Email Marketing Tutorial

Day 5: Periodically Use Teasers in Subject Lines and Email Copy 

Sometimes, using curiosity and intrigue can be leveraged to your advantage. You don’t want to make this habit in every single email because it gets old. Marketers who over-use vague curiosity as a clickthrough strategy time after time will see their subscriber numbers dwindle. 

The recipient is usually bored of the strategy, rolling their eyes, and wondering why you don’t just get to the point. However, every once in awhile, such as once a month, you may want to use this tactic where your subject makes them open it to find out more, and your copy requires them to click through to see the details of what you are hinting about or teasing them with. 

Let’s use an example in online marketing. Your subject might say something like, “I didn’t know this list building strategy was possible…” It’s enough so that it tells the recipient basically what the topic is (list building) but the curiosity comes in when they read your disbelief about the strategy. 

This will usually get you the open for the email. Next, you may want to get a clickthrough to a sales page. You can start off your email talking about how you are used to seeing the same old strategies used in list building, and you didn’t believe there was anything new for you to learn. 

Then, you happened to stumble upon a product that helped a certain marketer gain 1,000 subscribers in one week. Instead of detailing the benefits and features of the product, which you would often do in a product review, you will simply have a call to action such as, “Click here to see how he did it.” 

At this point, you have gotten a subscriber to open the email and piqued their curiosity enough so that they will click through on the link to see what is being sold. From that point on, it is up to the vendor to convert the visitor into a sale where you will earn a commission. 

It’s important for you to only use the strategy with vendors and products that you truly believe in and that you know have a high level of conversion and quality. You should never use this tactic with subpar products or shady vendors, because it will reflect poorly on you and they will either unsubscribe or simply not trust any of your recommendations in the future.

Day 6: Send Your Subscribers a Discount Perk the Public Can’t Get 

Being a subscriber to a marketer‘s list should come with benefits that the general public does not receive. One thing that is very important to subscribers is getting a good deal on a product. 

Whether it’s a tool like a plug-in, a software such as a page builder, a course that teaches them something, or a readymade pack of content, saving money is a top priority for many consumers.

The first thing you can do is give subscribers a discount to your own products. It doesn’t have to be an enormous amount such as 95% off. Instead, you can give them something like a 20% discount as a thank you for signing up to your list and staying with you. 

Another thing you want to do is secure deals for them with other vendors that you promote for as an affiliate. As long as the product is relevant to their needs, it will be very helpful if you can secure a deal that helps them save money or give them access to something that may not even be on the market any longer. 

For example, there are many private label rights sellers who will have several launches of content for the public, but then bundle up a bunch of products for a private deal just for you.

Of course, the bigger your list and the more experienced and successful you are as an affiliate, the better the deal you will be able to secure for your subscribers. But even a small discount in the beginning, such as making sure the product is returned to its launch pricing well after the launch for them, will be much appreciated by your subscribers.

Day 7: Deliver a Strong Call to Action in Every Email 

Earlier, we mentioned in passing how you should end your template with a call to action. This should be in every section of your email, not just at the very end. For example, if you include a promotion to a product, you want to specifically tell them to grab the product while it’s discounted, and make sure they enter a coupon code. 

These are specific action steps they know to take in that moment. In the section where you provide helpful tips to assist them in their journey, the value of the advice is not enough. 

You want to give them specific details about what they need to do next after they close your email. For example, you might have sent them an email about five ways to create an effective vision board.

At the end of your tip section, tell them to make a decision tonight about whether or not they want a digital vision board or a tangible one, and to spend the next five days building a vision board that will help them stick to and achieve their goals. 

You can even invite them to share the end result with you, which helps them feel supported in the activity. They need to know that you are interested in their success and there to guide them along the way.

Day 8: Email a Personal Connection Story

 This is a hard one for many marketers to do until they feel confident in their abilities as a niche leader. This is a great tactic to use if you are in the niche because you have a personal connection to it, such as a struggle that you have overcome or a goal that you have achieved that they are now working on themselves.

On this day, do you want to reserve your email for a personal sharing moment where you let your subscribers get to know you more. They need to see that you get them, that you know where they’re coming from, and that you are there to help. 

There is no better way to do that than to let them know you were once in their shoes. This is where you get transparent about why you are in this niche. They should be able to feel comfortable approaching you after this email because you have shared a part of your story that many refuse to do. 

This can be anything from how you once were unable to pay your bills, parenting or relationship mistakes that you made, health issues you dealt with, etc. As long as it is relevant to the niche topic, it will help your subscribers feel less alone in their journey and less embarrassed by the mishaps they’ve had.

