Your house list is a key element of your marketing program, but building it takes time, and it isn’t always possible to complete it on your own. It can take some time to earn returns on your business list, but there are steps you can take today to start realizing higher ROI immediately. The long-term dividends are still there, but getting some quick wins generates the momentum and the revenue you need to reach those more distant goals.
Hire an Expert
Email is the primary revenue-earning channel for a significant number of B2B organizations, and it’s a central channel for virtually all of them. Despite its vital importance, many companies relegate it to a back burner or try a do-it-yourself approach. Hiring a list management firm to put your house list in order with data enhancement or expand your audience with access to new third-party lists will give you an instant upgrade to your customer acquisition program. From the time you hire your email marketing team and send out your first message, you boost response rates, increase deliverability, and improve visibility.
Redesign Preference Pages
The binary choice of “in” or “out” works for fashion magazines, but it’s not the model you want for email subscribers. If you currently offer opt-in and opt-out as an email recipient’s only two choices, you risk losing leads who could otherwise have developed into customers. Preference pages that allow email recipients to opt down and choose their desired level and type of communication help you retain as many of your interested leads as possible. They’re also useful as a means to learn more about your audience, generating new opportunities to gather data and complete customer records.
Seek Audience Motivation
You already know why you’re communicating with your audience. Do you know why they’re reading? What are they hoping to learn? What problems do they need to solve? What compels them to click through? Are they looking for greater value, or are they motivated by limiting risk? Occasionally, you’ll get a glimpse of these motivations directly as some leads tell you what’s on their minds. More typically, you’ll need to piece together motivations based on the data you collect. Complete data is essential to understanding motivations, so this is another reason to consider data append services; with more audience knowledge, you develop a better picture of why your leads make the choices they do.
Think Like a Member of Your Own Target Audience
Every person who interacts with you is more than just a collection of data points connected to some demographic information. He or she is an individual whose time is at a premium and whose attention is a valuable resource. Don’t waste that time and attention sending email that isn’t relevant; work to discover what’s important to them and give them what they need up front. You know at a glance whether email is relevant or a blog post is interesting; trust your audience to do the same.
Make It Mobile
Depending on your industry, as much as 80 percent of your audience now reads your email marketing and other content on a mobile device. If your layout and design are geared toward desktop technology first and mobile as an afterthought, it’s time to change it around. Mobile-first design, including responsive website and email design, lets you meet your customers where they already are instead of expecting them to go out of their way to see your content on your terms. With marketing automation technology, implementing mobile-first design is a short-term project that has long-term benefits.
© Reach Marketing LLC 2016 All Rights Reserved.
