A successful email marketing campaign can help drive new leads for your business.
But why stop there? You can leverage data to create high-converting email marketing campaigns, whether a series of new subscriber emails, a monthly newsletter with must-know details for your target audience’s industry, or abandoned cart reminders.
In this article, we cover:
- What an email marketing campaign is
- How to create a successful campaign
- Why you should segment your audience
- What tools to use to craft a successful campaign
- How to grow your email list
What is an email marketing campaign?
An email marketing campaign is a series of emails sent to subscribers, such as a welcome email sequence.
Here’s a great example from Miro, who sends a welcome email with three simple onboarding steps.
Typically, a campaign’s purpose is to convert subscribers into leads. However, we encourage you to define your marketing goals before creating a new campaign. This can help you attract the right target audience.
Furthermore, your customer data and insights should inform your campaign for the best results. You can take demographic data from sources such as Google Analytics to target your ideal customer profile.
Once you know your audience, you can write personalized emails for a more effective campaign.
The power of a great email marketing campaign
According to HubSpot, there are 4 billion daily email users. If you’re not leveraging email marketing to capture this segment of your audience, you’re leaving money on the table.
Litmus found that for every $1 spent on email marketing, marketers make $36. HubSpot also reported that marketers list email marketing as the most effective marketing strategy, ahead of paid search, organic, social media, and events.
A successful email marketing campaign requires more than gathering email addresses and sending the same email to your subscribers. You’ll need to clearly define your target audience and segment to talk directly to the person on the other side of your email. Your content needs to be focused and intentional.
To further protect your brand and improve deliverability, using a DMARC generator ensures your emails are properly authenticated, safeguarding against phishing attacks.
Additionally, a great email marketing campaign is made up of many smaller components, including:
- Consistency: most campaigns include a minimum of 3-4 emails
- Specific and enticing call to actions
- Well-crafted subject lines
- Focused content
- Design
Before sending an email, you’ll also need an email service provider—examples include Gmail, Outlook, and Apple Mail. Create a dedicated account for your campaigns to avoid landing in the spam folder. Don’t use a personal or pre-existing work email address.
Once you’ve set up your email address, you’ll need to choose an email marketing tool. Without a tool, you can’t send your new campaign.
Popular options include:
- Convertkit
- MailChimp
- HubSpot
- Brevo
Why personalization is key
Sending personalized emails to your audience increases campaign success. Common personalization methods include knowing how to start an email by adding the recipient’s first name to the subject line and segmenting your list so the recipient receives the most relevant emails for them.
Statista states that 65% of marketers use subject line personalization in their email marketing campaigns. And for good reason! Campaign Monitor found that personalized subject lines are 26% more likely to be opened. It helps create a better customer experience.
You can see an example of personalization from the ambitious creatives in the email below.
Personalization also contributes to a competitive advantage—you’re talking directly to your target customer. It also helps build a positive reputation and develop your omnichannel marketing strategy.
How to create successful email marketing campaigns
Creating a successful email marketing campaign requires several components. We explain these below, including everything from goal setting to writing irresistible copy.
Set goals
Setting goals can help you gain clarity to achieve the results you want from your new email campaign.
Use the SMART acronym for effective and practical goal setting:
- Specific
- Measurable
- Attainable
- Relevant
- Timebound
You can use previous data from emails or broader marketing campaigns to help set goals, ensuring they are achievable. Forbes Advisor mentions how setting goals can help you identify strengths and weaknesses. For your email campaign, this allows you to dedicate time and resources to the weaker components—this might be your opt-in rate, for example.
Know your audience
To communicate effectively, you must have a clear idea of your audience. If you’re talking to everybody, then you’re talking to nobody. Segmenting your email list is crucial for creating personalized content.
Tools such as Mailchimp can help you identify and segment your audience. For example, you can group subscribers with similar interests, demographics, behaviors, and traits. You can even find out who is most likely to engage and convert.
The image below shows the MailChimp pre-built segments you can use–you can also build these from scratch.
You can collect audience information from various data sources to help you influence audience targeting and content decisions.
Connect your data sources with a tool such as Breadcrumbs Reveal to clarify your ideal customer profile. You can find out what industry your contact is in, their job title, and more.
Choose your campaign type
There are countless types of email campaigns, including but not limited to:
- Promotional campaigns
- Transactional emails
- Monthly newsletters
- Onboarding emails
- Welcome emails
- Abandoned cart
You’ll often have multiple campaigns to align with your goals and target audience. Choose the right campaign type for your audience or segment that aligns with your overarching goals.
If you’re just starting out with email marketing, you’ll most likely start with welcome emails before expanding your campaigns.
Create irresistible copy
The copy—the content of your emails—is a big part of your emails. Your writing must be persuasive while creating emotional appeal. An excellent way to achieve this is to write to your audience’s pain points.
When you write to their pain points, it’s much easier to relate to the reader.
You can use proven copywriting formulas to craft irresistible copy. One of the best formulas is the problem, agitate, and solution (PAS) copywriting formula.
Below is an example of the PAS formula for a SaaS company that sells accounting software for small businesses:
- Problem: Do you file your taxes at the very last minute in a frantic rush?
- Agitate: Imagine completing your taxes months in advance and saving money.
- Solution: Work with us
You can also use storytelling techniques to engage the reader. If possible, create a sense of urgency in your emails. You want your audience to take action. One way to do this is to add a deadline–an offer that expires, an RSVP for a virtual event, or a giveaway.
