How to set up an email marketing campaign
Email marketing – if done properly – is still very effective, second only to Search Engine Marketing. One of the great advantages that email marketing shares with Search Engine Marketing is that you can track the return on investment very accurately. With some trial and error you can learn fast how to communicate your message effectively. If you do well, it will show in your shopping cart, and the statistics report will help you spot the weak links for improvement. You can easily track how many recipients that open your email, how many clicks leading to your website, and even how many of those visitors that actually completes your order form.
But email marketing is not only for getting new customers. It should play a key role in your strategy for keeping your old clients. Send a newsletter every second week to keep in touch with your clients. Show them how valuable they are. Ask them to give feedback to your product. Give them free advice on how to get more out of your product and send them updates. Can you afford to be without the possibilities that email marketing offers you? I didn’t think so.
Here is how you do it
- Scenario 1: You already have a website and you need a standalone email marketing solution »
- Scenario 2: You do not have a website yet and want your email management integrated into your website management system »
I already have a website...
Get started in a few minutes with the email campaign manager PhpList pre-installed on a ServeU.NET web hosting account!
Some of the features of PhpList:
- Manage 100.000 + subscribers
- Open/View tracking
- Click tracking
- Send personalized messages with User Specific Content
- Send messages with text only, html only, or both
- Let subscribers update their own information
- Clean your database of unused and non-existent email addresses
- Import email addresses
- Batch Processing - Set the maximum number of sent messages in a given time period
- Domain Throttling - Limits the number of emails to specific domains
- Scheduled Sending
…and much more (See full feature list at http://www.phplist.com/details)
Set up your campaign in 5 steps:
- We install PhpList for you free of charge when you sign up for a web hosting plan. You configure it with your email address and other preferences with help of this guide, or we configure it for you for a one time single fee of 99 EUR.
- Gather email addresses. Here are some ideas:
- Ask people to Opt-in (fill a subscription form). PhpList helps you to set up an opt-in page on your website. An opt-in page on your Facebook Fan page can be a very effective way to gather email addresses for your target audience. Make sure you offer something helpful for those who opt in; free advice, a free e-book or another givaway.
- Make a contest and ask for the participant's email address (and inform them that you will send news/offers to them)
- Make a survey and ask for the participant's email address (and inform them that you will send news/offers to them)
- Write your email with a subject line that will stand out in the recipiant's inbox and attract to reading. The subject line should of course be relevant to the content, i.e. not deceptive. Use subheaders in the content to pull attraction to the fast-scanning reader. Call to action with a link to your website (the specific landing page containing your offer).
- Make a landing page on your website that contains only the offer that the visitor has clicked to read more about. Don't make them look around for it! Call to action on your landing page and make order procedure fast and simple.
So, what are you waiting for? Sign up for a web hosting account with PhpList pre-installed now »
