Email Marketing is a digital marketing strategy that involves sending emails to a group of people or specific individuals to promote products or services or convey important information.1
It’s a type of direct marketing aimed at sharing information, boosting brand recognition, and advertising particular products or services.2
Visual Representation
Purpose
The primary purpose of email marketing is to build relationships with your target audience and achieve specific marketing goals through those relationships.
This strategy lets marketers keep in touch, share news about new products or deals, and encourage purchases.
It’s also a way to divide the customer base into groups and send customized messages that fit different customers’ likes and actions, making it a powerful tool for driving sales.3
How It Works
Email marketing works by allowing businesses to send targeted, personalized messages directly to people who have signed up to receive them. Here’s a step-by-step look at how it typically unfolds:
- Gathering Emails: First, you collect email addresses from people who want to hear from your business.
- Making Groups: You sort these people into groups based on what they like or what they’ve bought before. This way, you can send them info they’re actually interested in.
- Creating Messages: Then, you put together emails that could be about special deals, news, tips, or just saying hello. The idea is to make each email something people will want to read.
- Sending Them Out: With special tools, you send your emails to many people at once, but you can still make each email feel personal.
- Seeing What Works: After sending the emails, you can see who opened them and clicked on any links. This tells you what people liked or didn’t like.
- Making It Better: Using what you learned from the last step, you try different things in your emails to see if more people will open them or click on links next time4
Usage
Email marketing is popular across different fields and types of businesses. Here’s how various groups use it:
- E-commerce: Online shops send emails about new items, special deals, and reminders for unfinished purchases.
- B2B Companies: These businesses use emails to keep in touch with potential clients, share news from their industry, and invite people to webinars or events.
- SaaS Companies: Software services inform customers about how to use their products, new updates, and features through email.
- Non-profit Organizations: Charities use emails to spread the word about their work, ask for donations, and keep supporters updated.
- Educational Institutions: Schools and colleges communicate with students, staff, and alumni about announcements, events, and important dates via email.
- Blogs and Content Creators: They grow their audience and promote their latest work through email campaigns.
- Freelancers and Consultants: These professionals use email to maintain relationships with prospects, share their knowledge, and advertise their services.5
Example
An online fashion retailer uses email marketing to announce its seasonal sales.
It segments its email list by past purchase behavior and sends personalized recommendations to each segment.
The emails feature attractive images of the products on sale, a clear call to action directing recipients to the online store, and an exclusive discount code for subscribers.
The campaign results in a significant increase in traffic to the website and a boost in sales.
Related Terms
References
1. Wikimedia Foundation. (2023, December 14). Email marketing. Wikipedia. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Email_marketing
2. What is email marketing? definition, tips, and Tools. Coursera. (2024, February 15). https://www.coursera.org/articles/email-marketing
3. Medium. (2022, June 10). What is the primary purpose of email marketing?. Medium. https://medium.com/@apprevenue.io/what-is-the-primary-purpose-of-email-marketing-9c1e1528c00c
4. Pasos, A. (2020). The Email Marketing Playbook – New Strategies to Get Your Emails Noticed: Learn How to Use Email Marketing to Get Sales and Build High Quality Email Marketing Campaigns. (n.p.): Adella Pasos. https://www.amazon.com/Email-Marketing-Playbook-Strategies-campaigns-ebook/dp/B07C329N5Q/
5. Email marketing benchmarks and statistics for 2022. Campaign Monitor. (2023, January 31). https://www.campaignmonitor.com/resources/guides/email-marketing-benchmarks/