You probably receive lots of promotional emails every day that are part of email marketing campaigns. Brands consistently turn to email marketing to promote their businesses because it’s so effective. For every dollar you spend on email marketing, you’ll receive an average return of $36 — a much higher ROI than many other digital marketing channels.
But to reap the full benefits of email marketing, you need to create strategic, cohesive campaigns. This guide explains how.
What is an email marketing campaign?
An email marketing campaign is a series of connected email messages that promote your business to your target audience. The classic example of an email marketing campaign is several emails promoting a new product, but there are actually tons of different types of campaigns.
Email marketing campaign ideas include:
- Welcome email series for new subscribers
- Event promotions
- Digital newsletters
- Survey emails
- Lead nurturing campaigns
- Seasonal campaigns
- Customer re-engagement campaigns
- Abandoned cart emails
Regardless of the industry you’re in, email marketing campaigns can help you reach your objectives.
How to create a successful email marketing campaign
There are several factors involved in any successful marketing campaign. Follow these steps to start building your own.
Select your audience
Choosing the right target audience is key to the success of your campaign.
Sometimes, business owners and marketers think they should simply try to reach as many people as possible with their messages. While that’s an understandable impulse, choosing a specific audience for each campaign is more effective.
For example, one campaign might target existing customers to improve engagement and enhance customer loyalty. Another could focus on enticing new customers and generating leads. While these two campaigns have completely separate audiences, they can both support your business objectives.
Define your goal
Before you jump into writing and designing your email messages, it’s essential to define your goals. These goals will shape your campaign and help you focus your efforts effectively.
Common goals for email marketing campaigns include:
- Increasing brand awareness
- Driving web traffic
- Boosting customer engagement
- Improving conversions
- Generating or nurturing leads
- Enhancing customer retention
Use the SMART goal structure to create useful goals for your campaigns. SMART stands for specific, measurable, attainable, relevant, and time-bound. “Increase sales” would be an example of a goal that’s not so SMART because it’s vague and hard to put into action. Instead, you might try a goal like “Increase web sales by 10% by the end of Q2 by targeting new customers.” The second goal meets all the qualities of a SMART goal and would be much more helpful in guiding your campaign decisions.
Another element of setting email campaign goals is ensuring they align with your broader business objectives. Your email campaigns are there to help your business grow and prosper, so make sure your campaign goals support your big-picture objectives.
How to create an email marketing campaign
Once you select your audience and set your goals, the next step is to actually start building your campaign, starting with your strategy.
Campaign strategy
Your campaign strategy is your approach to achieving the marketing goals you set. This is when you start to dig deeper into how you’re going to get the results you want from your campaign.
The strategy outlines details like how often you’ll send campaign emails, what time you’ll send them, and how many people you’ll send them to. At this point, you might be wondering: What is the most effective email marketing campaign strategy?
No single email marketing strategy will work for everyone. A strategy that delivers great results for one company might only offer lackluster results to another. While you can take inspiration from the strategies behind the best email marketing campaign examples, make sure to customize your strategy to your brand and business objectives.
Creating an email
Once you have your goals and email marketing campaign strategy in place, it’s time to start crafting your message. There are actually more components to an email than you might realize. Here’s a breakdown of all the elements you need to decide on.
Email header
The email header is what your recipients see before they even open your message. It contains just a few pieces of information, so you need to get them spot-on to get people interested enough to read more.
From name
The from name is the first component of the email header, and it shows up above or to the left of your subject line. It’s easy to overlook this part of an email campaign, but don’t just use the default option here.
You should think about how you want to identify yourself to recipients. Typically, your brand or company name is a safe choice for email marketing campaigns. It may sometimes make sense to use a specific person’s name, like the President or CEO, or even a salesperson at your company.
Choose a from name that’s recognizable to recipients. If you’re not sure which to choose, A/B testing with different from names can show you which name your subscribers respond to best.
Subject line
The subject line is arguably the most important part of the email header. It tells recipients what your message is about and why you’re contacting them.
If you use a weak, uninteresting subject line, most people will probably ignore your email. It won’t matter how incredible your email content is because few people will open it to see what’s inside. If you use a compelling subject line instead, you’ll have much higher open rates and a better chance of reaching your campaign goals.
Preheader text
The preheader text appears below or to the right of the subject line and offers a quick preview of what’s inside the email. Done right, it can complement the subject line well, making the recipients even more likely to open the message.
