Integrating email marketing into your strategy seems very obvious. What may not be so obvious however, is how to develop an audience to communicate with, and not just any audience, but instead a list of subscribers who have an appetite for your messaging, are engaged and will ultimately increase business.
Easier said than done right? While cultivating a great email marketing list doesn’t just happen overnight, you can start by deploying the ‘Four P’s’: Plan, purpose, persistence and perhaps the most important ingredient, patience.
Plan: Before any action is taken, set a goal for your email marketing list. Much like in the golden age of print media when circulation departments in newspapers and magazines were tasked with selling subscriptions, put a plan in place to establish a goal for how many and what type of subscribers you want to attract. A subscription goal should be a key part of your list growth plan.
Purpose: Building your email list is a two way street and to be successful, you need to give something to gain something. Offers and discounts on products and services as well as valuable content are attractive to prospective subscribers. It’s often said that ‘content is king’ and when it comes to developing an audience, content that is compelling, entertaining, insightful and educational will definitely connect with customers.
Persistence: Long distance runners understand that you can’t win the race in the first half, but you can definitely lose it. The same can be said for plans for subscriber growth and this is were many efforts fall short. Typically at the start of a plan everything is exciting, new and full of energy. As time wears on and other daily tasks evolve, the plan and purpose for the growth of an email list can easily fall victim to other priorities. Persistence in sticking with your plan and purpose over time will prove challenging, but absolutely worthwhile.
Patience: A solid plan with purpose and executed with persistence is a recipe for success, with the final ingredient being patience. Delivering consistently good content over a long period of time will provide a return on your investment by gaining more subscribers and a larger audience.
For example, a friend with a line of products in the food industry developed good content and product offers over time and then got to the point of rather than asking potential customers to simply ‘Join our mailing list’ he made the pivot and started to offer something in return and asked “Receive recipes and cooking tips from our chef’ by subscribing to our email list. His list grew exponentially from this moment forward.
Email subscribers should be a top priority as they can be more important to the growth of your business than social media follows or likes. Create an appetite for your content and with a plan and purpose, deliver it over a long period of time. An audience developed organically in this way will prove to be loyal and engaged! Good luck!
Blue42.