22nd February 2013

Communication… communication… communication

This is a first in a series of articles from Inboxx on the basic principles of email marketing. We hope it will help IFAs to understand how they can make the most of email marketing techniques to improve and develop customer relationships. Bento is created and sent via the Inboxx platform.

It’s a mantra worth repeating over and over again. Good communications are the lifeblood of any relationship. Whether we deal with customers one-on-one or we speak to millions at a time, it’s a lesson we all need to learn (and relearn). If your relationships with your customers are good, you will do more business. It’s a fact.

Fortunately, in today’s online world, there are some simple and affordable ways you can keep in touch with your customers. All of them take some time so there is always a cost somewhere but technology has given us the wherewithal to gain control over the who, what, where and when of our communications messages.

Over the past decade email marketing has had a massive impact on communications and its power has not diminished with the advent of social media (as some have predicted). Its popularity remains mainly because email marketing works when it is handled well. Over the next few weeks Bento will include some short and easily understood articles based on tried and tested real life experience. They will help you to improve the way you communicate and drive more business so let’s get started with some vital basics…

The holy grail of email marketing

Get these three good things right and email marketing will be good for you:

1. Good data

If your data is good it will be ‘clean’ and up to date. Try to send emails to a database that is three years old and you will suffer. People change their email addresses so you’ll get lots of ‘bounces’. Have the people on your list asked to receive your emails? If you disrespect their wishes they may accuse you of spamming but a decent provider will help you with all this if you ask them.

2. Good reputation

Trust plays a massive role. Your reputation is usually invested in your brand or, on occasions, an individual. If people trust the sender of the email they are more likely to open it, read it and respond. Lack of trust does the exact opposite… especially in the financial sector.

3. Good advice

If you were active in certain retail areas, this might have been headed up as ‘good offer’ because people like real value for money and don’t like to be deceived. The same goes for the information and advice you give. People will ask… Is it worth giving up my time to read this email? Can I trust what I’m reading? Is it going to benefit me?

Do these three ‘good’ things well and email marketing will do a work for you. Do two of them well and you should be ok. Get only one right and, frankly, you’ll struggle. But the good news is that something can be done about it.

None of this is rocket science but it’s amazing how eye-opening it can be when it is put into practice. Next time we’ll open up these issues a little more.

Tom Sterling

Inboxx

tom@inboxx.co.uk

01429 839292

Back Office