Successfully creating, implementing, and managing an email marketing campaign can be an arduous task. However, email automation tools and software can facilitate this process as they present marketers with opportunities to streamline and optimise campaigns in a way that can save a lot of time, whilst still delivering the desired results.
Email marketing automation refers to the process of using email automation software to create outbound and inbound email cadences. The goal of these emails is to encourage lead generation and demand generation from contacts collected in Client Relationship Management (CRM) systems. Email automation tools also allow marketers to construct email templates that can be easily filled by SDRs with relevant information for each target account.
Completing email cadences with automated elements reduces the workload of sales teams and maximises the number of prospective clients they are able to reach. Automation also benefits marketing teams by giving them more time to prioritise tasks that require more attention. The best email marketing automation software also maintains the timeliness of emails, regardless of the number of recipients.
Email campaigns are often composed of multiple touchpoints distributed and planned in detailed email blueprints. Well-constructed campaigns with automated workflows maintain communication with leads over an extended period of time to encourage them to make a purchase gradually, rather than immediately.
This approach aids lead nurturing and builds stronger relationships. However, it is important to not send automated emails for each touchpoint. Only elements of email cadences that require less personalisation can be automated to save time such as:
Deciding which emails would benefit from email automation tools depends on the purpose of the email and the recipient. For example, an email establishing contact with a lead for the first time should have a personalised message which delivers individual attention. On the other hand, email newsletters sent monthly to all opted-in contacts are prime candidates for automation.
Determining when best to use email marketing automation is crucial to guaranteeing its success and avoiding potential prospects feeling that they are receiving blanket messaging.
Before starting with automation, it is essential to first create a detailed email marketing strategy that resonates with prospective clients.
Not sure how to begin? Read our Definitive Guide to B2B Email Marketing to discover tips and tricks for unlocking the potential of email marketing for your business, including how to craft engaging copy and CTAs.
In addition to identifying when to utilise an email marketing automation strategy for each campaign or email cadence, it is also important to fuel automation with the right information. No matter how advanced the email automation software is, without the correct data, emails are less likely to produce positive results.
As such, it is important to make sure that all contacts and leads are properly segmented into key groupings that can inform automated workflows for email marketing and campaign strategies. This can be achieved with marketing segmentation. Using multiple segmentation techniques, marketers are better able to group leads into different segments and develop automated emails to best appeal to their behaviours and needs.
Lists should be regularly updated to add and remove contacts as necessary to make sure that emails reach target audiences. This can be informed by data such as bounce rates, unsubscribe rates, and spam complaints, as well as data from other lead generation methods in place.
To ensure the success of email automation, it is imperative for sales and marketing teams to be aligned with their goals. Not only does this help maintain the consistency of messaging but also the function of emails and development of automated workflows for email marketing.
As a result, sales and marketing teams should align to make the most of email automation software and adjust automated email campaigns based on insights from previous successes or failures.
Not sure how to get started on aligning your teams?
Read our 10 Sales and Marketing Alignment Best Practices to kickstart your strategy for alignment and the optimisation of team workflows.
There are a multitude of different email marketing automation software and tools available for enhancing email campaigns. However, each solution comes with its own advantages that suit the different functions of email campaigns. Below are some of the best email automation tools of 2022, in no particular order.
1. MailChimp:
MailChimp automated emails are a useful tool for marketers looking to automate certain email marketing processes. However, MailChimp automated emails are particularly suited to frequent emails such as email newsletters and opt-in-based lead generation campaigns. MailChimp offers a range of features, analytics, templates, themes, and A/B testing at various prices, as well as a free version.
2. ActiveCampaign:
Whilst it offers marketers many different features, the strongest element of ActiveCampaign is its marketing automation campaign creator. Users can take advantage of a variety of templates that can be customised to suit the specific email functions and segments. With their email marketing automation software, multiple email cadences can be mapped out as part of a campaign that can send responses based on different conditional triggers.
3. Hubspot:
Hubspot offers a myriad of different marketing automation tools to enhance and streamline different B2B marketing and sales processes, namely the Marketing Hub. Using this email marketing automation platform, marketers can create and send automated emails as well as set multiple triggers, conditions, and actions to guide automatic responses. Although its prices will likely rule out smaller businesses utilising it, the variety of email marketing tools and opportunities for optimisation make it a worthwhile investment.
4. SendinBlue:
This service is very comparable with MailChimp. However, SendinBlue not only offers more free features but also has a lower overall cost. SendinBlue also provides a variety of templates based on the function of the email such as lead generation, email newsletters, and events. Users can choose specific triggers for automated workflows for email marketing, with detailed tutorials provided for creating the first automated email marketing campaign.
5. Salesforce Pardot:
Among many of the salient features of Salesforce Pardot is the ability to review results at each stage of a campaign. With the email marketing automation platform, Engagement Studio, marketers can create, send automated emails and edit automated workflows for email campaigns programmed with various triggers and responses. An efficient marketing automation tool, Engagement Studio also allows marketers to switch out parts of emails that are underperforming based on statistics as the campaign progresses. This also includes data on when recipients are converting or leaving a sequence.
Well-crafted subject lines are crucial, as they are often responsible for capturing lead interest and first impressions.
Including the prospect’s name can make subject lines more captivating and add a personalised touch. The length of subject lines is also important, as subject lines longer than 10 words tend to have a lower open rate. This is also important for engaging mobile users, as 46% of all emails (Hubspot, 2021) are opened on mobile devices.
