How to approach email from a content marketing perspective

Many marketers see email as a fading, old-fashioned approach to marketing – if they don’t see it as dead altogether – and are instead choosing to focus their efforts on the more glamorous players on the scene: content marketing and social media.

But email is not dead. Not by a long shot. According to the Direct Marketing Association, email has an ROI of around 4,300% (no, that second “0” is not a typo!).

Savvy marketers are figuring out how to move their prospects from social conversation to conversion by incorporating the reach and impact of social media with  the incredible ROI of email. Want to find out how you can do the same? Read on!

By bringing social media and content marketing together with email, you can make your campaigns even more powerful, and get even better results.

Content marketing, at its core, is all about delivering value. With this in mind, you can begin to change your approach to the content in your email campaigns. Think of your emails as an opportunity for an exchange with the reader: your valuable content and information for their time and attention. This approach helps you build trust, thereby improving the chances of your subscribers continuing to open and read future emails.

When your email content is of quality, specific to your market niche, and valuable, it helps strengthen your relationship with your subscribers. Rather than focusing on selling them something, focus on writing great subject lines that compel them to actually open the email. Cultivate an authentic voice for your content. Approachable, informative, straightforward, and friendly are all good characteristics to aim for. And, above all, make it your mission to give your audience great content that they can apply to their jobs or their lives, or both! This encourages sharing and can help your content go viral (the Holy Grail of content marketing).

Follow these practices and, over time, you’ll see your open rates and click through rates increase. You’ll see more of your content being shared across platforms (email, social, etc.). And you’ll see an increase in referrals, conversions and revenue.

Have you tried incorporating content marketing techniques into your emails? How has it worked out for you? Let us know below!