Why Small Businesses Should be Using an Email Marketing Tool for Email Newsletters

In our experience partnering with small businesses, we’ve noticed some averseness to keeping up with technological advancements.

Take the execution of email newsletters, for instance. We’ve seen hardworking people who’ve taken the time to put together engaging content for their audience. Unfortunately, they aren’t extracting the most possible value from this marketing practice because they choose to manually perform the process.

First and foremost, sending manual mass emails is a practice rife with errors.

Half the recipients often don’t end up receiving the newsletter. Beyond that, personalizing the messaging to each recipient is virtually impossible without using a tool to streamline the process.

Furthermore, there might be issues with formatting and design. And you can’t track who’s opening your emails and clicking through to your website or landing pages. This means it’s impossible to analyze the success of a given campaign or campaigns.

Some companies might be doing this to avoid extra costs or think the technology might over complicate everything.

Both notions couldn’t be further from the truth. Email marketing tools streamline the process and ensure the small businesses generate a more sizeable return for the effort they put into their content.

Even better are the many solutions on the market that fit even the most frugal budget.

It’s Time to Ditch the Comfort of Gmail

We totally understand why some businesses stick with Gmail. It’s human nature to stay with what’s familiar and comfortable. However, if all we did was remain in our comfort zones, the whole world would dress in sweatpants and eat bacon sandwiches.

Bursting out of your comfort zone with your email marketing is the only way such efforts can make a genuine impact.

More specifically, Email Newsletter Marketing Platforms such as MailChimp, HubSpot, Constant Contact, and Vertical Response provide multitudes of savvy features. While these tools differ in capabilities, generally, using them enhances your campaigns’ efficiency, personalization, and formatting.

You’ll put together campaigns in a shorter time and send automatically, depending on when you schedule. The technology also reacts to various triggers and prompts from customers, customizing to preferences and behaviours.

But there’s one critical detail that tends to speak to most business owners: The ability to test and examine the overall effectiveness of your emails.

Through the software mentioned, you benefit from relevant data that’ll steer you in the right direction.

It’s also worth noting that many of these services offer free versions—though these lack the versatility provided by the paid packages.

Track Your Success for Single Campaigns

One of the more significant obstacles you’ll run into with your email marketing newsletters is getting recipients to open the message.

It’s not like you can improve if you’re blind to where you’re going wrong—which is the reality when you don’t use email marketing tools.

Conversely, with the tools mentioned above, you’ll know if your email is getting opened or not because of performance-tracking algorithms. When you notice that recipients aren’t bothering to read your emails, it’s usually a result of unengaging subject lines. Provided you’re struggling with this facet, there’s plenty of online resources that help you sharpen this skill.

Tracking features also give insights into whether recipients click to your website or landing page.

Say that a campaign has high open rates, but nobody is clicking through. It’s time to investigate improvements in content, formatting, design, or all three.

Compare Multiple Campaigns

Email Newsletter Marketing Platforms provide big-picture analytics for all your campaigns. This way, you’ll have concrete proof of what works and what doesn’t.

By leveraging these summary report insights, you’re likelier to craft successful templates and strategies most conducive to high open-rates, click-throughs, and conversions.

Proper Formatting

There’s nothing that turns an audience off more than poorly formatted emails.

When formatting manually, you’re likely only focusing on desktops or laptops.

Alternatively, with the software we’ve discussed, the formatting is 100% responsive to all screen sizes. There’s no additional work required to ensure your newsletter is perfectly suited to mobile phones, laptops, desktops, or tablets.

Resending, Targeting, and Testing

A key feature of these tools is how they’ll resend to recipients that haven’t opened the email. Remember, persistence pays off—but it’s even more lucrative when you don’t have to lift a finger to keep pressing the issue.

There are also filtering features allowing you to send to specific segments of your audience. This ensures that your audience receives emails that speak to their preferences, interests, and pain points. You likely don’t serve only one kind of customer. Thus, strategically diversifying your campaigns heightens your chances for opens and click-throughs.

A simple yet critical attribute of these tools is how they personalize the emails, using people’s names instead of generalities.

Studies found that adding a recipient’s name to the subject line increases the chances of an open by 20%.

Lastly, Email Newsletter Marketing Platforms offer a/b testing. You can send two campaigns with the same or similar goals at the same time. The objective is to see which strategy is more effective in engaging your audience and generating conversions.

Here’s a more in-depth look at the a/b testing process, as it requires its own deep dive.

Why Email Marketing?

We live in a time where consumers are far likelier to read an email (especially if it’s personalized and targeted) than they’ll answer a phone call.

So, why not use that consumer behaviour to your advantage?

Well-crafted email campaigns provide value to your audience’s life. Many business owners offer helpful tips and insights into how to get the most out of their product or service. This tactic helps establish you as an industry expert and go-to resource for your audience.

You can also create a sense of urgency around special offers, springing customers into action to make purchases.

Moreover, email marketing gives you a chance to stay top-of-mind and remain in your target market’s daily discourse.

Therefore, if you haven’t started with email marketing, it’s time to make up for lost time and profits.