Love it or hate it, email marketing remains one of the most effective ways to reach your audience directly. Whether you’re nurturing leads, driving sales, or building a community, crafting an engaging email newsletter is crucial. Here’s how to ensure your email marketing resonates with your audience and drives results.
Start with a Strong Signup Incentive
Your newsletter should be easy to sign up for, prominently featured on your website—whether through a pop-up, inline form, or a dedicated signup page. More importantly, you need to give a good reason for your would be customers to sign up. For B2B audiences when $$ off or a discount doesnt really make sense, consider offering downloadable PDF with tips, tricks, tools – anything to make their job easier.
[always give, give, give before you ever ask for anything from your perspective clients. It build trust, authority, and a connection that paramount to success]
For customers you are trying to get in your door or to purchase your product, I am a big fan of a first time customer discount. We tend to prefer a dollar amount for most of our clients but it really depends upon your business. Discounts work great for e-commerce stores and incentivize customers to not only subscribe but they tend to spend more with discounts.
Not sure which works best – try different options. A/B testing is a marketers best friend, make it yours!
Services like OptinMonster are excellent for managing these signups, allowing you to create multiple campaigns and gather analytics on what resonates best with your prospects.
Case Study: The Magic of Miss Bubbles Barkington
In our latest email gathering campaign on our medspa client’s website, we tested three newsletter opt-ins:
- One featured a smiling staff member
- One had a picture of a beautiful woman – stock photo
- And the third one with an adorable dog named Miss Bubbles Barkington in a robe and towel.
Guess which one had the highest conversions?
Miss Bubbles Barkington out performed the other two by 5x.
Why Miss Bubbles Barkington Was Best In Show
The Miss Bubbles Barkington campaign outperformed others by a remarkable fivefold, and it wasn’t just because it was fun.
This campaign’s success underscores the profound impact of emotional resonance in marketing. Featuring an adorable dog dressed in a robe and towel, the image immediately invoked a spectrum of emotions from viewers:
- affection
- amusement
- nostalgia and
- Dogs universally symbolize loyalty and companionship, traits that foster a deep sense of connection and relatability.
By tapping into these emotions, the campaign not only captured attention but also created a memorable, engaging experience that encouraged more sign-ups.
This example vividly illustrates the power of using emotionally charged imagery to connect with an audience, making them feel something genuine that translates into effective engagement.
Don’t Overlook the Power of Personal Connection
Remember, your newsletter is a direct line to potential clients. It is the platform that you can use to tell the story of your business as it unfolds.
The biggest mistake a business can make is using this channel solely for sales pitches.
Your emails should mimic the realness of human interaction.
They should have personality and flow.
They should be relatable, fun, timely, and easy to digest.
Done correctly, your subscribers should look forward to the next installment. They should feel invested in you and your business.
Avoid industry jargon that can alienate your reader. Think about how you interact with customers in person: you greet them, exchange pleasantries, and gradually introduce what you have to offer. Your emails should follow a similar pattern.
Note: There are a number of email marketing platforms to pick from. My go-to’s are Constant Contact and MailChimp. All (or at least almost all) platforms charge per subscriber and have SMS options for text marketing. Look through the options to find which one works best for you!
It can be overwhelming with so many rules of what to do (and not to do), but if you are building a business and brand, then every single opportunity to connect with current and future clients should be well thought out and executed with the same positivity and passion that you provide when you are face to face with them.
To help you out we’ve created a downloadable cheat sheet to guide you through the key points to check before sending out your next newsletter. Remember, perfection is a fallacy, but if you can check off enough boxes, you will quickly see your engagement grow as well as your client list!
Offering More: Our Email Marketing Services
Beyond providing tips, we also offer specialized email marketing services designed to maximize engagement and conversions. Whether you need help crafting compelling content or managing your entire email strategy, we’re here to assist.
Shannon Hayes
CEO
Shannon is CEO of Vitality Ventures and it’s divisions, Vitality Lens and Medspa Mastery
Shannon is also host of Vitality Vault Podcast where she speaks with other women in business about success, failure, and managing life and business every day.
Email Shannon at shannon@vitalityventuresgroup.com for more info or text or call us at 971-202-0950.
DM on Instagram @shannonventures
