Email Marketing, put simply, is a strategy that utilizes email to promote a cause or initiative. Whether you intend to build a list of contacts who you can market to later or immediately begin to engage subscribers, with the right connection points, you can make the most of your email marketing campaigns. Email marketing is one of the highest converting digital marketing strategies, in fact, 99% of people open emails that land in their inbox!

So let’s get started — You should first key in on what your goals are. Answer these simple questions:

1. What services or lead generation are you intending to market?
2. What types of content does your target audience want or are actively looking for?
3. How can you give your target audience what they are looking for with an enticing offer which leads to your call-to-action?

You should craft a message like the one below which defines your goal and how you plan to achieve it:

I want to generate more qualified drivers for my company by giving driver candidates a free video on overcoming X issue. After signing up for my mailing list to receive the free video, I will then provide value-added email posts which link to my driver application form.

With your end goal in mind, it’s time to set the stage:

1. If you have an existing mailing list solution, great, if not, we recommend Aweber, Mailchimp and MailerLite. Sign up or sign into your mailing list account and create a new segmented list for your campaign. (We recommend a segmented list rather than combining with existing lists so you can better collect metrics.)
2. Create your newsletter sign-up form and attach it to your new list.
3. Next, create your email sequence which you will plan to send regular updates to your opted in users. You should focus on breaking up some content into at least 3 emails and sending at least once a week. The content should provide additional benefits of what you are offering or have relevancy to your target campaign, e.g. if you are trying to get more drivers, share tips and tricks to help a driver ensure they are qualified and provide resources for staying up to date on certifications, etc.
4. Once you have your email campaign squared away, it’s time to put it to work by producing a targeted landing page that provides answers to your target audience’s wants, needs and pain points. As a call-to-action, use your opt-in form along with your lead magnet or freebie.
5. Next, make sure your leads are redirected to a place where they can access your lead magnet or provide them as an attachment or link in an autoresponder email.

Finally, you are ready to start driving leads to your page with your email opt-in form. As you begin to gain opt-ins, keep an eye on your metrics for open rates, link clicks, etc. and adjust as needed to optimize performance!

The great thing about email marketing is that once you have a list or multiple lists, you can continue to market to them in different ways as you go along.