Category: Marketing Automation

I started off my career as a software engineer. After working for about 6 years, I decided to try my hand in entrepreneurship. After building 6 solid products without much traction, I am slowly realizing that “**build it and they will come**” doesn’t work. These days, I spend most of my time learning marketing and sales. I feel like marketing is becoming the new coding. In a world where building products is becoming easier every day, marketing is becoming more difficult. And more important. I started growthchat.co to learn how other people are growing their businesses. If you are a marketer, salesperson, or founder, let’s connect at growthchat.co. we are 3,240 strong and 1-on-1 calls are happening every minute.
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Security and privacy are top-of-mind for our customers, so these topics are top-of-mind for us, too. Consent is an important part of this conversation: to deliver personalized experiences, we need consent to collect and use a website visitor’s activity on the site. Implementing strong cybersecurity practices and following privacy laws demonstrates respect for our customers, which is crucial in building a trusted relationship. 
Security, privacy, and consent are the pillars on which trust is built. When data is exposed or systems fail, our customers and their customers lose trust in or brand. Cybersecurity failures may also lead to serious financial losses from statutory penalties, civil action, and cleanup costs. If we lose control of someone’s personal data, we suffer loss of trust — and potentially loss of capital.
Consent is the cornerstone of meaningful privacy practices in marketing. It’s how people maintain control of their personal data, which is why it’s a foundational concept in privacy regulations like the European General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) and the California Consumer Privacy Act (CCPA).
As a product manager at Salesforce Pardot, my primary responsibility is security and privacy from a product perspective. I’m responsible for reactive privacy and security, such as responding to changes in privacy law or browser security. I’m also responsible for proactive privacy and security, like understanding the changing landscape and our customers’ needs. I promote ways to help our customers remain compliant, including ways our customers can keep ahead of their competition through strong security and privacy.
We are planning to bring the information you need about security, privacy, and compliance to the Pardot blog. In future posts, we’ll explain how the browser privacy landscape is changing — and how Pardot and our customers can respond. We’ll talk about consent mechanisms, and discuss how changing privacy laws affect Pardot users. We’ll also explore how brands can use privacy practices to show customers respect and build trust.
There are many reasons for brands to care about privacy in marketing, and we’re going to discuss them all — from the obvious to the obscure. Ultimately, we’re here to help our customers learn what they need to know to succeed with Pardot while keeping a watchful eye on customer security and privacy. 
For more information, tune into our privacy and consent webinar.

News, sports, entertainment, culture—1440 Media covers all the recent and hot topics trending around the world. Not to mention, they do it daily, and in a totally digestible and impartial way. 
Their neutral tone and email newsletter format keeps it quick and easy for readers to stay up-to-date with the topics they’re most interested in—and brings on a refreshing approach to informational reporting. 
To carry on their mission of delivering the latest updates to readers, 1440 Media relies on Campaign Monitor to get the job done right. From deliverability teams to a dedicated Customer Success Manager, 1440 Media comes together with the Campaign Monitor team to bring these highly anticipated news stories to inboxes daily. 
Stats to brag about: How 1440 Media consistently hits high open rate benchmarks.
When we sat down with co-founders Drew Steigerwald and Tim Huelskamp to get the inside scoop on the 1440 Media success, we were blown away at the mention of their open rate. As any email marketer knows, a consistent 55%+ average open rate doesn’t just occur by luck—it’s the daily work that goes on behind the scenes that allows the team to achieve such impressive stats across all newsletter sends. 
So, what’s the secret behind such mind-blowing engagement rates? Huelskamp says it can be split up into three parts: The product, the account management, and the attention to technicalities. 
The 1440 Media team holds true that developing a lovable product is the first step to proper engagement. Though, creating a newsletter that’s timely, relevant, and interesting (without bogging down the readers too much) isn’t exactly an easy feat, especially with so many competitors. In fact, there’s a lot of time that goes into finding out the right balance between too much and too little information. And that’s not necessarily something the team can figure out on their own—this type of research takes hours of customer feedback to create the ideal product. It also requires asking their audience how they can improve—and why the 1440 newsletter is preferred over many others. 

As for account management, both Huelskamp and Steigerwald agree that far too many email marketers fear letting go of those ghost (or totally unengaged) subscribers. Taking the opposite approach to this fear, the 1440 Media team set up an email marketing program giving new subscribers 14 days (10 messages) to open an email before they become automatically removed from the list. Additionally, the 1440 Media team has a drip campaign set up for those who have temporarily lost interest, helping the team recover subscribers. 

