How to Launch Your First Email Marketing Campaign and Get the Results You Want

July 27, 2018

5 min read

Opinions expressed by Entrepreneur contributors are their own.

Email isn’t going anywhere. There are 3.7 billion global email users, and that number is expected to grow to 4.1 billion by 2021. What’s more, this communication channel is supremely popular: People check their emails multiple times a day, and when you’re trying to market your company, you can get your name into thousands of inboxes just by launching an email marketing campaign.

Related: How to Boost Deliverability and Win at Email Marketing

The cost? Email marketing is also super-affordable, which makes it great for small businesses.

But just sending an email message promoting your business isn’t enough. People are inundated with a ton of promotional emails every day, and many get deleted without ever being read. That’s why you need to make sure your emails will stand out through the noise.  

So, where do you start and what can you do to be successful with your first email campaign? Let’s jump into it: Here’s how to launch your first email marketing campaign, which will boost engagement for your company and its sales.  

Build your email list.

In order to have a successful email marketing campaign, you’ll need people to email. That’s why you have to build up your email list to be a moneymaker for your business. Having an email list allows you to have a ton of qualified leads at your fingertips, and you can email them any time you want to promote your business. But how do you get people signed up?

Shinesty uses this attention-grabbing pop-up to encourage visitors to sign up for its email list.

Email List Pop-up from Shinesty. http://www.workbetternotharder.com/2015/

Using a nonintrusive, exit-intent popup on your site is a great, attention-grabbing tactic to get more email subscribers. Offering an incentive in your pop-up will convince users to hit that subscribe button, so consider offering a discount or another freebie in exchange for a prospective customer’s email address. Building a substantial email list is the backbone of any successful email campaign.

Related: 7 Statistics That Prove Email Marketing Isn’t Dead

Choose an email marketing service provider.

Once you’ve built up your email list and gotten tons of users ready for you to send a message, it’s time to get your email campaign in motion. Using Gmail or Outlook is strongly discouraged for sending bulk emails. That’s why you need to choose an email marketing service provider. Some great options are Constant Contact, MailChimp or ConvertKit.

By using an email service provider, you’ll get a number of benefits, including the ability to send bulk emails and manage your email database, campaign-management services and customizable email templates. You’ll also be able to ensure you’re compliant with CAN-SPAM laws.

Define the goal of your campaign.

Before you send out any emails, you have to figure out why you’re sending out the emails in the first place. Not defining a focus for your email marketing campaign will make that campaign appear all over the place, and confuse readers. So what is the goal of your campaign? Typical goals include:

• Educating users about your product/niche

• Promoting products or announcing a sale

• Upselling customers

• Increasing engagement on your blog/social media

Pinkberry’s goal with the following email campaign was to target its “inactive” users with a surprise incentive to return:

Pinkberry Email Campaign. https://mailbakery.com/blog/email-marketing-campaign-examples/

Remember: Not only do you have to decide “why?” but also “whom?” Will you be sending this campaign to customers who have already purchased, users who have never purchased or everyone on your email list? How you design your emails depends on what you want out of your campaign, so determine your goal and plan your campaign around it.

Craft your email.

After deciding what type of email marketing campaign you’re going to launch, start crafting your email. The first tip is to create a catchy subject line that will grab attention and make people want to open up your email. You can use a free tool like CoSchedule’s Email Subject Line Tester to see if your subject line makes the grade.

Other tips that will get your emails opened include personalizing them to each user; people will pay closer attention if you say their name. Designing an eye-catching email with a good mixture of text and images is also important. Design experts often recommend that emails employ a 60/40 text-to-image ratio.

Finally, when writing copy for your email campaign, keep it short and snappy and show some personality. You want to get your point across without boring readers by making them scroll through a long email to find out what you’re actually talking about. You should focus on content that shows readers how they will benefit, instead of just telling them how great you are.

Related: 5 Ways You Can Earn a Better ROI with Your Email Marketing Campaigns

Now you’re ready to launch your first email marketing campaign. Don’t forget that once you hit “send,” you can start to measure your results, like your open rate and your number of orders or registrations, for example. When you measure your results, you’ll be able to see what’s working and what’s not; and the next time you send out a campaign, you’ll get even better results than the first time around.