Are you wondering if you should include email in your marketing campaign? Is email marketing dead? Here, we prove that email is still alive and well.

If you spend any time around marketers online, you may have heard them say email marketing is dead.

Is that true? Not at all. People still sent and received around 281 billion emails per day in 2018. Email isn’t going anywhere. But is email marketing dead? Again, no. But it depends on how you use it.

Read on to find out more.

What Happened to Email Marketing?

Many businesses thought they don’t need an email list. They can post content on social media for free, right? That’s true. But the chances of their target audience seeing it are low. Thanks to changing algorithms, the platform may not put in front of their followers. Even if they do, the followers need to be online at the same time to see it. But with email marketing? The email sits in the receiver’s inbox waiting to be opened. Businesses started to realize the value of email.

Trouble is, some of those brands started sending people too much stuff. Endless sale coupons or ‘we notice you haven’t opened your email’ notices annoyed customers. People couldn’t visit a website without an opt-in form popping up straight away. Given the choice between clicking away or signing up? Visitors chose to go elsewhere.

So Is Email Marketing Dead?

No. 70 percent of customers actually want to receive communications from favorite brands. But you may need to change how you use email marketing. Here are some tips.

Deliver Value

If you keep sending useless content, people stop opening it. It’s that simple. Turning a subscriber into a loyal customer depends on valuable content. That’s not content that’s valuable to you. It must be valuable to them. Work out what your target audience values. Then send them that.

Give Subscribers Control

Sending too many emails is a great way to lose subscribers. 53 percent of customers think they get too many emails from brands. Solve that problem by giving them some control. One option is to let subscribers tell you how often they want to hear from you. They may prefer weekly digests instead of regular emails.

 
A second option is to use automation. Set up tripwires that trigger useful content when a customer needs it. Say a product you sell runs out after 30 days. Sending a ‘would you like to buy another one?’ email about 20 days would be great. It gives the customer time to place their order and receive it before the other one finishes.

Use Segmentation

A more personalized approach is working well for organizations. This doesn’t only mean adding a merge tag to embed a customer’s name. This means sending them content they actually want to receive. American Express did this and boosted email engagement by 150 percent.

So look at your customer’s spending habits. Put them in segments based on what they buy or how often they spend. Send them content related to their activity with you. They’ll pay attention because it’s relevant to their interests. Using an account based marketing agency (ABM) can get you better results. They can focus on target accounts while still sending personalized campaigns.

Have you been asking is email marketing dead? Now you know that it’s alive and kicking. But to do it well, you need to respect your customers. Send them content they want and need. Let them decide when they receive it. Why not check out our web development articles for more marketing tips?