Top 6 Alternatives to Email Marketing for Engaging Your Audience

Category: Email Marketing

In the ever-evolving landscape of marketing, the quest for effective and engaging methods never ceases. Email marketing took center stage with the advent of digital media, but times are changing. Is it time to look beyond emails and explore alternatives to email marketing? Let’s find out!

So, what’s the need for email marketing alternatives? Recent data shows a decline in email open and click-through rates by 17% and 11%, respectively. As people tire of overcrowded inboxes, it becomes increasingly important for companies to investigate varied engagement strategies, including email marketing campaigns. Some alternatives to email marketing include:

  • Social media marketing
  • SMS marketing
  • Content marketing
  • Influencer marketing
  • Video marketing

By diversifying your marketing efforts and focusing on customer loyalty, you can reach your audience through different channels and increase your chances of engagement and conversion as part of your overall digital marketing strategy.

Key Takeaways

  • Diversifying beyond email marketing can boost engagement, with heartfelt touches like Handwrytten’s AI-powered handwritten notes making memorable impressions.
  • SMS marketing trumps email with a 98% open rate and instant reach, but due to character limits, it demands compliance with opt-in regulations and savvy messaging.
  • Social media ads and messenger apps offer direct, personalized marketing opportunities with rich media and chatbot integration, but be mindful of user experience with clear opt-in/opt-out features.

Handwritten Note Marketing: A Personal Touch

Handwritten notes on a desk

In a world where digital interactions dominate, a handwritten note can be a breath of fresh air. It’s tangible, personal, and stands out in the barrage of digital marketing messages that flood our inboxes daily. However, handwritten note marketing is not about dismissing the digital realm; it’s about integrating a human touch into your digital marketing strategy for a well-rounded approach.

Automated handwriting services with Handwrytten

Enter Handwrytten, a leading provider of automated handwriting services. We capitalize on the appeal of personalized notes using specially trained handwriting robots, allowing you to send authentic-looking handwritten notes on a large scale.

Furthermore, Handwrytten provides custom handwriting styles, the ability to replicate your signature, and even an option to create your stationery online – truly a personal touch! With features like templates and scheduling options, you can automate your messages, ensuring a timely and consistent connection with your audience.

We work with a plethora of different clients, including:

Pricing and delivery options

Handwrytten offers flexibility in pricing with subscription plans, bulk discounts, and prepay options. The price for a card starts at $3.25, and most cards are available for $3.75 plus postage.

With Handwrytten, you can add a personal touch to your marketing efforts without breaking the bank.

SMS Marketing: Instant Reach and High Open Rates

Smartphone receiving an SMS

Imagine delivering a message that has a 98% chance of being read. Sounds impressive, right? SMS marketing demonstrates its power through its ability to:

  • Reach and engage a broad audience effectively
  • Be a valuable tool for businesses looking to connect with their customers
  • Have an astounding open rate of 98%
  • Trump many email marketing solutions
  • Be a viable alternative to engage your audience effectively

SMS marketing also shines when it comes to time-sensitive messages. Given that SMS messages are typically opened within minutes of being sent, they are ideal for urgent notifications or time-limited offers. However, it’s not without its challenges. The lack of visuals and character limitations require concise and impactful messaging.

Complying with regulations

On top of character limitations, it’s of paramount importance to adhere to regulations, which include getting customers’ consent before texting them and following SMS guidelines for best practices. Respecting opt-outs is a specific compliance aspect in SMS marketing, ensuring we respect customer preferences and stay within the law.

Auto SMS reply helps businesses provide immediate, contextually relevant information, ensuring compliance with rules.

SMS marketing providers

Various SMS marketing providers equip businesses with tools for more thoughtful SMS strategies, including marketing automation and email marketing software. They offer features like marketing sequences and lead nurturing campaigns to truly connect with existing customers.

Top players in this field include:

  • Sender
  • SimpleTexting
  • Mobile Text Alerts
  • TextMagic
  • EZ Texting
  • Textedly
  • Twilio
  • SlickText
  • Klaviyo

These providers offer a range of features like email marketing automation, segmentation, scheduled texts, and personalization, all of which can significantly enhance your SMS marketing efforts.

