Email marketing revenue is estimated to reach a whopping $11 billion by the end of 2023. Consider that for a moment – $11 billion.
If you thought e-newsletters were a communication tool of the past, it is time to think again.
Using e-newsletters is still an effective way to reach your target customers as the majority of people use email in their daily lives — whether that’s to send and respond to messages, or receive information from their favourite brands.
According to Hubspot, 74 per cent of Baby Boomers think email is the most personal channel to receive communications from brands, followed by 72 per cent of Gen X, 64 per cent of Millennials, and 60 per cent of Gen Z. In addition, 46 per cent of smartphone users prefer to receive communications from businesses via email, and 64 per cent of B2B markets say that their email marketing strategy was effective for meeting business goals in 2021.
Of course, the key to success is in understanding the marketing method, as well as your audience. Leveraging your database for any form of marketing requires careful planning and consideration. This is particularly true when it comes to email to ensure your subscribers feel encouraged to follow your newsletters, rather than opting out of your content.
Creating targeted content is crucial — Hubspot’s research shows that the most effective strategies for email marketing campaigns are subscriber segmentation, message personalisation and email automation campaigns.
Your aim should be to engage, entertain and educate your subscribers. When a consumer receives an e-newsletter, they should feel informed and interested. It should feel like it’s coming from a friend or an acquaintance, not someone pushing a hard sell or agenda.
When well-designed and written in a conversational and informative tone, an e-newsletter will nurture your relationships, build long-term connections, and result in business growth.
Why Is It Important For Real Estate Agencies to Use Their Email Database?
Smart marketers understand that email marketing is still one of the best methods to communicate with consumers. Quality content will not only raise your profile and enable you to directly engage with different audience segments but also generate business.
An email database is a must in today’s digital world. Real estate agents in particular are always looking for strategic ways to positively communicate with the wider community. Well-written e-newsletters tick all the boxes and allow you to use personalised and targeted content to build your business. As outlined by Realty Biz News, this form of marketing will help you build strong relationships and encourage former clients to promote word-of-mouth marketing.
A successful email strategy will help:
- Communicate and interact with a focused audience
- Build relationships with existing and potential clients
- Grow your brand and boost your identity
- Expand market reach to increase sales
- Build on community relationships, events and interactions.
E-newsletters will also keep your business front of mind for future sales – a homeowner might not be ready to sell yet, but that doesn’t mean they won’t need your services in the future.
As a customer-focused industry and one that has constant figures and sales to report, the real estate and property market can’t afford to ignore the benefits of e-newsletters.
5 Ways You Can Use Your Email Database
Here are some useful strategies that you can use to really maximise the use of your real estate business’ email database.
1. Implement an Email Marketing Strategy
There is a lot of talk about marketing strategies and for good reason.
According to Smart Insights, 69 per cent of marketers have a documented content strategy, which allows them to build a line-up of content for a period of time as well as measure the performance of their initiatives. A strategy will ensure you know what your goal is before you start firing off emails to subscribers. It will also ensure you don’t flood a consumer’s inbox or waste resources on creating an e-newsletter that doesn’t meet your needs.
One of the biggest issues that can arise from not having a well-thought-out email database plan is triggering spam filters. After all, if you aren’t getting any views, an e-newsletter campaign isn’t doing your business any good.
There are five key points to focus on to prevent your e-newsletter from going to spam:
- Create clear expectations for your subscribers
- Personalise your content
- Maintaining an up-to-date database
- Including an unsubscribe option
- Avoid the use of spam phrases
Developing a content strategy is the best way to increase consistency in content quality, posting and open rate while also aiding in reducing bounce rates.
2. Use Content Marketing in Your e-Newsletters
How long would it take you to craft together a few articles? More importantly, how much spare time do you have? The truth is, many real estate agents are time-poor – and for good reason. An agent’s job is to work alongside the client, to be an ever-present face in the community. There are meetings to hold, marketing to think about, contracts to develop and sign, not to mention open homes and signing new clients.
Yes, email marketing may be one of the most cost-effective and productive ways to promote your business and services, but without well-structured and web-friendly copy, you won’t reap the results.
As discussed in our previous blog, content marketing is more than just uploading information to your website or social channels. It’s about developing brand awareness (and in turn generating more business) through valuable, relevant and consistent content. A qualified writer can craft your newsletter and a database of leads and ensure you are incorporating creative storytelling, as well as your goals and vision, into your initiatives.
Take for example the e-newsletter strategy developed by Story League for premium Melbourne real estate agency, Nicholas Scott. Our team creates a combination of weekly updates as well as content updates; the former allows the Nicholas Scott team to talk casually about the latest news and events that might spark a conversation with their subscribers, while the latter discusses the latest blog they’ve recently published and why it might be of interest to Nicholas Scott’s audiences. This ensures the newsletters are always fresh, fun and engaging because they touch on general interest topics, not just properties sold.
3. Provide Exclusive Offers
People love free stuff. Offers, promotions – you name it, and consumers crave it. It is important to keep this in mind when planning content for your e-newsletters. The key is to consistently give value to your subscribers, such as industry-related information or exclusive early access to your services. Imagine being able to dish out the latest sale stats from your state’s real estate agent body, or give readers the scoop on the newest listings and sales in their area.
Giving your readers the five-star treatment is relatively easy. You can offer a ‘forward-to-a-friend’ email deal, or partner with a relevant business (such as a cleaning or styling business) to offer an exclusive deal to your subscribers. The element of exclusivity will make your audience feel great, increasing their loyalty and trust in your brand.
4. Use Audience Segmentation for More Targeted Content
Understanding audience segmentation can be tricky business, particularly when it comes to marketing.
One of Australia’s go-to email database marketing services, Mailchimp, breaks down segmentation into an easy-to-understand guide. In its simplest form, audience segmentation allows you to identify different categories within your target market to create more tailored and targeted initiatives for each one. Without identifying your target audience and breaking them up into relevant groups, your e-newsletter content can be viewed as mediocre or pointless.
Targeted content ensures that the relevant pain points and solutions are identified and addressed, which in turn could lead to a potential sale.
The first step in identifying groups is to make a list of existing and possible client categories. In real estate, this would include investors, buyers, vendors and the wider community and businesses.
5. Re-engage Inactive Subscribers
Within a database of thousands, it is highly likely that there is a segment of inactive subscribers. There are a number of reasons this can happen; perhaps they don’t currently need your service, or they have struck up a relationship with your competitor. Without regularly checking and updating your marketing database, these potential customers can disappear completely.
There are different strategies you can use to get inactive subscribers excited about your business again. In addition to taking a personal approach and touching base with the potential customer by email and phone, another great idea is to send an email and ask how they are, as well as for feedback on why they unsubscribed, and what would spike their interest to join again. It doesn’t hurt to also offer an exclusive offer or promotion.
It’s important to re-engage inactive subscribers so that you can continue their buying journey with your real estate agency and renew their interest in your brand.
An inexpensive and smart way to nurture your client relationships, email database marketing is a must for any forward-thinking business. If you have a growing database and don’t know where to start, or need help with producing interesting, reader-friendly content, contact us and we can help you to create an effective email marketing strategy.
