There is no better way to build a responsive audience of clients or customers for your business, than with the classic workhorse of the internet, your email list.
Email provides you the most direct line of communication for conversion to sales, and smart online marketers have no intention of giving it up any time soon.
What makes email marketing effective?
•• Email marketing is still the most cost-effective way of promotion
•• Email is personal, in your possession and not indirect and limited like social media
•• By consistently offering valuable content, you build loyal followers
•• More followers drives repeat traffic through referrals and word-of-mouth
•• Higher engagement means higher conversion rates that boost your bottom line
Sure, we’re all familiar with email newsletters that waste our time, pitches that annoy us, and downright spam. Those don’t work.
What works is a value exchange — your valuable information for your prospect’s valued time.
Good email content deepens your relationship with your audience
Your prospect is what legendary copywriter Robert Collier calls “the man on the speeding train.”
We see something shiny through the window as we speed through the massive clutter of the social media landscape, but we don’t look for long because a new thing is already in our periphery.
Attention alone will get you nowhere. That’s the secret that so many successful email marketers have learned.
Keeping your prospect’s attention is where the hard work comes in.
Selling yourself: This is the first step of establishing your credibility as an online publisher. Someone who is an expert in their field or simply exhibits a vast amount of knowledge on a subject is considered trustworthy (you have perceived intelligence, reliability, and authority). As a content marketer, job one is becoming the likable expert in your field in order create valued content that people click and share. Killer content builds your credibility over time.
Swaying emotions: Often achieved with metaphors, storytelling, or evoking strong emotions from your audience. Seen as the earliest breakdown of human psychology. When your readers are swayed by your powers of storytelling they are more likely to opt-in to your email list to deepen the conversation. This gives content marketers permission to offer even more valuable content, make offers, tell more stories, and share products and services with them to improve their lives. Just beware — Pathos without its companions Ethos and Logos can quickly degenerate into cheap hype.
Advancing your argument through solid reasoning: Includes use of statistics, logic, or specificity. Examples are often drawn from history (see above), mythology or hypothetical situations to create conclusions. Also deductive reasoning lets the audience solve the puzzle for themselves by simply providing all the pieces. Cookie content that establishes a relationship of trust with your audience is built on the value of your expertise. Often this comes in the form of social proof, testimonials, and lots of good ol’ bullets that nail down the benefits of your offer.
Let’s take a look at some successful email publishers who are delivering attention worthy content daily, and getting attention:
Thrillist
Thrillist is a free daily email that uses a mix of content and commerce to blur the lines of traditional media. They create one-on-one relationships with their audience of 20-something guys to showcase “cool stuff,” localized by city delivery.
Their innovative approach to regular daily content seems to be working pretty well for them.
DailyWorth
DailyWorth, a daily financial e-newsletter empowering women to “save more + spend smarter,” landed on Forbes Top 100 Websites for Women. It raised over $3 million in investor funding on the strength of its 200,000+ subscribers.
Daily Candy
Daily Candy got the jump on email when they started offering their stylesavvy e-newsletter for young women in 2000. 8 years later they were bought by Comcast for a mind-bending $125,000,000 on the strength of their 2.5 million subscribers.
What do all of these email newsletters have in common?
Undeniable value and the permission to deliver.
With social media, websites and blogs it's also possible to provide a lot of valuable information but how many people READ even just a fraction of that in todays accelerated life and goes back for more?
With email the massive benefit is that the person can read the email on his own time and at leisure and that you can establish a much stronger relationship with him/her over time.