Messenger Apps: Direct Communication and Rich Media

Messenger apps have emerged as a powerful marketing tool, allowing businesses to engage directly with customers and deliver rich media messages. With their interactive and real-time nature, they offer a unique avenue to deliver marketing messages beyond regular mail marketing.

From sale alerts and shipping notifications to updates on new blog posts, messenger apps facilitate interactive and informative conversations with customers. In addition to the popular email marketing platform, other platforms for marketing include:

  • WhatsApp
  • Messenger
  • WeChat
  • QQ
  • Snapchat
  • Google Business Messaging
  • Instagram DMs
  • Line
  • Telegram

Chatbot Integration

The integration of chatbots in messenger apps has revolutionized customer service. By handling basic questions and providing around-the-clock support, they streamline interactions and enhance customer experiences.

Despite chatbots being capable of automating many customer interactions, maintaining a balance is key. Having a team ready to handle complex issues and provide personal help when needed ensures that your customer service remains personal and effective.

Messenger App Best Practices

Despite messenger apps’ considerable advantages, responsible usage is paramount. Timely responses, personalization, and maintaining a healthy balance between promotional and informational content are critical to a successful strategy.

Negative feedback is inevitable. However, addressing it quickly and professionally can mitigate damage and even turn a negative situation into a positive one. This, along with maintaining a positive vibe in all communications, helps ensure a positive brand reputation.

Retargeting with Google Ads: Re-engaging Website Visitors

Website visitor being retargeted with Google Ads

Retargeting with Google Ads is an effective strategy to re-engage website visitors. By showing ads that reflect their interests and behavior, you can increase your conversion rates significantly.

SEE: Optimizing Your Automotive Digital Marketing in 2023

Setting up retargeting ads involves using a tracking pixel on your website and creating targeted ad campaigns. This allows you to track conversions, improve ad targeting, and create custom audiences for remarketing.

Setting up retargeting ads

Once the tracking pixel is set up on your website, you can create targeted ad campaigns. Different ad formats and sizes, such as sponsored page posts, link click ads, and video ads, can be used to engage your audience. A crisp and captivating headline, limited to 25 characters, is also crucial to attract attention.

To make your retargeting ads more effective, consider following some best practices:

  • Track your marketing campaign
  • Create different audiences based on specific criteria to target specific campaigns better
    • For example, setting up an audience of people who have visited your website already can be smart to exclude them from future ads – after all, if someone has already visited your website, it’s likely you’re already in the back of their head
  • Focus on customers likely to buy
  • Use conversion tracking
  • Fine-tune your targeting strategy with filters based on demographics, interests, and user behavior.

Balancing retargeting with regular display ads

Though retargeting can significantly boost your advertising efforts, it’s vital to maintain a balance with regular display ads. Overdoing retargeting can lead to ad fatigue, privacy concerns, and higher bounce rates.

Switching between retargeting and regular display ads every 4-6 weeks can keep your audience interested and engaged.

Web Push Notifications: Timely and Non-Intrusive Engagement

Desktop and mobile receiving web push notifications

Web push notifications are potent tools for timely and non-intrusive engagement. They deliver updates without requiring users to open an email or visit a website, offering an efficient way to communicate with your audience.

Web push notifications can be used to share fresh blog posts, announce sales, or provide personalized recommendations based on user behavior. They ensure your message doesn’t get stuck in spam, they’re quick and easy to create, they get more visibility, and you can reach your audience instantly.

Opt-in and opt-out options

Offering transparent opt-in and opt-out choices for web push notifications is fundamental to the user experience. Users must first opt-in on your website to start receiving these notifications.

To increase the number of users signing up for web push notifications, businesses can:

  • Use single-step opt-ins
  • Follow best practices to get more subscribers
  • Ensure that you explain the value of push notifications and address users’ concerns.

Social Media Ads: Expanding Your Reach

Social media ads are an effective way to expand your reach and target specific demographics. With the ability to hone in on specific user groups based on various factors, social media ads can significantly enhance your marketing efforts.

