What is Email Marketing and How Does It Benefit Your Business

Introduction.

So, you intend to start a business, or you already have and you want to have a sales funnel place to store and convert leads, Can I tell you that all is not complete without putting email marketing to use?

Yes, you heard that right, no matter how digitally inclined your online business is, you need to utilize email marketing when building a relationship with prospective and loyal customers.

You can’t have it all, but email marketing should not be left out. Email marketing allows you to segment your customers into different lists based on their preferences to send highly personalized content.

From crafting the perfect subject line to images that resonate with your customer, and valuable content that helps your audience, email is the perfect channel to drive engagement.

Your business has an amazing website, built with customer retention functionalities into it, such as Chatbots and many others, irrespective of all of that, you need email marketing to complete the marketing life-cycle.

What Is Email Marketing?

Email marketing is just one form of digital marketing, which includes sending emails to advertise or pass information across. Nevertheless, every email sent to a potential or current customer could be considered email marketing.

What is an Email Marketing Software?

Email marketing software solutions are applications that enable you to plan, perform, and monitor email marketing operations. They often come with email builders, email scheduling features, Website builders, analytics engines and campaign automation tools to help you ease operations.

How does email marketing work?

An Email Service Provider (ESP)is used by businesses to send marketing emails. An Email Service Provider is software that sends and manages email marketing campaigns.

It is also referred to as an email marketing platform, email marketing tool, email marketing service, or email marketing software. You might be questioning, can’t I send marketing emails with my regular inbox provider? Do I need to pay for this additional email service?

Technically, it’s possible, but you might just get banned. You can use personal email marketing services like Gmail, Yahoo and outlook. But, beware, though. You are likely to run into problems with limited email bandwidth, design, and, more importantly, email deliverability. Here’s why:

Internet Service Providers (ISPs) like Gmail, Outlook, Yahoo, etc., are created for personal use and not for sending mass emails.

So when a mass email is sent from an ISP, it’s easily labelled by spam filters, and your account can be banned for suspicious activity.

ESPs, on the other hand, have the required infrastructure in place to ensure email deliverability. The ability to land emails in the inbox. This is why you need a dedicated email service provided to assist you in taking care of your in-house email marketing problems.

Why Should You Subscribe to Email Marketing For Your Business?

You already started this article learning how excellent and productive email marketing can be for you. But, if you still have any doubt, then here are more benefits your business can derive from email marketing.

1. Low Cost.

If you have not heard, email marketing is the cheapest form of digital marketing you can ever use. Most email software gives you a free trial and allows you to upgrade at your own will.

2. Deliver Targeted messages.

Those subscribers on your email marketing list are not ghosts or people with different interests.

Your email subscribers are people who want to hear from you, and this helps you send targeted messages.

3. Drive revenue.

If you seek a sure sales funnel, email marketing is here to your rescue. Marketing Week reports that email generates around $49bn in retail sales annually.

Do you need to sell a product or a service? Then email marketing is here to the rescue.

4. Easy to get started.

Like tweeting messages and sending out Facebook posts, so is the simplicity attached to email marketing. A complete dummy can start with email marketing without prior knowledge.

5. Instant impact.

Do you need to make your mark at once? Then email marketing is there to the rescue. Information about sales or services or general awareness can be known in just a global window of fewer than 24 hours.

6. Easy To Measure.

Every email marketing software comes with an entire dashboard coupled with analytics functionality that helps you track open, click-through and conversion rates, making it simple to spot how a campaign can be improved.

How Do you Choose The Best Email Marketing Software For Your Business?

There are tons of email marketing software out there, but not all are worth it; in this section, I will give you guidelines on how to carefully select the best email marketing software that suits your business.

1. Deliverability.

Deliverability is the first criterion to consider when choosing an email marketing software; you don’t want all your emails to be spammed when you send out a broadcast; the better the deliverability, the better your email success.

2. Pre-Made email designs.

You also don’t want to choose an email marketing software that allows you to do everything by yourself, this can slow down your progress, and in most cases, you might need to call in an expert that you did not budget for. A legit email marketing software must have inbuilt support for pre-made designs for businesses in various niches to make work very easy.

3. Email automation.

We live in a time when automation is everything; we don’t want to always waste our time on a single task for a long. Therefore, legit email marketing software should support automation to help you engage your new subscribers as quickly as possible.

4. Report and Analytics.

Another feature to watch out for in email marketing software is built-in support for reports and analytics; you always want to measure the deliverability of your email campaigns to help you optimise and grow.