Day 9: Work on Optimizing Your Preview Space 

Whenever you receive an email in your inbox, you immediately see the subject line in bold. After that, you see a preview, also known as a pre-header, which shows you how the email starts off. 

This is a very strategic space you can use to your advantage to make people want to open the email to see what else you have to say. If you want to see how this is done, go to your inbox and look at the emails others are sending to you. 

You can pique their curiosity or showcase some sense of urgency, such as using wording like, “75% Off Today Only!” Consider this space similar to another headline that you will use in your email.

This is one reason why many marketers sign up to their competitors’ email lists, along with other successful email marketers in general. You can watch the strategies they use in their preview area to see what worked on you or what you feel may work with your subscribers. 

The wording you use will depend on the list you are contacting. For example, if you are contacting a list of your affiliates, then you might have a preview that says, “Earn up to $175 per sale.” 

This is enough to get them to open the email and see if the product launch is relevant and a good fit for their list, because all affiliates want to earn up to $175 per sale. However, a phrase such as, “Earn 50% Commissions,” may not be as effective because the product might be a $12 price point.

Day 10: Don’t Be Afraid to Monetize Your Emails 

Monetization is an integral part of your online success. Whether you’re doing it in your blog or in emails, your goal is to make money from the value you provide to the customer. 

If you are not providing value, but instead are simply pushing products, then you don’t stand to get the same reaction to your monetization efforts as someone who is there to serve their audience.

Usually, there are two ways you can monetize your list. The first is by promoting your own products and services. Regardless of what it is you’re selling, as long as it is a good fit for your list, they will appreciate finding out about it. 

You can send them promotions for new launches of products as well as existing products you have on the market if you feel it’s time to mention them again or you want to offer a special deal to your subscribers.

You can also monetize your list by promoting others as an affiliate marketer. There are some rules about promoting via email. For example, you aren’t supposed to send your Amazon Associate links in an email autoresponder. 

They prefer them to be on your blog or social media where they are public.  However, you can send links to other tangible platforms as well as many different digital platforms. You can link out using a simple hyperlink or by linking an image, such as a product image, in your email that goes directly to the product.

Depending on how long your subscribers prefer your emails, which is something you will be able to determine when you begin analyzing the statistical data, you may or may not be able to give all of the benefits and features of a product within your email.

Instead, you may only be able to touch on the many benefits it provides before sending the subscriber on to the other vendor’s website. That way, they can see the list of features for themselves. 

There’s a difference between you telling them how products will benefit them and a sales page making those claims. If you have gained their trust, they will not need to rely on the reputation of the vendor and take a risk with their purchase.

Day 11: Improve Time Management and Productivity By Automating Your Email 

Part of your email marketing tasks will be to send out your communications as often as you have determined works for your list. There are some people who log in early in the morning at the beginning of their day to send out an email to their subscribers. 

However, you can easily automate this process to free up your time so that you can take care of other things in your business. You might want to make a weekly email queuing up strategy. 

For example, on a calendar, a week usually starts on Sunday. So you might plan to queue up your weekly emails on Saturday for the following Sunday through Saturday. If you only work Mondays through Fridays, then you can spend Fridays automating your emails to go out the following week. 

Your task for that day might start with thinking of several different personalization stories to start the emails with. You might add things about plans you have for the week outside of work, like going to dinner with your best friend or even taking a vacation. 

Then you can go out and gather all of the promotions you want to create for the week. Open up a tab in your browser for each of the JV (joint venture) pages and have them ready when you need to pull the details for your email. 

Next, put together a tip or value-based section of your email for each of the days you plan to email your subscribers. You might do a series each week, such as 5 Ways to Earn More Money, where each day highlights a new strategy. 

You can either write these from scratch or use readymade content like private label rights that are sold as articles or emails you can queue up as your own. Tweak them with your own personalization whenever possible.

Day 12: Start Split Testing Your Strategies

 If you really want to improve your email marketing efforts, learn how to split test your emails. The exact instructions will vary, depending on the autoresponder system you use, but the premise is the same. 

This is known as A/B testing, where half of your recipients get the A version of your email and the other half get the B version. This will tell you which version is getting the most opens, the most clicks or other types of engagement, and ultimately, the most sales if that is your goal. 

You can split test many different things in your emails. For example, you might have a different subject line or strategy of promotion inside (a short teaser versus in-depth review, for instance). 

