Four ways to make your email marketing work

Email Marketing

Being in biotech, I used to find hard looking for information on how I can write a successful email. Most of the information available on the internet or in books is primarily directed to retail industry. We know that the customer base for biotech industry is mostly comprised of PhDs, and Professors or in simple words “Skeptics”. Yes, we all think as scientists in our Biotech world and I mean as really nerdy scientists. I know a good number of my scientists’ friends who would not click on the URL but instead hover the mouse over to find the URL properties & then copy paste it in the search engines to go to the destination.  Not all but some of them do know that they are being cookied. For marketers like us this definitely messes with the CTR. Yes, just in case this came as a surprise to you, so I forewarn you to rethink about the elements before crafting an email. In Biotech, we are marketing to intelligent species who are not impulse buyers.

Here are the key elements which I find are very helpful-
1. Short and sweet- If you don’t like to read that long email, neither would they. Don’t make it product centric please! No one like to know how good your product is but what they want to hear is how will that product help them.

2. Nurture them- This is one element which I find heavily missing from our industry. 99.9% of us just sprays & prays. Quick question to peak your interest in nurturing - What do you do with the contacts who have not opened your email? What's is your strategy for them

3. Pamper your readers- Personalize with their names if available if not then use Dr. Johnson or Dear Colleague. It helps. This usually takes time and in some cases money. Invest in good CRM and at the same time in data cleaning tool. Not only your sales team will be happy, your email metrics will put a smile as well due to personalized messages.

4. Subject line- This is something which I find hardest to work on at times. It is the most important element as it dictates the open rate of the email. For example- Instead of saying "10% off PCR reagents" try "PCR news exclusively for you."

Last but not the least, don’t send an email just for the sake of sending or to cross of the list  Bring creativity into it. Isn’t that what marketing is all about?