5 Simple Ways to Sell Email Marketing to a Skeptic

When it comes to new and sexy marketing tactics, let’s just be honest, email marketing isn’t the first thing that jumps into our minds. It’s social media, blogging and content that have the spotlight right now.

So questions start to arise-- is email still relevant? Does it still work to effectively elevate your company’s visibility, and garner leads for your sales team? In this post we’ll look at five ways to sell email marketing to a skeptic. So let’s get started! 

1) Describe Email's Massive Reach

The next time you’re having drinks with your social media manager discussing the most effective marketing tactics, drop this factoid. There are 3.6 billion email accounts in use. So when it comes down to the sheer numbers email leaves both Facebook and Twitter in the dust.

The ubiquity of email usage shouldn’t be overlooked. The fact that there are so many people using this medium on a daily basis should give it instant credibility in the eyes of marketers. Additionally, with the rapid adoption of smartphone technology in the past few years, most people take their email accounts wherever they go: (home, the grocery store, and the kids soccer game). So the first way to sell email marketing to a skeptic is to show the massive number of people that are using email on a daily basis.

2) Explain the Return on Investment

Another very important factor in evaluating the merits of a marketing medium is gaging its return on investment. Today, even with all of the other marketing channels available, email marketing still has some of the highest return on investment metrics when compared to other marketing tactics.

A study shows that every one dollar invested in email marketing yields $44.25 return on investment. This stat is staggering and can’t be ignored by even the staunchest email marketing skeptics.

3) Talk About Deliverability and Visibility

The marketing landscape has shifted and organizations are spending more time, effort and money on building out educational resources for their prospects and customers. Things like: videos, infographics, e-books, and customer success stories. This educational content needs to be delivered to the prospects, and the most effective and economical way to do that is through email marketing.

There are definitely other ways to make your content accessible to your audience. Like posting content to your social media profile, and getting your content visibility in the search engines and blogs. However, only with email is your content being delivered right to your prospects inbox. This assures visibility that other marketing tactics can not. Additionally, email allows for a longer content lifespan, being that your message will remain in the inbox unless the user takes proactive action and deletes it.

4) Sell the Idea of Scalability

As every smart inbound marketer knows building relationships online is at the heart of successful inbound marketing. By using marketing automation software you can build out email tracks that allow you to deliver personal, highly relevant and timely communication for thousands of people at time.

No other marketing channel allows you to do this type of personalized marketing at scale like email. This nurturing process helps you to build, and deepen relationships over time that eventually will lead to a purchase decision.

5) Tell Them About Tracking

The final reason that email marketing is still highly relevant is because it’s so trackable and measurable. With email there is never any ambiguity about how you are performing. The raw metrics are staring you square in the face every time you open your email marketing reports.

You have detailed data on: opens, click through rates, and forwards. These granular reporting metrics are at the center of where digital marketing is heading. A place where every marketing channel and campaign is evaluated based on performance and metrics alone.

The Bottom Line

Email marketing marketing is not dead, the truth is it’s just changing. By using marketing automation platforms in conjunction with highly relevant, timely and educational content you can effectively use email to grow your business.

It’s still a great way of economically building relationships, educating prospects, and generating leads. So next time you get into a conversation with an email marketing hater use the points above to defend this great channel!