In terms of net sales, a company’s ability or inability to effectively market itself has more of an impact on revenue than product or service quality. In an ideal market, product and service quality would suffice as the principle metric on which consumers evaluate a product. In this scenario, advertisements, marketing, and media would have no effect on the consumers decision and their choice would be made solely on the intrinsic worth of the product. In today’s world, however, practically every sector of the market is flooded with competing products, many of which are strikingly similar. Thus, for consumers to make buying decisions, they rely largely on the secondary information that is provided to them – ads, marketing, media, and reviews. For better or worse, these secondary sources of information have been important and will be even more important in 2016.
Marketing and sales are making a transition to digital platforms and communications. In terms of advertisements, physical ads like billboards and posters are no longer as effective. Consumers have become weary of cold callers, and so phone calls aren’t as effective either. For mass marketing, it’s going to be done digitally in 2016. As critical as it has been recently, email marketing will be extremely important this year. A company’s success or failure at email marketing will reflect in their performance and ability to acquire new business and generate profit. Here are four email marketing platforms to consider for your business for the new year.
GetResponse
One platform that is making strides is, GetResponse who has seen a strong increase in users recently. In 2016, GetResponse will probably see the most significant growth than any other platform. Across 182 countries, GetResponse has over 350,000 clients with over a billion subscribers every single month. The company prides itself on being the world’s easier email marketing, and offers additional assistance with 24/7 live chatting. Rather than demanding payment upfront, the platform offers users the ability to try to program for free for the initial thirty days.
The core components of GetResponse boast a robust feature set including webinars, landing pages, email creators, and autoresponders. Each element compliments the other. The autoresponders turn leads into customers using intelligent follow up, the webinars increase conversations from prospects to clients and also drive up engagement rates with an end-to-end marketing solution. Unlike other providers, GetResponse allows clients to create landing pages in addition to their email marketing campaigns. They provide the necessary tools for customers to create, publish, and host high-converting, aesthetically pleasing landing pages in a short amount of time.
MailChimp
With more than 10 million clients, MailChimp is one of the most popular email marketing platforms being used today. It’s similar to GetResponse, but different in various ways. Across the world there are a total of 600 million MailChimp emails sent every day, with companies in virtually every industry using the platform. MailChimp is great for marketers who are new to large-scale email marketing. The platform is very intuitive, user friendly, easy, and offers users flexible designs that they can drag and drop into pre-made campaign styles.
The platform’s robust marketing automation ensures that emails are delivered to the correct recipients at the desired time. With a single API request, users can trigger an entire series of emails and also target customers based on preferences, behavior, and previous sales. Users are able to create custom rules with a built-in segmentation, and send gifts and automated messages to fans and prospects. MailChimp gives clients the ability to gain in-depth reporting and insights so that they can best strategize their next email campaign based on data-driven feedback.
A Weber
A Weber focuses on speed, providing clients with all the tools they need to blast emails immediately, and do it in an effective manner. A Weber recognizes importance of keeping your brand at the top of clients’ minds while also maintaining contact with clients. Email, A Weber stresses, is critical for this type of communication. A Weber offers a plethora of unique tools that allows clients to connect with customers pre- and post-sale, with gathering data on their interactions.
Platforms like A Weber pair seamlessly with tools like Internet Vikings, which provides clients with access to domain dropcatching, daily parsing data, and IPs for hosting, proxy, and crawling. Being able to successfully manage a full arsenal of digitally tech-savvy client-facing tools will be key for marketing success and growth in 2016.
Constant Contact
Rounding out my list for the top four, Constant Contact does exactly what its name says it does. By providing clients with automated email campaigns that invite users to customize and target users specifically, the platform is effective in enabling clients remain in constant contact with customers. Constant Contact is also available on mobile devices, which give clients the ability to transact email marketing on the go. Their easy to use drag and drop method makes composing, editing, and sending out emails easy and quick. The platform allows enables users to integrate with social media.
Whether you choose a popular email marketing platform or use in-house technology to gain new customers this year, email marketing will be a powerful tool that will help grow your business in 2016.