The purpose of marketing is to persuade your intended prospect to act. This could be through a click on a call-to-action, booking a call with sales, filling in a form, or anything that would relevantly be measured as a Key Performance Indicator (KPI).
In general, marketing through email has seen huge growth over the years. And drafting persuasive email marketing content is critical to get your audience to engage with your message. This is twice as important when your focus is on cold email lead generation.
Here’s a list of things you need to write persuasive email marketing content, whether it be for a cold or opted-in list.
Persuasive Email Marketing: 6 Tips to Focus On
Tip 1: Be Grammatically Correct
To uphold the integrity of your brand, position yourself as reputable, and start off on the right foot, you need to make sure that your email is written grammatically correct. This will ensure you’re giving yourself the best chance at a strong first impression.
We get busy, I know. But there are several ‘spam’ emails out there where the time isn’t taken to proof an email message. These get flagged as spam due to spelling mistakes in company names, non-capitalized letters at the beginning of sentences, misspelled words, incorrect grammar, etc. Not only could this get flagged as spam before it even makes it to the inbox, but you risk your recipient marketing it as spam. If you didn’t invest the time to edit and proof a message for spelling and grammar errors, then why should someone take the time to read it.
Before you dive deeper into specifics of persuasive email marketing, make sure the content you’ve written is up to par.
Tip 2: Perfect Your Formatting
When building persuasive email marketing, it’s not just about what’s written. How your email looks, matters. If your template is confusing and unclear, you won’t be persuading anyone to continue reading. Instead, you’ll persuade them to hit delete.
A visually appealing email will get you off to a good start with your reader. It may seem like little things, but an email that looks appealing can produce positive impressions with your recipient. For persuasive email marketing to work, we’re not proposing you take drastic measures with lots of images and videos…in fact, that will likely produce the opposite effect.
Focus on having a good structure to make the text simple and digestible. Break your content into shorter paragraphs so your reader doesn’t become overwhelmed with copy. Short paragraphs with spacing in between is a great place to start.
Try making the email easy to scan. Highlighting your key phrases (see what I did there), so that if someone is strapped for time, they can easily scan your email without reading it. The bits that their eyes get drawn to will likely still net the same return or outcome.
Tip 3: Relevant Language is Key
Using industry-specific terms that resonate with your audience is key. This is the cornerstone to creating a persuasive email marketing campaign. Carefully craft your words and select phrases and terms carefully. The language you choose will either capture your readers’ attention or push them away. Focus on the former and position yourself as an expert.
Relevant language isn’t the only component when it comes to creating persuasive email marketing. You need to be selective in your word choices when highlighting what you offer and the benefits. Also, avoid unnecessary phrases in your content.
To generally sum up, some may inject the word “very” into their content creation. There’s a way to improve your persuasive email marketing messages with direct, to-the-point copy, while still emphasizing the value proposition you’re offering.
For example, saying “You can get very good results on your next persuasive email marketing campaign” doesn’t pack the same punch as “You can achieve incredible results on your next persuasive email marketing campaign.”
The second option holds more merit and can get your reader excited.
Tip 4: Persuade the Right Audience
Some may not necessarily consider this a tip for persuasive email marketing, but it’s critical, nonetheless.
Ensuring your audience targeting is on point will get you a high return. Failure to connect with contacts that fit your buyer’s persona will naturally produce less than desirable results. A highly persuasive email that is sent to an individual who would not benefit from your offering is not only a waste of time, but revenue as well.
Nothing irks me more than receiving an email from someone who is selling a service or offering that would not interest me. What that tells a recipient is, you didn’t take the time to know them. So, why should they take the time to reach out and get to know you? Your reader likely won’t. They’ll mark your message as spam, and the efforts you made to build persuasive email marketing content will be lost.
Tip 5: Be Succinct and Benefit Focused
When a reader opens an email message, it should be immediately clear what it is that’s being offered and what actions should be taken. A persuasive email marketing message should be simple, succinct and benefit focused. There should be zero doubt on what is being asked.
Before reaching out to your intended recipient, identify and understand what their problem is and develop a solution as to how your product or service can address that. Remembering to be concise and direct, make your content clear, and most importantly – engage.
Once they understand your solution, why it benefits them, and what they should do next, they will likely respond. Even if it’s just to say, ‘not interested’, that gives you an opening to ask why and begins a dialogue.
Keep your emails succinct, punchy, and easy to read and scan. Don’t ramble or write long-winded messages. Don’t make it difficult for your reader to decipher your message. This isn’t a puzzle. You’re reaching out to ask a person to take time to read your email, and potentially become a buyer. Don’t punish them for opening the message.
Tip 6: Provide a Call-to-Action (CTA)
Having a well-crafted persuasive email marketing message that contains no call-to-action will likely produce low results. Your content could be super compelling. But, if there’s no ask to do something…anything, then your reader won’t.
Make sure your CTA is clear and evident. It needs to be easy to identify and click through. Make sure the link you want clicked works. And most importantly, don’t be too generic. Having a nicely formatted CTA that says ‘Learn More’ won’t garner you clicks. It’s vague.
Tell them what they’ll be getting if they click. ‘Book a Demo’ or ‘Sign Up for Award-Winning Webinars’. Not only will you get the click, but if your landing page is as persuasive as your email, you’ll likely get your contact to convert as well.
Continue to follow our blog for more tips on persuasive email marketing campaigns.
