Jared Atchison — February 28, 2019 — February 28, 2019
When someone hands over their email address in exchange to receive information from you, your job is hardly done. Of course it’s important that they opt-in to your offer, but you have to make sure to follow up afterwards to keep in touch, and the best way to do that is to create a welcome email.
Return Path’s research found that the rate at which promotional emails get opened is 23 percent while welcome emails produce an open rate of 34 percent. Users are excited to receive and open their welcome email because they’re fully expecting it. It’s such a simple way to grow your audience and promote your brand yet not enough marketers are taking advantage of the opportunity as part of their email marketing strategy.
If you want to create a welcome email that brings you conversions you can brag about, here are three tips to get you started.
1. Follow up right away
Your welcome email is the pillar of your brand image. If you wait too long to send out your welcome email after a visitor has opted in, it’s likely they’ll forget who you are or will no longer be interested by the time you do send it out. Harvard Business Review says that potential customers are seven times likelier to purchase from you if you respond within an hour of them taking some sort of action.
If your subscribers expect an email and don’t receive one, you look disorganized and aloof. Avoid this by automating your email to send as soon as a visitor opts in. Unless you specifically state they’ll be receiving an email at another time, that welcome email should be in their inbox within minutes.
Setting up automated emails to go out after your welcome email is a great way to stay connected to your audience even when you have a million other things going on in your business and likely don’t have the time to personally email each subscriber on your list. It helps you save time and money by streamlining your workflow so you focus on more important tasks.
2. Set clear expectations
You want to be crystal clear to your new subscribers what they’re in for now that they’re part of your email list. It’s important to lay out the type of content they can expect in the future, how frequently to expect it, and what topics will be touched on. Link to other content on your blog to give them a taste of what future content entails and they can explore your brand.
Stay consistent with your brand image when creating your welcome email. Keep the same color scheme, fonts, language, and logo across all emails so that users know it’s you and identify those aesthetics with your brand. Your brand identity showcases your business and what it represents. If this isn’t consistent across all channels, including social media, you’ll come off disorganized and confused.
Harvard Business Review’s welcome email does a great job of setting clear expectations for their subscribers. They thank the user for signing up, tell them they’ll have an enhanced experience and achieve their goals, and then urge them to check out more of their content.
3. Thank your subscribers
People don’t just frivolously hand over their email address to any email list they come across. If you gain new subscribers, that means they want to get in touch with you, learn about you, and explore your brand further. They’re at the point in the conversion funnel where your business has sparked enough interest in them that they’re willing to hear from you regularly. That’s why you should thank them in your welcome email.
Thank them for joining the community and believing in your brand. Ensure them that there’s plenty more value you have to offer, but don’t stop there. Use this as a way to lead them to more juicy content. Encourage them to follow and talk to you on social media. Give them content that only they’re allowed to see. Show them you appreciate their engagement by offering them a coupon or discount code for any premium products you offer.
Over to you
Creating a welcome email that brings business growth and improved lead generation means doing research to figure out how best to appease your audience. Email is the most valuable way businesses and entrepreneurs can build a relationship with subscribers and help them solve their biggest problems. If you thank users, let them know what they’re in for, and follow up in a timely manner, you’re already on the path to higher conversions.
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