You can split test emails with or without an image inside. You can even split test quirky things like using an emoji in the subject line or in the body of the email itself. The idea is to get a better understanding of what your subscribers want from you. 

Test your preview area to see what gets more people to open your email. Split test the tone and style, if you’re still not sure of how you want to present yourself, and split test the call to actions you’re using. 

One thing you need to know, though about split testing. You only test one element at a time. This is not where you’ll test two completely different emails, because then you won’t know what made the difference. It might have been the subject line or the preview, but you won’t know if you change too much at once.

Day 13: What to Do When You Run Out of Email Ideas 

Many email marketers run out of ideas quickly and don’t know what they should be sending to their subscribers. No matter which niche you are in, you will be able to find an endless supply of topic with a little bit of simple online research. 

All you have to do is start with a mind map of your niche so that you can keep an eye on different areas for talking points. For example, online marketing is a broad umbrella of the niche. 

If you were to make a mind map of it, you would have segments that are offshoots of that main topic for things like building a list, creating info products, affiliate marketing, and more. 

Once you have a mind map, you will be able to quickly and easily zero in on new topics that you can discuss with your subscribers on a regular basis. You may even want to have a schedule in place so that the discussions are being rotated and your subscribers are always getting something different. 

For example, you might talk about choosing a niche on Monday, followed by affiliate marketing on Tuesday, info product development on Wednesday, list building on Thursday, and monetization on Friday. 

You can scour the Internet on your own by using search engines paired with keyword research tools that give you an idea of how consumers are searching for topics in your niche. 

You can also visit forums for your niche topic and see what people are discussing. Social networking sites and platforms can be used in the same way. You will be able to see what people are struggling with and address these issues with your subscribers.

Day 14: Weave Some Powerful Copy Words Into Your Emails 

One thing you want to start doing in your emails is experimenting with different power words that you can use in your copy. Sometimes, it can feel as if you are hyping things up a little too much, but these are also words that are proven to convert well with consumers. 

There are endless lists online for power words that you can use in your online copy, including your emails. For example, there are certain words that are specific to creating a sense of urgency. 

These might be phrases like ends soon, last chance, and expiring today. If you were needing to evoke feelings of trust with your subscriber, you might use power words such as no obligation, risk free, or studies show. 

Some of the most common power words you will see being used in copy for sales letters as well as emails are guarantee, free, bestseller, and more. They will use words to describe products like fastest, brand new, and so on.

Day 15: Learn How to Resend to Users Who Don’t Open Your Emails 

In order to have an effective email marketing campaign, you want to keep an eye on subscribers who have not opened your email. Sometimes, this is an issue of deliverability where the email happened to get last online and didn’t make it to your subscriber. 

However, they may have quickly gone through their inbox and deleted a bunch of communications, so resending that message could result in an open and clickthrough. Basically, you will simply go to the emails that you have sent and choose to resend it to the segment of subscribers who did not open it on the first round. 

That way, you’re not resending it to everyone again, including those who did open and read your email, but only to those who missed it the first time. You don’t want to do this with every single email you send out, but if you have something important that you feel will convert well for your list, you may want to try it at that time.

Day 16: See How a Several-Part Email Series Works with Readers 

Another strategy you may want to use in your e-mail marketing efforts is to create a series that will be released to your subscribers over the course of a few days. Sometimes, it can even be a two part email series. 

All you have to do is use this strategy whenever you want to create some sort of mystery that will be solved in a subsequent email. Your first email will need to end in some sort of cliffhanger so that the subscriber wants to open the second email the following day. 

Again, you don’t want to use this type of strategy on a regular basis. But from time to time, it can keep things interesting by building this suspense for your customers and then delivering on the promise to show them something interesting that was well worth the wait.

Day 17: Survey Your Subscribers’ Needs

 Even though your subscribers found you online somewhere and chose to opt into your list, it doesn’t mean you know what all of their needs are. You can get an idea based on the content they are engaging with or the fact that they signed up for a free gift on a certain topic. 

However, if you want to show your subscribers that you truly care about catering to their needs and stepping up to serve them, you will want to do something to extract more information from them. 

In your welcome email, you would have invited them to contact you if they have any questions or concerns. You also want to reiterate that from time to time so that the invitation is stated again and again until they feel comfortable with it. 

Another thing you can do is create a survey using an online tool like SurveyMonkey. here, you can ask a series of questions and have them choose from a multiple choice answer sheet or allow them to enter a comment of their own. 

It’s not enough for you to survey your subscribers to show that you care. This information will definitely be good for you to use when crafting blog posts, future emails, and even info products. 

