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Email marketing software available today provides much more than just sending basic emails to your work colleagues, suppliers and customers.

Whilst email clients such as Outlook and Incredimail will remain the backbone of people to people contact services – in addition alongside these can be run a whole range of online based email services like Mailchimp and Constant Contact that can be used to send out and control a wide range of business information to prospects and customers. With their costs starting from just £20 per month for an email campaign it’s very affordable and effective.

Why use email marketing?
There are numerous benefits to email marketing. The following are a few examples:
• Promotion of new products
• Brochure registration and distribution service
• Sending out service updates and changes
• Automated distribution of periodic training courses
• Distribution of newsletters
• Distribution of promotional offers

However, one of the key benefits of email marketing, if carried out timely and professionally, is the ability to remain front of mind with your customer/prospect in a less intrusive and more cost effective way than sending the sales rep around for a cuppa each month.

Professionalism and standards
All of this does not go without regulation. The sending of all electronic marketing communications in the UK is subject to “The Privacy and Electronic Communications (EC Directive) Regulations 2003” – which covers telephone, email, fax and text communications. In general this shouldn’t restrict you in your marketing communications, however it is stressed that that you take a permission-based approach with your contact lists.

Email tools:
There are a whole host of tools that can be used to enrich your email marketing campaigns and help to generate interest, such as:
• Video and Podcasts for sending multimedia messages. (This is a huge growth area at the moment)
• Surveys enabling you to obtain feedback, viewpoints, and reactions to your products and services.
• Management Tools enabling you to track the recipients who opened your emails and even particular links they clicked onto.

Steps for a successful campaign:
• Only use permission based contact emails
• Segment your customers based on your individual offers
• Create one theme/hook/message to the email campaign and stick to it
• Include one or two links that you can use for tracking
• Personalise each email to the named recipient
• Include a unsubscribe option in every email sent out

As with all marketing activities, your email marketing should be integrated both online and offline to ensure your campaign message does not conflict with any other promotions or information that exists.

So onwards and upwards with your email campaigns and remember; most customers now expect to have regular email contact and notifications from their suppliers, and if you don’t do it, then your competitors certainly will.