Any good marketing strategy needs successful email campaigns. I would argue that email copywriting is one of the most flexible types of copywriting out there. Whether it's a promotion, a newsletter, or a business update, email copywriting can be used as part of any marketing strategy, and businesses of all industries need to take advantage of it.
In this post, I'll talk about what makes a great marketing email and how you can craft fabulous emails for your marketing strategy in six steps. These steps are:
What Makes a Good Email?
I've talked a little bit about email marketing in my previous post on types of copywriting. Email copywriting is a very flexible type of copywriting that shares many traits with direct response copywriting (writing copy that encourages a response from people).
Marketing emails target their audiences and encourage them to take action in a particular way. For example, promotions push the audience to take advantage of a new product, service, or freebie, which transforms them from leads into paying customers.
Newsletters - despite perhaps being considered content writing rather than copywriting - also have a function in this process. They engage a niche audience with longer, conversational content that informs the reader about what has happened in the business.
So what makes a good email? Well, the answer to that question is varied, but I would argue there are three factors to crafting a great email:
A great email's content is always geared towards the target audience.
A great email showcases the best of the brand.
A great email is clear, concise, and friendly.
So with these three factors in mind, let's have a look at how to write a fabulous marketing email.
How to Write A Fabulous Marketing Email in 6 Steps
1. Understand your target audience
The first step to writing any marketing email is to understand who you are writing it for. You can't write any old generic email, slap a CTA onto it, and expect people to come running - it won't happen.
You need to understand your target audience first before committing to writing your email campaigns. You may have more than one target audience, in which case you'll need to craft separate campaigns targeted towards them.
The key to understanding your target audience is to research your current one. This includes all your customers, leads, and contacts. If you're a new business or a start-up and you don't have a big enough audience to research, that's fine. You can create buyer personas to identify who your target audience should be.
If you want to learn more about buyer personas and their uses for copywriting, check out the blog post below.
2. Use your brand voice
Once you have identified your target audience(s) and come up with some marketing campaigns directed towards their needs, it's time to get started with the writing process.
One thing to bear in mind when writing any form of content is your brand voice. I've talked about brand voice before on my blog, so I will briefly summarise what it entails here.
As the title suggests, your brand voice is part of your overall brand. Whereas most businesses consider the visual aspects of their brand (e.g. logo, colour scheme, and visual content), they may overlook their writing as an integral part of a brand. But it's just as important - after all, the brand voice showcases the tone and personality of a business!
So in your marketing emails, you must ensure your brand voice shines through in your writing. For more on how to find your brand voice, check out the blog post below.
3. Perfect the subject line
Subject lines can make or break your email. They need to be interesting enough for people to open the email, but not so clickbait-y that they end up in the spam folder.
The key to creating a great subject line is:
Simplicity and
Relevance
Keeping the subject line simple and short helps get your message across clearly and concisely. Make sure the subject line is also relevant to the content you are marketing - otherwise, it will be nothing more than clickbait, which can be annoying for people.
For more on how to craft better subject lines, check out this blog post by HubSpot.
4. Make the writing clear and simple
Like the subject line, you need to make sure your message is clear and simple to read. It's up to you what the topic is about, just as long as the content is accessible to readers. The simpler your writing is, the easier it will be to read and therefore the more likely it is for your audience to keep reading.
Some great ideas for email topics might include:
Special offers and promotions
Testimonials and stories
Newsletters and updates
Whichever format you choose, make sure the content stays relevant to the format and your audience. Special offers and promotions may not have as much copywriting as newsletters for example because the audiences are different, and promotions are a form of direct advertising.
So, when writing the main body of your marketing email, keep your content simple, clear, and relevant to the format you have chosen.
5. Keep the tone friendly and light
When writing marketing emails, remember that you aren't writing a white paper or a business document. Use your brand voice and add a flair of friendliness to it - this will engage readers and help them view your brand in a positive light.
Another benefit to using a friendly tone is that it helps readers feel like they are taking part in a conversation with you and your business. This makes it more likely that they will interact with your business - potentially converting those leads into paying customers.
6. Encourage your readers to take action
Finally, one of the most important steps is to add a call to action (CTA). This is imperative - there is no point in nailing the subject line, creating simple content in your brand voice, and engaging readers if there is nothing for them to do with the information afterwards.
Your CTA must be relevant to the content you are delivering. Is it a newsletter? Add a CTA encouraging readers to download an eBook or read a blog post. Is it a special offer? Add a CTA that guides readers towards the landing page.
It seems obvious, but it's also easy to forget as it's the last thing you will add to your email. As a bonus point, you can also direct your content towards the CTA at the end, building suspense and intrigue for the reader to the point where they will head to where you want them to go.
Over to You
So, those were six steps to crafting fabulous marketing emails. They were:
Understand your target audience
Use your brand voice
Perfect the subject line
Make the writing clear and simple
Keep the tone friendly and light
Encourage your readers to take action
This will be enough to get you started on creating some awesome marketing emails that will wow and engage your audience.