What’s the point?

Email campaigns are supposed to be some kind of magic bullet, but do you want a load of sales spiel in your inbox?  No?  I thought not!

I bet you’ve signed up for some download that looked interesting at some point only to discover you’re getting a daily sales pitch from someone in America!  If it’s in your face ‘buy my stuff’
you’ve probably unsubscribed by now.

However, some of these gurus do write well and are very good at writing email content that makes you feel like they know you and are talking directly to you.  I can quote a few myself and some of them give away lots of good advice and encouragement.  I’m on a few lists myself and choose to stay on those lists, because I find the email content useful and interesting.

So what is that magic formula that defines successful email campaigns?

This is just my opinion, but I think it depends on these three key factors:

1. Know your audience inside out
2. Know what they’re suffering from, what keeps them awake at night and understand what kind of help they WANT (never mind what they need, most people will sacrifice a need to a big WANT - ask anyone who has skipped lunch to afford a new pair of shoes!)
3. Be entertaining and human.

The three most compelling email lists I’m on are Kim Roach, Nick Stephenson and Peter Thomson.  Each of them talks to me in conversational language and ALL of them share their personal journey, warts and all.

Although of course they are selling products, services or membership of a group, I don’t feel ‘sold at’, I feel they genuinely want to help me, to share their knowledge and experience.

If you’re planning an email campaign, first decide on what the call to action will be, then work out how to engage the readers.

• What will get their attention?  That will be your subject line.  
• What will give them value?  That’s your lead paragraph.  
• Where is their pain point?  That’s the lead up to your service or product presentation.
• How will their life be different when they’ve got your solution?  There’s your call to action.

Focus on value, benefits and outcomes and think like your customer and you’ll find your email campaigns will start to write themselves.

We’re engaged!

Facebook is a powerful platform.  Millions of people look at it daily so it’s a great way to put your business offering in front of a lot of people.

Facebook frowns on using personal accounts for business, but there are business pages to fulfil that role.  The only challenge is that your audience has to be actively engaged for them to see your posts.  The only other way to put content in front of people is to pay for it.

You don’t have to spend a fortune, but you do need to know what you’re doing or you can spend a lot of money quickly with little return.

Facebook does have some clever ad testing tools for ads so you can easily find out what works best and you can hone the demographics finely so your ads are only shown to people who fit your client profile.

Paid-for traffic will bring people to your page, but to keep them coming back you need to get engagement.  This is where it’s essential to step out from behind your business ‘shop front’ and go and look at your ‘window display’ like a customer.

Getting engaged

What will interest your visitors?  It’s not a long string of ads for your business!  It’s not videos of cats either (unless you happen to be running a pets page).

There’s a big difference between broadcast and engagement.  Broadcast posts are simply information and often scheduled in via one of the social media management tools like Hootsuite or Buffer.  This is good to maintain ongoing content on your page, but won’t create much in the way of engagement.

Firstly Facebook penalises post that come from outside their platform, so fewer people are likely to see your posts in their feed.  In fact, you will have to work quite hard to get your posts seen (or pay for sponsored or boosted posts).  The more relevant content you post or share directly on Facebook, the better.

You’ll need to experiment and see what your followers like and share themselves from your content.  It’s important to keep track of this - and Facebook have some useful metrics on your dashboard that help you to do that.

For example …

If you’re a virtual assistant your Facebook page should include some amusing images or videos of people who are fighting the paper mountain that most businesses create (even if it’s an electronic pile of paper rather than an actual one).  It could also feature time-saving tips, useful templates and other helpful articles and videos you’ve curated.

Remember that Facebook is a social platform (even though you may be using it for business) and the tone and style of your posts needs to be appropriate to people who are in social head space.

If you’re serious about using Facebook well, put aside at least 10-15 minutes a day for being online.  Check for messages, comments and shares and respond.  Keep your eyes open wherever you happen to be online for things that will interest your audience.  Your business will benefit from the time and effort you invest.

A press release or a story?

