How Does Enterprise Email Marketing Work? 

Enterprise email marketing had humble beginnings. Before companies started sending out email marketing content, they had relied on delivering promotional flyers and handouts via traditional mail. 

In 1978, however, Gary Thuerk pioneered the marketing space by sending out over 400 emails promoting Digital Equipment Corp (DEC) machines. These emails alone sold $13 million worth of DEC machines. Talk about a high ROI!

Since then, enterprise email marketing has evolved to become increasingly complex and efficient, boasting personalization, dynamic media, and hyper-relevance on a mass scale. This effectiveness now makes email marketing vital to modern-day enterprises’ marketing strategies.

What is Enterprise Email Marketing? 

Enterprise email marketing involves sending promotional email messages to (prospective) customers with the goal of selling your products or services. However, it’s important to note that you can’t just send emails to everyone you see fit; you can legally only send emails to customers who have actively subscribed to your email list. 

While this may sound limiting, it isn’t. When done right, enterprise email marketing has A LOT to offer for your business, even if your email list isn’t extensive!

Why an Email Marketing Plan is a Must-Have

1. Broad Customer Reach

 
Over 4.1 billion email users worldwide send 320 billion emails every day. As an overly-populated marketing channel, you can fruitfully use emails to reach customers. As users now access their emails on various devices (most notably, mobile), sending email marketing content is an easy way to connect with customers, irrespective of the device they’re on. 

2. Cost-Effective

Email marketing is one of the cheapest marketing channels out there. For an average mid-sized business, enterprise email marketing can cost anywhere from $9 to $1'000 per month. The wide price range is due to multiple factors. For example, the intricacy of email marketing content, cost of your internet service provider, frequency of your emails, and design of your email marketing content all contribute to the overall cost of your email marketing plan. However, these costs are rarely (if ever) unreasonable, as marketers only spend around 16% of their marketing budget on email marketing. 

3. Brand Recognition 

Customers are unlikely to purchase from brands they're not familiar with. With enterprise email marketing, it's easy to establish ongoing customer relationships that nurture trust and closeness.

By sending emails using company-specific email templates and designs, you allow your customers to grow affinity with your brand. That is, customers become increasingly familiar with your business when they see your brand logo, style, and colours repeatedly. This familiarity increases the likelihood of cultivating a long-term customer relationship that boosts conversions and sales. 

4. Skyrocket Sales 

A solid email marketing plan has one of the highest returns on investment seen by marketers. With a mind-blowing average ROI of 3'800%, you should heavily prioritize the continuous optimization of your email marketing plan. Doing so is especially easy with our current email marketing automation tools. These can help you create highly deliverable, personalized, and timely emails. 

5. Consumers Prefer Communications Through Email 

If the reasons above haven't been enough to get you started with enterprise email marketing, the following fact sure will: customers outright prefer email communications. 

More than 7 in 10 US customers prefer to receive email marketing communications rather than direct mail, SMS, or push messages. A study by DMA further highlighted the extent of this preference, revealing that email marketing is favoured twice as much as other channels (46%  for email vs 26% for post and 24% for text or face-to-face communications).

Types of Email Marketing Content You Can Send 

When first navigating enterprise email marketing, you have to get acquainted with the vast array of promotional emails. Below, we list some of the most common (and practical) types of marketing emails.

1. Welcome Emails 

As an initial introduction to your brand, welcome emails can contain short introductions of your business, thank you messages, or offer subscription rewards (e.g., discounts). 

Given the undeniable impact of first impressions, a welcome email series is one of the most important emails you can send. After subscribing to you, customers are eager to interact with you for the first time, with GetResponse revealing that welcome emails have an average open rate of 86%. Therefore, you must focus on honing your welcome emails to provide new subscribers with the most favourable first impression. 

2. Winback Emails 

Contrary to welcome emails, winback email campaigns target lapsed customers who have stopped interacting with your company. These emails aim to gently remind customers of your brand and rekindle customers' interest. 

Depending on how long these customers have been gone, the amount of money they've spent, and the length of the customer relationships, different email marketing content may be required for specific customers. While a simple "we miss you!" email may reignite some customers’ love for your brand, others may need an irresistible incentive to interact with your business again. 

Regardless of how you choose to reconnect with these customers, 45% of customers who receive a winback email begin to read later emails, making winback emails paramount to the success of your email marketing plan.

3. Content Announcements 

Promoting new content is a great way to redirect more traffic to your blog or website. By sending your subscribers email marketing content that promotes recent blog posts, ebooks, or white papers, you provide a great source of value to your target audience. Doing so also humanizes your brand, with customers perceiving you as a brand that provides high-quality information rather than one that heavily focuses on concluding sales.

4. Newsletters 

Including newsletter emails in your email marketing plan is a great way to provide timely information to interested subscribers. Your newsletters can encompass a wide range of topics, such as company updates, industry news, and expert quotes, depending on what's timely. 

As highly versatile pieces of email marketing content, newsletters can serve various purposes, including strengthening your customer loyalty, redirecting traffic to prominent areas of your website, and humanizing your brand. As such, you should not forgo their integration into your enterprise email marketing schedule.

5. Abandoned Cart Emails 

Abandoned cart emails target customers who've added products to their cart but have not gone through with purchasing them. These emails aim to remind shoppers of the products they've left behind, encouraging them to come back and complete the purchase. 

Sending abandoned cart emails promptly (within the first hour of abandonment) can benefit your business greatly. Upwards of 44% of these emails are opened, resulting in sales recoveries of up to 14%. Email automation is necessary if you want to deliver well-timed abandoned cart emails that recapture customers' interest in your products. For example, iwinBACK's omnichannel automation platform aligns your emails with your customer journeys. Want to recapture lost sales and win back lost customers? Contact us today to get started!

6. Special Occasion Emails 

Improving customer relationships is as important as generating sales. When you send joyful customer emails celebrating holidays and special occasions, you create a well-rounded customer experience while solidifying your brand’s presence during holidays and celebrations. 

Beyond bonding with your customers during important events, special occasion emails can stimulate consumer spending. As customer spending increases exponentially over the holiday season, strategically positioning your email communications during this time can result in more sales. To incentivize customer spending, offer your email subscribers special discount codes, offers, and promotions to celebrate the holiday spirit. 

What Are You Waiting For? 

If you don't already have a solid enterprise email marketing strategy, staying competitive may be difficult. With a wide array of customization possibilities—and endless benefits—email marketing is a surefire way to entice new customers and recapture lost ones. Find out more top email marketing tips here!