On the technical side of things, deliverability is also a huge factor when it comes to achieving such consistently high open rates. With guidance from the Campaign Monitor deliverability team, 1440 Media can create an internal interface allowing them to maximize their deliverability. Each morning, the 1440 Media team receives an email that gives oversight into the backend of their email marketing program. With this system in place, the team can get ahead of any technical inconsistencies before they become a problem. 
When we asked Steigerwald about any advice he would give to other organizations who are struggling with open rates or engagement, he told us, “You need to get connected with your audience and figure out why people aren’t opening or engaging—because you can do all the work on the backend, but if you’re not delivering what people want, you’ll never improve your offering.” 
Deliverability serves as the backbone of a thriving business.
The 1440 Media team believes that it’s the integrity and quality of the Campaign Monitor platform that makes for such strong deliverability and open rates. Plus, the ability to quickly interact with the Campaign Monitor deliverability team allows the 1440 Media crew to not only take note of issues before they arise, but also have a better understanding of what those issues really mean. 
Steigerwald says, “Deliverability is the lifeblood of our business. I’m really shocked when I hear that other email marketers aren’t focused on it. You can create the best product in the world, but it doesn’t matter if it’s not making it to people’s inboxes.” 
But it’s not just open rates that makes deliverability such a key factor in the success of the 1440 Media email marketing program. Deliverability also plays a crucial role in generating revenue and profit for the company. 
“We sell ads based on how many subscribers open the email. So, a 4-5% increase in open rates [after switching to Campaign Monitor] leads to a 4-5% increase in revenues and profits. Strong deliverability and open rates add wild ROI to the business,” says Huelskamp. 
How 1440 Media found a successful partnership with the Campaign Monitor team.
Quick and personalized access to the Campaign Monitor support team and an assigned Customer Success Manager (CSM) are major selling points for 1440 Media. Because a direct line of communication with trained email marketing professionals helps ensure a more easygoing process for the 1440 team. 
“Despite how critical it is to the business, we don’t have a strong technical background in email sending. So, the ability to have access to experts is absolutely crucial. Campaign Monitor support can help us diagnose any problems and, very explicitly, tell us how to fix those problems,” says Steigerwald. 
When we asked Huelskamp and Steigerwald about their experience working with an assigned CSM, their words were filled with praise. Emily McAnnally is known to the 1440 Media team as more than just a fabulous CRM—she is a superb and valuable resource, who is always there to handle any questions or concerns in a prompt and efficient manner. 

Early on in their days with Campaign Monitor, the team was struggling with segmentation and understanding the basic logic behind the feature. Instead of spending hours finding answers on his own, Steigerwald turned to Emily, who was able to clear up his confusion in a moment’s time. 
“Emily is so proactive. She takes a problem we have and figures it out, but then she is also able to anticipate what we are going to ask next, based on our first problem, and she provides the answer to the next step, too. She truly wants us to succeed as an organization,” says Huelskamp.
Wrap up
We love working with amazing customers like 1440 Media. Watching our customers succeed is why we do what we do. If you want to hear how Campaign Monitor can help your business succeed, talk to one of our experts today.
The post Stats to brag about: How 1440 Media hits high open rates appeared first on Campaign Monitor.

After playing with both Campaign Monitor and MailBuild, I have to say you guys have, hands down, the best user experience of any newsletter service out there.
Gilbert Wilson , Council for a Livable World
How a newsletter can boost business
A regularly scheduled newsletter can have an incredible impact on your overall email marketing strategy, keeping your audience engaged and providing a powerful channel for back-and-forth communication. 
Traditional newsletters were sporadic emails sent to subscribers with new updates on the brand, new products, etc. But brands have become far more sophisticated with their approach to newsletters, and users have become more sophisticated in their expectations for communications. As a result, email newsletters are now sent out for a variety of purposes and come in several formats. 
Take these examples from Campaign Monitor’s client, Girlboss:

Source: Campaign Monitor
In the top example, Girlboss used a very traditional newsletter that is announcing a new addition to their community. Instead of a single group, they are announcing their new “collectives,” which are a selection of various communities catering to the needs of different subscriber segments. 
In the bottom newsletter, they are introducing readers to their new 12-week guide on investing. However, instead of a single email, they are sending out weekly messages on the topics of the week and what their subscribers can expect from the e-course. 
Both examples are creative uses of email newsletters—and both are incredibly effective when sent to the right subscribers. 
Why your brand needs to start using email newsletters
Thanks to the diverse nature of email newsletters, they make for excellent forms of communication between you and your subscribers. Need some convincing? Here are just a few reasons email newsletters are worth adding to your email marketing strategy:

When adequately segmented, they provide a deeper level of personalization to your communications with readers. Remember, 70% of millennials prefer personalized emails over blast communications. 

