3 Proven Steps To Follow When Creating A Marketing Campaign With ConvergeHub

If you are like many of our ConvergeHub CRM customers, you are in the thick of developing and executing numerous marketing campaigns at once, it is natural you must be using different forms of contents for a variety of selling channels to address your prospects and customers. However, if you are not aware in the very first place at what you are aiming at, how is it possible for you to measure whether you are hitting the right goals? Therefore, just as a pilot works through a pre-flight checklist before hitting the runway, similarly, every marketer should adhere to these three pivotal steps when creating and executing marketing campaigns to measure its goals.

If you are like many of our ConvergeHub CRM customers, you are in the thick of developing and executing numerous marketing campaigns at once, it is natural you must be using different forms of contents for a variety of selling channels to address your prospects and customers.

In a recent marketing event where we were discussing about measuring Marketing, a participant asked for a list of metrics that can be used to measure the campaign’s performance.

CRM is used for email marketing 60% of the time for small businesses- MarketingCharts Click To Tweet

However, if you are not aware in the very first place at what you are aiming at, how is it possible for you to measure whether you are hitting the right goals?
Therefore, just as a pilot works through a pre-flight checklist before hitting the runway, similarly, every marketer should adhere to these three pivotal steps when creating and executing marketing campaigns to measure its goals.

  1. Know Where You Are Aiming

There is no marketing organization that has unlimited resources. Hence, every marketing campaign must serve a clearly defined specific purpose that will bring a positive impact on their business. Therefore, before creating any campaign, you must recognize what the campaign is expected to impact and how this impact can be measured using your easy to use CRM software.

In other words, do not execute any campaign if its business outcome is not well-defined in advance.

  1. Establish Performance Targets Before You Fire

Next, armed with a solid business outcome, your subsequent step is to set each campaign’s performance targets, which can be illustrated as a specific goal the campaign will accomplish within a set period of time.

Executing on time and within (or under) budget is not the performance target. Rather, create measurable and relevant performance targets that you want to relate to your business needs, which you are trying to move.

For example, if your desired business outcome is related to expanding your market share among a particular customer segment, or acquire a specific set of customers in a new market, your performance target for this campaign (taking into consideration the buying cycle that has been deployed)  may consist of a certain number of inquiries, appointments, and quote requests.

Nevertheless, whatever be the performance target, the target should be defined in advance, so that all can understand what result the campaign is expected to bring. It is only by pre-setting your campaign’s performance targets you can understand if your aims are viable and true.

Therefore if you are using a best small and medium business CRM software like ConvergeHub and you do understand the importance of sales force automation, be sure that you remember to incorporate your performance targets before firing your campaigns.

  1. Plan How to Measure Your Results

Measurements cannot remain as an afterthought. Your performance targets and business outcome provide insights in what data you will require to measure your campaign’s performance, and how you will strategize to manage that captured data, in addition to what analytic parameters you will apply on that info.

Therefore, to apply any cloud-based marketing technology to support your measurement reports, like an easy to use CRM, you need to do your planning in advance, put your elements in place, and thereafter test your performance before you hit the “send” button. Since this the only way by which you can truly determine whether your campaigns are moving the needle when you view their analytic reports.

Takeaway

Following this above-stated process for each of your campaigns will do more than just enable you to measure the success of your campaign, but it will also ensure that each campaign is linked to a business outcome and therefore help you to find out the expenses the campaign will incur accurately.

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As per our knowledge, most ConvergeHub CRM users follow this process during budgeting and marketing planning, for this actions can be used to justify your budget, renegotiating goal, and for applying bonus components for your sales and marketing teams.

3 Types Of Emails Which You Should Automate with Your CRM

Email automation is the perfect way to educate and move your leads, prospects, and customers through your sales funnel, with further wasting any more time. In a recent study done on sales, it shows that sales reps spend more than half of their time at the office doing administrative CRM works and another 29% of their time searching and creating contents to pitch their products and services, which eventually leaves them with just one-third time for actually building a relationship and achieving winning businesses.

Chances are there that your sales team actually spends less time than they should spend for selling your products and services. In a recent study done on sales, it shows that sales reps spend more than half of their time at the office doing administrative CRM works and another 29% of their time searching and creating contents to pitch their products and services, which eventually leaves them with just one-third time for actually building a relationship and achieving winning businesses.

Now, to ensure that your sales team can utilize more of their time in closing deals, it is important that you must leverage your Customer Relationship Management system. You should understand that CRM is just not the software used for tracking and managing relationships, but it is also an extra pair of hands in your office for all those things (apart from selling) that your sales need, but should not have to do once they implement a CRM platform.

One of the best CRM tools that fall in this category is email automation. Automating emails shaves down the prolonged numbers of hours that your reps would have otherwise spent on customizing emails and remembering to send them on time.
Here are three most important email campaigns that you can automate with a CRM to keep your customers engaged without even bothering for your constant manual efforts:

1. Welcome Emails

Welcome emails are meant for new subscribers and lead to introduce them to your brand. Creating and automating welcome emails can generate substantial ROI, as studies have proved that welcome emails are viewed three times more by subscribers than other subsequent promotional emails. Moreover welcome emails help in educating your prospects and are likely to weed out any non-interested parties through the unsubscribe link.