But you also want to take their responses and do something with it that will help them directly. For example, if you spot a pattern about the biggest pain point your subscribers have in your niche, you can create an info product that addresses it, and make sure they know it is a result of your survey so that they know you are listening to their needs.

Day 18: Test Text Email Versus Newsletter Format 

Another thing you want to do in your email marketing efforts is not solely rely on text emails. Whenever you are designing your emails, you will notice that you can choose between plain text and HTML versions. 

You don’t want to make the process too confusing for you. Plain text emails convert fine, as long as the information within it is good. But you can also work with HTML designs to create a different look like more of a newsletter layout.

Day 19: Try Personalization and Brevity in Your Subject Lines 

Whenever you are sitting down to queue up your emails, you may want to periodically insert the personalized code into your subject line. For example instead of the subject of the email saying, “New List Building Technique,” you can try something like, “John, have you tried this list building technique?” 

In order to get their first name in the subject line, you would simply use the same code that you would in the body of the email: firstname_fix. One thing this does is make people assume, at first glance, that this is an email coming from a friend (which you hope to have them see you as over time). 

Another thing you may want to do when it comes to subject lines is tighten up the wording so that it is as short as possible. Instead of a subject that is long that says, “Here’s a New List Building Technique You Need to Know,” try something like, “List Building Shocker!”

Day 20: Remember the WIIFM Mindset of Subscribers 

With every email that you send out, always keep in mind that the recipients of your communications have a mindset known as WIIFM – “What’s in it for me?” This is human nature, and you do this yourself whenever you are being asked to consider purchasing something or taking some sort of action. 

Many people forget that their wording will make a big difference in how the information is being presented. For example, you don’t want to say, “I just released a new tool for $17” but instead say, “You can free up an hour every day using this 60 second tool that does the job for you.” 

The new language shows the benefit the subscriber will get if they follow through with their purchase of the product whereas the original wording was all about you and what you created.

Day 21: Work on Reengaging Stagnant Subscribers 

From time to time, you will have subscribers that stay on your list, but don’t engage with you anymore. They may be a lost cause, or you may be able to re-engage with them. You will be able to see which subscribers have become inactive, and then make a determination if they are worth keeping on your list or if you need to scrub them. 

Keep in mind that you are paying for the level of subscriber numbers you have. So if you have a large number of inactive users, it may be worth running a re-engagement campaign so that you can see if they are worth saving. 

First, you need to know why they are not opening your emails anymore. You don’t want to directly ask them why they have become distant from you. This is not something that you need to take personally because it may be that their priorities or needs have simply changed. 

You can create a segment of subscribers who have not been interacting with your emails anymore and send them an email that you spend time creating with the best subject and preview copy possible. 

Make sure you remove people who opened your email from your inactive subscriber list so that you don’t accidentally delete them at a later date. Also, make note of what worked in reengaging that particular target audience so that you can do more of the same with your emails.

Day 22: Send Something to Weed Out Your Non Audience 

There are times when you will realize certain subscribers on your list are nothing more than tire kickers. They got on your list because of your free gift, and they are only sticking around for additional freebies you are willing to hand out to subscribers. 

These are known as bad leads. You don’t want to have freebie seekers who constantly complain whenever anything has a price point attached to it. These are people you can segment off of your main list or delete if they are dragging your deliverability. 

Sometimes, you can use a very blunt approach in making sure your list knows what you will and won’t be providing as a niche leader. For example, if certain subscribers are asking you to engage in unethical behavior or scams, you can put your foot down so that those who are interested in this type of thing will unsubscribe.

Day 23: Watch Your Quirkiness 

As an email marketer, you need to set yourself apart from the rest of your competition. There are many different ways you can do this from the slants and tones of the product you deliver to the simple language or quirkiness you provide that they appreciate. 

However, sometimes you can take it a little too far. There’s a big debate about whether or not you should use cuss words in your email marketing. As a rule of thumb, it’s probably not good to do this even if it’s part of your everyday language. 

While you don’t want to censor yourself, keep in mind that some people may be sitting there opening their email next to their impressionable child and they don’t want to see a barrage of F words on their screen. 

There are other ways that your quirkiness can get you into hot water. For example, you may have started off as a bold and blunt marketer who isn’t afraid to say what everyone’s thinking. 

However, this kind of behavior may get you in a lot of online spats with other marketers. If you become a negative influence that is always involved in online battles and discussing it with your subscribers, they may unsubscribe just to get away from the negativity.

