In this day and age running a business is becoming more and more complex when it comes to getting the right mix of advertising, which is cost effective as well as sales effective, and that will give you the best return on investment is increasingly complex.  Any promotional mix should include a combination of Search Engine Optimsation (SEO), Social Media engagement, Search Engine Marketing (SEM) and email marketing which suit your business and target audience.  This article is about email marketing and e-communication specifically but look out for our other articles on the other topics.

As the article on Scoop.IT points out

” Email may seem like an oversaturated communication channel today, but email campaigns still nurture leads, increase sales, and CONVERT CUSTOMERS 3X MORE THAN SOCIAL MEDIA. It’s a no brainer.”

So why  is email marketing effective today when we are overloaded with emails?

Email marketing allows you to reach out to your current and prospective customers and keep them updated and engaged with targeted information on the latest deals and news about your products and services.

While many consider email marketing to be the modern day equivalent of the free junk paper catalogs we receive in a traditional mailbox it has the huge advantage of being able to be effectively tracked.  Through email marketing services you can:

• To discover what subject lines worked
• discover what email content worked
• what time of day
• what links did the receiver click on
• then based on the receivers decisions automatically send them a customised following up newsletter or email.

Let that sink in for a moment….. emails marketing can basically work like a personal sales assistant by having a follow up line that re-enforces standard sales techniques!!!!

So what to look for in an online newsletter/e-marketing provider:

• ease of use- the admin area or dashboard has to be user friendly and make it easy for you to import mailing lists etc
• be able to create custom demographics so you can really target your emails to suit specific customers
• provides you with the ability to easily create responsive emails – the majority of mail is now opened on a phone or tablet
• reporting features so you can track what worked and what didn’t work, who has unsubscribe, who forwarded what emails
• automation features so that emails can be sent based on receivers actions. for example if someone didn’t open an email you could send them a follow up one with an engaging  subject line to trying encourage them to open the email this time
• scheduling options – being able to schedule an email to go out automatically
• feature to ensure or reduce the possibility of you being blacklisted!!!
• Integration with other third party tools

Ok enough about the talk what about some recommendations

Mailchimp

Pro’s

• Pretty funky/chimpy
• for premium accounts completely full featured
• A lot of help videos and tutorials
• 90% of the features needed are available in the free accounts
• social sharing in free account
• Responsive emails in free accounts
• segmentation in free account
• easily integrated with third party software such as WordPress
• RSS to email
• custom sign up forms

Con’s

• sometimes the navigation is too funky/smart for its own good so you can’t find the right link to click on next
• automation is only available in premium paid for accounts
• Even with a small list you have to pay to remove mailchimps logo in emails

Aweber

Pros

• full featured 30 day trial
• isn’t bloated with alot of wizards are extra features
• A lot of help videos and tutorials
• segmentation in free account
• easily integrated with third party software such as WordPress
• RSS to email
• custom sign up forms

Cons

• no free version after the 30 day trial
• interface is a bit outdated
• it assumes you understand the terminology

 

Benchmark

Pro’s

• free full featured plan for up to 2000 subscribers
• Real time reporting
• Responsive emails
• sign up forms
• simple autoresponders
• not as straight forward third party software such as WordPress integration

Con’s

• doesn’t have as many features as aweber or mailchimp
• only simple autoresponders

And there are many many more 🙂 But at this point in time I think the best thing to do test out the 3 above and see which one best meets your needs!!!

Further reading: https://litmus.com/blog/we-analyzed-13-billion-opens-to-discover-where-subscribers-read-email-infographic