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When users interact with your website, every click holds the promise of a potential customer. Therefore, increasing website traffic means you have more chances to get new customers. However, it’s not about just bringing any visitors to your website. You need to attract the right visitors. The ones who’ll become qualified leads and, eventually, customers.
So, how do you ensure you're reaching the right people?
The answer lies in email marketing. By catching your visitors' attention with copy good enough that they provide their email addresses, you can keep them engaged even after they leave your site. With the right approach, email becomes a powerful tool to engage website visitors in the long-term and turn them into loyal customers.
This blog post lists five effective strategies that will help you direct subscribers to your digital doorstep and turn them into recurring website visitors.
1. Build a healthy and segmented email list
Building a healthy and segmented email list is a prerequisite for every successful email marketing strategy. Let's take it one step at a time, though. You should start with permission-based email marketing, meaning you're reaching out to people genuinely interested in hearing from you. Here's where double opt-ins are crucial.
Set up a double opt-in process where users confirm their interest by clicking on a verification link in an email. Just like this straightforward verification email by Typeform:
This might seem like an unremarkable email. However, it's an integral part of an effective SaaS email marketing strategy, helping users trust you. This simple process also reduces the chances of fake or misspelled email addresses getting into your email database. That way, you can focus on the readers most likely to engage with your SaaS emails.
But this is not the case only for SaaS companies. Small businesses and ecommerce stores can also use a healthy email list and segmentation best practices to drive traffic to their websites.
Imagine you own an auto dealership, for example. A first step would be to grow your email list using a lead magnet. So, you invite visitors to subscribe to your newsletter. In return, they get to download a guide on "How to Pick the Right Car Based on your Lifestyle.”
Once you collect the visitors’ email addresses, you should keep sending them useful content. But this time make your CTAs about redirecting them to your website instead of downloading content. Perhaps it could be a link to promote a new product or feature, or one that directs them to your latest blog post.
The next step could involve asking for subscriber feedback through polls, surveys, or short rating requests. Once you have these insights, combine them with the data you gather from their browsing history on your site. Perhaps some users are looking for family SUVs while others are after sports cars.
Any kind of interaction with your brand will provide further insight into user likes and dislikes, helping you build detailed segments. As data keeps coming in, you'll be able to tailor your automotive email marketing, so each group receives targeted vehicle offers and news.
Tip: It may sound tempting ,but stay away from buying email lists. When sending emails to people who haven’t consented, they will be disengaged. Worse than that, sending unsolicited emails is illegal in some countries - your emails will be flagged as spam, you’ll get complaints or even face data privacy issues.
2. Craft valuable email content
Businesses need to deliver valuable email content to stand out in the sea of digital promotions. On top of that, great content helps you build authority. As a result readers will return to your website, since they trust your expertise.
Let’s check the best tactics to craft compelling emails that get opened and acted on:
- Focus on the experience rather than the offer. Customers tend to remember the way they felt during the interaction with your brand, not what they bought. So, tailor the email content based on their past behavior. Personalize their experience by celebrating their birthday or anniversary with your company. Sometimes, even something as small as mentioning a recipient's name in the email copy could do the trick.
- Add clear, prominent, and actionable email CTAs. The goal is to make subscribers understand what their next action should be without having to scroll through your entire email.
- Limit your images or other visual elements to one or two per email. Going overboard with graphics not only creates visual clutter but also drives readers away from your key CTA.
- Experiment with different types of helpful content to showcase your expertise. Think of quick tips, customer success stories or reviews, and exclusive content they won’t find elsewhere.
- Don’t make false promises. Evoking a sense of urgency in your subject line is always a nice touch… but only as long as there's something urgent in your offer. Emails that don’t follow through on the promise made in the subject line frustrate readers and foster distrust.
Uber sets an excellent example with its feature announcement email. The actionable and straightforward language in the subject line and body encourages recipients to act. Combined with the clean formatting, readable content, and prominent CTA, it ticks all the boxes for directing readers to book their ride—and increase the site's traffic.
Subject line: ✈️ Step off the plane and into a waiting car
3. Harness the power of social media
Driving consistent website traffic takes more than a great website and helpful email content. It's about being where your audience is and making your brand recognizable across multiple platforms.
A multi-channel approach, where powerful channels like email marketing and social media join forces, works wonders for amplifying your reach and boosting website traffic. Also, it helps you offer users a seamless experience, encouraging readers to engage with your content more frequently on different touch points—your website included.
The first step is to use your emails to share user-generated content. UGC is often perceived as more authentic than any content brands create, making it a valuable tool for businesses to establish and build their credibility.
