Email Marketing trends for 2019
So here we are in December 2018, we are all starting to think about Christmas. With the focus now shifting to 2019, we thought it would be a good time to share what we think will be the top five email marketing trends for 2019.
So, let’s dive straight in with number 1…
#1 Countdown timers.
You’ve probably seen a few mailers lately in your own box that have a countdown timer - announcing a countdown to a specific date. A good example of this were the recent black friday sales. Lots of businesses used countdown timers to build the anticipation, of their black Friday sale start date.
As well as build anticipation, countdown timers add movement into your email, in a sea of static text emails, this really helps to bring a strong visual element to yours.
This really helps with piquing the interest of your viewer, it helps to hold their interest long enough to deliver your sales message.
Up until fairly recently, animation in email marketing has been something that hasn’t been possible, because many of the big email browsers didn’t support it. In recent years though, some forms of animation have been seen making an appearance.
Try using count down timers in your next email - they are a great way adding that wow factor to your email communications.
#2 Social Media sharing.
Email marketing has really started to become about much more than just communicating via the inbox in recent years.
Recently we have really seen a much closed relationship between email marketing and social media. One has always complimented the other, but have remained separate entities.
We’ve seen the two now fall under the same banner of digital marketing, modern email marketing software will allow you to also post a copy of your newsletter to the main social media pages also.
Controlling and posting to your social media pages from inside your email marketing software really makes it easy to spread your marketing reach much further than ever before.
Here at Email Blaster, we have some great updates coming out in early 2019 that will give you so much more control over your social media from within our software. This will really make it easy to do everything from one place.
#3 Animated header images
Digital marketing is always about new technologies coming online, making things easier, faster and better than before.
Perhaps the biggest curve ball of this- that we think will continue to grow into 2019 is the return of the animated GIF.
An animated GIF is a simple form of animation that has been around for a really long time. At one time it was a really popular way to incorporate movement into websites. Over the last five years though it has declined significantly with use in websites - as better, faster, quicker technologies became available.
The world of email marketing has really swung back towards animated GIF’s in a big way though - lots of us have started using them to bring movement into our email marketing.
An animated GIF is basically a flickbook. It is a series if flat images that when played quickly can be used to animate sequences.
Email marketers have rediscovered it because it’s supported by all of the email browsers out there and the file sizes are pretty small by modern web standards.
This makes it a really accessible way to bring motion into your email marketing. It’s a great tool for helping your message stand out inside your viewer’s inbox.
#4 Navigational Bars
Digital marketing has really started to get much more ambitious it what it presents over recent years, this trend is continuing to grow.
Because we are now viewing emails mainly on our smartphones, this means that we can’t use lots and lots of text - people just don’t have the time or inclination to read it.
So, if you have a few products or services that you want to market, what works is giving your viewers the option to view these elsewhere - on your website for example. Rather than cluttering up your email marketing with big long lists of products, navigational bars are a great way of offering your viewers the choice of viewing a wider range of products or supporting text online.
As this trend to deliver your message as quickly as possible increases into 2019, expect to see more mailers that contain weblike navigational bars, offering links to more products.
#5 Dynamic Automation
This year has been all about automation for email marketing - sending automated chains of communications to your subscribers. This is generally based on a trigger, such as when a new subscriber joins your list.
In 2019, this trend will continue, with lots of dynamic features being added along the way - making our marketing even more smart.
When we are talking about dynamic, we mean that automated emails offer each viewer something different, based on how they have interacted with previous sends. This means that you can get really smart with what you send each person.
It puts us very close to the holy grail of successful digital marketing, this being “ to send the write message, to the right person at the right time”
If some of your viewers always open their email in the evening, the autation will remember this for future sends. If you viewer has previously showed a level interest in a specific product, the automation will send them emails based around that particular product.
In 2019, there will be a whole array of smart tools available, that make automation more focused and dynamic, in a way that was never before possible.
Ok, so there’s a quick round up what 2019 could offer in terms of email marketing trends and areas of growth and development.
Certainly here at email blaster, we have a whole host of really great features and benefits that will be added to our software throughout 2019.
If you don’t already have an account with us - why not open a free account and take it for a spin.