With the rapid progress of social media, many advertising"experts" believe that email marketing is a thing of the past. However, rather to the contrary, email marketing is still an extremely effective, inexpensive, and thriving medium for businesses big and small. What exactly are the benefits of this kind of marketing and how can you make it work for you?

Small business owners must first recognize that the price of email marketing is a small portion of the cost of traditional direct marketing campaigns. Newsletters, lively ads, and subscription services could be transmitted to a huge number of possible customers without incurring the expenses of postage.

More importantly, because of the ability to reach a mass audience almost immediately, even a one percent response rate in an effort can have a huge influence on your bottom line. Yet, the very best email marketing campaigns routinely achieve response rates of around 5 or 10 percent.

Some recent data released by DoubleClick after an email customer study found that almost three quarters of online shoppers have made purchases as a result of email marketing campaigns, and nearly 60 percent of email recipients were tempted to create in-store purchases. The power of this sort of online campaigns is incontrovertible.

Email marketing applications can be used in many of ways. You can keep your clients updated on information and special promotions; you can send direct emails to prospective customers with hyperlinks to your home page; and, you can promote products and services. Ultimately, the objective of email campaigns would be to increase traffic to your website, increase conversion rates, and improve your return on investment (ROI).

Still, regardless of the effectiveness of these marketing techniques, how can you make emails function for you? When developing an email campaign, it is almost always best to check a professional internet advertising firm. A Good internet marketing firm will

Identify your target audience,
Develop a strategy for and monitor the success of your email marketing campaign,
Integrate 3rd party email marketing services and social networking,
Develop email sign-up forms for your website,
Design email templates,
Create and manage your email list, and
Track and analyze web site traffic since it relates to a email campaign.

There are many reasons that is effective. First, we have already mentioned how easy it's to reach massive numbers of potential clients through email, but these campaigns may also be specifically targeted to your most motivated sector. Moreover, these campaigns are equally direct and data sales driven, while also providing you with an opportunity to build loyalty and relationships with new and existing customers. Finally, it can help you generate more visitors to your website and even physical places.