The Golden Rule Approach to Email Marketing
July 9th, 2010 by Dan LukensIf it’s your first time conducting an email marketing campaign, the entire prospect may seem overwhelming. Rest assured, however, it’s not as difficult as you might believe.
The major challenges can be conquered relatively easily with a dedication to planning and thoughtfulness. The technical side of email marketing is the most daunting, but hiring a good service provider such as Admail.net alleviates almost all technical issues. You can create a successful email campaign for your organization by following the golden rule and by relying on some common sense methods.
What do I mean by the “golden rule approach”?
I’m referring to the simple idea of only sending email that you would want to receive yourself. This works best if you put yourself in the shoes of your recipients and is known in marketing terms as “understanding your target market”. The golden rule approach is essentially an exercise in common sense and targeted marketing.
One of the first things that I tell any customer about their email campaign is that they need to be transparent and open with their customers.
We have all heard the phrase “honesty is the best policy”, this applies heavily to email marketing. Your main objective must be to let your recipients know why they got the email, what the email is offering, who the email is from, and how they can stop future mailings if they no longer want to receive the email. If you give your customer all of these pieces of information your campaign will be easily understood and you’ll receive less complaints and unsubscribes.
The success of a campaign is determined by many factors, but the single most important aspect to any email campaign is the quality of your list.
This is one of the most often overlooked of all common sense email marketing practices. You must have a good relationship with your list in order to have a successful campaign. This is the main reason buying a list is such a bad idea. If you buy a list, you have absolutely no relationship with your recipients. You want to have members who have signed up for your newsletter and have a firm understanding of what to expect from it. If you have a list like this, you already know that your recipients are interested in what you are sending them. To achieve this, be clear about what you will be sending and how often you will be sending it.
There are many other examples of common sense practices to improve your email campaign, but most questions you will have to answer on your own. Don’t rush an email campaign and always remember to put yourself in your customer’s shoes.
To stay focused on common sense and the golden rule, ask yourself these questions before sending out a campaign. Does it look trust worthy? Does what I am sending follow what I told recipients I would send when they signed up? Does the mailing live up to its offers or promises? Are your offers or information provided in your mailings relevant and worth while? Ask yourself these questions with each mailing and ensure that you can answer each question with a firm “Yes!” but remember, the most important question is, how would you feel about receiving your own campaign?