5. Opt-in Forms.

This is another feature to watch out for in every email marketing software you are determined to use. Opt-in forms have been known to convert more subscribers than any form.

6. List Segmentation.

List segmentation allows you to be able to split your email marketing list based on specific criteria; for example, you might decide to use a singular email marketing account to grow your email marketing list; let say you run multiple online businesses and want to be able to separate one list from the other to avoid sending non-targeted emails, the only way to do this is by segmenting the list, which allows you to group subscribers.

7. Landing Page Builders.

Landing page builders are another vital functionality when choosing your email marketing provider.

Landing page builder allows you to set up a static website to serve the primary purpose of collecting emails.

Landing page builders can help you set up a static website in just minutes without any coding knowledge; the absence of a landing page builder in an email marketing software automatically makes that email marketing software a terrible idea.

8. Multiple Integration.

Most times, we often want to be able to talk to a particular piece of software, and this can only be made possible by a certain kind of integration; in software development, it is called APIs.

We want our existing online store, Facebook account or third-party marketing service; this can be made possible by integration support from the intended email marketing software.

9. Explore various Options.

In this section, I will recommend a complete list of email marketing services to help you choose from.

These email marketing services to be recommended are ones that have been tested and trusted; they are also known to possess the email mentioned above marketing qualities.

1. Moosend.

Moosend is an email marketing software that helps small, medium and large online-based businesses build their lists.

Moosend comes with many email marketing features to help scale your business, such as; Easy-to-use Drag-and-drop Builder, Free email marketing templates, segmentation, In-built tracking, cart abandonment tracking, multiple integrations and In-built analytics.

Moosend offers a free plan for users with under 1,000 subscribers and includes sign-up forms, reporting, and the ability to send unlimited emails.

TRY IT NOW- Moosend.com

2. Send IN Blue.

Send IN Blue is an email marketing software that allows online business owners to build and manage their email marketing list; they have successfully powered over 175,000 growing businesses worldwide.

Send IN Blue comes with many unique features: Email marketing, SMS Marketing, Instant Messaging, CRM, Marketing automation, segmentation, landing pages, opt-in forms, retargeting, multiple integrations, and real-time statistics.

Send IN Blue comes with a limited free plan that allows you to test run their services and can be upgraded for just $25/Mo.

TRY IT NOW- Sendinblue.com

3. GetResponse.

Get Response is more than an online marketing platform for email marketing; It comes with extra features like a landing page creator and webinar solution.

Get Response boasts over 350,000 customers in 183 countries. It is also available in 27 different languages.

Get Response comes with many exciting features such as Email marketing, landing pages, market automation, Webinars, Conversion funnels and Paid Ads.

Get Response offers a 30-day free trial where you’ll get access to all features. Unfortunately, there is no money-back refund since it’s a pay-as-you-go service.

TRY IT NOW- GetResponse.com

4. Constant Contact.

Constant contact was founded in 1995; Constant Contact has grown to become one of the most extensive email marketing services globally.

Constant Contact also allows you to generate all kinds of websites, from an essential business website and static pages to building a full-blown e-commerce website to manage all your inventory.

You don’t have to worry about creating and promoting your email marketing list because every tool that you need to drive your email list growth is built-in into your constant contact dashboard.

Constant Contact comes with many exciting features: Email Marketing Automation, ECommerce, Social Media Marketing, contact List management, tracking Tools, Donations, surveys and Polls, and Sign-up Forms.

Getting started with constant contact is relatively cheap and easy with no credit card required; Here is an image depicting the details of their pricing below.

You can get started with constant contact today for free and upgrade later; here is a link to their website.

TRY IT NOW- Constantcontact.com

5. Mail Chimp.

Mailchimp was established in 2001 by Ben Chestnut and Dan Kurzius; it is presently headquartered in Atlanta with additional offices in Brooklyn, Oakland, and Vancouver; Mailchimp is 100% founder-owned and highly successful.

Mail Chimp is one of the world’s leading email marketing providers, with over 1 billion emails sent a day using their service.

Mail Chimp is a simple-to-use email marketing tool for bloggers and smaller websites as it comes with a free plan.

Mailchimp also comes with a lot of exciting features such as; Signup forms, segmentation, Behavioral targeting, content studio, creative assistant, campaign templates, multiple integrations, reports, intelligent recommendations, surveys, and A/ split testing.

It can be integrated alongside WordPress and other CMS. The free plan allows you to have up to 2,000 subscribers and send 10,000 emails per month.

