[Welcome back to our Word of Mouth Marketing Lessons newsletter. This is text from the great issue all of our email subscribers just received. Sign yourself up using this handy form.]
Email is still one of the most effective word of mouth marketing tools you have. Yet so many marketers take for granted that they have permission to send inexpensive, sharable marketing to their customers.
Here are a few ways to get the most word of mouth out of your emails:
1. Make it feel like a community
2. Take your mistakes seriously
3. Tell a great story
1. Make it feel like a community
theSkimm, an email newsletter that turns current events into quick daily reads, includes the names of readers celebrating birthdays that day at the end of every email and a “Skimm 50” list of names on Wednesdays thanking readers for referring friends. It doesn’t have much to do with the rest of the newsletter, but it points out something most newsletters forget to mention: “Other people read this, too.” By making their readers more visible, theSkimm creates a sense of community and a sense of belonging — which is a great word of mouth motivator.
2. Take your mistakes seriously
There are plenty of opportunities for an error to sneak into email newsletters: a typo, a broken link, whatever. One of these errors snuck into an email blast from The/Studio when they accidentally sent their readers an email addressed to “Dear *|First Name|*.” A simple coding mistake, but instead of ignoring it, The/Studio sent a follow-up email apologizing by saying, “We know your name isn’t *|First Name|*, but we were so excited to send out our product announcement that we got carried away.” Don’t forget: With email marketing, making up for your mistakes is just as important (if not more important) than in your store. Readers are looking for any reason to hit “unsubscribe” — make sure you’re not giving them any.
3. Tell a great story
Best Made Company has a weekly email newsletter that sometimes features product promotions and sometimes shares stories about outdoor adventuring or how-to videos. These non-salesy stories are great examples of word of mouth carriers: People forward them to their friends, their friends sign up for the newsletter, and now they’re getting updates on great content as well as Best Made’s products.
Bonus: 4 word of mouth lessons from one email
We were so impressed by the word of mouth marketing chops in this email from Pinrose, we dedicated an entire newsletter to it. Check out how they made their customers feel special, showed the company’s personality, asked for feedback the right way, and gave customers a reason to come back.
