Increase Revenue with Email Lead Generation

As the pandemic of 2020 continues to rage with no end in sight, generating sales leads digitally continues to grow in importance. Digital communication channels are growing increasingly important as people spend more time working, consuming, and entertaining themselves inside their homes. Lead generation is crucial to making sales.

Generating leads can be difficult, but email has proven to be an effective strategy under the right circumstances. The following list represents actions you can take to make your email lead generation more effective.

1. Use Automation – We are all familiar with the old adage, “work smarter, not harder.” Automation is one of the best ways to do this. It lets you send out email marketing without the time and effort of manually generating these emails. Automation makes it easier to connect with customers when they sign up or register on your website, or when they buy a product.
2. Use Images – Customers find images appealing. They can break up the text and make the content more interesting. A few well-placed images can be far more effective than text alone.
3. Embed Links – Customers love it when things are easy. But a surprising number of sales emails have calls-to-action that are not linked – making it much harder for potential customers to take advantage of the offer. Before sending that email, be sure that it is linked to website pages that can complete the sale.
4. Be Clear – Keep your proposal short and sweet, and make sure that the message is clear. Customers are always trying to figure out the motivation. If you are clear about your sales proposal, they can easily discern what ‘is in it for them’ when they purchase your product or service.
5. Keep an Eye on the Competition – You must know what your competitors are doing if you want to stay one step ahead of them. While it is never a good strategy to copy their strategies, you can sometimes identify elements of their success that you can use to increase your own ability to connect with your customers.
6. Strive for Constant Improvement – In today’s age, we can easily collect data to make better, more informed decisions. Data can help inform email creation too. It is easy to collect metrics about what is working and what is not and then adjust a strategy to make it even more effective.
7. Develop Interesting Subject Lines – Most sales emails do not even get opened. The user deletes it without even glancing at the content. But creating more interesting subject lines can increase the likelihood that your email will get opened, which makes it more likely to generate a sale.
8. Cross-Promote – An effective digital marketing plan incorporates many different channels. Taking advantage of all of your marketing assets can increase traffic. It is always a good idea to cross-promote your other digital assets- like websites and social media channels – within your emails.
9. Foster a Sense of Exclusivity – If every piece of communication you send has the same offer that is going on continuously, there is no advantage for the customer to act now. However, if you can leverage a sense of exclusivity or urgency with the email, the call-to-action is often much more effective.
10. Use Contrasting Colors – Using contrasting colors on hyperlinks or calls-to-action can make them stand out rather than blend in. When they stand out, they are far more likely to compel the reader to act.
11. Clean Up Your Design – While images and hyperlinks can be effective, be sure that they flow with your email’s overall design. People like content that can be scanned easily. Be brief and to the point. Bullet points can be highly effective at conveying important info quickly.
12. Demonstrate Value – People also like content that is relevant to them. You can generate more interest in your product or service if you show why they need it. Links to white papers or other relevant content can create a greater sense of need and urgency across your customer base.

While these suggestions can help you develop a strategy to leverage email as a strategy to increase revenue and sales, it is also important to realize that there is not a one-size-fits-all approach. Effective email strategies often require some fine-tuning to figure out exactly what your customer base wants and when they want to receive it. By taking the time to assess and reassess the effectiveness of your emails, you can determine ways to optimize them for maximum sales and lead generation.