Effective email marketing provides insurance brokers with many benefits. Chief among them is that it can help them acquire new prospects, build and maintain relationships, and convert subscribers into customers. To avoid costly mistakes, follow these top ten email marketing best practices.
1 – Opt-In / Opt-Out Email Marketing
The first best practice is for people to enter their email address (opt-in) and choose to receive emails from you. Sending SPAM (unsolicited) emails are ineffective and may be offensive and illegal. Subscribers must be able to “opt-out” (unsubscribe) from your email, which you must honor within 10 days of receiving the request. The AmeriLife Compliance Department recommends that all unsolicited emails undergo a legal review prior to distribution.
2 – Build Value and Trust
The second-best practice is to build value and trust. Providing quality content over many months and years builds value and trust with your audience. For example, you can answer customer questions. Moreover, it’s best to avoid misleading subject lines that may violate the CAN-SPAM Act. You can, however, offer an incentive for signing up.
3 – Sign Up to Get Info
The third best practice is to offer something of value in exchange for signing up. In many cases, this is a downloadable PDF document containing valuable information. When is the best time to ask visitors to sign up?
4 – When to Ask for Email
The fourth best practice is to ask for your visitor’s email after presenting them with your content. For example, you can ask for their email after they read a well-written article. Furthermore, you can offer subscribers exclusive content.
5 – Exclusive Content
A fifth best practice is to offer subscribers exclusive content. For example, entice subscribers by having them download an eBook exclusively for them. Then ask for your visitor’s email address. Where are the best places to ask for email subscribers?
6 – Where to Ask for Email Subscribers
The sixth best practice is to ask for email subscribers on the sidebar of your blog posts. Specifically, the top of your blog sidebar is the best converting position for an email signup form. How can you get more visitors to share their email addresses?
7 – Increasing Email Subscriber Conversion
The seventh-best practice is to create a dedicated landing page for email subscriptions. Instead of a signup form on your blog’s sidebar, you have a link to an email marketing landing page. The content of this landing page persuades visitors to give you their email addresses. Now that you have built an opt-in email list, how frequently to send emails?
8 – Email Frequency
For business-to-consumer emails, the eighth-best practice is to send two to four emails per month. Consumers who receive more than four emails per month may flag your email as spam. Also, as more people read their emails on their phones and tablets, be sure you optimize emails for mobile devices.
9 – Email Deliverability
The ninth-best practice is to optimize your emails for delivery on multiple devices. Mobile devices now open 81% of all emails. However, most seniors use desktop computers or tablets. Whatever email solution you use, make sure you review how it looks on different devices before sending it. People who receive your emails may unsubscribe; here’s how to reduce your unsubscribe rate.
10 – Send Relevant Content
The tenth best practice is to send emails with relevant content. Make sure the content you send meets your subscriber’s expectations. For example, you can segment your subscriber list by interests. Then send them specific content based on their interests.
Lastly, make sure you adhere to compliant communication practices when sharing Medicare-related content and seek legal guidance you’re unsure.
By following these top 10 email marketing best practices, you can generate new leads, share valuable content, and improve your sales.