Email newsletters drive traffic to your website with an average click-through rate of approximately 7%.

83% of B2B marketers use email newsletters as a part of their content marketing strategy.

40% of B2B marketers say email newsletters are the most critical aspect of their content marketing success. 

What makes for a good quality email newsletter?
Looking for a few quick tips on how to create a quality email newsletter for your subscribers? Then consider these key points:
Your consumers only want information they find relevant.
Make sure to check with them regarding their email preferences or consider including an email preference center for them to give you the detail you need. This allows you to send them only the best, most valuable messages. 

Source: Really Good Emails
Design for the reader.
Since many newsletters include updates on products, new launches, or brand updates, you want to make sure you are designing for your readers. This means making it easy to skim through so they can find the information they want without “wasting time” on information they don’t care about.
 
Source: Campaign Monitor
Personalize content as much as possible.
Once you’ve collected valuable subscriber data, such as their name, location, and interests, make sure you are using that information to personalize each piece to the reader. This will increase the likelihood of them clicking on a link or taking some other form of action. 
Scaling up with branded email newsletter templates
Establishing a regular cadence for an ongoing newsletter series can feel like a lot of work. You can make the job more manageable by starting with a flexible newsletter email template that you can easily adjust and adapt as needed. 
A good template will save time and resources, so you can stay focused on crafting a great message instead of worrying about technical and design details. Creating a newsletter with Campaign Monitor’s takes it even further, making it easier than ever to adapt a template to your brand’s colors and art to create something unique, special, and representative of your organization.
Then it’s up to you to decide what kind of content and updates you want to include—a note from company leadership, product news, blog articles and so on. Get creative! It’s what will get subscribers to keep opening and look forward to getting your newsletter.
Wrap up
Email newsletters aren’t the one-off messaging they used to be. With so many ways to spin a newsletter, they can help you boost user activity and help drive traffic to your website. A few quick tips to keep in mind when designing an email newsletter include:

Prioritizing personalization
Designing for your readers
Sending only the most relevant information to each of your subscribers
Using a branded template to easily scale up your messaging

Looking for more tips on getting started with email marketing? Then make sure to check out our collection of excellent get-started resources today!
The post “Hands down, the Best User Experience” appeared first on Campaign Monitor.

HIKI, a newly launched genderless full body sweat brand, was set to reveal their DTC brand in March 2020, when the COVID-19 pandemic was in full swing. Despite the pandemic, HIKI decided to push forward with the launch by shifting its social media marketing launch strategy to suit the times we were living in. But how did they manage to do so?
Read on for a behind-the-scenes look at how HIKI shifted their social media marketing strategy for a COVID-19 era and how they leaned on their community to co-create their products. You’ll hear directly from Tinah Ogalo, Social Media Coordinator at HIKI, and you’ll learn:

Where to find inspiration for creating social media content for a Gen-Z/millennial audience
How to leverage your community to inform your marketing strategy (and to create TikTok content)
How to plan for a successful new brand or product launch on social media
How to stay up to date on social media trends and updates

This post is part of the #BufferBrandSpotlight, a Buffer Social Media series that shines a spotlight on the people that are helping build remarkable brands through social media, community building, content creation, and brand storytelling.
This series was born on Instagram stories, which means you can watch the original interview in our Highlights found on our @buffer Instagram profile.

Who are you?
Hi, I’m Tina w/ an H. I’m the social media coordinator for arfa, a new consumer goods brand house specialising in personal care products. We co-create every product with real people from all over the country (we call them the arfa Collective) because we believe people should have a say in what they put on their bodies. And in return, we make them stakeholders in the business and give them 5% of profits. We currently have two brands that we launched this summer: HIKI, a genderless full body sweat line, and State Of, a skincare and beauty line for menopausal women.
Where do you find inspiration for HIKI’s social media content?
Our HIKI audience is predominantly Gen-Z / millennials, so I look to platforms and topics that those demos are currently responding to most, like pop culture, TikTok, Giphy, and my Instagram explore page. I also am so inspired by our community’s posts about HIKI. They created the brand with us and they’re so invested in its success, so when they post content to their socials about our products, I am always re-posting or coming up with creative ways to showcase their content.
Our HIKI audience is predominantly Gen-Z /millennials, so I look to platforms and topics that those demos are currently responding to most.

