Email scripting? Who really needs that? Is it a script for a movie or a video or is it some sort of complicated computer programming? And after all, what does it really have to do with your email marketing campaigns?
To answer these questions, let us start at the top. As Designmodo explains, “email marketing is a part of Internet Marketing, it helps to communicate with your customers via sending emails.”
Email marketing is currently probably the marketing method businesses of all shapes and sizes use the most, as it brings numerous advantages. This particularly concerns small businesses with limited budgets for marketing and promotion.
As far as the advantages are concerned, the numbers speak for themselves. According to Marketing Sherpa study, 72% of consumers prefer to receive promotional info through Email. As for other ways, only 17% would like to answer a phone call or be contacted via Social networks. TV Ads are also not favored among prospective clients. So, make a conclusion.
Also, it is of interest to note that mobile users are inclined to look through incoming emails more often than their Facebook feed. “ Moreover, Email Marketing allows you to reach users on other devices like tablets” (above).
This is where we come to email scripts and email scripting. If you want to reach as many potential customers or businesses, you need to reach as many email addresses as you can. To do that you need to have your emails work in a two-fold manner.
On one hand, they need to be uniform in their message and style. On the other, the recipients must feel that you reached them as individuals, not as a part of a group. To be able to achieve both, you need to use specific email scripts.
What is email scripting?
Making a sale, reaching as many customers or other businesses through email, means sending dozens, or even more emails daily. To be able to send as many emails that present a uniform message, but on an individual basis, you need to use specific email scripts and email scripting methods.
As this source notes, “you won’t write separate emails to each prospect. Instead, you would need to change several words here and there to personalize the email and demonstrate your relationship with the customer.” Using email templates allows you to eliminate manual work re-entering the same text over and over.
Of course, you can’t just pick up one type of email script, also known as an email template as an all-source, and simply change names and addresses. Using the right script depends on a number of factors, ranging from the category of users you want to reach to the subject matter. Are you trying to reach potential customers, possible business partners or just presenting information about your company and products?
There are some basic elements of any email message that you have to consider when you are preparing a single email or are planning to use an email script for bulk mailing.
Essential elements of a good email
According to the University of Carolina at Chapel Hill, there are three elements that you always need to consider when sending an email:
- Subject lines – email subject lines are like newspaper headlines. They should convey the main point of your message or the idea that you want the reader to take away. Therefore, be as specific as possible.
- Greetings and sign-offs – Use some kind of greeting and some kind of sign-off. Don’t just start with your text, and don’t just stop at the end without a polite signature.
- Cc: and Bcc: (‘carbon copy’ and ‘blind carbon copy’) – Copying individuals on an email is a good way to send your message to the main recipient while also sending someone else a copy at the same time. This can be useful if you want to convey the same exact message to more than one person. In professional settings, copying someone else on an email can help get things done, especially if the person receiving the copy is in a supervisory role.
Marketing software experts Vero point out the following eight elements that constitute a perfect email or email script.
- The sender of an email should be a person, not a company. – “Your audience is bombarded with tons of emails on a daily basis. They are constantly fighting to keep their inbox under control, so as soon as they see an email from someone they neither know nor trust, they will lean towards the delete and spam buttons.”
The recipient needs to quickly identify the sender, “as well as the return email address so the recipient knows how to respond directly.” Since a portion of your audience may be relatively new to your business and might not remember you by name just yet, adding the brand will help trigger their memory.
Good elements continued
Adding to the importance of the subject line, Vero gives the following advice concerning emails/email scripting:
- Use a personalized subject line. – “The best ways to personalize your subject line are to use the recipient’s first name and to address their specific needs. The name part is easy – you can use personalization features inside your email marketing tool to include the first name in the subject.”
- Segment email lists to send more targeted emails – “People are receiving more and more emails every day and they don’t like receiving emails that aren’t relevant to them.” Facts show that segmenting the email lists increases recipient engagement.
Bulk email specialists Mailchimp scanned their system for users who use their list-segmentation feature and sampled about 2,000 users who had sent a total of around 11,000 segmented campaigns to almost 9 million recipients.
The results showed that there were opened emails that were 14.444% better than the list average, and clicks were 14.994% better than the list average. - The call to action (CTA) has to be clear and precise – “Emails are just like landing pages and websites: your audience only has so much attention and your goal should be for them to take a specific action fairly quickly. This means your emails need to have one clear call to action. Don’t bombard your audience with so much information or so many options for action that they become confused or disinterested.”
- The content of the email should be short, concise, and encourage engagement. A study by the Nielson group found that, on average, people scan emails in just 51 seconds. So, ‘the author’ of the email should get to the point of the email very quickly. “There’s no reason to prolong getting to your main point with trivial wording – especially in the first headline and paragraph.”
Personalizing emails and other elements
Vero (above) cites a study by the National Institute of Health. According to NIH, we like hearing our own names.“You can leverage this ‘increased activity to capture and engage your audience via email.”
Implementation requires only an email marketing tool that gives you the ability to merge the data based on customer fields. “You can start with using a first name and company name. As you collect more data from your customers based on their behavior on your website, you can send even more tailored emails.”
Yet, there are more elements you need to consider when preparing emails and email scripts. An increasing percentage of your audience is accessing emails on their mobile devices. Litmus recently completed research that found 48 percent of emails are now being opened on mobile. Perhaps more importantly, the study noted that a whopping 69 percent of mobile users delete emails that aren’t optimized for mobile.
Basically, if your emails aren’t optimized and are unappealing, your audience is going to ignore them.
When the content of an email or an email script is concerned, New Old Stamp (above), adds the following concerning email scripting:
- Always explain what you are offering. – “Keep your recipients’ attention by showing them how you can help them. For example, you can add a screenshot of their website or a short video that demonstrates how they can benefit from using your service.”
- Write a proper closing line. – “A powerful closing line is as important as your subject line. In most good B2B sales scripts, calls to action form the email closing line. So, you can focus on a clear and specific action you want your recipients to take. Keep in mind that personalization works great for closing lines, too. Signing off with “thank you” can also be an effective way to get a response.”
Getting the right help with email scripting
To all that, Vero adds that all email scripts should include the unsubscribe link. “You want people to unsubscribe if they don’t get value from your emails. Research by BlueHornet found that 14 percent of consumers unsubscribe from emails because they have grown tired of the brand.”
So what should you do to have good email scripting and make your marketing emails work?
Of course, you can go the DIY way, but that will cost you more time and effort than the savings you might get.
Another way is to the multitude of ready-made templates available online. There, though, you have to have two things in mind. Quite a number of other companies or individuals might use exactly the same template you are considering. Also, these pre-set templates might not suit your needs in the best possible manner. You would probably need to make changes anyway.
That is why outsourcing preparation of email scripting should be part of your possible outsourcing of content marketing. And that is where BunnyStudio is certainly able to help you. Not only are we able to offer the service of freelancers that have ample experience with email scripting, but also with services like including email videos or marketing writing in general.
