Market Like a Pro

Angie oversees Cazoomi's operations. She enjoys traveling, loves dogs, is a 1% Pledge supporter, and a start-up entrepreneur with investments in several APAC startups. 7 minute read

Market Like a Pro

4 Companies That Kick Butt at Email Marketing

(And What You Can Learn From Them)

Email Marketing isn't just for the big boys. Email marketing helps level the playing field by allowing anyone to distribute quality content to a mass of people at a marginal cost. But just because you have a small marketing budget doesn't mean your emails have to show it, here are just some of the tricks and strategies used by some of the biggest names that have most successfully utilized email marketing.

NikeStore
Nike had developed a brand that is internationally recognized, but also has a strong brand loyalty deeply ingrained in its core fans. Check out this email fuels brand awareness and loyalty.

1. Logo/Name in the Top (Left) of the Email makes it clear who the email came from while reinforcing your branding

2. Integrated Website Navigation showcases your product offering and creates an invitation for customers to visit your website.

3. One Featured Piece of Content, Front and Center, tells your customers what you want them to look at, decreases distractions, and increases interaction.

Nike System

4. Having Fun makes your content more likely to be consumed and remembered. Here Nike turns a pair of their sneakers into a Cobra to position their brand as aggressive and edgy, but fun-loving.

5. A Clear, Simple Call To Action wrapped up in 8 words gives fans a clear path of where to go next.

6. Additional Options at the Bottom of the Email give customers additional options while not distracting from your featured content and call to action at the top of the email.

7. Less is More. How many long descriptions or paragraphs do you see in this email? Always look for opportunities to keep the most of your content on your blog or website, while using your email as a tease to draw customers in. This helps keep customers from feeling overwhelmed and allows you to measure what they are looking at (via clickthroughs).

Uncommon Goods
Uncommon Goods has created success by showcasing their unique range of products and creative style. Here is an example of a fun and friendly way to showcase your products

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1. Integrated Website Navigation (again) gives consumers the option and invitation to check out your website.

2. A Brief Snappy Subject Line, Title, and Subtitle are the first step in the difference between engaging your customer and hitting the delete button.

3. Using 2-3 Colors or Shades makes your email professional and inviting while reinforcing your brand’s personality.

3. Let Your Customer Speak for You. Showcasing customer reviews or testimonials are a great way increase credibility and let prospects feel like you are sharing value rather than talking at them. Link these reviews to relevant products and services.

4. Teasing Customers with a Preview and Linking to Full Content helps keep your emails short and concise and allows you to capture who’s looking at your content and what they are looking at.

5. Wrapping Up With a Call to Action gives customers who were engaged enough to read (or at least scroll through) your whole email a clear direction for what to do next.

Amazon Local

Online retailer Amazon gets away with pumping out a lot of emails by making its content brief, simple, and all about the consumer. Here is a ridiculously simple example of how you can switch things up and use email marketing to leverage social interaction and engagement.

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1. Brand Identification in the top left corner of the email.

2. Super Short and Sweet. This email contains less than 30 words and just one obvious call to action. Your customers might get annoyed with you sending out two sentence emails on a weekly basis, but occasionally switching it up can be a welcome alternative to sales emails that drone on and on.

3. Utilizing one obvious call to action. All marketing, including email, is about eliciting a measurable response. Make sure your call to action is clear, simple, visible, and not getting lost in the rest of your email.

4. Using a Friendly Email Signature Your email campaigns should be personal right? Signing your emails as you would your personal emails gives your content the feel that it came from a human (or team) that’s trying to provide the consumer with value rather than a mega corporation that’s pumping out spam.

5. Linking to Social The simple format of email and email clients does not yet allow for Like/Dislike ‘social’ interactions, but that doesn't mean you can’t link to social content, videos, contests, and polls on your companies website or social media site.

6. Making it all about the consumer. Regardless of what industry you are in two of the customers greatest needs will almost always be (1) that their opinion matters and (2) that their voice is being heard. Why not give them what they want? Questionnaires and polls are a powerful way to capture consumers attention and build brand loyalty.

Apple

It hard to discuss email marketing without featuring the kings of copy. Love the brand or hate it, Apple has an undeniable ability to make content that is both simple, but eye catching. Here are six ways that you can too!

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1. Clear Brand Imagery in the Top Left of the Email

2. Pictures are Worth a Thousand Words. We live in a visually stimulated culture more than ever. Use vibrant, crisp images to capture attention and compliment well written copy.

3. One Piece of Featured Content, Front and Center

4. Minimal fonts and colors make your emails clean, easy to read, and draw attention to what really matters: your product and content

5. Use headings and subheadings to break up and organize your emails. Using different font sizes and bolding key content helps guide customers through your email and keep customers from being overwhelmed.

6. Wrap Up with a Call to Action. Customers that read all or most of your content likely want to read more of your content, show them where to find it. Enlist some action words to increase participation.

7 Key Things to Remember

1. Provide Value People hate receiving spam or feeling like they're being marketed at. People love getting insider knowledge, getting informed, or being entertained. Make your emails something people look forward to getting.

2. Keep it Clean Most of us have short attention spans. Make your emails easy to read with 2-3 fonts and font colors. Use headers to organize your content and bold text to highlight key content.

3. Less is More An email that’s too long or too text heavy causes people to press out and prevents them from engaging. Try to keep your email to less than 2 pages and take it easy on the long text sections.

4. Tease and Link Keep your email short, but provide links to where customers can find more information. This helps make it easier to find what they want to look at and allows you to capture/measure interaction.

5. Key Content Above the Fold, Options at the Bottom Limit the top of your email to one key story or product offer. Give consumers additional options and links towards the bottom of your email.

6. Remember to Ask If 90% of your email creates value for the consumer by enlightening, informing, or entertaining them, the other 10% of the email can be used to call them to action. Increase engagement rates using action words and creating a sense of urgency.

7. Be Yourself Your brand’s unique identity and personality is what will make you stand out, get noticed, and be remembered. Include a little bit of quirkiness can make your brand more accessible or include some personal information to reinforce a human connection.

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