Email Marketing

Compared to the old days of marketing, where we were at the mercy of direct mail and cold calling, electronic capabilities have opened up great opportunities to reach wider audiences, more often, at low costs.  The problem is, everyone has the same advantage—it’s a classic case of “too much of a good thing.”  Thus, all of us on the prospect/consumer end are bombarded with a near constant stream of offers and information.  Eventually we tune 90% of it out.  That’s why it’s more important than ever to be strategic in our marketing tactics, particularly with email marketing.  Even minor things can affect whether someone finds your message valuable enough to give it a few minutes of their time or deletes it without reading.

If you’ve read our previous blog, Inbound Marketing, you know that helping yourself “get noticed” by those already interested in learning about your industry is an effective strategy.   What do we do to get noticed?  Deliver consistent, valuable information.  You also know that through this act of giving (vs. self promotion) you will be rewarded with a higher level of credibility, and eventually business and loyalty.  Good content makes a person stop-read-think and behave differently.  This is especially true for B2B professional service firms .  You are the experts in your field.  Your product is your knowledge.   

Traditional “outbound” marketing is becoming less and less effective with people learning how to filter out what is not of use to them.  The old way of, “pushing your message out far and wide” is no longer able to hold its own.  TiVo lets you skip commercials while watching television, magazine and paper ads are easily thrown out and people have mastered the concept of surfing the web, no longer fazed by pop-up banners and pages.  The average human is bombarded with over 2,000 outbound marketing interruptions per day.  The