OK, here we go – it’s only taken me almost 15 years to get here, but I am about to embark on my first marketing post! Be gentle with me now – though marketing and design is my craft, indeed, my livelihood, I find it far easier to write about shiny things like shops, hence the slightly more populated retail blog.
But bear with me, and I’ll try to make it interesting.
This very intro describes the age-old problem of the painter’s house. I can sit with any business owner - or even simply look at a business objectively without any inside knowledge and instinctively know how they could improve their presence and attract the audience they are looking for. Doing that for my own business is spectacularly difficult.
One of the services we’ve been building lately is the writing, design, and issuing of EDMs (E-Direct Mailshots) or Newsletters, (as they are often unimaginably named) – a moniker that makes them sound so dull it’s no surprise business owners invariably decide not to bother.
In my humble opinion, this is a huge mistake.
I’ll explain in more detail, but back for a minute to the concept of the painter’s house. I attend a business owners’ Mastermind every month, where a members discuss business topics and challenges and gain advice from the collective. As I posed the question of how I might promote Velvet Creative’s EDM service, it hit me like a train. I don’t actually issue one for my own business! Why not? Because my clients are my priority? Because I don’t have the time? Because…… I must admit, I ran out of excuses. Why don’t I communicate with my clients and contacts on a regular basis? And more importantly, wouldn’t doing so be a perfect demonstration of our service and skills in this field? Of course it would.
Well, the communication is now actually in existence – in fact, by the time you read this post, it will likely be because you clicked on the link in our very first EDM.
Thank you, by the way, for opening, and for clicking through. Your attention is greatly appreciated, and I hope you find it useful.
So now I have you here, why not stick around for a while, and listen to me extol the virtues of communicating with your audience on a regular basis.
Let’s start with all the reasons clients and prospects are resistant to sending out regular EDMs:
1. “Nobody will read it.”
2. “I don’t want to be annoying by always sending people mailouts.”
3. “I wouldn’t know what to say.”
4. “I’ve tried that, and it didn’t work.”
There are more, but these four reasons cover most of the reluctance, so let’s address them one by one:
1. “Nobody will read it.”
This is likely based on the fact that most of us receive emails that don’t interest us on a daily basis. Here’s the thing – many of them are dull and lacklustre, they come from businesses you don’t really know or care about, and/or the frequency is overwhelming.
The important thing here is the quality of your database. All the businesses we work with have a really solid database of customers who are happy to hear from them and have an interest in the sender’s business / product / services, and like to feel connected to the brand. If your database is largely compiled from business cards you’ve collected, details you’ve gathered online, or a purchased list, your engagement is going to be much lower. That doesn’t necessarily mean it’s useless, but it’s going to be a very slow burn, and you’ll need to have a dazzling product or service to stimulate interest.
2. “I don’t want to be annoying by always sending people mailouts.”
Frequency is a consideration here – monthly is the most common for people starting out with communications, but it really depends on the business. For example, we started out issuing monthly EDMs for an independent retailer with a very loyal customer base. Oddly, though the open rate was good – between 35% and 42% (well above the average of 21.5%) and click-through between 8% and 12%, online sales only saw a slight uplift. But the in-store sales spiked significantly on the day of issue and for a couple of days after. Customers would call the store, comment on the EDM, and ask the owner to put things aside for them to pick up, or would just drop by.
Why? Because a business they like to buy from reminded them they were there. It’s really that simple.
If you have a strong customer base, you’re not going to annoy them. They are always welcome to unsubscribe, and a few will, but what’s more likely is they just won’t open the mailer if they don’t have the time, or the headline doesn’t grab them. But here’s the thing – sometimes, your EDM will land when they do have the time to open it, or maybe they’ve been thinking about a need and meaning to do something about it, and that communication brings your business right back on their radar. What you’re really doing is keeping your brand top of mind, so when recipients are ready to engage, you are the one they reach out to. In the absence of regular communication, you risk losing that business to someone who is communicating. Don’t let them steal your lunch!