These are few points you should remember while sending your welcome emails:

  • Introduce prospects and leads to your brand’s products and services
  • Prepare your prospects and leads into buying your products or services
  • Encourage your leads and prospects to connect with your brand through other channels and opportunities
  • Provide your leads and prospects with basic incentives to buy your products or services

2. Lead Nurturing Emails

Lead nurturing with emails can be really tricky. For without an organized process, it is easy to find opportunities slipping through the cracks that can eventually inundate your leads with too little or too much communication from your side. Therefore, automate your lead nurturing process through email campaigns without putting too much pressure on your leads.

Here are certain things you can do in your lead nurturing emails:

  • Educate your leads and prospects what your brand is capable of doing for them
  • Tell them a story about your brand and what sets your products and services apart from the competition
  • Occasionally, refer leads to your website or special landing pages for availing seasonal discounts and offers

3. Customer retention Emails

According to a study done by Forrester Research, it has been found that existing customers spend 69% more than new customers. So putting brakes on communication after the primary sales would definitely be a costly mistake. Therefore, after you have made a sale, start an automated email campaign with your customers. Keep them in the loop with subsequent offers on your new and other products and services.

These are few points you should remember while sending your customer retention emails:

  • Thank your customer for their businesses with your brand
  • Let them know when their purchases will arrive or how they can activate your services
  • Check to see how much they are satisfied with their purchase
  • Check to see if they need any further help regarding your products and services
  • Request a review by sending a survey form tailored to your customer’s interests
  • Offer interesting contents as a ‘gift’ to your purchasers without pitching only on your brand

Now that you know how much a CRM can help you, you should also understand equally that CRM cannot replace the natural and earned skills of your sales representatives. Hence, use your CRM to free up your sales team’s time and help them to do what they are hired for.

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Email automation is the perfect way to educate and move your leads, prospects, and customers through your sales funnel, without further wasting any more time.

4 Most Essential Do and Don’t of Email Marketing

According to market research data, nearly more than half of the global population nowadays uses emails, which suggests that it is possible for you to market your products and services to a potentially huge audience using email-marketing strategies. Therefore, if you want to make your email marketing campaigns a hit and more effective, then you must keep these following 4 tips in mind before you push the “Send” button.

Email Marketing might seem to be the best option that we have in this world of smartphones, apps, and social media that we live in, for if email marketing had not worked, then companies would not have used it. Nor would have they spent so much effort and time on getting it just right for their selected audiences.

According to market research data, nearly more than half of the global population nowadays uses emails, which suggests that it is possible for you to market your products and services to a potentially huge audience using email-marketing strategies.

However, it is also important that you must understand how you should design your email marketing campaign so that it bypasses the usual instinct that people have to hit the “Delete” button, especially when they realize that someone is to trying to sell them something undesirable against their will.

Therefore, if you want to make your email marketing campaigns a hit and more effective, then you must keep these following 4 tips in mind before you push the “Send” button:

1. Provide a Snappy Subject Line

The most important part of an email marketing campaign is its subject line. For, it is the subject line of an email, which determines whether someone will open your message or send it straight into the trash, unseen. Therefore, make the subject line of your emails clear and concise, and ensure that the verbiage in the subject line does not sound like an advertisement. Remember, if the subject line even has a whiff of spam about it, it will be deleted.

In addition, try to use few phrases similar in all your subject lines every time you send out new emails. This is because, if your customers are used to looking for a particular phrase, then when they see a new message in their inbox, they will know where it is from right away, instead of deleting the email for being unfamiliar.

2. Do not rely on images

Although it is necessary that you must include images in your email marketing templates, you should also know that images do not always get displayed automatically or correctly. Hence, before you send your email campaigns, make sure that you have sufficient text description to make your message clear, just in case your pretty picture does not show up.

Use images that load quickly, and choose the ones that will display on the greatest number of devices. Doing this will assure you that it will not matter if someone is checking their email on their phone, tablet or desktop.

Uploading optimized images helps your viewers to see the emails as you intended it to be, instead of seeing them as truncated and missing pieces.

3. Do include unsubscribe information and your physical address

While it may seem like you are setting yourself up for failure, but you must always include a link to unsubscribe from your email-marketing list as well as your physical address in all your emails. This is because, without the elements, your message will be considered as spam, and will be directly violating the federal law. So make sure everyone who receives your messages know how they can stop receiving them, and make this endeavor a straightforward process. Remember, even if some of the viewers of your email leave for now, if they exist easily, that will surely give them a positive impression of your brand.

4. Stop sending messages no one wants

None of us wants to receive marketing promotions, we did not ask for, which is particularly true when it comes to emails. Hence, make sure that you only send messages to people who have shown their interest in your company. Find people who want further communication from you and avoid digit cold calling, for it seldom works.

