Getting started with email marketing

Email marketing is generally considered the most efficient and effective form of (online) marketing. It is easy and inexpensive and delivers immediate results. With email marketing, you send out emails (newsletters) on a large scale to strengthen the bond with your contacts and increase your revenue. 

What should you think about when getting started with email marketing? An overview in nine points.

1. Legal regulations and sending reputation

It is good to know that you can legally only send newsletters to existing customers and/or contacts who have explicitly given consent for receiving them in advance. At Laposta, we like to adhere to the rules of the law. To prevent misuse, we carefully check each new account and new contact list; we also scan the content and results of the newsletters. This benefits our sending reputation; it is excellent.

2. Protection of business data

At Laposta, we have established a solid privacy statement. Your business data - your contact data, the content of your newsletters, and your statistics - are in good hands with us. Your data is excellently secured. Naturally, your data remains your property; we never make it available to third parties.

3. Importing contacts

In Laposta, you can easily and quickly import your contacts via Excel. With the help of our API, you can also link your own relationship system to Laposta. New contacts and contact data will automatically be entered into Laposta. We recommend importing other contact details (such as first and last names) in addition to email addresses. With this information, you can personalize your newsletters and segment your contact list. If you enter the birth dates of your contacts, you can also send birthday mailings.

4. Special integrations

To synchronize contact data, you can link Laposta to other programs, such as WordPress and WooCommerce. You can easily link each newsletter to Google Analytics with one checkbox. This way, you can see how many additional visits and sales (conversion) were brought to your website as a result of your newsletter. Discover which software you can link to Laposta through our API. 

5. Sign-up forms

To acquire new contacts, you can place a sign-up form on your website. People who subscribe through this form will be automatically added to your list. You can also use a so-called standalone sign-up form. With a link, you can refer to this form. You can place this link on your website, in a signature at the bottom of your email, or on social media like Facebook and Instagram. You can also design a sign-up form entirely yourself. People who subscribe via a sign-up form will automatically be added to your list. Laposta adds an unsubscribe link to each newsletter; this is legally required. Contacts who unsubscribe will automatically be removed from your list. This also applies to contacts whose email address is outdated (which has led to hard bounces).

6. Profile enrichment

You can add a special change link to your newsletter, allowing your contacts to view and edit their own data. The corresponding change form can be easily formatted. This feature is called profile enrichment.

7. Templates

To send your newsletter, you need a template. With a template, you ensure that your newsletter looks the same every time. You can also use multiple templates, for example, one for each type of newsletter. For a modern professional appearance of your newsletter, a technically skilled person, such as your web designer, can create and import an HTML template. Our designers can also do this work; they can create a custom design for you. Furthermore, you can choose from dozens of ready-made templates for our drag & drop editor in your account. These templates are immediately usable. If desired, you can further design them in the editor. As an alternative to working with a template, you can import a ready-made newsletter. This alternative is only available to tech-savvy individuals.

8. Writing a newsletter in six simple steps

Using a six-step plan, you can add text, images, videos, links, and social media to your template. In your newsletter, you can also refer to a file. During the filling process, you can preview your newsletter. In between, you can send a test email to yourself or a few others. At a later time, you can resend your newsletter to new contacts. You can post your sent newsletter on your website. You can also share your sent newsletter on Facebook, Twitter, and LinkedIn.

9. Viewing results

The results of your newsletter are live. Immediately after sending your newsletter, the first statistics start coming in. What is the acceptance ratio, the open rate, the click rate, and the unsubscribe rate of your newsletter? Every action of every contact can be found in your statistics. Laposta also keeps statistics for every list and every contact.