.