Day 24: Send a Promo Email That’s Heavy on Benefits 

Whenever you are sending an email that promotes a product, and you want to watch the length of your communication, make sure you go white on the features of the product and heavy on the benefits the buyers will receive. 

This has been mentioned in passing before, but it’s worth noting that today you need to practice this task by creating a product review to send to your subscriber list that solely touches on the benefits they will get by using a certain product. 

After you have created the email, go back and make sure you are not focused on the features of the product, which might include things like the length of the PDF or video course, price point, outline and more.

Day 25: Create Gated Subscribers Only Content

Subscribers are always wanting exclusive deals and access to things others don’t get. You want to always be working on some sort of gated content that only your subscribers can access with a password or private link.

For example comment you can create a case study behind closed doors where the general public lands on your blog and is unable to read a word because I need a password – and only your subscribers have that word.

You can also upload gated content too social networking sites like YouTube. You can make the video private to the general public, and only accessible by your loyal subscribers.

You can even create downloadable material such as templates or checklists that you provide to them, which are not on sale or available anywhere else to people who are not on your list.

Day 26: Don’t Forget the Post Script! 

The post script is very important whenever you are writing copy. Usually, marketers will focus on this at the bottom of a sales letter where they use a double post script: P.S. and P.P.S. 

This is where they often re-emphasize the urgency and the benefits of the product briefly so that those who scroll straight to the post script will see a summary of what they need to know. 

But you can do the same in your email if you want to. Postscript literally means written after, so it’s an afterthought that you have that you want to either emphasize about what you wrote previously, or add a new thought for them to consider.

Day 27: Embed Images and Videos in Your Emails 

While text emails are well received among consumers, you can enhance your experience for the subscriber by inserting images and embedding videos so that your recipients will have a multimedia email hit their inbox. 

This is great because the world is split on which media format they prefer most. Some people love to absorb information by reading it because they can go at their own pace, while others enjoy watching a video or listening to it as they multitask so that they don’t have to read long blocks of text.

Day 28: See If Segmenting Your List Can Help with Conversions  

Segmenting a list has been mentioned before in this report. But let’s talk about it a little differently this time. You can segment your list not just so you can resend a message, but do it based on other factors. 

For example, you segment people on your list based on the level of engagement they have with you, such as whether or not they are a buyer of your previous products. You can also segment them based on what stage of the funnel they are in, if you want to move them from one list to another. 

You can also segment people based on how they arrived on your list. For example, you may have a different list for those who sign up through Facebook then you do for those who sign up through TikTok. 

Sometimes, knowing where the list originated can help you create content that caters to their needs better. You might know the media format there used to or the style in which they like to learn.

Day 29: Take Your Autoresponder Data and Analyze It 

If you are not looking at the data provided to you by your email autoresponder, you are wasting your time with email marketing. This is a task you need to do periodically, whether it’s daily or monthly. 

You will be able to see things such as what rate your emails are opened at. You want your e-mail open right to be at least 20% or more, and you always want to be working at improving that number. 

You also want to look at the click throughs you received in your emails. For example, you may have a plain hyperlink that got very little click-throughs, but the place where you hyperlinked the name of the product received better stats. 

The analytical data will also tell you what time your subscribers are most responsive to your emails. That maybe at 10:00 o’clock in the morning or it could be 8:00 PM at night. Having insight into the behaviors of your subscribers it will help you level up as an email marketer.

Day 30: Clean Up Your List to Maintain Its Effectiveness

It seems odd to talk about intentionally deleting people off of your email list, but if you want your autoresponder to work better for you, you will need to do this on a regular basis.

First and foremost, always make it easy for people to unsubscribe from your list. You’re not doing yourself any favors by being sneaky and failing to allow them to opt out easily. In fact, you could be hurting your success.

They could be marking your emails as spam or simply deleting them as unopened whenever they hit their inbox. By cleaning up your list and deleting people who are inactive or whose emails are continually bouncing, you will enjoy a higher deliverability rate with your email autoresponder.

Not only does the autoresponder company view it unfavorably whenever you don’t have a responsive list, but Internet service providers can send your emails to spam folders as well.

You may be hesitant to dwindle your list down in numbers, but you will be making it more effective. It’s better to have a small, high converting list than it is to have a large one that doesn’t perform well for you.

Check to see who is inactive and try to re-engage these individuals as mentioned before. If that doesn’t work, you can try one more time before finally cleaning them off of your list.

If they really want to receive emails from you again, they can resubscribe on your lead magnet page. And if you learn to go above and beyond in providing value, they won’t be in danger of being inactive in the first place.