Introduction:
Social media’s rapid rise in recent years gave marketers exciting new tools for communicating with customers and prospects. Suddenly, established marketing tactics such as email were seen as old fashioned, one-way channels that consumers were increasingly likely to ignore.
Social networks such as Facebook, LinkedIn and Twitter offered an alternative: two-way communication channels where marketers could listen more than talk, and then engage with customers and prospects in a true dialogue.
But rather than making email obsolete, widespread use of social media has in many ways made email an even more powerful marketing channel.
For starters, social media gives marketers other online options besides an outbound email campaign for messages they want to share with their audiences.
That flexibility can help reduce email list “fatigue” by letting you cut back the number of emails you need to send while making sure each email offer or newsletter is more personalized, targeted and relevant to you email list.
What’s more, social media usage actually makes consumers even more engaged with their email inbox: 42% of social media users said they check their email more than four times a day, compared with just 24% of non social media users, according to a 2011 survey by Merkle.
And those social media users are likely to share email-delivered content with their personal networks, giving campaigns new legs. Adding “social sharing” buttons to email messages increased the reach of an average email by 24.3%, according to a study by email service provider Silverpop.
As a result, smart marketers have learned that email and social media are
complementary – not competitive – channels. Social media’s massive reach, viral
characteristics, and opportunities for dialogue help propagate content far and wide, helping you build better relationships with customers and prospects.
The Definitive Guide to Integrating Social Media and Email Marketing
marketing can also intensify those relationships through permission-based,
personalized, targeted messaging.
To get the most out of email and social marketing, you can’t treat the channels like trains running on separate tracks. The best results come when your marketing strategy integrates social media and email marketing to grow your audience, share your company’s content, convert more prospects into customers.
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