Email marketing can be very successful, but it does have its disadvantages. Some business owners are wasting their time sending out emails that are ineffective and probably doing more damage than good. Here are 5 of the most common difficulties with email marketing and how you can overcome them.
1. You Have No Email List
Obviously, the main disadvantage of email marketing is not having anyone on your email list. So, your first priory is to build a list of people who will give you their permission to send them emails. To do this, you have to offer something of value in return for the email. This could be a free report, video, tutorial or newsletter that is related to your industry.
2. Nobody Is Opening Your Emails.
If nobody is opening your emails, you need to take action. Open and click rates vary greatly from industry to industry and campaign to campaign but most of your subscribers will base their decision to open your email primarily on what is written in your subject line. It’s like an advert headline and if it does not attract the attention and interest of the reader, it will be ignored. Test different subject lines and see what works best.
3. You Can Get Reported As Spam.
Legitimate and effective email marketing is based upon people giving you their permission to send emails to them. This will avoid you from becoming labelled as a spammer. Do not send emails about your products or services unless somebody has asked for information from you. If somebody on your list decides that they no longer want to receive your emails, make it easy for them to unsubscribe. If they don’t want to receive your emails anymore, it is very unlikely that they will ever become a customer anyway.
4. People Receive Too Many Emails.
People buy from people, companies and brands they like and respect. Provide useful information that is of benefit to your audience and they will start to look forward to reading your emails. Inject your personality into your messages and build a relationship with your subscribers so they see you as a real person, not just a hard sell salesperson. If you would not send one of your business emails to somebody that you know personally, don’t send it to the people on your list.
5. You Cannot Do It By Yourself.
Investing in reliable email marketing software is one of the best decisions you can make. As your email database expands it becomes impossible control your email marketing without any software. As you list grows into the hundreds and then the thousands of subscribers, you would have to spend all your time trying to manage enquires, remove people from your list who want to unsubscribe, send out messages to new subscribers as soon as they join your list and segment your list so that the right person receives the right email.