Email Marketing: 7 (Actionable) Tips To Turn Leads Into Customers

Some may think that email marketing is dead, but I say it’s “more” alive than it has ever been.

The problem is that business owners aren’t utilizing email in a way that will separate them from the rest of the noise filling their prospects’ inbox.

What you’ll learn from these steps is how to get your leads to engage with more of your emails so they can get to know, like, and trust you; and eventually, buy from you.

1 – Resend unopened emails

Yes, really.

There are a number of reasons your email didn’t get opened but the most likely one is that it got lost amongst all the other emails your prospect receives in a day.

While this may seem like it’s spammy, it’s actually quite effective.

Studies have shown that resending an email a couple of days later to those that didn’t open the first one dramatically improves open rates.

Most email providers have this feature and even allow you to change the subject line on it.

So you can try something new like Did you see this? or simply add (Resend) to the subject line.

2 – Use numbers in your subject lines

People get email every day and they usually scan through their inbox to see which subject lines grab their attention, then decide whether or not to open.

The Nielsen Norman Group found that by using the digits of numbers, instead of spelling them out, stops wandering eyes and grabs attention

So if you had a subject line like Five mistakes everyone makes when booking a vacation it’s best to use the number “5” rather than spelling it out.

Words are basically patterns of letters, so when an actual number is used, it’s like a pattern interrupt and your brain can’t ignore it.

However, this doesn’t work as well if you are using numbers in the millions or billions, it’s too many zeros for the brain to take in quickly.

In cases like these, use digits for the significant part of the number, and the word for the order of magnitude (millions, billions, etc.).

For example, you would use 24 million instead of 24,000,000.

The thousands magnitude would be the only exception because there are fewer zeros.

3 – Be more personable

People like to interact and do business with people, not faceless companies and corporations.

You’ll get a far better rate of engagement when the person reading your email feels like they are interacting with another person.

A couple of ways to go about doing this is to use your actual name in the “from” field for the name and email address.

Having John Smith johnsmith@abcplumbing.com looks a lot better than having something like ABC Plumbing noreply@abcplumbing.com.

Also, when you write your emails make sure you use the word you as if you are talking to them one-on-one.

A great exercise to help with this is to imagine you are writing an email to your ideal customer.

And don’t over-think the words you use. There’s no need to sound overly professional as if you’re following an email script. Let your personality come through and use the words you would use in conversation.

4 – Provide value

If every time you send your list an email you are asking them to do something that will benefit you, then that is a quick way of getting unsubscribes and unopened emails.

You really should only email your list when you have something valuable to say.

It’s like the old saying “If you don’t have anything nice to say, don’t say anything at all.”

Except, in this case, we’re not talking about saying something nice but offering value to the reader.

Obviously, you need to sell something if you are going to stay in business and that’s okay.

But when it comes to selling, you should follow the 80/20 rule which is to give 80% value (first) and sell around 20% of the time.

You can do this by showing empathy with the problems and struggles your reader might be having. You can tell a story about a problem one of your customers/clients went through and how you were able to help them overcome it.

By providing value, you can nurture your lead into becoming a customer.

Some email service providers offer a feature called lead scoring where you can determine a score based on the email interaction of your list.

Once a certain score is achieved by any of your leads, a sales email could automatically be sent to them because you now know they are a hot lead.

If your email provider doesn’t offer a feature like this, I recommend you check out the email provider I use.

They allow you to have the lead scoring feature on all of their plans…even the free one.

#5 – Have one action for the reader to take

People need to be told what to do next, you should never assume they know what the next step is.

If you want them to set up an appointment with you, then you need to tell them how to do so. If you want them to read an article, then you should tell them.

And when you do this, make sure to tell them why they should do it and how it will benefit them to do so.

You can also use multiple links throughout your email, but only where it makes sense. And those links should all point to the same page. Doing this increases the chance of someone taking action and clicking.

#6 – Segment your list

Successful email marketing is all about delivering the right email to the right person, at the right time. Segmenting your list is the best way to make sure you are doing that.

For example, let’s say you’re a travel agent that specializes in vacations to Italy and someone joins your list.

One of the first emails you send has a link to information about historical sites in Italy, so the person clicks on the link to read more.

A couple of days later, another email goes out with a link to an article that talks about the different wineries in Italy but the person doesn’t click or even open the email.

We can gain some information, from the behavior with interacting with these two emails, that this person is more interested in Italian history than wine.

Now your email provider should have a way for you to create tags which you can attach to people on your list depending on the actions and links they click on.

In this case, a “history” tag can be applied automatically to this person’s profile indicating that they are interested in history. Doing this segments them into a history group which could then trigger a sequence of emails to be sent every couple of days which provides valuable information about historical Italian sites.

That person will be more likely to open and interact with your emails because you are sending information about topics of interest.

If your email provider doesn’t have a way to tag people based on actions taken within your email, then you can take a look at the email provider I use.

#7 – Optimize your emails for mobile

Smartphones and tablets account for 66% of email opens.

So if you are using one of those fancy newsletter templates or if your email uses images, then make sure you are using a template that is responsive and will also resize images.

Most email providers should have a way for you to preview what your email will look like on other devices. But just to be safe, send yourself a test email and check it on your desktop, tablet and smartphone to make sure there isn’t anything strange happening.

If subscribers keep getting emails from you that are poorly formatted, why would they want to continue that experience? Don’t let this simple fix be the reason they unsubscribe.

What tips do you have that has helped you get more engagement from your email list? Let me know in the comments below!

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