Most entrepreneurs rely heavily on email marketing to fill their programs and sell their services and products. Email is great because it’s trackable, fast, and costs you nothing in paper or postage.
However, if your sales email isn’t written well, it won’t get a decent response, and worse, might even prompt some recipients to unsubscribe from your list. The best way to prevent this is to follow a few best practices for creating effective emails.
- Know your audience
To truly know your audience, you should have a good idea of a few different types within the group you’re writing to. Some people create “personas” for each segment within their mailing list, and write customized emails for each persona. For example, if your business is a coaching or counseling practice, you may want to segment your list by gender, geographic location, age, type of employment, marital status, etc.
Once you have your segments, figure out what they want. This is the psychographic information that tells you about their problems and needs. What is their pain point? What is bothering them the most or preventing them from succeeding? This information is the key to your success.
- Pique their interest
The subject line of any email should not have SALES as its goal. Rather, aim to make the recipient interested in what you want to tell them. This should be fairly easy: go back to their needs! In seven words or less, your subject line should mention either the problem or the solution – or clearly hint at either.
- Keep it simple
Use everyday, clear language. Don’t make readers run for a dictionary. Keep sentences short. And above all, keep the entire email short. Nobody has the time or patience to read lengthy sales emails. Unless it’s your mom or spouse, most recipients will want you to cut to the chase.
Sales emails should be 300 words or less. This is no joke. No matter how brilliant or important or earth-shattering your offering may be, your emails will be more effective if they are brief. Here’s an easy outline for your email body:
- State the customer’s problem, frustration or fear. This could be an inverted goal, such as “What if you can’t do xyz?” or “What would you do if PDQ happened?”
- Tell them how (get specific) their lives would improve if this problem were solved.
- Present yourself as the path leading from the problem to the solution. Define your offering succinctly but with enough detail that readers understand what you’re talking about.
- Call to action. What do you want the reader to do? Sign up for a course? Call you? Register as a client? Buy something? Tell them specifically what to do. Examples of CTAs include: “Purchase now!” “Call today!” “Register right away!”
- Provide ways to get in touch
When readers want what you’re offering, make sure they have multiple points of contact with you so they can get what they want. Always include a link to your own website and an email address or phone number where you (or your customer service agent) can be reached. Include links to all social media profiles such as Twitter, Facebook, Pinterest, LinkedIn, etc.
And that’s it! Pretty simple, right?
But if writing sales emails just isn’t your thing, or if the idea of segmenting your list makes you want to run for the hills, you can hire a virtual assistant to take over for you. She can source a crackerjack copywriter to create content and can get your database sorted and optimized for you.
Want help with your emails? Let me know! Just reach out today. I’m virtually there for YOU!
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