If you don’t edit the preheader text, it will generally default to the first few lines of your email. That might include your greeting and other text that won’t be compelling in the recipient’s inboxes. Instead, choose your preheader text carefully to entice readers. You can elaborate on your subject line’s premise or tease more of the message content — whatever you think will get recipients to open the email without misleading them.
Email content (aka body content)
After crafting the perfect email header, the next step is tackling the actual message — the body content. The content of an email includes everything from your greeting and the main message to the call to action and signature.
Call to action (CTA)
Any effective marketing email contains at least one call to action. The CTA tells recipients what you want them to do next after reading your message.
Examples of email marketing CTAs include:
- Shop now
- Download your copy
- Add to cart
- Use your discount code
- Pre-order now
- Finish checkout
- Grab your offer
- Request a demo
- Sign up for free
- Leave a review
Your CTA should directly relate to the campaign’s goal. For example, a nonprofit running an email campaign to boost donations might use a CTA like “donate now” or “contribute here” in their message.
In emails, the CTA often appears as a button, making it stand out from the text. Experiment with different CTA text and button styles to find the combination that leads to the highest conversions.
Email Design
The design of your email is just as important as the text you write. If the design is appealing and consistent, readers are much more likely to engage with your message.
Luckily, you don’t need to be an expert graphic designer to create stunning email designs. With the help of email marketing templates and tools like Constant Contact, designing your emails can be a breeze.
Focus on ensuring your email design is consistent across your campaign and in line with your branding. Resist the urge to include too many decorative elements that may overwhelm readers.
Company Logo
You probably want to include your company logo somewhere in all your promotional emails. Adding your logo ties the message to your company and helps build brand awareness. It doesn’t need to be huge or distracting — just enough to remind the reader of your brand.
Images and graphics
While some emails only contain text, most email marketing campaigns use images and graphics to make their messages more visually appealing. Be mindful not to overwhelm readers with too many images, though. The images and graphics you include should be high-quality and complement the content of your message.
Buttons
Your call to action often appears as a button readers can click to engage further. When they click these buttons, they go directly to whatever page you specify, typically a page on your company website.
Make your buttons bold and enticing to encourage readers to click them. Experiment with different button shapes, colors, placement, and sizing.
Email footer
The email footer is the very last part of your email, all the way at the bottom. It’s even under your email signature.
In this section, you can include basic details like your company address or an unsubscribe link to adhere to SPAM rules. Other information you may put in your email footer includes:
- Links to your social media accounts through icon buttons
- Legal disclaimers
- Your company logo
- A link to your contact preference center where subscribers can adjust how often you contact them
- Additional contact details
- A link to download the company’s app
Typically, you use the same email footer in all the promotional messages you send. Staying consistent in your email footer will help with branding.
Test your email campaign
With all these elements complete, you may be tempted to just hit send and kickstart the campaign. But wait! Before sending the first message to all your recipients, you need to test your email campaign.
Start with quick technical checks to preview everything and make sure the message appears as intended on different devices. Then, consider A/B testing your emails by sending two slightly different versions to smaller audiences. Take the version that performs better and send it to your whole audience list.
Examples of excellent email marketing campaigns
Looking at successful email marketing campaigns may help you come up with ideas for your own. Check out these excellent examples.
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Uncommon Goods
Save time with email marketing templates
Designing all the messages for an email marketing campaign from scratch can be very time-consuming. Instead of doing everything by hand, consider using templates.
Email marketing templates are pre-designed so that you can customize them to your brand and campaign. There are templates for every type of campaign you might want to run. Find some templates that fit your style and campaign goals, then fill in your details.
Choosing an email marketing platform
Using an email marketing platform to manage your campaigns will make every step easier. These platforms help with email writing, design, and monitoring to give you complete control over your campaigns.
As you’re comparing different platforms, consider factors like:
- Integrations with your existing software and systems
- User-friendliness
- Cost
- Design capabilities
- Limits on how many emails you can send
Constant Contact is a comprehensive email marketing platform that ticks all the boxes. The drag-and-drop templates in Constant Contact’s email editor help you create stand-out emails in minutes. Sign up for a free trial to see how the platform can take your email marketing to the next level.
Harness the power of email marketing to grow your business
A well-executed email marketing campaign will help you connect with customers, grow brand awareness, and drive conversions. Focus on setting clear goals and creating every element of your campaign with those goals in mind.
With the help of the right email marketing tool, these campaigns can start driving results for your business almost right away. Now’s the time to get started
First up, learn how to create the perfect email
