Four Reasons Why Email Marketing Converts

In the last decade, a lot of self-styled gurus and ‘experts’ have appeared, offering to help marketers, salespeople, and businesses incorporate psychological tools into their sales routines, marketing methods, and direct advertisements. If the demand for psychological marketing professionals is any indication, it is quite clear that their methods are effective. Most marketing consultants are booked out; busy helping businesses improve their results and boost their bottom line.

Of course, you do not need a marketing professional to help you improve your email marketing campaigns. The vast majority of psychological information is easily available, at least with a small amount of research. After looking at the best performing email campaigns, we have come away with four triggers, effects, and reasons for email’s phenomenal long-term conversion rates.

1. Email builds trust over multiple interactions
There is a phenomenon in human attraction called the familiarity effect. It is a scientific phenomenon that dictates people are more comfortable around, trusting of, and attracted to people that they see frequently.

Think of your dealings with the average marketer. For the most part they are limited to 30-second blocks of TV time, or incredibly impersonal newspaper and magazine advertisements. Email marketing is so effective because it builds that familiar connection and attracts buyers to the product or service on offer.

2. Email is private, and private buyers feel more secure
There is a certain stigma to buying goods online, particularly the type of goods that are commonly advertised by online marketers. It is a stigma that is quite thankfully shrinking, and will eventually disappear, but amongst the non-technical, there is still a certain uncertainty and fear of online commerce.

Email gives potential customers a degree of privacy that they otherwise lack, making difficult purchases more secure and simple. Instead of exposing their purchases to the world, or even just the other people in their home, email keeps online purchases remarkably quiet and personal.

3. Email gives buyers time to think
There are different types of customers out there — three or four according to most studies. Some buy on impulse, others are more meticulous and research-friendly, and others are very difficult to convert, but finally succumb after multiple interactions. The reason that email marketing is so highly effective is that it targets each of these buyers individually. Impulse buyers are taken in on the first email. Long-term thinkers and researchers are given time to explore the product. Reluctant buyers have time to fight off temptation, but finally give in.

What does PPC marketing have that serves every type of customer? Very little, unfortunately. When it comes to wide psychological appeal, email marketing wins almost every time.

4. Email gives secure return options
When someone purchases something on an impulse from a one-off sales page, often found after clicking on a PPC ad, they are left with few return options if they forget where they bought from. Email leaves a paper trail; a trail that is highly valuable to customers that are permanently worried about returning products. That extra security is valuable for some customers, and they are often unlikely to buy unless they know they have that level of consumer security available.

Tuesday 29 December, 2009, 10:27 | Category: Internet Marketing
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