Email and Social Media Integration
It’s great to have a big following in social media but how can you integrate email with with social media marketing? The first step to integrating email and social media marketing, is to be certain your peeps are hanging out on the same social networks that you are.
Not every business will have a large number of customers and prospects using all of The social media outlets, so focus your marketing strategy, initially, on the places your customers and prospects are likely to congregate.
The network that will be most effective for you depends on your audience and the strength of your brand’s efforts on each site. According to HubSpot’s State of Inbound Marketing 2011 Report, which notes that:

  • 67% of B2C marketers reported acquiring at least one customer from Facebook, compared with 41% of B2B marketers
  • 61% of B2B marketers reported acquiring at least one customer from LinkedIn, compared with 39% of B2C marketers

Sometimes we might assume that our email opt-ins are the same people who engage with our business on social media sites. Instead of assuming, we should…Ask them!

  • Survey your social media fans and followers to ask whether they also subscribe to your newsletter or email promos.
  • Then, survey your email subscribers to find out how many are also fans or followers of your business’s social networking accounts, and how many have ever shared your email content with their peers.

You may find that there isn’t as much overlap between the audiences as you think.
Start by adding an email opt-in form on your Facebook page.  You will be ahead of most small business owners.
There are several ways to mix email opt-in offers with your regular tweets. The most direct way is to tweet occasional requests for followers to join your email list (including a shortened URL that links directly to your email sign-up page).
When tweeting an email opt-in offer, briefly describe the benefits of joining the email list, such as getting access to exclusive offers, valuable content, industry news, etc. Other list-building tweet ideas include:

  • Teasers of email newsletter content
  • Mentions of current email-only promotions, with a reminder that followers must sign up to get access
  • Links to registration-required content, such as white papers or on-demand webinars

Also make sure your email opt-in box is on every page of your website or blog. That way, any content you tweet features a way for visitors to join your email list after clicking on a link shared via Twitter.
Add “Follow us” buttons or links for each of your social networking accounts in the sidebar, header or footer of your email template.
Implementing those few strategies to integrate your social media and your email marketing should keep you busy for a short time anyway. 🙂
 

About the Author: Donna Amos


I believe you can achieve anything you truly want to achieve. “It might sound trite, but time and time again, I’ve seen it happen with my clients. They overcome the fear of exposing themselves to the possibility of failure to creating profitable exciting businesses. My clients do great work, and sometimes it only takes someone else believing in them to give them the confidence to step out and take the chance.”

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