3 Reasons an Email Marketing Strategy Will be Crucial to Your Business in 2023
Everytime a new calendar year rolls around, marketing professionals crowd mainstream discourse with lengthy predictions on upcoming trends. As a human centric agency, we at Fearless Foundry know what you need is clear cut predictions that cut through the fluff, so let’s get to it!
In 2023, we’re expecting to see an increased reliance on email marketing. Though social media will remain a powerful tool, a report by Global Web Index shows a 12 percent increase in individuals saying they use social media less than they used to since 2020. There are 4 billion daily email users, and 46 percent of smartphone users prefer to receive communications from companies via email. On top of this, 77 percent of marketers have seen an increase in email engagement over the last 12+ months.
Email marketing is currently one of the fastest growing forms of marketing, and should be taken seriously by all types of companies in 2023. Here are 3 reasons why having a solid email strategy is crucial to your business:
#1: Staying Top-of-Mind with Customers
Sending out emails on a consistent basis is a great way to keep your business at the forefront of your audiences’ mind and provide them with valuable information or offers. The great thing about an email list is that if you’ve properly implemented a double opt-in, you know everyone on your list truly cares about receiving your company updates. This helps build trust and loyalty, which is crucial to attracting and retaining customers.
It's important to make sure the emails you send are relevant and valuable to your customers, and to not overdo it by sending too many emails or emails that aren’t interesting or useful. We recommend no more than 3-5 emails per week, max! It's also a good idea to give your customers the option to opt-out of receiving emails because this shows you value their boundaries.
#2: Building Relationships with Customers
Every email you send is an opportunity to connect more deeply with your customers and better showcase your company’s offerings. Sharing company or industry news, tips, and insights provides value to your subscribers and builds trust.
#3: Driving Traffic and Sales
Remember when Facebook and Instagram went down for hours in October of 2021? The outage affected a lot of businesses, especially ones who relied heavily on social platforms to communicate with their audience.
Building an email list is so important because it’s the only way to directly communicate with your customers if social media platforms fail. Emails can be used to promote discounts and new products, which can help increase sales, but they can also serve as a way to showcase customer testimonials, success stories, and point readers to a specific page on your site, such as a blog post.
How to Get Started With an Email Marketing Strategy
We recommend starting with a well-executed welcome nurture flow to set the stage right. A welcome nurture flow is a sequence of emails that are sent to subscribers after they sign up for your emails or enter their email to receive a discount code, e-book, or similar item. The purpose of a nurture flow is to educate people about your company, products, and services in a way that provides value to them. This can help guide them through the buying process—from your perspective the goal is to create sales, but in an educational, non-salesy way.
Sending nurture flows is about building trust, establishing credibility, and creating lasting relationships with your email subscribers. The emails are based on consumer behavior, and can be adjusted in response to a customer’s activities on your site. For example, it may be a good idea to send someone who signs up for your newsletter a different nurture flow compared to someone who only signs up to receive a one-time coupon code. Newsletter subscribers may be more interested in learning about your company vs. coupon-only subscribers; sending emails about your company values might cause the coupon lover to lose interest and unsubscribe.
You need to know the goal of your campaign and consider your target audience in order to create a successful nurture flow. Do you want to increase awareness about how your company operates? Maybe you want subscribers to know about your best products and services. Don’t be too salesly—focus on why you’re offering your products or services and how they can be of benefit.
"The most valuable asset a business owns from a marketing perspective is their email list, but most companies spend too much time shouting out the latest deals and promotions, and not enough time engaging with their audience. Great email marketing starts with building nurture flows that lead your list through a unique user experience that showcases the value your company has to offer. The actions that recipients take creates data on how to tailor your outreach to attract and convert more customers."
—Madeline Reeves, Fearless Foundry’s Founder and CEO
Once you have an automated nurture flow up and running, you can turn your attention to one-off or weekly emails that include info on company updates or discount codes.
If you need help creating an email marketing strategy, reach out to us! We’ve helped numerous clients boost brand awareness, build customer relationships, and drive traffic and sales. Schedule a free consultation with our team!