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Now that you have understood the basics dos and don’ts of email marketing, if you have any further suggestions, we would be happy to learn about them in the comment box below.

How To Create Click-Bait Newsletters That Make Your Readers Want More

Many of us think that we know how to create click-bait newsletter, as we assume it very simple. However, think again about the number of bland newsletters that we see in our email’s inbox every day. Following these best practices while sending email newsletters will guarantee that your subscribers will actually open and read the newsletters the moment it reaches their mailbox.

Many of us think that we know how to create click-bait newsletter, as we assume it very simple. However, think again about the number of bland newsletters that we see in our email’s inbox every day.

Following these best practices while sending email newsletters will guarantee that your subscribers will actually open and read the newsletters the moment it reaches their mailbox.

  1. Find out if you really need to write a newsletter

Ask yourself before you decide upon writing a newsletter whether you are doing so because you have relevant content and information to share with your audience or if you just want to post a newsletter because you want to follow what others are doing online. If your answer is affirmative for the first question, then proceed. However, make sure that you have set clear and measurable objectives before emailing your content. Do you want your newsletter to close more deals, drive more leads, or boost retention? Understanding what you want to achieve will definitely help you to focus your efforts, measure success and set goals for your newsletter email campaigns.

  1. Set expectations

Do your subscribers know what they are signing up for? Be absolutely clear to your audience as to what they will be receiving from you. Is it special discount coupons, an early view of your new products and services, inspirational blogs, or how-to information? Hence, make sure you are meeting your email recipient’s expectations so that you do not bombard them with contents that they do not want.

It is also wise to let your email recipients know how often they will hear from you. Once a month? Once a week? Establish a routine cadence with your subscribers and stick to your plan. Remember your subscribers shared their email addresses only because they trust your brand. Abusing that trust will soon enough end up all your emails in a spam folder or you will register a very high unsubscribe rate.

  1. Keep balanced content

Unless you have set a predefined expectation, a good thumb rule for any newsletter contents is 10% promotional and 90% educational. This allows room for a focused call to action, however, you must primarily make sure that a large majority of your content is meant to serve your customer first.

  1. Stick to your brand

Like other communication verbiages, your newsletter should also adhere to your brand’s standards for voice, tone, and design. Although you can also at times write just for fun since users who have subscribed to your newsletter are the ones who are most engaged with your brand and are so ready to hear something different from you occasionally.

  1. Think mobile first

It has been found in a research done by Litmus “54% of emails are now opened on a mobile device”. Moreover, the number is growing every day. So get your email templates optimized for mobile devices.

This means, keep your content limited to fit on a mobile screen. Make sure that your CTA buttons are large enough to tap. Additionally, limit the image size in your newsletters to avoid lagging load time.

  1. Make your newsletters exclusive

Remember your newsletter subscribers are likely to be some of your most engaging brand fans. Hence, reward your subscribers with exclusive and early access contents.

  1. Track, test, and refine your newsletter

Measure what is working well and what needs improvement by going back to the goals you defined to yourself at the beginning of your email campaign. If you find that, your goals are met, go ahead, and set a higher one. If not, then question yourself why and keep on testing and tweaking your newsletter’s images, templates, contents and subject line till it meets your goals.

It is beyond any doubt that newsletters are a great way for staying connected with your prospects, leads, and customers. So go ahead and start building an exceptional email journey with the help of your CRM right today.

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See Who Opens Your Email With ConvergeHub (The #1 CRM for Small and Medium Businesses)

We all know being in sales is not always an easy job. Nevertheless, users of ConvergeHub are equipped with the right tools, which help you to start your day guiding you through your most pressing tasks. Taking a step further, how would you feel if you can also see who has opened your emails? ConvergeHub email tracking and delivery status update keep you informed on all emails sent from ConvergeHub, CRM for Small Businesses.

We all know being in sales is not always an easy job. Nevertheless, users of ConvergeHub are equipped with the right tools, which help you to start your day guiding you through your most pressing tasks.
Taking a step further, how would you feel if you can also see who has opened your emails?

ConvergeHub email tracking and delivery status update keep you informed on all emails sent from ConvergeHub, CRM for Small Businesses.

Once your customers have opened the email, using ConvergeHub you will be able to see how many of them have viewed the email.

Pretty neat, right?

Using ConvergeHub CRM, once you know your engaged prospects who have interacted with your email message, you can easily interact with them for cross-sell or up-sell activities.

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So connect your email account to ConvergeHub now and start tracking your emails to customers. With email tracking, we have left behind those days when you had to speculate if your customers are opening the emails, you have sent to them.

Every email in ConvergeHub has an open and delivery status:

Sent/Attempted: Total number of email sent to recipients.

Viewed:  Number of recipients that opened the email any number of times.

Opted Out: User has chosen not to receive any promotional emails.

Bounce/Invalid: The total emails sent that could not be effectively delivered to the recipient’s inbox.

Click-thru Link: The number of email recipients who clicked on one or more links contained in a given email.

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Hope you find these email statuses helpful. Happy Selling!