If you’re reading this, you probably aspire to be (or be part of) a billion-dollar company. What if email could be a foundational tool, fueling your rise to $1 billion and beyond?
For the three companies cited below, email is a major sales channel, but each strategy outlined does require work. Adding complexity to email is worthwhile; it’s a numbers game. Improve the number of phone calls you get from emails by five percent or 10 percent for 12 months, and your increased sales make the upfront investment pale in comparison.
Here are three ways to significantly increase your sales through email.
Automate Your Marketing Based on Lead Source or First Purchase
Someone opting in can help define your initial email auto-responder path for that person. Guiding this new person down the path you see in your mind’s eye is very useful in crafting effective email messages.
HubSpot has multiple lead sources, their blog being one of the biggest. At the bottom of their articles, they’ll give people an opportunity for an opt-in related to the article. Some call this a “content upgrade.” A content upgrade provides further detail than the article had space to go into. The upgrade is usually a checklist, a PDF or some videos or audios.
If someone enters their name for a Facebook marketing guide on HubSpot, the first couple emails they get are about Facebook ad strategies. Dead-on messaging warms these subscribers up and builds a relationship based on what HubSpot knows they care about.
Amazon knows their lead sources and does email follow-up well when they send, “Hey, these other books are similar to what you just purchased” emails.
It seems simple, but so many companies send out generic “red button” blast emails.
Include Coupons, Bundle Deals and Other Incentives
Big, well-run e-commerce companies often use this strategy early in broadcast marketing emails to get folks to buy. For some reason, it’s often neglected by smaller businesses.
Wayfair is a good example, doing over a billion dollars in 2014 ($910,332,000 at the end of Q3). They are the Amazon for home goods because they are very sharp with their email marketing, even if you’ve never bought anything before.
Early in the relationship with their visitors, an initial pop-up coupon gets you to opt in. Wayfair doesn’t just highlight items you could buy, but entices the sale in multiple ways. These include — but are not limited to — discount codes, coupons and buy-two-get-one-free-type offers. You can split-test multiple offers worded differently to sell people of varying mindsets.
But what if you’re in a business where offering coupons devalues your service and trains your clients wrong?
First, see who’s making a billion dollars in the service you offer. Second, model their offers and find ways to rotate a new offer without devaluing your main offer. You might offer a discounted service to mobile optimize a new client’s email templates. This doesn’t anger your “full boat” $100,000 service clients but still allows new people a lower-barrier way into your business.
Segment Your Subscribers or Customers
Two segments that might apply across all businesses are purchase activity and lead source. You can differentiate the kinds of messages these two groups receive so more from each group buy (or take the action you desire them to take).
L.L. Bean ($1.5 billion in sales) is a fantastic example. L.L. Bean has been customer segmenting since well before email was even dreamed up. L.L. Bean understands that if you’re a female in Vermont buying boots for yourself and your children, you probably want “warm wear” clothing.
They’re not going to mail the same catalogue to a guy in Florida who bought a couple pairs of cargo shorts. L.L. Bean has to be scary good with their catalog targeting because paper has a higher cost — it’s not “free” electrons. If they mail a customer group the wrong catalog, they just wasted a ton of money and made a bunch of species extinct.
Stop using systems that don’t allow you to segment. MailChimp is not made to segment relevant offers to make money. Instead, use a system like Marketo, HubSpot, Infusionsoft or ActiveCampaign. This will allow you to make significantly more money through emails. Second, you’re building more legitimate relationships through highly relevant segmented messaging.
Get your tech up to date because these methods are not going to be whiz-bang cool and different for long. Instead, they will be run-of-the-mill and necessary to stay alive in the near future business environment.
