If you own a small business, chances are you realize what a competitive environment it is in which to market your products or services. The same tools that make marketing so cost-efficient for your business, such as social media or business websites, are likely being utilized by each and every one of your competitors. That makes it difficult to be heard, which is why you have to avoid mistakes once you finally do get someone’s attention.
Email marketing is another one of those cost-effective measures by which you can grab the attention of potential clients or customers. It might seem easy enough, to just tell people a little bit about what you have to offer and include some kind of sales pitch. But there are pitfalls to this approach, mistakes that you might not even realize you’re making that will result in your email list dwindling because of the ranks who decide to unsubscribe.
One common mistake is to not get those emails addresses validated, so make sure you check out experts in that field like the folks at Email Ready who can walk you through the process. As for the content, here are some things to avoid.
1. Watch That Grammar
It might seem like an obvious thing, and yet the number of business emails that are sent out with glaring grammatical errors would likely surprise you. And if one of yours gets sent out to a massive list of recipients with some of those errors, your potential clients and customers might consider you to be unprofessional and therefore not worthy of your time. Find someone, whether it’s a professional editor or a local English teacher, who can take a read-through and make sure that everything is grammatically sound.
2. Strike the Right Tone
There is a balance that needs to be struck when you’re sending out a business email. On the one hand, you want to project a little looseness to your recipients, so that they’re not bored stiff by your little pitch. By the same token, too much of that might make you seem like you’re not a serious business partner.
Aim for a little levity or informality in the beginning of the email, just enough to disarm the reader. Once it comes to your pitch though, try to dispense with that looseness and concentrate on the particulars of the pitch and why it’s a great deal.
3. Write To Your Audience
A common mistake made in any marketing effort is when someone tells too much about their product or service and forgets to address why these things are needed by the people to whom they’re pitching. A sales pitch should be as much about the potential buyer as it is the seller. So try to put yourself in the shoes of the businesses receiving the email. What would they want to hear? Why is what you’re selling right for them? Answer those questions first and foremost.
Conclusion
Watch out for these little snafus when you’re composing your next business email. Your bottom line will thank you for it.