Email Marketing
Email marketing is one of the most cost-effective means to communicate with prospects, clients, and referral sources. It extends the efforts of a single salesperson, turning your company communication from a one to one emailing system to a one to many at any given time. Email, when used correctly, can be leveraged by your sales team to create awareness, qualify prospects, create meaningful interactions, and move contacts through the sales process.
To correctly use email as a tool with your sales team, it is vital to use an online email management software that can provide reporting and list management for your sales team. With every email sent, your email management software will provide statistics on the opens, clicks, and conversions. Knowing how and when to follow up with each audience type will be critical for moving them through the sales process.
The “open” group are warm leads. These are people that clicked into your email, showing they have interest, but not enough to click into the links within the email. You can use the open rate as an indicator if your subject line is effective and resonates with your target audience. The higher the open rate, you can assume people found value in the subject messaging. The open group is your lowest level priority for following up. Following up with this group is optional, but if resources are available, it never hurts to reach out with a personalized email or phone call.
The next group of leads is the “clicked” list. These are people that took interest in your email, opened it, and then proceeded to click on a link within the body of the email. This means they expressed interest in a problem they have and believe you may be able to solve. It is highly recommended that this group is followed up with by a phone call or a personalized email. Your email management software should be able to report on which links each person clicked. By digging into what interested them, you can tailor your message to be more personal and connect deeper with the contact.
While the opened and clicked group are important, your sales team’s top priority should be the “converted” group. These are contacts that showed interest by opening and clicking through to one of the links and then requested information or completed a form (i.e. a downloadable checklist or eBook). These are hot leads and should be followed up with by a phone call. This is a great opportunity for your sales team to also ask other probing questions, assess sales opportunity, and begin the sales process (schedule a meeting, etc.). These contacts should be entered into your CRM database as a lead and assigned a follow up task.
Key Takeaways:
- A salesperson can send to one at a time while email marketing can send to thousands at a time.
- If you have limited resources, the converted and clicked groups should be your top priority when following up with contacts you have communicated with through email marketing.
- The more personalized you can make your follow up, the more likely the contact will be to trust you and continue down the sales process.
- All “converted” contacts must be followed up with. Establish that process within your sales team to make sure everyone understands the steps that need to be taken to properly follow up with these types of leads.
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