Overcoming the Challenges of Industrial Email Marketing

Are you reaching your market where they're looking? A recent survey shows that 95 percent of engineers consider email to be a valuable resource for content.

Suffice to say, if you are not using email, a substantial amount of your target market is not going to know about what you can do for them.

Just because email is the oldest form of online marketing does not mean it is ineffective. In the following piece, we will show you some tips to increase your success rate with email.

Looking to improve your email marketing game? IndustrySelect's industrial database gives you live access to 400,000 U.S. manufacturers and their one million executives. Trusted data since 1912. Learn more here.

What your email should achieve

An email should perform specific tasks when used for marketing purposes. It should create more leads, increase conversion rates, lengthen engagement time and increase the number of subscribers.

• Leads. While it is essential to get leads from potential customers, how you do this can have a profound effect on the outcome. Engineers and industrial managers are by and large very logical and rational people not prone to making emotional decisions. A gentle call to action combined with a display of your value will be more effective than a hard sell or "act now" type of tone.

• Conversion rates. Including testimonials of others who have benefited from your services is a simple way to increase conversion rates. When someone reads the value and services that you have provided for another company, it proves your credibility through a third party. The importance of this cannot be understated. Another method for increasing conversion rates is to ask for an in-person meeting in the email. Industrial marketing is all about relationships and moving from the digital to the physical is an important step.

• Engagement time. While much of modern society may be based on fast-paced, short attention span bursts of media, this demographic still values detailed content. Writing knowledgeably about industrial or technical topics ensures that the reader will see you as an expert in the field. This leads to the user reading the entire email rather than just scanning a headline. Your email may become a reference if the information is unique and detailed enough, further stretching the engagement time.

• Subscribers. Boosting subscribers can happen organically or via generator services. Going the all-natural route, increasing the number of subscribers is accomplished by encouraging people to have a relationship with you and the content you produce. Do not forget to provide the means for people to sign up by including a link to the subscription.

Overcoming Challenges 

Creating useful and valuable industrial emails takes effort, but it is well worth it. A little bit of experience will overcome the initial challenges very quickly.

• Gathering accurate information. Having accurate information about manufacturers can be a challenge, especially when some do not update their website on a regular basis. You may need to call the company to verify that the data is correct.

• Creating relevant content. Researching topics of interest to write about takes more time than just mentioning your capabilities. But engineers and industrial managers will appreciate and read content geared towards their specialized fields.

• Delivering emails consistently. Providing consistent content on a schedule takes dedication. It cannot be thrown together at the last second. Many times you must perform research to ensure you are disseminating accurate information. A helpful tactic is to write in advance about topics that are not time-sensitive. This allows flexibility if other demands eat into the content-creation schedule

• Earning trust. Words matter and the ones you choose to represent your knowledge and abilities should reflect that. Write in a way that speaks to your intended audience. This may mean abandoning the current trends in content creation such as very short paragraphs or slideshows. Engineers and industrial managers will trust your information, sources and analysis far more than flashy but shallow layouts.

Gathering accurate information on manufacturers for email campaigns can be a challenge. IndustrySelect, the industrial database, provides all the information you need to launch a successful campaign. IndustrySelect subscribers can select up to 30 data points on any manufacturing company in the U.S. to help build a powerful list of contacts. Company profiles also include the contact information for hard-to-find executive decision-makers, so your message gets in front of the right person. Learn more about IndustrySelect here or try a free demo today!