View this post on Instagram

Two things we love: Our Anti-Chafe Stick and @theogermaine 😍 A post shared by HIKI (@hiki_foranybody) on Aug 13, 2020 at 9:05am PDT

One example was the ‘Put a Finger Down’ challenge on TikTok. We saw that this was a great way to engage with our community so we created our own version to show them and others that sweating is totally normal. We had our Collective members, Noelle and Gabe participate in the challenge. Fun Fact – that’s our UX Designer, Ian’s, voice. We thought a British accent would be a nice added touch LOL.
How does managing HIKI’s social media account and community look like on a day-to-day basis?
Every morning I check to see what posts I’ve got lined up for the day, and then I go through all of our notifications that I may have missed from the night before. For the rest of the day, I’m working on the content calendar that’s two weeks out, searching for the latest trends, leveraging audience insights, making creative briefs for assets I want to incorporate into the feed, and working closely with our designers to create custom content for each platform.
HIKI was launched in March 2020, when the COVID-19 pandemic was in full swing. How did HIKI shift its marketing launch strategy to suit the times we were living in?
I joined in June, so I wasn’t at arfa for the initial launch, but the team did an amazing job. They had all of these plans for launch, then when COVID hit, people’s lives and priorities shifted of course, as a business ours did as well. It felt counter-intuitive to what we were trying to build – products and brands that put people first – to launch for-profit as though the world hadn’t changed. We also realized sourcing supplies was a big problem for a lot of folks, so we decided to instead give away all of the products we had ready to sell and ship to healthcare personnel, essential workers, and first responders—we ended up giving away 20,000 products, and I am so proud of that.
It felt counter-intuitive to what we were trying to build – products and brands that put people first – to launch for-profit as though the world hadn’t changed.
It also helped us a lot when we officially launched for sale in July, because we had about 300 reviews on the site and had already gotten some amazing feedback from customers that I could use on social. Beyond that, we really leaned on our Collective, the people from all over the country we built the brand with, and micro and nano influencers to get as much vibrant and fun content as possible to push on our organic and paid channels to spread awareness. And it worked! The response to our branding on social accounts has been overwhelmingly positive.
What marketing/social media advice do you have for brands that are pre-launch?
Launches are always hectic (but so fun!), so it’s important to do as much heavy lifting beforehand so you can sit back on launch day and enjoy the show. Build up your asset arsenal so you have lots of social content to choose from in the first few weeks, gift 50-100 influencers in the 20K-100K range to generate buzz, partner with like-minded brands on social giveaways to build up your email list, and do lots of research on relevant hashtags. And definitely have at least a two-week plan so then you can breathe.
Build up your asset arsenal so you have lots of social content to choose from in the first few weeks, gift 50-100 influencers in the 20K-100K range to generate buzz, partner with like-minded brands on social giveaways to build up your email list.
How do you leverage HIKI’s community to inform your marketing strategy?
Our Collective wants us to succeed just as much as we do, getting feedback from them is always great because it’s so inspiring. Creating engaging stories such as polls and questions allows us to see what our community likes and doesn’t like. Right now we know that they’re big fans of product shots and memes. They tell us how they incorporate HIKI into their lives and in turn, helps us share with our community different HIKI Hacks.
Creating engaging stories such as polls and questions allows us to see what our community likes and doesn’t like.
HIKI’s Co-ounders with The Collective membersWhat’s your number one tip for engaging with HIKI’s community?
Be active and listen! Check throughout the day that you’ve answered everyone, pinned tweets, liked comments. Even on the weekends, I check on our page in the morning, midday, and evening. It’s so important to us that our social account feels like a person(because it is! It’s me! :)) and we all are engaging with our feeds regularly, so the same should go for HIKI.
How do you stay up to date on social media/marketing trends?
I am always on the platforms, looking at what interesting new brands are doing and what’s trending. (Side note: I LIVE for TikTok trends). I also listen to podcasts and read social media blogs, like Homemade Social, to stay in the know.
What’s your favorite HIKI product and why?
I love all of our children equally, but if I HAD to pick, I’d say the Body Powder because it smells amazing, is talc-free, and rubs into my skin seamlessly. Besides putting some on my lower back to fight my daily back sweat, I also use it as a setting powder.

