Introduction
The purpose of writing and sending a promotional email is to promote a product or service. The whole idea is to tactfully persuade your client to take advantage of a product or service that will benefit them. Your primary interest should be the client, what is in it for them? Any promotion that does not add value to your intended audience is nothing but fraud! It is only after you have established that your promo truly adds value to your clients that you can put a profitable price tag on it.
Below are essential things you should be well acquainted with before embarking on a promotional email campaign.
Clarity of the Promotional Email
In your email, the promotion intended should be clear. Your clients should not need to spend more than 10 seconds before they understand the promo. That is, when they open your email, which they may be reluctant to do, the message should not be ambiguous or hard to understand. You are probably not the only one sending promotional emails to your recipient. You will need to get your message across decisively, and clarity is vital to this.
Brevity of the Information
Another major characteristic of a good promotional email is brevity. Keep is short. The effectiveness of a promo is hampered by too many words. Be succinct, go straight to the point and be impactful. Unfortunately, this is an aspect many business owners have issues complying with. They want to say everything in just a single moment; they bombard the customer with loads of details that yield little or no result at all! People do not need details.
The world we live in is fast-paced. When people are online, they have many things they hope to achieve; reading a long boring piece about a promotion is not one of them. Remember, only what gets to be read, gets the needed attention, if your promotional email is rather long, it is almost as good as a waste.
Simplicity versus Professionalism
Promotional email language should be simple. Completely avoid trade jargons if possible. Use words that can be identified easily by your target audience. Simplicity drives the message home. You have seconds to deliver your message; do not let the customer use half of the time racking his brains out!
People are not that patient.
Trade jargons may be used in the case that your promotion is targeted at certain professionals in a particular field, for example, doctors. A promotional email for the sale of medical equipment may contain few specialized terms.
The Need for a Strong Copy
The idea is to deliver the right words that will ensure that the promotional email is a success. Choosing the right words for the right promotion, at the right time and for the right audience does not happen by chance. You may need a professional for this. Otherwise, consult a book or two for how to do this.
Let us go through a quick lesson for writing a strong copy.
- First, use “you” more than you use “we”. The focus should be on your client, not on your company. In other words, zoom in on the customer as much as possible. Avoid focusing on your company, no matter how tempted you feel! If you overload your email with information about your company, the recipient will not likely read your email at all, and may delete your next email without opening it, or worse, tag your email address as spam – thereby, sending all future emails to the spam box!
- Second, let the customer know exactly what is in it for him or her. Supply brief information about the benefits the customer stands to enjoy by participating in the promo.
- Third, the subject of your promotional email must be catchy enough to make the recipients to open your email. How to achieve such an effective subject line is an entire topic on its own! However, the more important thing is for the content of your promotional email to actually reflect the subject that drove the recipient to click open. If there is a disparity, you can be sure you would lose the trust of the customer.
- Fourth, your copy should reflect an answer to the client’s need. You should ensure that the entire purpose of sending a promotional email is to meet the need of the recipient. If this is not the case, then the email is as good as junk. Those receiving the email should have need for the product or service you are promoting. And they should get that sense of a need being met in the email they receive, a copy should reflect this.
- Finally, as noted earlier, a very good and strong copy may require a professional, however, by following the preceding principles (and also consulting good books on this subject), you can have an effective copy.
Urgency of Action
Give your client a reason to do something about the promotion fast. Give the customer a sense of urgency. The promotion should have a short timeframe; let it have a limited time span to persuade the client to take the required step quickly. In your text supply action words that will make the customer act. For example; “Place your order now!” or “Shop now!” or “Signup today!”
Singleness of the Eye
Let your eye be single. Stay focused on only one promotion. Do not include any side attraction (which is more or less a distraction to the recipient). Let the email and call for action be directed at only the promotion at hand.
Grammar and the Likes
Ensure your email is grammatical and typographical errors free. Your grammar should be simple enough. Punctuate appropriately, limit the exclamation marks. Avoid writing your action words, or any other word, in ALL CAPS (that is UPPERCASE), it does not make a good-read; appears to be yelling at the recipient.
Email Sample: How to Write Promotional Emails in Business
Subject: Enjoy A Free Family Trip to Hawaii is This Christmas!
Dear esteemed customer,
The Goodbuy Mall is thrilled to inform you of our Christmas promo. For any purchase worth $1000 you make during this season, you qualify to participate in a lottery draw using a raffle ticket. This gives you and your family an opportunity to enjoy an all-expense-paid trip to Hawaii this Christmas!
Take that much needed holiday with your family – for free! Shop now at any of our outlets.
Collins Cummings
Client Relations Officer
