As a marketer or entrepreneur, your objective is to reach customers in an effective way. Thanks to email automation that allows businesses to connect with their audience with ease. Using email automation the right way not only scales your marketing campaigns but also helps you improve your brand image.
Let’s see everything you should know about the email automation process.
Email marketing has been driving amazing results for companies since the inception of the internet. The automation technologies make it even more simpler and cost-effective to deliver the right message to the right person and at the right time. You can schedule emails to your customers and prospects using pre-defined triggers.
This is what makes email automation a strong marketing tool for almost every industry. For example, the insurance industry can use automated email processes to take their customer service to the next level and implement a strong insurance marketing strategy.
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What is email automation?
What does it really mean to have automated email marketing processes? Simply put, when you use email automation, you design a series of emails that are sent automatically to your prospects and customers. An autoresponder sends or schedules emails based on your customers’ or prospects’ interaction with your brand. For instance, you can have your email automation system send a welcome email every time someone signs up for your newsletter.
If you’re still using old-fashioned email marketing tactics, consider the following stats. Automated emails have a 70.5% higher open rate and 152% higher click-through rate than generic email newsletters.
Setting up email automation
A marketing automation tool could be as good as the business that is using it. No matter what automation platform you want to implement, you have to come up with a thorough strategy for your email marketing campaigns. You clearly define what actions your prospects and customers can take with your business. After that, you create a separate workflow for each specific situation. To explain further, let’s take a look at some examples of automated email series that can be sent based on certain triggers.
1. Event promotion emails
Let’s say you want your audience to get registered for an event or webinar. Now, you can design a series of emails to promote your event. You can choose to send these emails to all of your clients and prospects. The first email invites your contacts to your event, explaining how your contacts will benefit from it. You can simply share what they should expect and why you choose to invite them. Of course, the email will share the important details about the time and place. If you’re hosting an online webinar, you will share the log-in information and ask readers to respond.
Once the first email is sent, you can send another email a day before the event to remind your audience of the event. Sending a reminder email 15 minutes before you go live can boost the attendance rate. After you’re done with the event, you can send an automatic after-event email to simply thank your participants or let them know what else you have for them. This is how you design a series of emails for different situations within a specific scenario.
2. Onboarding emails
Here is one more example of a trigger: new product sign-up. A series of welcome emails can be designed and automated when people sign up for your products or services. No matter your onboarding workflows or the nature of your products, it’s a good idea to keep things simple instead of overwhelming your new customers with forms and links.
All you have to do is deliver a great onboarding process. A welcome email can be followed by some educational emails helping your customers understand your product and its value. There can also be implemented a blog section with latest insights – where you can collect blog posts which will serve as a backup for the onboarding process. At the same time, you will improve your SEO.
3. Account renewal emails
Let’s say you offer a subscription-based product that comes with a free trial. This is where you can outline an email automation process and send emails to customers whose free trial or subscription is about to run out.
You can send an email to people who signed up for a free trial and now they need a little more motivation to finally buy your product. But what is even better is to follow the LinkedIn practice, and remind users of the expiration day several times. This means that you care about your customers’ time and money, and that you are really there all the time. You can also emphasize the importance of the certain version of the product, and highlight the advantages of having it.
Final Thoughts
Opportunities for business growth are endless when it comes to email automation. All you have to do is find the right email automation platform and processes. Work smart and leverage email automation to ensure success against all odds.
