July 15, 2021
If you’re a salesperson, you already know how important email is to getting a meeting. After all, nothing can happen without that initial meeting, so it’s critical that we are continually testing what types of emails get results and which don’t.
We all understand that communication is key to helping any business stay above water. In fact, digital communication through email has become even more prevalent over the past year and a half, and we can assure you that it’s not going away anytime soon.
Here at Dakota, we have a dedicated sales team that spends a great deal of time setting up meetings and conference calls, reaching out to clients and prospects, and of course, consistently following up. From this, we’ve learned how important it is to put a lot of thought into the type of email you’re sending to clients and prospects. We’ve broken it down to two main email types: direct emails and mass emails.
In this article we’ll discuss the two types of emails every investment firm should know about, as well as how to measure success with your emails. By the end of this article, you’ll have a clear vision on when to use which type of email, and how to do so effectively.
You’ll want to take the direct email approach when your message is tailored to a specific individual. This includes asking for anything one-on-one such as calls, meetings, etc.
When emailing due diligence analysts or qualified prospects, make it personal. Reflect back on your prior conversations and include some of these topics within your email. People like to feel valued and not as though they’re just another sale to you.
Another thing you’ll want to do in your email is establish yourself as credible. If a new search appears, you’ll want to be a part of this! If you come across as credible it’s very likely you’ll be included in it.
Now to get people to open your direct email, you’ll need to have a short, clear subject line. One great tool we recommend using is SubjectLine.com. This site will rate your subject line and show you the criteria they rated it on. They’ll also offer advice on how to improve it in order to meet industry standards.
As one could predict, you’ll want to send a mass email when sending to a large audience. Examples of this include quarterly invitations, quarterly newsletters, updates on performance, etc.
I’m sure your firm has tools to capture updated information, however, you’re going to want to be able to provide prospects and clients with these updates. This is where it’s helpful to send a mass email with the newly updated information and redirect people to the website that contains this information as well.
Not only do your prospects and clients benefit from mass emails, but so do you. You can use this approach as a form of prospecting to keep in touch with those who are qualified candidates. It gives this group of people an idea of your investment strategy, and how much career risk will come out of this. It gives them security that post-investment they’ll have this information. Lastly, it gives them an early look into what the client experience will look like with your investment firm.
Make sure you’re sending mass emails quarterly at the minimum to provide these updates to prospects and due diligence analysts. If you do this, you’re in their inbox on a quarterly basis at the least.
Now we’ll discuss the metrics you need to look at in order to determine if your email was successful or not, and follow up with tips for acknowledgement within your emails.
There are three metrics you’ll need to look at to draw a conclusion on how successful your email is:
Number of deliveries
Open rate
Click-through rate
The percentage for the number of deliveries will inform you on whether you have the correct email for people. You’ll want to make sure you’re sending the email to a clean, accurate list of contacts.
The open rate will tell you the percentage of people who opened your email. This percentage gives you feedback on whether you chose a good subject line and preview text.
Lastly, the click-through rate will inform you on engagement from your email. This percentage tells you how successful the content of your email was; whether or not your call to action created a sense of urgency to the recipient to click the link within the body.
To get the most out of your emails, you’ll need your prospects and clients to read them. It’s important to make sure you form the email in an effective way. Be short and direct, make it easy to respond, and give them a reason to respond.
Another great way for your emails to get acknowledged is having it come from a person. This may seem obvious, but it’s commonly overlooked. Having your email come from a real person and not just a generic address makes it more personal. Like I stated earlier, it’s all about showing this person that they mean something to you and that they’re not just another sale.
If you feel like you’re doing these things, maybe more, and aren’t getting acknowledgement on your emails - you’re not alone. It can be difficult to get analysts to open your emails, we know. We’ve provided some tips that have worked for us on how to fix your emails if you’re still struggling to get your investment sales emails read.
Morgan Holycross is a Marketing Manager at Dakota.