Successful social media advertising hinges on the following:

  • Understanding your target audience
  • Maintaining activity on the relevant social media platforms
  • Setting unambiguous goals
  • Keeping a consistent brand voice.

SEE: A Guide to Automotive Social Media Marketing in 2023

Selecting the right platform

Selecting the most suitable social media platform for your ads is critical and contingent on your target audience and marketing objectives. Different platforms offer advertising options that allow you to target specific demographics, interests, and behaviors.

The most popular platforms for advertising include:

  • Facebook
  • YouTube
  • Instagram
  • TikTok
  • Snapchat
  • Twitter
  • Pinterest

For B2B advertising, some of the top choices are:

  • LinkedIn
  • Twitter
  • Facebook
  • YouTube
  • Instagram
  • BeReal
  • TikTok

Measuring success

Assessing the performance of your social media ads is a vital component of your marketing strategy. Key metrics to track include engagement, reach, and conversions.

Reach is a critical metric that shows how many people viewed your ad. Conversely, conversations measure the percentage of the audience that took a specific action, like clicking a link or filling out a form.

How to choose the right email marketing alternative

Choosing the right email marketing alternative depends on your business goals, target audience, and the type of message you want to convey. You should consider the following factors:

  • Audience preference: Understand where your audience spends most of their time. If they are active on social media, consider using social media ads. If they prefer direct communication, consider SMS marketing or messenger apps.
  • Message type: Some messages are better suited for certain platforms. For instance, time-sensitive messages can be effectively delivered through SMS marketing or push notifications.
  • Budget: Some alternatives may require a larger budget. For instance, social media advertising can be more expensive than email marketing, but it can also reach a wider audience.
  • Integration with existing systems: Consider how the alternative will integrate with your existing marketing systems. For instance, if you’re already using CRM software, you might want to choose an alternative that can seamlessly integrate with it.

Remember, the goal is not to completely replace email marketing but to complement it with other methods. A multi-channel approach can help you reach your audience in different ways and increase overall engagement.

How Handwrytten can help

Handwrytten can be integrated with Salesforce, HubSpot, and Zapier, allowing for seamless automation and tracking of handwritten note campaigns. This integration enhances marketing efforts, improves users’ onboarding experience, increases loyalty, and enhances members’ lifetime value.

With the ability to connect to over 1000 apps through Zapier, Handwrytten allows businesses to automate sending handwritten notes based on triggers from different platforms or CRMs. With a fully documented JSON API, businesses can integrate handwritten note automation into their unique workflows.

Summary

In the dynamic marketing landscape, exploring alternatives to email marketing can significantly boost your engagement rates and customer loyalty. Whether it’s the personalized touch of a handwritten note, the instant reach of an SMS, the direct communication of a messenger app, the strategic retargeting of Google Ads, the timely alert from a push notification, or the expansive reach of a social media ad, each method offers unique advantages. Businesses can effectively engage their audience and achieve their marketing goals by selecting the right mix of these alternatives and integrating them into a comprehensive strategy.

Frequently Asked Questions

What’s better than email marketing?

Handwritten note marketing achieves higher open rates than email marketing and can easily help you set yourself apart from the crowd.

Is email marketing obsolete?

No, email marketing is not obsolete. It continues to be an essential marketing tool and is still widely used.

Is email marketing still worth it?

Yes, email marketing is still worth it. Research shows that email is still the best channel to reach people ahead of other channels, and email users are anticipated to continue growing.

What is Handwrytten?

Handwrytten is a service that uses AI-assisted robots to write notes in your chosen handwriting style, helping you scale your handwritten outreach.

Choose from our cards design or your own.

Over 100 designs to choose from or design your own. Our online card customizer makes it simple.

Check Out Our Cards!

Next Posts

How Handwritten Direct Mail Can Revolutionize Your Marketing Strategy

12 Heartwarming Real Estate Holiday Card Messages for Your Clients

What are you searching for?

Still need help?
Send us a note.

    Thank you.

    This website uses cookies to improve your experience.
    We'll assume you're ok with this, but you can opt-out if you wish.