One of those decisions that makes me pause is a company’s request for my email address. Am I going to get spammed now? And how easy will it be to remove myself from their mailing lists if I decide that it’s not worth sticking around?

More fundamentally, what value will there be in me giving my email address?

This is an opportunity for marketers to use automation effectively in a way that’ll help them and help the person signing up. After looking at automation in marketing broadly a couple of weeks ago, last week we took a more detailed look at chatbots and this week it’s automation in email marketing.

Of course, there are plenty of other areas you could implement automation into your marketing, like scheduling social media posts to land with the target audience at prime times. But, as we learnt when we looked at email marketing, this is still a huge marketing area which can really engage your customers or supporters.

Benefits of email automation

Let’s take an example, you’re a busy marketer or multitasker at a small charity and you are given an email list of 5,000 and told that currently there are new sign ups each week. If that’s not overwhelming enough, you can see that the list is segmented into groups which means they’ll all be requiring different versions of the fortnightly email. You look dazed and the office manager sheepishly mentions that there are two ways to sign up on the internet; as a donor with a gift or as a supporter. And the CEO has a pile of sign-up forms they are bringing back from a conference they’ve been speaking at.

Coffee time!

With new resolve, you settle down to make sense of the email marketing. You work out that there will be nine different types of email going out each week.

1. New supporters’ email (to be sent after sign up)
2. New donors’ email (to be sent after sign up)
3. Supporters’ 1^st onboarding email
4. Donors’ 1^st onboarding email
5. Supporters’ 2^nd onboarding email
6. Donors’ 2^nd onboarding email
7. Regular supporters’ email newsletter
8. Regular donors’ email newsletter
9. Regular major donors’ email newsletter

For a brief moment you consider mail merges and responding to the sign ups personally as soon as you spot them but quickly you realise this is a silly idea. Quite simply, no one has the time to do that.

Your next thought is to simplify your email marketing and send out just one regular newsletter to everyone plus a short welcome email to new sign ups. This is the cheapest, quickest and easiest way but it’s not going to grow your relationships with subscribers. In fact, this is likely to get them heading for the unsubscribe button.

Automation allows you to hit that sweet spot between these two options. You are able to manage your time effectively so that it is not all sucked up into writing emails or always having to be personally on top of the email list spotting changes. At the same time each subscriber is getting the emails containing the information that is relevant and useful to them which keeps them engaged, opening your emails and responding to your calls to action.

It is my fear of receiving irrelevant and uninteresting emails that prevents me from signing up to newsletters but those that engage me by addressing my pain points are the ones that I keep opening week in and week out.

Email automation software

You’re convinced and you are going to start automating your email marketing but there are plenty of options out there and you need to make sure that you are getting the best fit for your organisation. Aubrey has used different software to automate emails, so get in touch if you want to talk to us about how you can take your next steps in email marketing.

Perhaps you’d like to think about what your needs are before choosing whether you go with HubSpot, ActiveCampaign,MailChimp or any of the other options out there. As always, it is important to consider pricing and functionality. However, there are a couple of other considerations.

• Scalability – You might be starting with a small list but will the software keep up when your organisation has grown and you are making more complex requests. No one wants to have to migrate to a new system further down the line.
• Interface – This needs to be straightforward and easy to understand, not just for you but colleagues too. When there are so many systems to keep up to date with, the ones you’ll love are the ones you are confident in using.
• Compliance – This can save you a lot of stress. You’ll want to make sure that any software you use adheres to privacy regulation like GDPR.

Conclusion

Anything that helps us as marketers achieve our goals is worth investigating. If automating your email marketing will develop relationships with supporters and clients, then it is worth jumping into.

Is there any note of caution? Of course! It can be altogether too easy to set up a system and forget about it for too long. If this happens then that personalisation which has been built into the system will break down and your subscribers will end up feeling like you don’t know them at all.