Are Your Email Campaigns Reaching Their Full Potential?

Posted on March 7, 2018 in Associations, Chambers, Email, Feature Updates, Membership, Nonprofit

Let’s make sure you’re getting everything you can out of your email marketing, blog post sends, newsletters, and “We Miss You” emails. There is always a way for you to spruce things up and increase email engagement.

The average number of emails sent and received on a daily basis has reached 269 billion. This statistic is enough to tell you the potential of an email. It helps you segment your marketing content, reach out individually and personalize your communication based on your relationship with the recipient. – Kimberly de Silva, Entrepreneur.com

[Email Marketing Statistics to Guide your Email Strategy in 2018 – Kevin George]

Increase Traffic to Newsletters and Blog

Brand Recognition!

It’s important for your marketing email recipients to immediately recognize where the email is coming from. Make sure to include your brand’s logo and other visual signifiers in the email. The graphics and colouring should match your organization and website. An increasing brand awareness will over time attract members to your brand as you have built trust and knowledge of your membership.

If they need to pick between two organizations for the same or similar product — one they recognize, the other they’ve never heard of — you can count on them picking the one they know.

Below I’ve used a MailChimp Blog email as an example of a good marketing email:

Their name and logo are immediately visible, colors used are brand cohesive, with MailChimp signature at the bottom (without having to scroll to find). Its a quick read so you instantly know what you’re looking at and if you want to click through to the post or not.

Customer Retention

You certainly don’t want to be a one-time purchase for your members, you want them renewing month after month, year after year. Loyal and passionate members can become your brand advocates, taking it upon themselves to market your organization for you.

Sending out email blasts, newsletters, and blogs help remind your members of their memberships. These emails can inform them of new sales promotions, events, conferences, etc. Even when your subscribers are not interested in your email at the time, they will be reminded that you exist and that their membership has benefits.

Try to send out “We Miss You”, emails or re-engagement emails to your members to improve retention and get them back attending events and participating. If you are an organization that requires them to re-order products, you can send out re-order emails to retain the member. This will show them you care.

Similar to the BuzzSprout email above, send them updates on all of the exciting things they might be missing, and why attending and participating is beneficial to them. If members have new member capabilities in Membee, let them know! (ie. edit credit card information, profile info, purchase from your online store, signing up for events, etc.)

Establish Authority

As an organization, your email marketing should showcase what you have achieved, and how well you know your industry. Remind members how much their membership benefits them by offering valuable tips, information or content that can be found nowhere else.

Boost Relationships

Whether it is a new member or someone who is a long-standing loyal member, the emails that you send will help them get to know you better and eventually trust you. Emails help nurture relationships. Send out Membee’s welcome email to all new members to help foster the relationship.

Get Responses to Your Email Campaigns

Keep it brief and Spot-on

According to Email Statistics An average office worker receives on average 121 emails per day, and are only opening around 1/3 of those emails.

If you want members to actually read your emails, newsletter, blogs, etc. try to keep it to the point. No one like to read a massive, boring email.

Get to the point quickly and pleasantly, while bringing value to what it is you are sending to your members.

Add a Call-to-Action

It is important to write an actionable email. If your prospect is learning about your brand, try taking them to the website. If your prospect is in the consideration stage, the content of the email and the CTA should compel them to purchase a membership. Adding appropriate CTAs will help with conversions.

Time Your Messages

As a business, it’s important to send out emails appropriately. Unless you have a true relationship with the person you are writing to, try to write during business hours and work days. There may be some exceptions, ie. many of Membee’s users are volunteers work over the weekends and evenings for their associations, nonprofits, and organizations. Always be cautious and considerate of your email audiences time.

Be Considerate & Patient

If your sending emails to potential new members or new member organizations be careful and never burn any bridges. If you do not hear a response right away you can always loop back after a couple of months and may discover some of the following possibilities: the receiver’s server was down, it was simply bad timing or your prospect had just been fired and did not have the guts or the mindset to tell you.

Life is constantly changing, peoples jobs change, financial stability, interest in the membership etc. Sending out gracious followups can seek more rewards them you may think. From personal experience, potential Membee users were interested but it just wasn’t the right time for them and/or their board, but a few months later they are ready to signup. It’s important to not annoy, overdo it, or be too pushy. Let them know you are here for them whenever are ready.

Appropriate Follow-up Intervals

Remember that when a member or potential new member is not replying right away, he or she might be preoccupied.

As a rule: Monday is a typically a busy day, as many things have to be done after the weekend. Therefore, try to send emails on a Tuesday or Wednesday if you want a quicker response. Otherwise, if you need to send a message right at the beginning of the week, understand that you’ll have to be patient and wait a few days.