If you engage in email marketing you may at some point find yourself questioning whether or not it is working. Here are three signs you may need to hire a designer to create a professional template and perhaps review and edit your email marketing copy:
1. Your readers aren’t buying anything.
The # of subscribers on your mailing list is not the metric you should be monitoring with email marketing. If your emails aren’t leading to valuable contacts or conversions, it doesn’t matter how many people are on your list. It’s quite possible your audience (the people who are really listening) is actually shrinking. Some of your subscribers will let you know how they feel about your email marketing by unsubscribing. Others will just delete emails as they arrive or set up filters to send them directly to trash. There are definitely ways to engage with your clients and prospects through email marketing which increase leads and sales. If your current efforts aren’t working it could be time to make some changes.
2. Your emails contribute nothing to your branding efforts.
Email marketing is just one important element of what should be a comprehensive marketing strategy for your business. In addition to driving traffic to your website, emails should be easily identifiable with your company. They should consistently portray your desired business image. If your emails look nothing like your website, your logo, or your print or other marketing materials, it’s probably time to make a change.
3. You let your summer intern handle your eNewsletter, didn’t you?
The fact that email marketing is free* doesn’t mean every email sent shouldn’t be a professional-prepared marketing piece. Presumably your mailing list consists of current, former and prospective clients to whom you periodically reach out to. Depending on your business and client base, email marketing could, if undertaken properly, be one of your most important activities for generating new and repeat business. It keeps the communication lines open. It reminds people who you are and what you do, and why they did business with you in the past. Consider the implications to your business if every week your most important asset — your customers — get a pointless, ugly or unprofessional contact from you.
*Professional email marketing doesn’t require a paid Constant Contact account. Our favorite email marketing software is PHPLIST, which is a free, open-source, self-hosted solution.
