Web Hosting HUB was at the 5th Annual Constant Contact event for Small Business Week this May 2015. We attended a lot of the workshops and had a booth set up for the over 1,000 small business attendees. A lot of the questions we got had to do with the steps following the registration of a website with a hosting company, as well how one should go about promoting their business. Given that the event was hosted by Constant Contact and a lot of the workshops had to do with content and email marketing, we’d like to share with some tips on email marketing for new and established businesses.  Here is our list of ‘3 Ways to be Successful in Email Marketing.’

1)  Start Small

There is no reason why you should be confined to the idea that email marketing works when you have thousands of emails on your list. Just 10 emails is enough to start on your email marketing journey. Why? Because those are 10 people that opted in to receive messages from you concerning deals or your content. That doesn’t mean stop growing your list – but by no means do you have to wait for a threshold of numbers before you start emailing your list.

Starting small allows for you to be short, concise, personal and to the point.

2) Be Useful

A lot of articles mention “To be successful you need to be useful.”  Yeah – go figure. How about some strategies?

• Add an infographic
• Send lists with expert advice
  • Depending on your industry, send tips that will be useful and help your clients
  • If you sell leather bags – send them “ 4 Ways to Prolong your Leather”
• Offer web links to useful websites
  • TIP: link to your blog if you have useful content
• Offer a Q&A via Survey
  • Sometimes members on your list have opinions, suggestions, and questions. Just send out a simple – “Howdy! How what do you think about this?”
  • This makes you better informed, and allows for your customers to tell you what they want

3) Have a Theme

Think of a tool. Craftsmen didn’t invent the wrench because they were bored. They created it because it was useful, and served a purpose. The same thing applies in your email marketing campaign. You need to have a theme for your campaign, and each one should be different.

The best way to break down purpose and theme is to first think of holidays, events, and geography. By inserting your campaigns with these three elements you cover a broad spectrum of space throughout the year.

If you’re emailing because of a discounted deal – say so. If you’re emailing to send your customer list a great article of tips – say so. Just have a purpose behind each campaign otherwise you’ll be crowding your monthly newsletter with content that will never get your users passed the subject line.