So which would you rather read?  A press release or a story?

My guess is, like most people, you’d much rather read a story.  What’s the difference?

A press release is factual, usually promotional to encourage readers to take notice of the organisation or individual that’s being written about and frequently appears to be a bit dry.

A story has a beginning, middle and end and is more satisfying to read.

BUT - why couldn’t a press release also be a story?

There’s no reason why it shouldn’t, but that requires a bit of planning and careful crafting to take some potentially dry facts and maybe a quote or two and turn them into something that people will want to read.

On the plus side, making that effort should also win you points with the editor too - as their focus is entertaining and informing their readers.  They’ll have less work to do to polish your piece up if you’ve already put it in story form.

Get the structure right

A title/headline that will encourage people to read.  You need to spend time on getting this right, although it doesn’t necessarily have to be written first.  Sometimes something will emerge from your story as you work on it.

When people are consuming newspapers, journals, or magazines they tend to read the headline for each article before deciding if they want to read the rest, so the headline is the hook you throw out to catch readers.

An opening paragraph that will set the scene.  The ‘once upon a time there was a beautiful princess …’ part that draws the reader in and makes them want to know what comes next.

A build up to the climax.  A good story takes the reader on a journey, giving them bits of information as the story develops.  This is your opportunity to explain facts, provide statistics (and their source) and educate your reader.

The end.  ‘And they lived happily ever after’ - for a press release is more likely to be a conclusion - the so-what of the story, the point, the pulling together of all the facts, figures and information.

My tips

Be sure you do have a good story that people will be interested in.

Don’t fall into the trap of writing over-descriptive prose, just because you’re writing a story.

Don’t be tempted to embellish and extend it.  A good press release should be no more than two pages, double-spaced, including the headers, footers and notes for the editor.

Do write concisely and, when you’ve written it go back and edit to ensure it’s sharp and polished.

Resist the urge to directly promote your business.  If the publication is willing they may put your contact details at the end, but a sales pitch or even a strong promotional statement is the fastest way to the recycling bin!

Integrated marketing

Marketing is a huge subject - and it starts with consumer demographics and statistics, through research and development, including market share, promotional activities and sales.  It even includes customer care, post purchase support and more.

However, for most business owners it’s the promotional activities that tend to get most of their focus.  And even then they suffer from overwhelm.

Do you:

• Advertise in publications or billboards, banners, posters, etc.?
• Sponsor an event or something where our name is visible?
• Write press releases and distribute to local and industry publications?
• Invest in video material, because that’s what everyone wants these days, isn’t it?
• Get on all the social media platforms and be active?
• Launch lots of email campaigns to keep your name in front of those people who are on your list?
• Enter lots of awards and aim to get a few gongs to impress potential clients?

This is just the tip of the iceberg and any one of the above can be time-consuming.

Before you jump in and start taking frantic action, stop and think.

Some of these could be very effective - but which ones?

That will depend on who you’re trying to reach.  Your first action should be to have a very clear idea of exactly who you want to influence and connect with.  Once that’s sorted out, the decisions you make about the other activities will be easier.

Where you advertise and where your articles are published will be dictated by your target audience.  It’s pointless advertising, sponsoring events or submitting articles if that’s not where your target audience is going to be looking.  This will help your activities to be much more focused.  Managing a press distribution list with eight publications that are reliably read by the people you want to reach, it much easier than pushing articles out to dozens of random publications.

Sponsoring an event where the attendees are all your target audience is much more productive than hoping for a few lines covering in the local press will reach them.

Before you invest in anything ensure it’s something that your target audience wants and will see.  The same applies to social media - pick the ones where you’re most likely to be able to connect with the people you want to.

The same with email campaigns - how will these be received by your list?  It’s worth doing some testing before jumping in the deep end.

Awards are great - but putting together an awards entry can be time-consuming.  Will an award influence the people you want to reach to use you?  Will it get you enough publicity in the right places to justify the time and effort?

Thinking through your options should produce enough information to put together a promotional plan that’s manageable.