If you are looking for a high level overview of how to do email marketing, you have come to the right place! This is an email series I sent to my peeps to give them ideas of how to have a successful email list and relationship with their customers and clients!
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Why I Wrote This Post
A friend/client from way back in the day when I used to do coaching reached out, wanting to talk about her email list she was trying to build.
Well I shot her down about talking with me… hahaha! I don't do any coaching anymore, instead I work on my own website, Artsy Fartsy Life, and my own email list (who are super nice and love all the cool things I do for them!)
Why You Should Listen
I have had an email list since 2008 and I think some of the peeps on my current list started then!
I currently have two lists, a marketing peeps list (3K) and an artsy peeps list (10.5K). Here are stats for some of my recent emails…
People often ask how I get these cool stats… I use Convertkit for my emails and it is built right in!
Evergreen Ideas
Any of the tips and ideas about email marketing I give are “evergreen marketing“, meaning they aren't strategies that are working right now, instead they are tried and true methods I have used to build up my list over time.
My Top 4 Email Marketing Tips and Ideas!
With this in mind, lets get to the tips in a semi-normal order. I didn't write these originally to be a blog post so they aren't as structured as usual, just my “top of the head” talking points!
Who Is Your Customer
Today we are going to talk about your customers and how to love on them the way that they want to be loved on!
I am helping my son's lacrosse coach, Coach Harry, to grow a relatively new business. He has himself and three other coaches he is trying to get one-on-one coaching clients for.
So I wrote him a post about sales funnels for coaches and we had a call the other day and one of the main things I tried to get Coach Harry to decide is “who is your customer?“
Because his customer could be boys who play lacrosse, but they don't have the money to pay Coach Harry the big bucks.
His customer could be parents who are ALREADY paying through the nose to put their kids in club lacrosse (a VERY GOOD prospect for one on one coaching) because we know they have money.
His “customer” might be the local lacrosse team coaches who Coach Harry has to convince to introduce him to their parents.
The marketing for those people will all be very different!
And the glorious thing about marketing is that you can conjure up YOUR perfect customers through images, your words and product development.
Here is an example of how I use that in my Artsy Fartsy business!
My peeps tend to be older, they are international (lots of them talk to me in other languages when they email back… how cool!) and they have disposable income to do crafts.
So if I have to choose whether to make a nautical or camping freebie that they could use in a vacation junk journal, I would probably opt for making Mermaid freebies before I made “living in the outdoors with bugs” freebies!
This works for everyone! For Realtors this means that if you are Irish and like to work with diverse clients, like my friend the Irish Realtor, you post house pictures from your trip to Ireland with your gay past clients!
So now you… take a minute and think about who you would like to work with or sell to in a perfect world where everyone is amazing and loves you and your work.
AND do something today to attract them to your business!
Hope this helps!
XOXO
Tara
HOW TO DO EMAIL!
Did you know that I have TWO email marketing newsletters? This one and an artsy one I send out on Tuesdays.
They both have super high open rates (over 50%) and they both bring me joy to write (I am bossy that way).
But they look very different in terms of what they will do and what they like…
The Friday email, which is Business To Business (B2B), has a higher open rate and the Tuesday email, has a higher click rate. The Tuesday email is Business to Consumer (B2C).
The unsubscribe rate is about the same as a percentage of people on the list.
Now you may not be a strategy nut like me, looking at your email stats every week, but today might be the day to try and figure out what your peeps like and what you can give them more of!
For example, my Tuesday peeps love free printables and like to click on links to things I am selling. Here are the links they clicked on…
Freebie, blog post, paid product, freebies, paid product, freebie, freebie.
Now, if I suddenly started just trying to do nothing but sell to them, that for sure would not work.
But because I have ads on my site, just by visiting my site, I make a wee bit of money whenever they click on a link!
Now you… take a peek at your email stats and start to try to figure out who is on your list and what they like from you!
Hope this helps!
XOXO
Tara
Staying Out of the Spam Folder
I had a question about last week's email where I recommended Convertkit (it is the one I use, but this isn't a Convertkit email… don't worry!)
Pat said, “Does convert kit go into spam as much as mail chimp? Starting to do email again and want to do what works.”
That is a BIG question, but I am going to try and break it down into little pieces for us!
Your Email Provider
There are hundreds of email providers out there… seems like Pat might be using Mail Chimp, I use Convertkit, my besty uses Constant Contact.
