What is Email Marketing?

Some people ignore email marketing because they think it is outdated, but nothing could be further from the truth. There are more than 4 billion email accounts across the globe–nearly half the population–and email marketing remains an effective and efficient way to connect with customers. It’s cost-effective, too. An email campaign provides a great return on investment (ROI), considering that you can get email service for free in some cases. In this overview, you’ll learn more about what email marketing is, what it can do, who uses it, and how to learn it so you can determine how to add this skill to your professional toolbox.

What Can You Do with Email Marketing?

Email marketing is an effective way to reach customers and build a business. Whether it be increasing sales, building a brand, or sharing meaningful content, email marketing can help you reach the right person at the right time. Email lets you build relationships with your customers and stay connected over time.

The first step in creating an email marketing campaign is to build an email list. You can start your list with people you have met in person or anyone who has asked for more information on your products or services. You can add people to your email list if they have given you their contact information. It is crucial to get permission before adding someone to the list. One way to collect emails is to ask for them when customers place orders. Another way is to offer a discount or some kind of bonus if the customer subscribes to your email list. A common way to do this is with a popup message on your website.

Once you have a list of customer emails, you can begin to send out links to content that will be interesting to them. This helps to build a connection with your customers. To send a bulk email to a list, you must sign up with an email service provider (ESP). ESPs allow you to schedule your emails and provide analytics that tell you when users open the emails and when they don’t. This lets you time your emails to have the most impact and tweak the message if it isn’t attracting attention. 

How Do You Set Up Email Marketing? How Much Does it Cost?

You can start with email marketing by sending emails on your own, but as your list grows, you will need to sign up with an ESP. These companies send out emails for you according to a pre-set schedule you determine. How much the ESP will cost depends upon the company you choose, the various fees they charge, and the features you opt for.

Mailchimp by Intuit offers a free version that includes up to 2,500 email sends. Paid plans include the ability to test to see which message is best, as well as scheduling and segmentation. Plans start at $11 a month and go up to $299 a month, depending upon features. HubSpot also offers a free email plan with more features for the $45 a month Starter level, $800 a month for the Professional level, and $3,600 a month for the Enterprise level.

What Are the Benefits of Learning Email Marketing?

Knowing how to design and implement an email campaign is an important skill for small business owners. Building an email list is the first step to making a stronger connection with customers. Once you have a list, you can determine the goals of your campaign, which could be getting customers to buy something, sign up for something, or become more informed on an issue. The final step is to create content that will appeal to your customers, then set a schedule for email distribution. 

Another reason to learn to create email campaigns is if you want to change to a career in digital marketing. Email is another channel, along with social media and content marketing, to increase website traffic and sales or build a brand. Digital Marketers need to learn email marketing and other tools to help businesses succeed in the online marketplace. Email marketing is an easy and effective way to increase internet sales.

Read more about why you should learn email marketing. 

Email Marketing Careers

When you learn how to design an email marketing campaign, you are on track for several different careers. You could get a job as an Email Marketing Specialist, a Content Marketer, or a Digital Marketer. Here are some of the possible careers that use email marketing:

Email Marketing Specialist

Email Marketing Specialists connect with subscribers and develop deeper relationships with current and potential customers. Email marketing can increase sales quickly and reach a large number of people at once at a minimal cost. Email marketing is a fast and practical addition to any business’s digital marketing strategy.

Content Marketer or Copywriter

Content Marketers and Copywriters provide content for emails, web pages, blogs, apps, social media channels, and print publications. It’s about generating interest and providing consumers with information about products, services, and brands they need or want. 

Digital Marketer

Digital Marketers use digital channels and tools like email marketing, social media marketing, paid and unpaid search marketing, and search engine optimization (SEO) to promote products and services. Digital marketing has become one of the most critical ways to publicize a business and help it grow. 

How to Learn Email Marketing

You can learn email marketing on your own by watching free video tutorials or taking a class. There are two types of classes to choose from: in-person email marketing classes or live online email marketing classes. In-person classes have the advantage of an instructor in the classroom and students to interact with, while live online sessions have a remote instructor who can answer questions and help when you don’t understand something. Full or partl-time classes are available on weekdays, weeknights, or weekends.

If signing up for a class that meets at a set time feels like too much right now, you can also find on-demand email marketing classes on many platforms. LinkedIn Learning offers courses on email strategies, newsletter marketing, managing email marketing lists, and using email service providers. HubSpot and Mailchimp both offer email marketing courses you can take at your own pace, as do SkillShare, SimpliLearn, and Reliablesoft.

Many free resources are available for learning about email marketing, too. Free seminars like Noble Desktop’s Intro to Email Marketing and other presentations will give you an idea of what email marketing is about. You can also read articles about email marketing on Noble Desktop’s Tech Blog and other blogs. There are many free resources to help you get started learning about email marketing. 

Read the full guide on how to learn email marketing.

A Brief History of Email Marketing

Email is older than any other aspect of digital marketing. Ray Tomlinson sent the first electronic mail message (email) in 1971 on a US Department of Defense network called ARPANET. Email eventually moved into the private sector, and in 1978, Gary Thuerk sent the first marketing email to 400 users. Email was still limited to schools and companies until 1991 when Hotmail began to offer personal accounts, changing the landscape for email marketing. Today, over half the world’s population uses email on many different devices, allowing companies to reach their customers easily and efficiently.

Comparable Fields

Fields comparable to email marketing include content marketing and social media marketing. Both of these areas involve solid communication skills, knowledge of how to collect and use data, and an understanding of scheduling and automating regular output. 

Much like Email Marketers, Content Marketers plan a strategy, create blog posts, ebooks, how-to articles, infographics, or videos, and post the content on a website according to a publishing schedule. Then they use data analytics tools to determine if a campaign is successful and make changes if necessary. Social Media Marketers work in a similar fashion, although they also need to interact with followers on a more immediate basis.

Learn Email Marketing with Hands-on Training at Noble Desktop

You can master email marketing with classes from Noble Desktop. To get an introduction to email marketing, sign up for Noble Desktop’s Email Marketing Bootcamp. This introductory class covers building a list, creating a campaign, writing effective emails, optimizing your campaign, and delivering the email. Classes are small, and instructors can give you individual attention. You can retake a course for free up to a year after you take it. Choose from in-person classes at Noble Desktop’s New York City location or attend live online from anywhere in the world.

Noble Desktop also offers a Digital Marketing Certificate for an in-depth course on digital marketing. Learn about content marketing, web optimization, SEO, Google Analytics, Google Ads, and social media marketing on Instagram, Facebook, LinkedIn, YouTube, and TikTok. You can find a free email marketing seminar, Intro to Email Marketing, on Noble’s website and lots more resources on Noble Desktop’s Tech Blog. 

Key Insights

• Email marketing provides a great return on investment and is an efficient way to connect with current and potential customers.
• Sign up for an email service provider to handle large batches of messages. You can get started for free and increase to gain more features as you can afford it.
• To create an email marketing campaign:
• First, build an email list. 
• Next, send links to high-quality content.
• Use analytics to see where your campaign is successful and what you need to change.
• Knowing how to create an email marketing campaign is vital for small business owners and an excellent way to get started as a Digital Marketer.
• If you want to learn email marketing, you can find many free resources or sign up for classes.
• You can receive comprehensive email marketing training through an in-person or live online course with Noble Desktop.