View this post on Instagram

Bad news? Talcum powder is harmful and it can be found in many personal care products. Good news? We don’t use talc 😏 A post shared by HIKI (@hiki_foranybody) on Sep 21, 2020 at 8:54am PDT

We hope this interview with Tina w/ an H helps you get started with or double down on your social media efforts. You can follow her journey on Instagram here!
Have any questions for Tinah? Feel free to reply with your questions to the Twitter post below and Tinah or someone from the Buffer team will get to them as soon as possible.

For our second #BufferBrandSpotlight episode, we’re featuring @tinah_ogalo, Social Media Coordinator at @hiki_foranybody, a full body sweat brand that launched while the pandemic was in full swing. Head to our Instagram stories series to hear from Tinah: https://t.co/5QBF0B2ENr pic.twitter.com/f3fS9uRba8— Buffer (@buffer) October 1, 2020

Email marketing is one of the most flexible, versatile, and effective options in the marketing toolkit, able to deliver outstanding results on its own or fit seamlessly into larger strategies. It’s a high-value, accessible service that almost any agency can incorporate into its offerings to attract new clientele, grow your accounts, and make your shop as sticky as possible. 
Best of all for agencies, email ROI is highly attributable, meaning it’s easy for you to show exactly how much revenue you’re bringing in and keeping you an essential part of their marketing program.
Once you’ve added email marketing as part of your agency business services, you can start encouraging your current and potential clients to make use of it. Here are our top 5 ways to encourage your clients to get started with (or refocus on) email marketing.
1. Offer these statistics to prove that email marketing works.
The biggest selling point for email marketing is simply that it works! Email marketing gets business results, and gets them for less cost than other marketing methods.
Explain to your clients some of these highlights:

Emails are a great way to get in closer contact with customers. It doesn’t rely on your customer remembering to visit your site, or seeing a print advertisement. It’s the ultimate 1:1 engagement channel.
You can personalize emails to suit the particular interests of that customer, instead of sending a generic brochure.
You only pay for people you are actually sending to, instead of blasting a message out to the world at large.
It’s easy to scale. Whether you’re just reaching out to a handful of subscribers or engaging a list of millions, email can keep up and grow with your business.

Email marketing is calculated to return $42.00 for every $1 spent in ROI. That’s an incredible ratio.

Once you start delivering results, don’t forget to record your success into compelling stories. Build case studies highlighting results and use them as prime sales collateral.

2. Track the results from email marketing to connect results to specific campaigns.
One of the frustrations with many marketing activities is that it can be hard to tell what works, and what just costs money. When you conduct email marketing with a tool like Campaign Monitor, you can see what works at a glance—and what doesn’t.
Show your clients some of the detailed, in-depth reports you can provide on key email marketing metrics. You might even go further; set up a sample account, and let them click around and see some real reporting.
If something isn’t working, they’ll find out and be able to tweak it immediately, at low cost. This is a potentially huge saver of time and money.
Don’t forget to explain your approach to email marketing testing. Show them how you never stop pushing for better results and have a systematic approach to helping them optimize their campaigns.
3. Manage email marketing with ease.
If your client has tried email marketing in the past, they may have been overwhelmed by unsubscribe requests or bounces coming back to them. Or they might have tried a system that was difficult to learn and frustrating to use. Not all email technology is the same, and some email platforms are more intuitive than others.
You can offer something better: Automated processes that handle all the tedious subscribing, makes sure people can get off the list when they want to, and keeps track of emails that bounce. Ask them how much time they used to spend doing those things, and what they could achieve if they spent that time being creative, innovative, and analytical instead.
If your client or prospect is relatively new to email marketing, it can be intimidating to get started. Use a tool that comes with prebuilt high-performing email templates and an easy drag-and-drop interface. A what-you-see-is-what-you-get approach is far more approachable to these clientele.
4. Emphasize the flexibility of email marketing.
Take some time to think of a few ways your specific client could use email marketing. Propose a few low-risk, high-reward ideas they could use to get started and see results quickly:

Could they feature a different product each week, and offer special prices to frequent buyers? 
Maybe they can have case studies of customers using their service, and can segment their lists to send them to other potential customers in similar industries. 
Could they email customers who have been out of touch for a little while, and ask if they have any suggestions?

