Why SEO and Email Marketing are Essential for Your Business
Looking for something that will take your business to the next level? Email marketing and search engine optimization (SEO) are essential digital marketing tools that have the power to elevate your business when used effectively. Both methods work towards the same goal, generating warm leads to organically grow your business.
This is not to downplay all the other marketing channels. They all play a role in a cohesive marketing strategy. When it comes to cost and effectiveness, SEO and email marketing are a difficult combination to beat.
Keep reading to learn why SEO and email marketing are the best digital marketing channels at this time.
High Return on Investment (ROI)
The cost of email marketing and SEO becomes very low once you have the necessary systems in place. This allows you to maximize your marketing investment dollars.
First Let’s Look at Email Marketing
Email marketing strategies can be absolutely incredible at generating profits. According to CampaignMonitor.com, email marketing has an ROI of 4400%!
Moreover, in 2018, Barilliance.net reported 17.75% of clicked-through emails resulted in a purchase.
Imagine what it would mean for your business to expect 17-18% of clicked-through emails to result in a purchase. These numbers are very impressive considering print ads and direct mail have an average conversion rate of only 1.7%.
Next Let’s Look at SEO
Similarly, SEO can be just as effective as email marketing when it comes to maximizing your marketing investment dollars. ImForza notes that the leads that come from SEO have a 14.6% average conversion rate.
Stats from SearchEngineJournal.com reported that 93% of online experiences begin with a search engine. Additionally, according to HubSpot.com, 57% of B2B marketers stated that SEO generates more leads than any other marketing initiative.
Moreover, imForza reports that “70-80% of people ignore paid search results, choosing to only click on organic search results.”
If done correctly, SEO strategies by themselves can drive a 14.6% conversion rate. When coupled with an effective email marketing strategy, it has the potential to provide the highest ROI in a digital marketing setting.
Drive Traffic to Your Website, for Free!
SEO has the distinct advantage of driving relevant traffic to your site. A person who finds your website via SEO is searching for something that you are most likely providing.
Anyone who has gone through the torture of cold calling knows just how difficult it is to get a potential customer to allow you to make a presentation.
SEO is the opposite of that situation.
SEO means potential customers will be reaching out to you precisely because they are already interested in what you have to say. It can be because of an informative article, a review article, a service page or a product page. Regardless of what it is, the person is already interested and therefore more receptive.
This is exactly the opportunity every marketer is looking for.
SEO Lends Credibility to Your Website
By ranking your website ahead of others, Google confers upon you two distinct advantages.
Users are more likely to click on your website if it is ranked first. Most people never go beyond the first page in a search.
A high-ranking page will make you appear more legitimate in the minds of your potential consumers.
Due to time constraints, the average person is unlikely to extend the search beyond top ranked sites. So, having a high SEO ranking puts you at a tremendous advantage.
In other words, because Google has ranked your website ahead of others of similar content, your credibility is immediately established.
People will assume, consciously and unconsciously, that what you have to say matters and view your site as a standard.
Effective in Small Numbers
In general, it is said that paid marketing in small numbers should be avoided. The reason is that it can be extremely expensive.
As an example of this, I recently ran a Linkedin Ad for a small business where the CPM (cost per thousand) was $241.00!! So why did I do such a thing? Because in that case, we were advertising to a very unique and specific audience that could yield a high return.
On the other hand, a small audience acquired via SEO and email has a minimal startup cost. i.e., Labor.
In this scenario, the general guideline of avoiding small numbers with paid marketing doesn’t hold. With a targeted small audience, you are able to extract the most value from your list.
Let’s look at why - First, an engaged email audience helps you to quickly build your audience profile. You are able to directly speak with your audience, get feedback and curate your content.
Second, stats from GetResponse email lists of 1000 - 2,499 subscribers have the highest click-through rate (CTR) at 5.32%, followed by lists of 2,500 - 4,999 recipients that have a click-through rate of 3.98%.
An extensive list of recipients could create the situation where you are sending emails to inactive or invalid addresses, which might be a reason for hard bounces and deliverability issues. A smaller, more focused list avoids this problem.
Finally, a small retargeted audience brings in more money. SaleCycle noted that successfully implemented retargeted emails drive 28.3% of all ecommerce revenue.
They wrote, “Statistics about email marketing show that sending emails to regain the lost sales can be very beneficial. Highly personal and conversion-centric, these emails should include a sleek subject line, the abandoned product along with a bold call to action button, and persuasive text.”
Wrapping it up
In the world of marketing, there are countless other methods and strategies that people are using really well. Ultimately, it comes down to connecting consumers to your business in the most cost effective and profitable ways that allow you to reach your business goals.
By implementing SEO and email marketing into your business plan, you have the potential to see a high return on investment, drive traffic to your website for free, generate credibility and be incredibly effective in small numbers.To put it simply:
With SEO - consumers come to you.
With emails - you go directly to the consumers inbox.
I think this makes for a very powerful combination in the age of online marketing. I hope you enjoyed this article. What has been your experience using SEO & email marketing for your business?
Author’s Biography:
Kevin has been working in the online marketing industry for over five years. He is an active internet marketer, freelancer, and builder of affiliate websites. He has successfully built and sold multiple online businesses and is a contributor on Bestcompany.com.
Connect with Kevin on Twitter, Email, or his website Pegueroo.com