Email Marketing Service: What’s Good, What’s Not

Email marketing service software is a great help when you need to send mass emails. But when not done the right way, these services can go awry. Not all email marketing service types are made the same, so in this guide, we’ll explore a little bit about what you might find in some.

Before we start, realize that many of the name brand email marketing service types are quite fine to use. You just have to know their strengths and weaknesses before using them. Knowing them ahead of time will help you know how to implement the software to get the most out of it.

Email Marketing Service: Typical Email Software

The typical email marketing software will be designed for you to create your own mass emails to send out to your list. They usually contain pre-made templates for “prettied-up” emails that aren’t HTML-based. They usually have an HTML version of each template so your HTML-only recipients can still read the emails without getting them filtered into the spam folder.

The nice part about these email marketing service types is that you can filter through your list, send emails to recipients who signed up within a certain date range, exclude other recipients, personalize titles and email openings and more.

Oftentimes, you’ll find that you can integrate the biggest name brand email marketing service choices with other software, like membership software, or plugins. This makes using the software even easier when blogging or broadcasting social media.

Email Marketing Service: The Ones That Aren’t As Ideal

There’s email marketing service types for those willing to work hard, and there’s options for those who aren’t so keen on writing. Of course, something is sometimes better than nothing, but in the case of emails, the more direct to your purpose they are, the better.

Unfortunately, not all these services are made with sales in mind. For instance, I recently worked with a company that made email newsletters that were built like a newspaper. They had stories about everything under the sun in them, but very few were directed at making their customers any money. I take issue with this, because it just detracts the reader. Not that the reader should be “funneled” into buying something, but you need to make your message clear and direct. Someone who subscribes to your newsletter for tech advice doesn’t want to read about how to clean up puppy messes, and that was the disparity I saw with using this particular company’s service.

I don’t mention all this to discourage you from using an email marketing software. But I would like you to be prudent in selecting one. Pay close attention to what they tell you is “free,” and what you’re actually paying for. Do you get up to the first 500 subscribers free? Then what happens after that? Do you get any written emails, or do you have to write them all yourself? Is that what you planned on? These are all things you should consider when choosing an email marketing service for your business.