TRY IT NOW- Mailchimp.com

6. Convert Kit.

ConvertKit is built by creators, for creators. They understand their client’s needs and know what it takes to grow an online following.

For bloggers looking to send personalised, text-based emails, their designs look like they are coming right from Gmail. In addition, their advanced triggers make for some excellent list segmentation options.

Convert kit is one email marketing platform that comes with a lot of exciting features such as; Email automation, Email sign-up forms, landing pages, Email designer and multiple integrations.

The convert kit offers a 14-day free trial that includes all of the features.

TRY IT NOW- Convertkit.com

7. Drip.

Drip is a new email marketing provider. Their core demographic is bloggers, marketers, and eCommerce site owners.

Suppose you’re coming from another background, or your website was built using another infrastructure.

You don’t need to worry because Drip allows you to integrate your existing infrastructure with its own.

Here is a detailed image depicting their pricing.

You can get started with no credit card and enjoy a 14-day trial; one thing about Drip is how they set up their pricing; with Drip, you are to pay more as your email list continues to grow.

TRY IT NOW- Drip.com

8. Aweber.

Another excellent email automation software is Aweber. Aweber is a viral tool that has been around for 18 years and might have even invented the email autoresponder.

Aweber is one of the very best email marketing services because it puts small businesses in mind and gives them tools to help them grow fast.

Everything you need to run your online business is already prebuilt into Aweber’s Eco-system, so you don’t have to worry because it comes with seamless integrations.

Here is a link to help you check out the official Aweber website. Aweber offers a 30-day free trial that gives you access to every feature. Beyond the monthly payment options.

TRY IT NOW- Aweber.com

9. Mailer Lite.

Mailerlite is an email marketing tool founded in 2005; it is currently managed by 96 people spread across 12 nations of the world.

MailerLite was one of the first email marketing tools used by me. It’s also one of the simplest, but don’t let this simplicity fool you; Mailerlite comes with lots of unique features to help scale your business, and most of them include; Email campaigns, Landing pages, PoP ups, Automations, Surveys, Multiple integrations, Built-in photo editing, Website builder, Segmentation, Email newsletter reports, Developer API, File manager and Mobile-friendly email newsletters.

MailerLite offers a free plan of up to 1k subscribers and 12,000 messages; You can get started free without any cried or a debit card.

TRY IT NOW- Mailerlite.com

10. Omnisend.

Omnisend is an email marketing software solution created in it; it allows users to send mass email campaigns, Build a List and develop their email and SMS marketing services.

Omnisend started in 2014 as an email marketing platform called Soundfest; it has been in existence for over six years + now and has over 50,000 customers.

Omnisend comes with many exciting features such as; email + SMS campaigns, segmentation, pop-up forms, eCommerce automation and multiple integrations for WordPress and many other webs CMS.

TRY IT NOW- Omnisend.com

11. GetGist.

Get gist is an all-in-one email marketing and automation software that comes with many more features than just traditional email marketing software: Collaborating your conversation across various social media platforms, Chatbots for customers, Email Marketing, Schedule meetings, marketing automation, and support for multiple integrations.

Besides being multi-functional, gist also comes at very affordable pricing, starting at $0/Mo up to $99/Mo.

TRY IT NOW- Getgist.com

12. Campain Monitor.

Campaign Monitor is yet another exciting email marketing solution that allows small and big businesses to utilise the power of email marketing and other online business development tools.

Campaign Monitor powers media moguls, tech giants, nonprofits—lots of different industries making their numbers through the power of email marketing, with over 250,000 customers worldwide.

Campaign Monitor also comes shipped with many features such as; Email marketing, Marketing Automation, Personalization, Contacts and segmentation, sign-up forms, Analytics, Mobile apps and various integrations, and Transactional emails.

TRY IT NOW – CampaignMonitor.com

Conclusion.

Email continues to be the primary driver of customer retention and acquisition for small and medium-scale businesses globally. Not to say that social media such as Facebook, Twitter and Instagram is not essential for your business, but if you’re looking for direct impact and reach, there’s no competition with email marketing.

A well-thought-out email marketing strategy will make you a lot of money. Just as I have earlier stated at the beginning of this article, statistics were gathered around the stability of email marketing. Therefore, it is high time you started building a list to help save you stress in the nearest future.

Just before leaving this article, I wrote a comprehensive guide on this blog on how you can turn your email marketing list into a business. I recommend you read this article by clicking the link below.