Reading—or even better watching—customer testimonials where other consumers describe their positive experience using your products or services helps build trust in your brand among your readers. When using testimonials or reviews in your emails, opt for the ones that highlight how your products or services addressed a specific pain point.
Your social media can also work as a lead generation practice, helping you build your email list. For example, you can tease upcoming content that your followers can access only if they sign up for your newsletter.
Or, make subscribing a condition for entering an exciting social media giveaway. It's a win-win situation where subscribers enjoy the fun of a chance to win an enticing prize, and you get to boost website traffic and brand awareness.
You can create a dedicated email campaign to ask subscribers to follow you on social media. Here’s how Tens did it, using a friendly tone for readers to relate to the brand:
Subject line: Come Hang With Us ✌️
4. Use exclusive promotions
If you want engaged subscribers, make them feel special. Make sure users know that by joining your list they gain access to exclusive content and promotions. Featuring this kind of content in your newsletters is a sure-fire way to drive traffic to selected pages on your website.
The key is to add an enticing incentive that prompts recipients to click on your email CTA and navigate through your website. It could be anything from a limited-time discount to exclusive access to a downloadable resource—available only to subscribers.
Everything in your email, from your email subject line to your CTA, should highlight the offer and how it helps your audience solve their problems.
It’s important to evoke urgency when it comes to limited-time offers, so recipients read and act as soon as possible. Consumers want what they can’t have. Therefore, making them feel they’re about to miss something of value drives immediate action.
If you've launched a blog, you could promote its content through your emails, helping to establish your business as an industry thought leader. Provide a few key takeaways from your blog post in your newsletter with the promise of more in the full piece, giving readers a reason to go to your blog.
By including teaser blog insights in your emails, you increase the chances of building a loyal customer base eager to explore your content on a regular basis.
Lastly, when incorporating exclusive content or promotions in your emails, make sure it’s customized to each subscriber's individual needs and preferences. By tailoring your promotions, you create a personalized email experience that encourages subscribers to engage with your business on more touch points.
5. Measure and analyze email performance
Measuring and analyzing how your subscribers react to your emails gives you a deeper understanding of their needs and interests. Using the data collected, you'll be in a better position to adjust your overall targeting, including making strategic tweaks to your website.
Some of the key performance indicators to keep track of are:
- email open rates
- click-through rates
- conversions
These metrics allow you to find patterns in your recipients’ engagement with your email content. For example:
- Do you see your click-through rate increasing when you include specific topics in your emails? Perhaps this means you should create more of that content on your website and blog.
- Have you noticed that emails with fun elements and a touch of humor in the email copy perform better? In that case, maybe it's time to tweak your tone of voice accordingly on your site, too.
- Does using scarcity or urgency in your subject lines boost your open rate? If so, you can incorporate these elements on your website copy to promote limited-time offers.
- Do interactive components in your emails drive more conversions? Consider adding interactivity on your home page and product pages to catch your visitor's eye.
The list is endless, and you can use any of the insights you gain to make adjustments to your website.
Another way to find out what works with your audience is through A/B testing. Performing A/B testing on your emails allows you to check how subscribers interact with different email variations. Experiment with different components, such as subject lines, CTAs, layouts, and send each version to a small audience group.
This process lets you access valuable insights regarding your audience’s preferences. That's data you can later implement on your site to make users convert or keep coming back.
Last but not least, your email campaigns offer you a great opportunity to collect feedback easily. Something you can't do on your website directly. With email all you need to do is add a short and fun email survey or poll to hear what your audience needs, directly from them.
Make sure to include questions regarding what kind of content they'd like to see on your site or where they think you should improve. Not only will you identify aspects for optimization, but you'll also build stronger customer relationships by showing that their input matters.
Graza created a compelling email to ask their subscribers for feedback. The brand uses interactivity, in this case a survey, to turn providing feedback into a fun process. The email copy is full of puns, subtle humor, and a promo code as an incentive to further motivate readers to take the survey.
Subject line: WE'LL TRADE YA
Turn email subscribers into engaged website visitors
Email marketing remains one of the most effective ways to boost website traffic. However, you shouldn't think of it as a channel to fill with links to your website. It's not just about adding links and pushing content to your readers. Think of every email as a new opportunity to deepen your connection with them and add value to their lives.
When making email content about educating and entertaining your target audience, you're doing more than directing people to your site. You're building a community of users who value your authority and turn to your brand when looking for a solution to a pain point. This practice leads to increased website traffic through email, converting casual subscribers into recurring visitors.
