Email is very a powerful tool in your sales and marketing arsenal because it can reach the right audience and drive them to action. According to data gathered by Magnetic, almost half of US and Canadian residents check their email three times per day or more. Additionally, email works to drive customers to act. Experts say that a targeted and effective email campaign can generate $44 in revenue for every dollar spent.
However, traditional sales efforts often fail because they are too general. When emails are not specific to an individual, they often are ignored or completely unopened. Fortunately, email automation can help alleviate these problems, creating highly personal and valuable emails for each individual or target group while still being easy to set up and send.
What’s Email Automation And How’s It Work, Anyway?
Email automation pairs customer data with marketing savvy to make your email campaigns more effective. Thanks to new technologies, email automation isn’t mass emails without context and personalization. Rather, the best email automations are tailored to your customer’s needs and your own business objectives.
Email automation works by providing data that helps the marketing team iterate with each new campaign, amplifying your message to each marketing persona by creating marketing that’s personalized and memorable. Actions taken by your prospects, imported data from your CRM on each customer, and other bits of personal info help you customize your messaging so it’s never lost in your prospect’s inbox.
Here are just a few of the practical ways email automation works for you, no matter what campaign you’re running.
1. Get Really Personal With Your Email
Offer highly specialized, valuable information so your prospects actually look forward to your emails and learn more with each email. Automation tools such as Mixmax allow you to create specific email sequences for each stage of the sale cycle. For example, by integrating with your CRM, you can identify which prospects haven’t been contacted in 6 months. Send those contacts a series of emails that re-introduces your services and shows your industry expertise. As they engage with your content you can even create a sperate sequence of emails for prospects who open the emails and those that don’t. If they open the email, you may automatically send a follow-up request to meet in person.
By personalization the emails based on how familiar and interested they are in your services you can ensure you don’t come across as too pushy or saley, while still capitalizing on prospects who are eager to learn more. Creating personalized emails can reduce unsubscribes, increase click-through-rates and sales.
2. Provide Better Customer Service
When a customer has a problem and reaches out to your business, it can be a critical experience for your company. A dissatisfied customer will tell between 9-15 people about their experience which could translate into powerful negative work-of-mouth.
Automated emails can help in a few ways. First, setting up an initial email that goes out as soon as an email is received can let the customer know you have received their note and well get back to them shortly. This will make them feel heard and valued. Additionally, email automations can be used to proactively send updates or downtime notifications about a product. If you are able to see which customers have an outdated version of software, you can proactively send an email to just those customers so they are notified, but other customers are not alarmed.
Finally, email automations can be set up to get product feedback. For example, an automated email can go out when a free trial is over and ask customers who did not purchase what could be improved to get them to pay for the service. This can be powerful information to build product and inform marketing.
3. Helpful Reminders And Coupons
Anything that makes the customer’s life easy is going to be welcomed. Appointment reminders can help customers show up on time and prevent expensive no-shows. Additionally, reminder emails are helpful to get customers back in the door, or back on your product. Connecting your email to your appointment system can make the emails go our automatically the day before and then at a certain time after.
Stay On Track
Additionally, email automations can be made off customer data like birthdays. Offering a coupon, or free items on someones birthday can delight and engage a customer and once set up, will work for everyone.
Email automation can be powerful and simple to set up. Marketers who leverage automation have seen conversion rates as high as 50%, which can translate into substantial revenue, signups, or customer engagements. Opportunities for email automation can be found in both B2B and B2C organizations, the trick is finding the best ones for you.