Simple Tactics to Increase Your Email Results (1 of 5)

It's easy to get overwhelmed by all the email marketing strategies and tactics available to the average winery. Today we begin our 5-part series:  Simple Tactics to Increase Your Email Results. Focus on implementation of one tactic every 2-4 weeks, then watch the results roll in!

Set it and (don't completely) forget it
Add ONE triggered or automated message to your email marketing program.

Don’t you want to do your work once, and have it pay dividends for days, months, years to come?

Triggered messages generate a higher click through rate, and the more relevant your message is, the higher the revenue generated. Relevance=revenue, baby!

Where to start? The obvious place is the welcome campaign. Nearly ¾ of us expect to receive a welcome message immediately upon signing up for an email list[1]... if you aren’t meeting that expectation, you are missing out on the customer at their HIGHEST level of engagement. Welcome emails have 4X the open rate and 5X the click through rate over traditional batch and blast email campaigns [2]. And subscribers who receive a welcome message have a 33% higher engagement level over the lifetime of their relationship with you[3].

Some ideas on what to include in your welcome message:

• Set expectations on what kinds of content you’ll be sending and how often
• Give them a quick run-down on where to get more information on your website
• Share a coupon for their first online order
• Link to a brief survey to capture even more subscriber data (which allows you to send more relevant communications in the future… Relevance=revenue, remember?)

Already have a welcome email?

Take it to the next level with some of these other data-driven, highly relevant and automate-able messages.

• Birthday
• Wine Club Anniversary
• “Miss You” – It’s been 90 days since your last purchase
• Re-order offer – How are you enjoying that Syrah?
• Cart Abandonment – Did you forget something?

After your welcome email campaign is in place and you’ve explored date-based or behavioral-triggered messages, you will have several programs constantly running to drive revenue and increase engagement with your subscribers. Kick back, relax, pour yourself a glass of wine and revel in a sense of immense accomplishment.

Don't completely "forget it", though... you want to regularly review your triggered campaign performance to ensure it is up to date and relevant, that you aren't missing any behavioral indicators that could be a sign of a mistake (or opportunity), and of course, retest the campaigns to ensure  they still look and function as expected in the ever-changing email environment. We recommend a quarterly audit... put that audit on your calendar, and then forget it... for 90 days or so.

Stay tuned for part 2 in our series: 5 Rules for A/B Testing Your Email Campaigns

[1] Blue Hornet
[2] Experian
[3] chiefmarketer.com