Despite the ever-expanding choice of new consumer touchpoints available in the digital age, email still remains one of the most engaging promotional mediums available to today’s businesses.
Niche or sector aside, email is a potent means of grabbing the attention of both prospective and existing partners, customers, and clients.
78% of brands have seen a rise in email engagement over the last 12 months. And, for every dollar you invest in marketing, you can expect an average return of $42 (that’s one healthy ROI).
Emails drive customer engagement—but, only if you get them right. In these times of isolation building customer engagement and driving brand loyalty is essential.
To help you do just that, here are three essential tips for driving customer engagement through email.
Optimize your email signature
Most business owners and marketers overlook the power of an effective email signature—but, it makes a big difference.
If you create an email signature that is informational, visually balanced and flows with the rest of your email, you will drive customer engagement. And, yes, you can add a signature to a promotional email (if anything, it will make it more human).
Here are some tips to help you create a business-boosting email signature:
● Make sure that your email signature is consistent with the rest of your company’s branding and blends with the design of your email.
● When you add hyperlinks to key webpages within your email signature, ensure that they open up a new window, navigating away from the email. Also, highlight important information or words by using bold font.
● Include all essential information within your email signature. These details include your preferred name, position within the organization, contact info, social media icons, website links, branding, and a legal disclaimer (optional). Using tools like WiseStamp’s email signature generator will help you ensure that you include the right details in your email signature while formatting it for success.
Use action words
47% of customers open an email based on the subject line alone. One of the reasons for this is the savvy use of action words.
Marketing action words are powerful and will not only prompt your reader to click through to your email but if you weave them into the body copy (the email itself), they will be compelled to read it to the bottom (and ultimately, take action).
Particular words or phrases will drive engagement and encourage action. These terms are punchy, inspiring, and stand to make your emails all the more impactful.
This glossary of marketing action words helps you spice up your email copy—and there are many to choose from.
Get your formatting right
Another key element of email communication or marketing success is formatting. A poorly formatted email will hinder the user experience (UX) and kill customer engagement, so getting it right is essential.
Here is some email formatting advice that will steer your success:
● Write in short, snappy sentences, and avoid large blocks of text. Bold or italicize action words or important phrases to make your content scannable.
● Test your emails to check for any line break issues that will make your emails difficult to navigate or look unprofessional.
● Aim for a 60% to 40% text to image split. Ensure that the images or graphics you use within your emails aren’t too busy in terms of color and content, and are edited to perfection.
● Avoid using more than two fonts in any one email as this will make it less scannable and detract from what you’re trying to say.
● Make sure—and this is of vital importance—that every single one of your emails is optimized for mobile. If you fail to do so, you can kiss bye to your customer engagement levels.
● Tell a story with your emails. While this isn’t a formatting tip, as such, creating a narrative (with a logic beginning, middle, and end) will resonate with your readers while helping you keep your formatting fluent and digestible.
Right now, people are craving information, assurance, and a welcome distraction. By crafting compelling emails that offer direct value to your audience, you will drive engagement, encourage brand loyalty, and accelerate the success of your business, one reader at a time.
Follow our business-boosting email tips and you will start to drive the customer engagement you deserve. And, for more engagement-enhancing strategies, read ‘Top Internet Marketing Strategies That Should Be Executed Now’.