That retailer, by the way, increased EDMs to fortnightly, then weekly, then twice-weekly, and saw little drop-off in terms of ‘unsubscribes’, but kept sales flowing at a higher level on a continual basis. Customers were in-store more often, and relationships became even stronger.
3. “I wouldn’t know what to say!”
That’s an easy one – you have a lot to talk about that will interest people. It’s important to create a strategy (nothing major – just an outline of what you want to achieve, and key messages you want to get across). Then create a rolling 6-month plan of communication topics / promotions / features / etc., etc. This is something we spend time with clients creating up-front, which considers the timing of activities or services in the business, seasonal influences, brand / cultural messages, stories and achievements, and new product or service launches, for example). If a marketing plan exists, we take the lead from that schedule, and if not, the EDM plan can also guide other marketing activity, such as social media and website features, to integrate and augment your communications activity.
One client of ours understands the importance of staying close to her customers but doesn’t feel comfortable talking about her business all the time or being seen to be ‘selling’ her services. Instead, we focus the attention on her clients. Each mail-out leads with a spotlight interview with the owner of the featured business. This has the added benefit of the featured business owner sharing the communication with their own contacts, extending reach. It builds further loyalty, communicates to the database the quality of businesses the company services, and highlights services they may not be aware of. Not to mention, the client in the spotlight is generally highly complimentary of our client and the services they provide them with.
Win : win!
We supplement this with monthly tips that readers can implement themselves, and reminders of key activities on the calendar they need to be aware of.
Again, it’s all about creating a communication strategy that works for you and your business.
4. “I’ve tried that and it didn’t work”
There are so many reasons campaigns don’t work. Marketing is no magic bullet, and trial and error is part of the process. What works for one business has little impact for another. Your business, your audience, and your communication style is unique. And it may take a little time to find your groove, but it’s worth the persistence.
Another reason business owners feel that EDMs didn’t work for them is that they were promised the earth by lead generation companies, gave it a few months, and felt cheated when the enquiries didn’t come flooding in.
In my opinion, email marketing just doesn’t work that way. It’s a slow burn, and back to my point in resistance statement #2, its main objective is to keep you in the frame, ensure your clients don’t forget about you, and make it easy for them to reconnect when they are ready to buy.
A tradie client of ours, with a strong database, routinely enjoys an open rate above 50%. Do they get masses of leads? Not really, but they do secure one or two jobs following every mail-out - often sizeable jobs. Simply because the topic of the month has reached someone who was thinking about that very thing, and it was the easiest thing in the world to click the BOOK NOW button or click on the phone number to call. We made life easy for those clients and they were delighted. If they hadn’t heard from the business in years, it would be easy to forget them and look for someone new. These communications more than pay for themselves, and more importantly, they aid customer retention by keeping them close.
Here's an example I often use.
A few years ago, a friend came to visit. We went on a mini cruise to Tasmania with P&O. It was fun. Being on their database, I began to receive emails a few times a week. I had no plans to book another cruise, but I didn’t unsubscribe because I thought it might be nice to take the family on something similar sometime. So, the emails kept coming and I rarely opened them, but occasionally something piqued my interest, and I’d click thorough. A couple of years later, the same friend came over again and suggested we book another cruise. “Leave it with me” I volunteered, as I knew the regular emails would remind me. And they did. But often they would drop when I was too busy to look or take any kind of action. Sometimes I might click through to prompt me later in the day, but somehow, manage to close the website window and then forget about it for a while. This pattern repeated for some time, but eventually, an EDM came through, when I did have the time, I did click through, and I did book that cruise. My point is, that if P&O hadn’t kept reminding me of their existence, I might instead have searched and found something similar from a competitor or booked a different kind of break entirely. Possibly with a business that was reaching out to me on a regular basis.
So, dear reader, I have battled my demons and picked up that metaphorical paintbrush. I’m going to be realistic, so I’ve set myself the objective of writing one post every month and sending out one EDM.
What will you do to keep your customers close?
If you’re interested in exploring EDMs for your business, check out our packages…
http://www.creativemarketingsydney.com.au/sme-marketing
Feel free to reach out any time if you need help – or would just like to chat.