Revisiting their triggered emails, like their welcome series or order confirmations, could deliver big gains.

A big promotion centered around an upcoming holiday relevant to their product is an easy way to be creative and help get clients excited about committing before that window of opportunity closes.

You want your clients excited about the possibilities! If you put some effort in first to start them off, they may come up with some even better ideas on their own.
5. Show them a working example of your email marketing services in action.
One final thing you might try would be to include a sample email design with your web designs. A lot of digital marketing can seem theoretical and difficult to visualize. Seeing their brand in action as an email could be much more convincing and inspiring than graphs and slideshows. 
Wrap up
Why not send a sample email to your client, with their own branding on it? P.S. you can do this FREE through Campaign Monitor, and should only take you a few minutes to mock up.
We’d love to hear any comments on other techniques that have worked for you or you plan on trying. Any pitching ideas we’ve missed?
Get powerful, agency-grade email technology your clients can’t resist. Choose the platform designed and built by agencies, for agencies and learn why Campaign Monitor is loved by more than 50,000 agencies around the world. Learn more.
The post 5 Ideas You Can Use When Pitching Email Marketing to Your Clients appeared first on Campaign Monitor.

Despite its position as one of the oldest digital channels, agencies love email marketing. 
At least, they love it for their clients. A recent survey shows agencies recommend using email to their clients more than any other digital channel.

Chart from The Impact of COVID-19 On Digital Agencies: A Survey Report
It’s not hard to understand some of the reasons why:

Year after year, email consistently provides some of the highest marketing ROI you’ll find anywhere
It’s easy to attribute email’s contribution to the bottom line and prove your value to clients
Email marketing is the perfect “gateway service” to get accounts in the door and create opportunities for future upsells
You can ramp up quickly and start delivering results fast
Infinite scalability makes it suitable for clients of any size, whether they’re SMBs with small, exclusive mailing lists or a multinational corporation that reaches millions of inboxes every week

But even though email marketing is often a bread-and-butter service offering for their clients, agencies seem to struggle to make it work for their own business growth strategy. Email marketing only generates about 2% of new agency leads for marketing agencies, according to a study from Promethean Research. 
Now might be a good time for marketing, creative, and advertising shops of all kinds to re-evaluate the way they approach agency email marketing. In the wake of COVID-19, many are struggling to attract new business. Research from Uplers shows 47% of agencies have experienced a decrease in marketing leads. 
Email offers a low-risk, potentially high-reward avenue to make up some of that difference. With intelligent use of some of the best templates for agencies, you can elevate your email program quickly and easily.
Agency email marketing: Unique challenges for a unique industry
Several aspects of conventional agency email marketing make it different from other industries. This, at least in part, helps to explain why agencies have historically struggled with it:

You have to take your own medicine. As an agency, you’re expected to be the experts on good marketing practices, from creative and content to best practices, design, coding and more. If you’re advising clients and prospects to do one thing, but your own emails don’t follow that advice, you’re eroding your own credibility.
Small, targeted audiences. Agency email marketing is a focused affair. As is with the case of many B2B brands, target audiences tend to be very sophisticated and discerning. If you’re not on your A-game 100% of the time, they’ll notice.
Your emails double as marketing and sales collateral. Showing off your best work is a cornerstone of promoting an agency’s new business strategy; it captures attention and establishes social proof. Agencies need to approach their own email marketing with just as much care and thought as any other part of their sizzle reel. 

With unique challenges come unique opportunities. 
Agencies that find a way to stand out in the inbox will outshine lackluster competitors. The best templates for a marketing agency inspire clients and reflect the authority and innovation your agency needs to get new business. 
Email templates vs custom coding
If you’re positioning your agency as a smart, creative, innovative marketing partner, an obvious question might arise: Why use email templates at all? Why not build something special every time you need to send an email that really shows off what you can do and blows away your recipients? 
There are a few important factors to consider when weighing your options.

Saving time and resources. Using a prebuilt template designed by experts can save endless hours of production and testing. That’s time and talent you can keep focused on being innovative, analytical, and delivering a phenomenal customer experience (or just sending more emails). With a powerful email marketing platform, you can customize a template and get started in a minute or less.

