Tech companies can use a wide range of inbound marketing strategies to generate leads and grow their companies - but none has a higher lead conversion rate than email marketing.
According to recent research, email marketing converts recipients to leads at a rate of 2.9%.
This is very impressive compared to 1.45% for organic search traffic, and social media's 1.22% conversion ratio.
Clearly, there's a huge opportunity for growth here.
Technology companies with a strong email marketing strategy can use email as a powerful tool to nurture prospects, increase sales, and further relationships.
Read on to discover the ultimate email marketing guide for technology products so you can leverage the power of emails to get you the results you want.
1. Define Your Target Audience
If you don't know who your ideal audience is, you'll find it hard to build a list of engaged email subscribers.
Take the time to define your target audience - either from your existing data or by doing the research from scratch.
Keep in mind that your targeted audience might change depending on the type of email campaign you are running.
You need a targeted demographic for every marketing effort you make, so think through the specific list or segment your campaign is aimed at before proceeding with the rest of the steps.
2. Trade Your Best Content for Email Addresses
Your next step is to audit your assets and choose or develop content that you can then trade for your audience’s emails.
If you've been in business for any length of time, you likely already have a massive selection of content assets in your library.
You can choose the best content pieces that are most likely to capture your ideal audience’s interest and drive downloads.
Alternatively, you can develop new content assets to meet the needs of your email marketing campaign.
For instance, say your company offers cloud storage for enterprise businesses.
You might build an online course explaining how to use your product, post it on your site, and then restrict access to the course until after a website visitor enters their contact information.
Once they've done that, you can then automatically add them to your mailing list.
3. Personalize the Signup Process
These days, consumers expect brands to deliver relevant content, products, and services.
This goes for EVERY aspect of marketing - including emails.
That's why it's more important than ever to focus on personalizing the email sign-up process. It will help you segment your audience from day one.
An easy way to do this is by including optional personalization questions on your sign-up form.
For instance, if your tech company is focused on some type of localized job search, one of the questions on your opt-in form might be "What industry are you interested in working in?"
Depending on the new subscriber’s answer, you can then create a personalized email campaign with content and offers that are relevant to different individuals.
Pro Tip: Add questions to your “Welcome” email.
You can also add questions to the welcome email that you send out soon after someone signs up for your list.
This has the added benefit of assuring your customers that you are committed to personalizing their experience and providing them with the most relevant content and products.
You can then use the answers to your questions as a way to segment them into appropriate lists.
4. Send the Right Types of Emails
There are many different ways you can use emails in your tech company.
For instance, you might send emails to:
- Welcome your subscribers;
- Thank them for downloading your content;
- Share company news;
- Direct them to a new blog/social media post;
- Invite them to a webinar, virtual conference, or other events;
- Or to simply ask how things are going.
The types of emails you send will depend on who your customer is, and where they are in the customer sales process.
This means you have to properly segment your subscriber list AND personalize the emails you send so they can be more relevant to recipients.
The key here is to create a compelling experience with each email you send.
Whatever your goal is, you need to focus on getting subscribers to take the desired action
5. Send Emails at Optimal Times
Just as there are different emails to send in different situations, there’s a right time to send each email.
Studies show that there’s an optimal time for sending emails in the tech industry.
But, rather than infer general trends from best practices and big data, it's always a good idea to conduct your own research to find the day, time, and frequency that is ideal for your own audience.
Keep in mind that you must plan your emails so their timing is aligned with your subscriber’s place in the sales journey.
Regardless of optimal sending times, you shouldn't be sending the same email to someone who just purchased your product and someone else's been using it for months.
So make sure that your email progression should take into account where new sign-ups are in comparison to subscribers who have been on your list for weeks, months, or years.
6. Use Automation to Improve Efficiency
Marketing automation is crucial for companies in the tech industry to stay on top of, contact, and nurture their leads.
You need to choose the right marketing automation tool that will help you improve efficiency and build a predictable and sustainable revenue model.
Luckily, there are A LOT of tools and automated systems available today to help you collect leads, build a marketing pipeline, segment contacts, and market to them consistently (and intelligently).
Examples of marketing automation tools that can help you accomplish more in less time include Hubspot, Eloqua, and Marketo.
Reliable marketing automation is something that is particularly important in the technology space.
That’s because sales and presales cycles can last weeks or months (sometimes even years).
You need a marketing automation tool that will help you in nurturing, qualifying, and passing leads over to sales once they are finally ready.
The best tools will also help you gather data on subscriber behavior so you can build stronger email marketing campaigns.
7. Monitor Performance
The final step in creating a successful email marketing campaign is to track and monitor your performance so you can find ways to improve your results.
Keep track of the important email marketing metrics like:
- Open Rates
- Click-through Rates
- Conversion Rate
- Unsubscribe Rates
- Return on Investment (ROI)
This will help you identify any strategies that may be holding you back so you can make the necessary changes to increase your success.
The best email marketing platforms today come with insight and reporting features that make it easy to understand how the different aspects of your campaign are performing so you can continually optimize your email program.
You can compare your metrics to industry benchmarks, like the ones in the example below:
If you find your campaign falling short, you can then take the necessary steps to improve your results (such as removing non-engaged contacts from your opt-in list).
It’s recommended to use environmental scanning to look at your business holistically and understand if the issues are tied only to your email, or the way in which you depict your company publicly.
And don’t be afraid to experiment.
Trial and error through A/B testing different aspects of your emails will help you find ways to get the best return on your email program.
Examples of Highly Engaging Emails from Tech Companies
Below are a few examples from some of the top tech companies.
Use them as inspiration to help you develop your own highly engaging emails.
Example #1: Domain and Web Hosting Services
Example #2: ECommerce Store
Example #3: Graphic Design and Web Development
Tips to Grow Your Email List
Tip #1: Send super-personalized video emails that are guaranteed to increase your response rates
Tip #2: Choose responsive email templates with high deliverability. Most of the leading email tools offer predesigned, professional templates and drag-and-drop tools for customizing them easily.
Tip #3: Always include a call to action that drives users back to a specific area of your product or service. For instance, instead of saying "Get started now", offer a more concrete step, particularly if your onboarding is a bit more complex.
Conclusion
The tips outlined above will help you create an email marketing campaign with an impact.
Use them to improve your existing campaigns and inform your future campaigns so you can develop a comprehensive program for nurturing your prospects, building community, and growing your tech business.
Have you implemented any of these steps into your tech company’s email marketing strategy? If so, share your experience in the comments below!