Likewise, in your copy, it can be tempting to list the features of your product or service. But you can take it further–describe the benefits, not the features. This lets the reader see first-hand how your product or service can help them.
Below is an example table comparing features and benefits:
Features | Benefits |
Automatic unpaid invoice reminders | Save time and get paid without the follow-up |
Saved contacts | Send invoices easily with the saved contacts feature |
Profit and loss analytics | View how your business is performing at a glance |
And finally, if you want to earn a few bonus points, add social proof to your emails. You can do this by adding testimonials, awards, case studies, and media mentions.
Write captivating headlines
Before subscribers read your email, they’ll see it in their inbox, showing the subject and preview line.
Your headline needs to be captivating and intriguing. If it doesn’t get their attention, chances are they won’t read your email. All of your hard work writing irresistible copy will have gone to waste!
So, how do you write a captivating headline?
- Personalize the headline by adding the recipient’s name
- Create intrigue and a sense of urgency
- Keep it short and effective
- Get creative!
We said to keep it short, but how short?
According to ActiveCampaign, your subject line should be between 30 and 50 characters or 4 to 7 words. Meanwhile, your preview text should be between 30 and 100 characters—this is your opportunity to explain what the email is about and why they should read it.
Before sending your email, send a test email to your email address and examine the subject and preview line. Make sure the formatting is correct, too.
Leverage the right tools
Marketers and brand managers can use personalized content tools to deliver targeted content across various platforms. Popular tools include:
- Breadcrumbs Reveal
- Unkover
- Optin Monster
- MailChimp
- HubSpot
Below, we detail how each tool can help you create successful campaigns.
Breadcrumbs Reveal
Breadcrumbs Reveal lets you connect several data sources to gain quality data on your email subscribers.
You can find out their industry and role, their demographic, and more. With greater data insights, you can determine the leads most likely to become customers.
Unkover
Thanks to Unkover, you can get competitor insights without the heavy lifting. You can find out what content they publish, their email flows, trends, and other valuable insights to inform your email campaigns and broader marketing strategy.
You can even read the emails they’re sending to their lists–a valuable asset to have in your toolbox when crafting your own campaigns.
OptinMonster
Before sending emails to your target audience, you must build a list. OptinMonster helps you grow your email list with smart lead generation tools, including exit-intent detection, geolocation targeting, and templates to create irresistible opt-in forms.
MailChimp
You need an email marketing platform to help you send your new campaigns. MailChimp is one of the more popular options out there. It’s easy to use, and the segmentation tools make it easy to personalize your emails to help you convert readers into leads.
In addition, MailChimp lets you deliver targeted content across various platforms, including socials, for maximum conversions. You can also collect valuable data from your subscribers, such as who is most engaged, to optimize your campaigns.
Schedule your campaign strategically
Set up a schedule to strategically deliver your campaign.
Consider target audience preferences, peak engagement times, and competitor activities. The day and time you send your emails are fundamental to the success of your campaign.
HubSpot found that Tuesday is the best day to send an email, and the best time is between 9.01 a.m. and 12 p.m. EST for a U.S. audience. If your readers are not based in the U.S. or you have a global audience, adjust as needed.
A well-planned schedule that takes advantage of peak engagement times and audience preferences allows you to get the most out of your marketing efforts.
A/B test and optimize
A/B testing, commonly known as split testing, involves sending unique versions of an email to two sample groups in your email list.
You can test various email elements, including:
- Which emails send quicker without landing in spam
- Which subject line has the best open rate
- Which visuals get the most people to click
- Which CTA gets the most clicks
Creating an A/B test is easy—most email marketing platforms have a built-in split test feature.
Simply create your test emails—making sure to adjust various elements for testing—and select a percentage of participants to measure the success of your campaign. Typically, anywhere from 10-30% of your audience is a good percentage for a split test.
Once you have the results, you can refine your campaigns and make the necessary tweaks to yield a greater ROI.
Make it shareable
To get the most out of each campaign, encourage readers to share your content. You can add share buttons within your emails to encourage readers to forward them to a friend or post to their socials.
Additionally, you can post a newsletter on social media as the publisher. Platforms such as MailChimp allow you to copy the campaign URL and post it for increased visibility.
To increase engagement in your drip email campaign, add attention-grabbing headlines, visually appealing images, and appropriate hashtags to your post.
Grow your list
As previously discussed, you should segment your audience based on relevant categories, including:
- Geographical location
- Industry and job title
- Pain points
- Interests
- Age
This enables you to create personalized groups to deliver more relevant messages. Besides, sending personalized messages may help grow your email list—your audience is more likely to share your emails with others, so long as the content is top-notch.
Aside from delivering quality content, you should double down on your opt-in forms. It’s a good idea to create several forms–you can also A/B test these–depending on the page, allowing you to build your segmented lists. For example, using a quiz opt-in to collect data can be fun and engaging while segmenting your customers by their interests and preferences.
Your next successful email marketing campaign
Key takeaways:
- An email marketing campaign is a series of emails sent to a subscriber
- The goal of most campaigns is to convert readers into leads
- A successful campaign requires irresistible copy and a clearly defined audience
- Personalize your emails to resonate with your readers
- Set goals to create an effective marketing strategy
- Send your campaigns on days with the most engagement
- Split test components of your email to improve ROI
You can pat yourself on the back, thinking that you have the best email marketing campaign, but if your contacts are outdated or your emails are going to spam, you won’t get the best results. The Breadcrumbs free email validation tool lets you import a list of up to 10,000 subscribers. Verify emails with one click to stop landing in spam, increase your online reputation, and increase your ROI.