Marketers can take advantage of marketing automation software to experiment with A/B testing to determine the correct subject line strategy for their audience.
It is essential to lead emails with an interesting offer (a service or educational opportunity). Offering leads something useful makes a call to action (CTA), or ask, more acceptable and effective as it forms part of an exchange, rather than a one-sided demand. Including this offer in the preheader text of an email can also improve open rates.
Companies looking to make an efficient offering often turn to content marketing to educate leads about their services, the industry, and ultimately, establish themselves as thought leaders.
So, how can you get started on building your own content that leads to conversions?
Read our Definitive Guide to B2B Content Marketing for a wealth of insights into crafting powerful content marketing with long-lasting value.
Finding the right time and day of the week to reach out to leads is a complex process that requires consistent adjustments.
However, this can be facilitated by marketing automation software. MailChimp found that whilst there is no exact time when an entire audience is opening emails, the optimal time is typically mid-morning during the working week.
Despite streamlined processes with email marketing automation tools, identifying the best timing for sending emails remains far from an exact science. Marketers should make judgements based on a detailed understanding of their audience and implement testing to narrow down optimal timings for their email marketing automation strategy.
Jargon lessens the impact of messaging and can dissuade leads from opening emails entirely. Including a conversational tone in emails and addressing topics how target audiences describe them can help emails stand out. Avoid utilising language which may be considered generic. Email marketing tools and automated workflows can also aid the testing of the effectiveness of different vocabulary.
Manage and segment email lists to maximise the effect of email marketing campaigns and avoid receiving spam complaints. Email lists can be segmented using demographics and behavioural patterns to divide broader target audiences into specific groupings. Depending on the industry of target audiences and their needs, the way they interact with email marketing may differ.
Following up on the previous item, utilising an email validation service allows businesses to remove emails that contain typos, temporary addresses, bots, and those that do not meet qualification criteria (such as personal emails).
By simply uploading your list, you can gain a list of credible contacts for your campaigns in just a few seconds. This results in more accurate metrics since you will not be targeting unreliable addresses. You are also able to protect your sender reputation by achieving lower bounce and undelivered rates this way.
As CTRs are reliant on recipients opening emails, many factors are similar to those included for improving open rates. Emails should encourage prospects to interact with CTAs and strong content offers. Personalised content aids CTRs by motivating different target audiences to engage with emails. This will also result in landing pages and content marketing generating greater results.
The most notable difference for enhancing conversion rates is the importance of automation. Email marketing automation has the potential to improve conversion rates by delivering emails based on a variety of triggers such as welcome emails, purchase reminders, and inactive subscriber bumps, as well as top-of-funnel and bottom-of-funnel conversion events.
This combined with optimised email formats, customised content, and attention-grabbing subject lines that appeal to specific audiences within target segments can help improve conversion rates.
As the starting point for any campaign, determining target segments is essential for driving the personalisation prospects expect and ultimately ensuring that strategies are successful.
Get started with our Definitive Guide to B2B Market Segmentation and learn more about the various methodologies and tactics for identifying actionable
data to fuel your campaigns.
Emails themselves can be leveraged to increase mailing lists by providing readers with unique content that may lead to more shares. These shares can be incentivised and combined with opt-in campaigns and links in employee signatures to encourage interaction and list growth.
Social media platforms present great opportunities for list building as they are a perfect way of sharing CTAs. Contests, newsletter previews, interactive CTAs, and backlinks are some of the many ways that social media platforms can be leveraged for list growth. LinkedIn is particularly effective as posts can easily include links to gated content as well as create discussions around important topics. Managing social media strategies across multiple platforms can also be facilitated with marketing automation software.
One way of boosting list building with website content is making sure that lead forms are kept as short as possible. Although the priority is to collect useful information, long forms can often dissuade visitors from completing them. Asking website visitors for feedback, including reviews, and creating a content blog visitors can subscribe to are some other effective ways to boost list growth.
Finding the right partnership that is mutually beneficial for both parties can be useful in many ways, including list growth. Depending on the agreement in place with a partner, promotions can be published across a partner’s network, increasing their reach. Co-marketing can be another way to work with a partner to improve list building and overall brand awareness whilst splitting the workload. If planned ahead, these campaigns can also benefit from email marketing automation tools.
Hosting live and in-person events can be an efficient way of collecting new contacts for email marketing lists. Online webinars are also effective for building lists, however, in-person “traditional” marketing events have the potential to create a more personalised, memorable experience from one-on-one interaction. Data collected can then be fed into marketing automation tools to drive future campaigns.
Email marketing automation tools, when implemented correctly, can be an incredibly useful asset for outbound marketing, lead generation, and demand generation. Creating an efficient and successful email marketing campaign can be a daunting and time-consuming task. However, with the right strategy and email automation software, the results of email marketing campaigns can be boosted and maintained.
Email marketing is just one of the many strategies to prioritise as part of an omnichannel or multichannel marketing strategy.
INFUSE works with clients to develop custom campaigns designed to reach specific target markets, even beyond the inbox. With our Deep Media Nurturing solution, we are poised to employ integrated, omnichannel nurturing that facilitates your prospect’s natural progression along the buyer journey.
Contact the team at [email protected] to get started.