More customized doesn’t always mean better. There’s a reason some templates stand the test of time and get used time and again: they just work. Even your brightest, most clever ideas may end up falling flat when it comes to the measurements that matter.

Provide an error-free user experience. Email is infamously finicky; you need to account for the large-and-growing list of devices and email clients your message may be opened on. Custom work introduces more room for mistakes, which looks especially bad if you’re trying to pitch email marketing to clients. The best email templates for agencies will work every time, no matter how or where they’re opened, so you can send with confidence that your message will look good and perform as expected.

There’s a time and a place for custom-built emails, but that approach should be reserved for special projects and campaigns that require something unique. 
As a compromise, a good email template will be flexible enough to handle heavy customization anyway. Adapt the templates you choose to your own brand and messaging needs, or use an intuitive email template builder to craft something that’s just right for you.
The best templates for a marketing agency to keep in its toolkit
When beginning or ramping up your agency’s email marketing, start with a few essentials that will cover most of your bases and give you the flexibility to adapt your program as needed.
The welcome email
First impressions are always a big deal, especially in B2B marketing where relationships, trust, and reputation are paramount. 
Whether it’s a single send or a series of emails, it’s important to give new subscribers a red carpet experience. Set the tone for the kind of engagement they can expect from you, and give them a reason to keep opening future emails. 
It doesn’t have to be complicated or fancy to make an impression. Sometimes, as this example from MBB shows us, a simple hello and an invitation to engage further is enough to establish a connection.

Source: MailCharts
Need to clean up your digital welcome mat? Start with the best welcome email templates for agencies and get up and running in just minutes.
The newsletter
The newsletter is an essential component of lead nurturing and account development. It keeps your agency top of mind and acts as a powerful way for you to share updates and new content. 
The best agency email newsletter templates need to be flexible. It has to be able to adapt to various updates and content you want to share. As this newsletter from Firebelly illustrates, an agency newsletter often includes blogs, product updates, awards announcements, client case studies and more.

Source: Really Good Emails
Building a newsletter for your agency, even a very elaborate one, can be fast and easy with a prebuilt email newsletter template.
The promotion
Promotional emails are tricky for agencies. It can be difficult to translate typical promotional tactics that work for consumer brands, like limited-time sales or hot new product features, over to the traditional agency business model. Contract terms and pricing that can vary wildly from one account to the next don’t always accommodate a promotion that would be sent to your entire mailing list.
That said, a smart promo can certainly be a useful tool in getting that first contract signed or growing an account up to that next tier.

 
Source: Really Good Emails
Once you’ve thought of a promotion that makes sense for your agency and clientele (like this one from Taylor Brands), package it in one of these templates optimized for deals and offers to get the best possible results.
The survey
Want to know what your clients think of your performance? What about the kind of content your leads would find most valuable? 
You don’t have to speculate. Sometimes the easiest way to find an answer is to just ask. And as this example from Taylor Brands shows, there’s no better way to directly bring important questions to clientele than through the inbox.

Source: Really Good Emails
Guarantee a good response to your survey by starting with one of the best feedback email templates. 
Wrap up
As you look for ways to attract new business and build relationships for your agency, email is a smart, accessible, affordable way to get started. The best email marketing templates for an agency make designing captivating, effective emails a breeze, even if you’re working with limited resources. Don’t forget to include these core templates in your toolkit:

A welcome email template to establish a connection and keep new subscribers coming back
A newsletter email template to share news and updates with clients and nurture leads
A promotional email template to highlight a special offer and drive short-term conversions
A survey email template to gather important data and learn more about your audience

There’s a reason Campaign Monitor is the preferred email marketing platform for more than 50,000 agencies around the world. Get powerful email technology designed by agencies, for agencies, and drive better performance not just for clients but your own brand. Learn more.
 
The post The Best Email Templates for a Marketing Agency to Grow New Business appeared first on Campaign Monitor.

