Email is an effective method of prospecting for customers. However, to turn a prospect into a customer, the company’s emails need to be read and not deleted. A firm has a maximum of five to ten seconds to convince busy prospective customers that the emails they have received contain something that is of value to them. This brief paper will look at ways to improve email response rates for firms (Sterne & Priore, 2000).
People are more likely to open emails that originate from people that they are familiar with. This is where the company’s marketing efforts will pay off- with email or name recognition. Consistent direct mail and catalog campaigns; presentations at conferences; tweeting and advertising the firm’s website go a long way in establishing name recognition and improving the response rates. If customers recognize the blog or twitter handle as a viable source of information and items that assist them in solving their needs they will click on any latest email from the company (Brodie, 2014).
In any official marketing email, the subject line is crucial. Immediately after the “from” line, the subject line that follows is what a significant number of people base their decisions on to go through the email or not. The firm’s representative should make the subject line seem as if they are sending a personal email as opposed to an auto-generated mass email. The email has to be clear about its contents and avoid the use of clever cliché subject lines. The reader should be able to immediately tell what is in it for them (Mullen, Daniels & Gilmour, 2011).
The email should be brief and easy to read, 200 words ought to be the upper word limit. If the message is too long or appears text-heavy, a busy prospective client may immediately archive it to read in future increasing the probability of the email not being read at all. Prospective clients receive numerous emails from companies seeking to sell their goods and services hence it would be prudent to let them know that the company respects their time by keeping the correspondence brief and to the point. The email has to about the prospective client as opposed to the company and its profile. The email’s subject line enticed the recipient to open the message; it is therefore up to the first sentence to hook the reader and compel them to carry on reading (Butler, 2010). The first sentence should be about the recipient’s needs, pain points or issues.
The more targeted the clientele one is sending to the higher the response rates. Targeting enables the company to tailor their messages to suit the audience that it is intended for. A good example is that the issues and concerns of a superintendent will significantly differ from those of a curriculum specialist in case a curriculum product is being marketed.
The message has to be suited to the audience (Bodnar & Cohen, 2012). The email should be made simple and easy to take action upon. It is advisable to go straight to the point and avoid beating around the bush. The company’s calls to action should be placed front and center in all the emails. Lastly, allow the recipients of the emails to get to better know the sender. This can be done by including one or two links to a website or twitter account. People tend to make purchases from people they are familiar with (Sales & Baggott, 2013).
The scatter chart will be the preferred method of presenting the results after conducting the DOE. This is because such charts are easy to understand as well as interpreted. Any email response values that are extreme will be easily identified as outliers and labeled as exceptions. The scatter chart will show if there exists any correlation between the various values that have been plotted showing a link or relationship between the various values. It will also allow one to draw a line of best fit to identify where most of the points are showing whether or not there exists a close link between the data.
References
Bodnar, K., & Cohen, J. L. (2012). The B2B social media book: Become a marketing superstar by generating leads with blogging, Linkedln, Twitter, Facebook, e-mail, and more. Hoboken, N.J: Wiley.
Brodie, I. (2014). Email persuasion. Fairfax VA: RainMaker Publishers
Butler, M. R. (2010). Email marketing: A guide to the internet’s most effective marketing tool. Charleston, SC: Butler Pub. Group.
Mullen, J., Daniels, D., & Gilmour, D. (2011). Email Marketing: An Hour a Day. New York, NY: John Wiley & Sons.
Sales, A., & Baggott, C. (2013). Email marketing by the numbers: How to use the world’s greatest marketing tool to take any organization to the next level. Hoboken, N.J: Wiley.
Sterne, J., & Priore, A. (2000). Email marketing. New York: John Wiley & Sons.