How To Make Email Marketing Work For You

Email marketing—that nebulous term I’ve heard and read about, is everywhere. Every email I receive is specifically formatted to get the message across to me. It’s never overwhelmed me with junk email, and if it does, chances are it won’t get sent. This gives me a lot of freedom as a brand, but on the other hand, I know that people are expecting something. That’s why I have a plan.

There are different types of branding. One thing that really draws me in is the way your emails look—they tell me what your brand is and what you’re going to do. If they’re emailing to those whom you are already familiar with you, they’re sending them from your own email address. On the other hand, there are those who only want to show off their brand to newcomers. They’re sending their emails to those, who are likely just browsing social media for inspiration.

It’s all about branding and I don’t believe anything else. This is how brands grow.

With that in mind, there are a lot of different ways to do branding—it’s all about what makes your brand stand out and is unique from your competitors.

I think everyone can benefit from branding. Unfortunately, it is a tough thing to do right, with so many things getting in the way and influencing your decision.

Knowing the three big ways we’re at a disadvantage and how you can overcome that disadvantage, and certainly the 10 reasons why you don’t need to know branding at all, can help you brand yourself in a way that works for you.

1. We Don’t Need to Know What Our Brand Is

It sounds obvious to us, but a lot of people don’t understand branding. If your brand is boring and your content just isn’t cohesive, you won’t be putting effort into your email marketing efforts. To overcome the lack of brand marketing, I think it’s important to ask questions like this: “Hey, what is your logo, how long have you been in business, what do you do, what does your email signature say about you and who’s on your board?” This way, you won’t be labeled with bad or derogatory keywords, and your content will be done in a way that you have control over. In other words, you will have control of your brand in relation to the emails that you send.

2. We Can Avoid Some of the Rules That We Don’t Know About

The wonderful thing about the rules-based marketing strategy is that everyone has a different outlook on brands. The rules don’t necessarily apply to everyone and we don’t all have the same opinions on what a branding campaign is. Also, as it’s mentioned before, it’s difficult to make a branding effort without knowing what your brand is, as most of it comes from your own brand. This aspect of branding that can be easy to avoid is email marketing. Your brand might want to support a cause, but what your brand is might not match up with who you would like to reach out to. If the rules are changed and your brand’s logo looks ugly, then you’re losing out, but if your brand is uncohesive and has a weird texture on your logo, then you’re having an easier time and making more sense. It’s okay if your brand still looks weird to you, as the problem should be fixed and you’ll be able to fix it by applying the new branding.

3. Branding Is Easy to Change With Your Release Cycle

This is one of the biggest advantages to branding when it comes to emails. Email is getting far quicker with each passing release. Yes, the past year has seen a mass adoption of the sending lists I mentioned earlier, but still, you can change your branding. Your brand can be different on every release. It’s no longer a work in progress. In fact, brands are already existing, and they need no formal marketing activity to be a brand. Anyone can go out and brand themselves with the same logos, brand spruces, beautiful ads, and it will seem brand new and untraditional. Branding is changing and we are already engaged. We don’t need to wait for one launch to be published.

4. Be Personal with Your Emails

This sounds like a no-brainer, but you see a lot of brands getting heavily promotional emails, encouraging people to subscribe to their newsletter. This gets sent in the exact same way no matter if the brand is a healthcare-focused email or a coffee shop. The only way to make that work, especially with people who are not you, is to make sure your email is personalized to them.