So first off, yes Mail Chimp might, as a whole, go into spam more than Convertkit.
When you use a super low priced email provider you are sharing server space with more spammers. So, as a whole, Mail Chimp might have a “deliverability problem”.
What Is Deliverability?
So now let's talk about deliverability… that just means that emails you send will go into the “Primary” folder on Gmail rather than “Promotions” or ack… “Spam”.
Google grades each email and decides which folder to send it to based on a number of factors like open rates, clicks, and replies.
Getting “good grades” on your emails IS somewhat in your control no matter what provider you use!
Here are some things that you can do to make your emails more deliverable…
Ax the slackers
I cull my email list about once a month. People who have not opened an email in the last 60 days are deleted without a second thought.
Having a large email list doesn't mean anything if no one is reading it, so get rid of those freeloaders and your score will go up!
Google knows if your peeps are not opening your emails on a large level, so only send to people who you know love you!
Make Better Subject Lines
I start with a working subject line each week… this weeks was “Your Email Provider Matters”.
As I was writing this I thought about what would be the most interesting thing I could say and changed it to “Staying out of the Spam folder!” which is much catchier and will probably get me way more opens!
Additional resource : 100 Great Email Subject Lines
Ask For A Reply
You might notice that I always ask people to “hit reply” and do SOMETHING, ANYTHING!
Sometimes it is tell me your story (I got two great story replies in my Tuesday email that I can use as content in my next email), sometimes it is asking what I should write about next.
Functionally any question will help… you get better grades on deliverability if people reply to your emails for any reason.
Wrapup
That is a great start to getting out of the spam box! Hopefully it helps Pat and you!!!
My open rates are in the high 50s to 60s and I LOVE to talk to my newsletter peeps so I work on making my newsletters great!
Hope this helps!
XOXO
Tara
How I Manipulate You Each Week…:)
Today I have a confession, I spend a fair amount of time each week thinking of how to manipulate you into opening my emails….
How To Get Your Emails Opened
I have been sending a (mostly) weekly email out since 2008 so some of the things I have learned to do over the years is just “what I do” so I have been thinking really hard about how to help you get more “reads” on your emails.
SUBJECT LINE
The very first thing that someone sees about your email and deciding whether to open it, archive it for “later” or delete it is your subject line.
As I told you last week, I start with a working subject line… this week's was “How To Get Emails Opened”. That is okay, but not that cool….:)
I had a couple of other thoughts in between, but the final was “🦹🏽♀️ How I Manipulate You Each Week…:)” and it must have worked because you are reading this now!
I take about as much time thinking about the subject line as I do writing the whole email, it is that important!
WHAT'S IN IT FOR THEM
You may notice that I write my emails in first person (using “I” instead of “us” for you non-grammar-nerd peeps) which may or may not be a no-no.
Mostly I don't talk about myself unless it is to help YOU, the person I focus on each week. How can I help YOU.
Your subject line has to knock them out of scrolling and think, “hey, maybe this email will help me” and so they open it!
MAKE IT INTERESTING
One of my favorite emails every day is from Pot Pie Girl (she talks A LOT about Pinterest at a super high level and that is super interesting to me).
But as subject lines go, her's is not that interesting! She started with day 1 and now is on day 124.
Because her content is so good she can “get away with it” but how many more opens would she get if there was a hint about what I would learn that day?
EMOJIS
Last but not least, at least for today, is the Emoji game. The perfect thing that both me and Pot Pie Girl do is use emojis in our subject lines.
See how those emails stand out from the ones below them with no emojis? (I KNOW, they are bold, but still, in my inbox the emoji emails pop out to my eye).
Here are the recent emojis I have used in my subject lines….
I KNOW, a lot of the time I use my default nerdy guy with glasses or the artist palette for the Tuesday emails, but sometimes I mix it up like today, the “Villain Woman”.
According to my besty Rebekah, emojis are super important in marketing for social media and I recommend them for email subject lines too.
I don't get it, but hey if it works, it works! Here is how to make emojis on a Mac or on a PC.
Hope this helps!
XOXO
Tara
Email Marketing Tips & Ideas Wrapup
Whew, that felt like a lot of info! I hope some of it is helpful to you as you get started on your email journey!
If you have any other questions about email marketing, shoot me an email, [email protected] and I will add it in here!
