5 Tips To Use Email Marketing For Brand Awareness

You probably already know how to use email marketing to sell your products and services. But how can you use it to increase brand awareness?

What is Brand Awareness?

Oxford Reference provides two definitions of brand awareness:

1. Consumer familiarity with a particular company, product, or service and/or the extent of this familiarity.

2. A measure of the target consumers’ recall of a particular brand: see aided recall.

In this article, we are going to be talking about the latter – using email marketing to stay top of mind with potential and existing customers.

That way, when they need a solution to a problem that your products or services address, your brand will be the first one that comes to their minds.

The Email Marketing Conundrum

It’s probably safe to say that most people feel overwhelmed by the amount of emails that they get. 

This means that you need to be mindful when it comes to email marketing – you can’t just bombard your subscribers with endless sales pitches. 

That will only annoy them and might lead to them marking your emails as “Spam” which can damage your email deliverability. 

But you also need to email your subscribers on a regular basis if you want to stay top of mind with them. So how can you do that without alienating them?

#1: Set Up an Automated Welcome Sequence

We don’t recommend hitting new subscribers with a sales pitch the moment you get their email addresses.

Send them this automated welcome sequence instead:

• Email #1: Who Are You? Introduce yourself to your new subscriber.
• Email #2: Where Did You Come From? Tell them your “origin story” – how did you come to do what you do now?
• Email #3: What Do You Do? Explain in more detail what it is that you do.
• Email #4: How Did You Gain This Expertise? Explain what makes you qualified to do what you do – share relevant experiences, accomplishments, and qualifications.
• Email #5: Who Do You Do This For? Explain who your dream customers are + share a case study of how you helped such a person get the results they wanted.
• Email #6: How Can You Do It For Me? Either pitch your frontend product or provide links to all your products with short explanations.

It’s best to end emails 1-5 with a question and then encourage the new subscriber to hit the reply button and respond. 

Ideally, you want to then personally reply to as many of these responses as you can because that will show the new subscribers that you value them. 

As for the 6th email, you should either end it with a call to action to buy your frontend product or with a call to action to check out your products in general. 

Note that while the sequence we described was designed for personal brands, it can be modified for company brands as well – you can use it to introduce your company instead of introducing yourself. 

#2: Launch a Link Roundup Newsletter

Okay, the new subscriber has gone through your welcome sequence. How can you stay in touch with them now?

We recommend launching a weekly link roundup newsletter where every Friday you send your email subscribers links to interesting articles, podcasts, and videos related to your niche.

You can also use this newsletter to let your subscribers know about product launches, seasonal promotions, and limited-time sales. 

However, the primary purpose of your newsletter should be to provide free value to your email subscribers, not to pitch them your products or service.

You want to make sure that each issue provides value in and of itself – even if the subscriber doesn’t buy anything from you. 

A newsletter like that is one of the best ways to use email marketing for brand awareness because it gives you an excuse to email your subscribers every week.

#3: Create Exclusive Content for Your Email Subscribers

You can also start creating exclusive content for your email subscribers such as:

• “How-to” articles – Figure out what your email subscribers are struggling with and start creating guides that can help them solve those problems. You can break them up into a series of emails. If a particular guide gets a lot of positive feedback, you might want to consider turning it into an automated sequence.
• Case studies – Write up case studies about customers who got the results they wanted with your product or service and then share them with your email subscribers. Make sure that each case study contains actionable insights that the subscribers can implement even if they don’t buy that product or service.
• Interviews – Use your connections to do interviews related to your niche. A good place to start is to figure out what your subscribers want to achieve, then interview people who have already achieved that. You can also interview well-known people in your niche that your subscribers are likely to be familiar with.

Again, the purpose here is to provide free value, not to pitch your products and services. 

#4: Share Your Other Content With Your Email Subscribers

Do you have a blog, a podcast, or a YouTube channel?

Then depending on your publishing schedule it might make sense to let your email subscribers know whenever you release something new.

We don’t advise this if you have a frequent publishing schedule – if you are releasing new content several times a week, then it’s better to just share links in your newsletter.

But if you only publish new content a few times per month, then it might be best to promote it to your email list with separate emails for each piece. 

#5: Come Up With Special Occasions to Celebrate!

A fun way to stand out from other brands is to get creative and come up with special occasions that you can celebrate.

For example, a cat food store Cat Person once sent out this email with the subject line “How much do you really know about your cat?” to celebrate International Cat Day:

It’s probably safe to assume that this memorable email helped Cat Person increase brand awareness!

Bonus Tip: Use the Hook, Story, Offer Copywriting Framework

We recommend using the Hook, Story, Offer copywriting framework in your emails:

Hook

Grab the subscriber’s attention with a compelling subject line.

This can mean:

• A benefit-driven subject line that emphasizes the value the subscriber will get out of that email.
• A curiosity-driven subject line that is so intriguing that the subscriber can’t help but click on it to learn more.
• A pattern-interrupt subject line that is so wacko that it makes the subscriber do a double-take and then click on it just to see what it’s all about.

Your subject line is the most important part of your email because it determines whether or not the subscriber will open it.

So make sure that you give your subject lines the attention they deserve!

Story

Tell the subscriber a captivating story that resonates with them on a deep emotional level. 

How exactly you should go about it will vary depending on the purpose of the email in question but you should aim to incorporate storytelling into all your emails in one way or another.

Offer

Finally, you want to transition from your story to the pitch for your offer and then to the call to action. 

Keep in mind that the offer doesn’t have to be a product or service.

Say, if you just released a podcast episode, then that is the offer that you need to pitch to your subscribers. Why should they listen to it?

Then end your pitch with a call to action that encourages the subscriber to check out that episode. 

You should always be intentional when it comes to email marketing. What do you want the subscriber to do next? Each email needs to have a call to action!

Want to Learn How to Write Emails That Convert?

Copywriting is what makes or breaks email marketing. 

But how can you write copy that converts if you don’t have any previous copywriting experience?

Our friend Jim Edwards wrote a book called “Copywriting Secrets” where he shares everything that you need to know to get started.  

If you apply his advice correctly, you should see immediate results, which is what matters the most when you are trying to get a business off the ground. 

So don’t hesitate and get a free copy of “Copywriting Secrets” today!

Get “Copywriting Secrets” for FREE!