9 Tactics for Email Automation to Increase Your ROI

There are fewer elements to running a business that are as important as managing your ROI. What you spend has to be less than what you produce for revenue and the wider the gap, the better.

But it doesn’t just apply to profit.

You should also be considering the amount of time and energy being placed in each task, because time is, as they say, money.

Marketing automation has changed the way we are able to produce more results with less hands on work. Email automation in particular can save every brand owner a significant chunk of effort and even improve the outcome of those drip campaigns.

Here are nine ways you can make email automation work to increase your brand’s marketing ROI.

1. Reduce Payment Failures

One of the biggest threats to your overall revenue is payment failures. Whether that is due to the fact that your customer hasn’t updated their payment information since it was closed or expired, or if they have insufficient funds, you need to be able to be able to collect.

Right away, you should be sending out an automated email reminder letting them know that the payment failed and asking them to update their information.

PayKickstart Dunning / Subscription Saver feature helps you recover your customers’ failed subscription payments by sending three emails to the customer prior to canceling the payment:

• Right after the failed rebill attempt,
• Three days after,
• Five days after

You can also help to reduce failures by sending an automated email when the payment is coming due within the next few days. It is amazing what a difference it will make when your customer has time to verify they have the money they need in the account they specified.

2. Send Reminders To Complete Registration

People get impatient. They have limited time. I have always suggested that you make the onboarding process as simple as possible, such as authorizing third party sign up or just keeping the form short. But that isn’t always effective.

When someone starts to register and gets to the email portion but does not finish, send them a reminder. Wait a day so they have some time to complete whatever tore them away. Many will come back and complete the process with that little reminder.

3. Send Reminders To Complete Sales

The same as above can be done with uncompleted sales. Have you ever been shopping on a profile you have previously created and left something un-bought in your cart? Customers are savvy, they don’t always compulsively purchase what they want in the moment.

No wonder that as many as 70% of shoppers would abandon their shopping carts without completing the purchase!

Going back later and reminding them gives a second chance at securing that conversion. You can even have a banner showing similar products in the email that could increase their likelihood of adding even more to that cart.

PayKickstart handles the cart abandonment on your behalf. The pre-built and tested cart abandonment emails are sent out after each failed attempt. Each template can be fully customized with dynamic customer and/or product information allowing you to personalize each email.

4. Incentivize Feedback

We all know that feedback is pretty critical but also hard to get. I have found the most success from emails, which is a surprise given how much work I have put into social media feedback requests. Emails just produce more response and more descriptive, at that.

Try sending out a “How are we doing?” email at least once per customer. You can link to your website, but it is even better if you build a response box right there in the email that they can send back to you. It takes away a step and the fewer steps for the customer, the better for you.

To survey your customers, use PayKickstart Surveys feature. You can set up different survey options based on an action a customer performed (e.g. you can ask to share the customer’s experience after they cancel or request a refund):

5. Thank Them

I feel as though this one is getting lost in modern day drip campaigns and understand why, to an extent. It can seem trite and unauthentic when you send a generic email to a customer thanking them for joining your email list, signing up for a service, etc.

Yet, this simple trick may boost your customer loyalty building strategy.

That is why you have to customize it to fit the tone of your brand and the needs of the customer. Sell a product? Put together a mini lookbook based on items they scrolled or bought. Offer them a discount for the service you provide. Introduce them to a referral or points reward program.

Make your thank you genuine by showing you care about the customer experience.

To set up thank-you emails inside PayKickstart, use any of the available integrations including Mailchimp, Getresponse, ConvertKit and more. You can add your current automation marketing solution inside your PayKickstart Dashboard by opening “Integrations” and clicking “Email” tab:

6. Tie Emails To Linked Content

Obviously, you want your emails to be constructive and lead the reader back to your site. The good old fashioned newsletter still works and is still worthy of your attention. The right automation tool can create a solid newsletter with the best content and information weekly or semi weekly for you.

Just remember not to overcrowd it. You want your best stuff featured, not the best mixed with the mediocre. Here are a few powerful email templates that can be used here as well!

7. Turn Readers into Buyers

If your content marketing strategy works, your site has a ton of educational content that attracts people who wanted to learn something new, rather than buy something.

Trying to sell them your product right away will probably be ineffective. Instead try to capture their emails and try to convert them when the moment is right.

To better optimize your content-based landing pages, use Text Optimizer which will guide you though creating a better-ranking and more-engaging copy that would lead your readers through your secondary conversion funnel:

8. Send “We Miss You!” Emails

Haven’t seen your customer in awhile? Reach out! I love the “We Miss You” email because you can use any tactic you want to show you are sincere. Some of my favorites have been the tongue in cheek “Is it something we did?” variety. But in my experience, coupon codes are some of the best ways to urge them back.

When I was helping with a drip campaign for an online subscription based platform, we did a dual purpose “miss you” email. It actually invited them to come back and be the first to test out their soon to be released new version with additional features, with three months free. The response was incredible.

9. Rollup Your Content

There is this tool that lets people “roll” their emails into a single email so it unclutters their inbox. Most brands could learn from this idea. Instead of sending our a new email three times a week, make it into a newsletter.

You can also leave it up to the customer in their settings. They can choose to get a rolled up or individual email (or none). This will reduce your unsubscribes.

Bonus: Curate Industry News

Not everything has to be about your brand. It can be about the industry itself. I am signed up for a number of political and local newsletters and they will often branch out into related fields to keep me up to date.

You can do this, as well. Is another company doing something that will impact your readers? Is there some kind of security flaw you want your tech junkies to know? A new fashion line showing the latest trends for your fashionistas?

Do you have any tips for email automation examples for getting that ROI at its peak? Let us know in the comments.

Ann Smarty

Ann Smarty is the Brand Manager at Internet Marketing Ninjas, as well as co-founder of Viral Content Bee. Ann has been into Internet Marketing for over a decade, she is the former Editor-in-Chief of Search Engine Journal and contributor to prominent search and social blogs including Small Biz Trends and Mashable. Ann is also the frequent speaker at Pubcon and the host of a weekly Twitter chat #vcbuzz

Read More About Ann Smarty