Email marketing continues to be an integral part of content marketing.

According to Statista, by 2023 there would be 4.3bn email users globally which is roughly half the population of the world. Another report by DMA shows that for every dollar spent on email marketing, it gives an ROI of $42. Email can be a great tool to distribute thought leadership content. In fact, the primary objective of distributing content across other social platforms or advertising online is to begin the email relationship. So how do you get your email strategy right? Here are 5 questions to ask to get a good email strategy.

1. Why: In the “why” phase, the objective is to identify why you are carrying out the mail campaign?- Is it for them to try your service, participate in your program or give a referral?

2. Who: In the “who” phase, identify a single unifying persona that you need to keep in mind while you craft your content. Eg: where does this person spend more time, what type of content they consume, what format they prefer?

3. What: In the “what” phase, identify the sequence of information that the prospect needs to achieve his/her goal. Eg: industry trend insights, your point of view on the pain point, proposed solutions you have to offer and demonstrated the example of delivering value to the client.

4. How: In the “how” phase, take what youknow about the prospect in order to best present the information you may possess. Eg: if your target audiencespends more timewatchingvideosduring a particular period of the day on a platform, youneedto have your content available in video format shown to him/her during that period for better engagement.

5. When: In the “when” phase identify when you propose to send the mail out and in what frequency. According to Statista, 49% prospects are ok to receive an email from brands once a week.

The goal of your email communication should be to strongly differentiate your brand, nurture your buyer across various stages of the buying cycle and thereby generate better ROI for your business. Working with an expert content marketing agency can help you garner better ROI for your email campaigns.