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email marketing

Managing your Customer Relationships

It is vital to manage your customer relationships well. This goes all the way from prospect to delighting your existing customers. Check out these steps to improving your relationship management.

  1. Keep track of your customers.

It’s common knowledge to most business owners by now: Successful companies know their customers well. Companies buy information about people and good data on a lot of people can be an amazing tool. Think about how much money is spent on acquiring customer data. This is such a lucrative business because the consumer data is key in knowing how people operate, what they want, and who they are. If your business doesn’t use any type of tracking CRM system, you’re missing out some key consumer data. If you can keep track of the habits of consumers then you’ll be able to spend money on marketing and time on relationships that will be lucrative and spend less time on the ones destined to fail.


Even your customers want to be known, to some extent. They don’t want to receive emails that are completely unlike them. I have little interest receiving emails on expensive boating equipment because I only have so much energy to devote to emails in one day. If I  don’t plan on buying expensive boating equipment, please don’t make a sales pitch to me for it. That would waste both of our time and leave a bad taste in my mouth towards your company for not doing your research.

  1. Keep track of your sales efficiency.

How many cold calls before you make one sale? Is there a leading salesperson in efficiency? If you can’t answer these questions, you need a better system for data tracking. Some businesses have several sales members on their team. Some businesses are too small to hire a salesperson. Both of these businesses need a way to track who they’re calling, who is making sales, and how efficient your method of selling is. Cold calls might be falling flat while referrals are working better. If there is a way to track this you can estimate what to do next and stop wasting time on a “standard” sales goal or plan.

  1. Learn what interests your contacts.

Do they want a discount? Or do they just want to be in the loop with new products?

This is something that I am personally thankful for marketers doing. There is one company that I am subscribed to and they see what I’ve been watching, and email me when it’s on sale. Sometimes they’ll see that I’ve been looking at a certain product and then email me next week with other looks that are similar. Sometimes it is the price that keeps me from purchasing, so their email coupons are what push me to pull the trigger. Other times it is the product I just don’t love. Then when they send me similar products I see one that is exactly what I wanted! Their email marketing is genius. It causes me to purchase more from them as a company. If every company could fine-tune their marketing email communications, I believe they could create lucrative relationships with their customers.

These aren’t overnight fixes for most companies. They require someone’s attention and the use of tools created specifically for Customer Relationship Management. We, along with Forbes and many other successful businesses, believe it is well worth the investment to know your customers well.

We would love to hear if you’re tracking with these tips! Contact us to provide feedback.

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By Kacie Reed
Get More Opens with your Email Campaign

How to get more “opens” with your email campaign

It is harder than ever to get recognition in email campaigns. Attention is at a premium, and you are fighting the noise of emails from every direction. Here are some quick tips of how to inspire opens with your email campaign.

DO

Provide something useful to the recipient

People enjoy things that are beneficial to read. Imagine how many emails you get that you don’t read before you delete. If you find value in an email, you’ll read. This can be something funny, informative, or an offer from your business. Secrets, exclusive information, and unique articles are all beneficial to the recipient.

 

Personally address the recipient

We’ve gone over this before, but it is worth noting again, and again, and again. Don’t send mass emails and ignore the target audience. Include first names in the email. Address the person receiving your email as well as telling them who you are. Don’t send it from some mass email name. Send it from YOU, and even sign the email if you’d like.

 

Provide timely information, whether it be promotions or news.

There is nothing more annoying to me than getting an email about a news story that was popular 2 weeks ago. If you can’t do more than dig up old stories that caught our attention before, please don’t send your email. If the article still has an active conversation (say, like the Apple / FBI drama), then it’s still fair game. Also, don’t send outdated coupons or discounts. That is just useless information and may cause more unsubscribes than opens.

 

DON’T

Offer a lot of FREE stuff and DISCOUNTS for ACT NOW clicks. It looks bad.

When your email looks gimmicky, people spam you. If it looks like it’s coming from a hacker I will delete it before I even see who it was sent from. There is nothing entertaining or beneficial about a lot of CAPITALIZED coupons YELLING at me to TAKE ACTION NOW. If you truly have a deal worth taking, and an email worth looking at, your subscribed recipients should read your email and take the offer without being screamed at. Think about it- these people are getting almost 100 emails a day. Why yell at them for choosing to read yours?

 

Forget to work on your subject line

I’ll admit it. I’m a sucker for a punny subject line. There are several retail companies that do a great job at this. Some senders, like the NYT Cooking Email, has a small snapshot of what their email includes. It might say “8 easy weeknight recipes” or “The Best Salmon Recipe” and since I know they are true to their word, I will open almost every email they send. If the subject line says they are telling me about salmon, they’re telling me about salmon. Please, please, whatever you do, don’t try clickbait subject lines and forget to deliver what you just promised.

 

Miss the spell check step

Have you ever seen a magor typo in an otherwise professional email? It makes them look bad. (Did you catch that?) It discounts the validity of the email, as well as making the sender themselves look bad. I usually click “delete” when I see a typo. Not because typos are the end of the world, but because it screams “you’re not important enough for us to proof read” and that is disappointing. I have too much to look at and read on a daily basis to spend time on someone that doesn’t care about my time.

Please reach out to learn more about email campaigns with Salesmanna!

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By Kacie Reed