Here is a good email marketing example from Ace Hardware
Why does this work? It’s seasonal and it’s good, informative content that shows you why you need their products. They didn’t just send a promo for me to by grass seed and fertilizer – they are telling me why I need it through informative content.
When you first hear email marketing, most people think of the spam that infiltrates their inbox daily. This bombardment of solicitations has led to its decreased effectiveness. While some of these messages make it through the spam filter and are actually read, it is not the best way to utilize this marketing tool. This is not to say that mass emailing should necessarily be thrown out altogether. As e-mailing one-thousand people takes about as much time as emailing ten people, it can still be worth it to do so. However, even within the realm of mass emailing, there are ways to optimize your efforts.
One of the best methods for getting the most out of your general email marketing efforts is to offer exclusive deals and discounts. Doing so makes it much more likely to generate interest than does a message simply advertising a specific product. Specials and coupons generate a sense of immediacy that has a higher chance of resulting in a webpage viewing and, thus, a purchase. Everyone wants a good deal and this technique uses that fact to its full advantage while still benefiting the customer.
Nonetheless, moving beyond mass email marketing will undoubtedly benefit you the most. One effective way to build a targeted contact list is through squeeze pages. These one-page websites provide an offer for the customer in exchange for their name and email address. Once they have filled out the form, a message will be sent immediately to their mailbox that contains their bonus information along with details about your company and direction to your main website. By providing something of use to the client, it begins to build a trusting and loyal relationship. Also, as they took action and showed interest by filling out the form, they are much more likely to make a purchase than would someone who received an unsolicited email.
This opt-in structure is the best way to avoid your message being sent straight to the trash. What results from these lead capture pages is a list of people that you can now continue to build a relationship with. When there is a new product or business advancement, you now have a group of people who are interested in hearing about it. Although it is important to make sure you do not contact them too often, an update here and there is a great way to keep your company fresh in their minds. By using one or all of these techniques, your email marketing efforts can now be more effective than ever.
We use AWeber for just about everything email marketing and lead generation related at our web strategy consulting company and for all of our sites like this one. All of our mini courses use the AWeber forms and autoresponders. And our email newsletters rely on this service as well.
Today they’ve released a brand new form creator for users to design lead capture and subscription forms for AWeber.
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