Last Updated on October 6, 2020 by Rakesh Gupta Why send your Inside Sales Team on a wild-goose chase with invalidated Email and Phone Numbers? We can do better than that – so, let us do it! Inaccurate information can … Continue reading →

Amid the pandemic and a year of uncertain changes, many businesses of all sizes have had to quickly adapt and change. As remote work becomes the new norm and consumers spend more time online, our world has changed to an all-digital dependent world. However, driving engagement in an all-digital world doesn’t mean having to fully transform your small and medium business. What it does mean is leveraging technology to meet your customers where they are. A recent report from the Connected Commerce Council highlighted how, “76% of American Small Businesses are relying on digital technology to run their business”, which speaks to the increasing importance of embracing digital engagement right now. 
Marketers are facing a pivotal moment. With rapid shifts in customer expectations and behaviors, marketers have the opportunity to rethink how they connect with their customers in this all-digital, work from anywhere world. In July, Salesforce & Third Door Media hosted a panel on the topic with VP of AMER Marketing of Salesforce, Meghan Gendelman, and Dr. Ann Marie Sastry, CEO & Cofounder of Amesite, an award winning artificial intelligence software company focused on improving learning. Key discussion points on the role of marketing in an all-digital world as it pertains to SMBs revolved around three main areas:
Empathetic Marketing
Personalized engagement with a focus on empathy is crucial as customer expectations continue to shift in the “new normal”. Marketing strategies that lead with empathy and focus on the customer are helping many small and growing businesses stay connected with current customers and reach new ones. 
Some key tenets of empathetic digital marketing include:

Email with Compassion – Clarity in communication is essential, so keep your emails clear and concise.
Use Content to stay Connected – Create a landing page that gathers business updates and essential resources to further help support your customers during this time.
Host a virtual event that builds community – Virtual events are a great way to maintain and build community, and often require fewer resources to spin up than in-person gatherings. As you plan, think about why you’re putting the virtual event in first place, who your target audience is and what content would your customers or prospects be more interested in learning.
Stay positive on social – Include uplifting advice to help keep your audience moving forward despite the difficult times

“This year we’ve seen more headwinds and challenges than ever before. As marketers, we found ourselves pivoting our message to be humble and helpful, while also maintaining relevance as we shift how we approach our customers. We’re doing this while our marketing strategies and tactics have shifted to be all-digital”.
Meghan Gendelman | Salesforce

 
Engaging Online Experiences
Your ideal buyer is online now more than ever, and as marketers we have to meet them where they are. It’s important to create online experiences that will keep your ideal target audience engaged. One approach to enhancing online engagement is through experimentation. Many small and medium businesses are experimenting with different engagement tactics, such as:

Pivoting to a virtual events strategy – Pro Tip: Bite-sized content and brain breaks help attendees stay engaged.

Trying new social media tactics – Experiment with new content like  Instagram Stories, try partnering with influencers, and share your content across different social media platforms to see what resonates.

Setting up a help center – A help center is a great way to stay connected and support your customers by giving them the most up to date information on your business, e.g. up-to-date hours, contact forms.

Creating short video content – More businesses are experimenting with using video content to market their products and services. Consider trying some influencer reviews or how-to content, to name a few.

“Social media [have] the ability to engage people for long periods of time with compelling relevant content. So in our software, we try to use those lessons to really help engage kids. When we design engaging online experiences, whether they’re educational or other experiences, we should be thinking about why people are joining the virtual classroom. And is it adding value? Same can be applied for how any SMEs approach engaging online experiences.”
Dr. Ann Marie Sastry | Amesite

 
Align Your Teams to Create Better Customer Experiences
In Salesforce’s recent State of Marketing report, 69% of customers said they expect connected experiences across the different teams they interact with, such as sales and service. 
The best way to remediate this is by making sure that teams like sales and marketing are working on the same platform, off of the same data, and collaborating, consistently.  Sixty-three percent of marketers said they use the same CRM system as their sales and service teams to enhance cross team collaboration. Many SMBs are looking to various technologies with the best integrations, like Salesforce CRM and Pardot, our marketing automation solution, to help them drive alignment across teams and have a 360 degree view of the customer. 

“We have made some changes with technology this year, Pardot, which has really helped us. We found that there, there are more octaves on the piano to play in our digital marketing tools with Salesforce and Pardot and that’s caused us to be more granular in how we create assets, and drive social engagement. At Amesite, we don’t think of sales and marketing as separate. Sales and marketing work closely with product. We think that’s really important because every time we learn something, we want the key teams to be aligned and adapt quickly.”
Dr. Ann Marie Sastry | Amesite

 
The role of marketing in this all-digital world has fostered more experimentation and innovation, and boost in technology in order to help small and medium business marketers meet their customers where they are. To learn more about the marketing automation, visit pardot.com. 
This post is a part of our SMB Success Series. Stay tuned for monthly blog posts to drive your small business growth!