If you take a second to reflect on direct email outreach in 2021, you’ll see how the pandemic transformed the way companies all over the world included cold email outreach in their email marketing strategies. And the trend we’re seeing is accelerated adoption across all industries.
Email marketing is hot, and the ROI benefits it offers are one of the highest compared to other marketing strategies. 80% of prospects prefer to be contacted by sales representatives via email rather than any other outreach channel.
If you’re looking to amp up your marketing efforts with actions that lead to sales appointments, then direct email marketing is something you need to include in your overarching marketing strategy.
Primary Trends to Watch in Direct Email Marketing in 2022
Going into 2022, businesses need to adopt an outbound marketing strategy that delivers results (booked sales appointments) in the most effective, cost-efficient way possible while managing a high level of cold lead conversion into warm prospects.
Tactics
Email marketers, both in-house and freelance/outsourced have been developing their strategies. What we’re going to see is a lot more personalization, custom approaches, and most importantly – timely offers.
Omnichannel communication
For teams targeting enterprise accounts, omnichannel communication is going to hit an all-time high, with it being a primary service by some of the best lead generation agencies.
Legacy workflows
By the time 2022 comes to an end, we’ll see a massive drop off of legacy workflows that don’t include automation of some kind, shape, or form.
Integrations and extensions
There are already numerous tools in the form of integrations and extensions on the market, and what the data shows us is that isn’t going to stop anytime soon. A major trend is the introduction of many new and interesting tools for email marketing automation and personalization.
Data silos
As more and more lead generation specialists optimize their workflows and start offering higher-level customization and personalization, data in combination with business process automation (BPA) will continue to be a key success factor.
Analytics
The development of email automation and a more comprehensive approach to reaching out and communicating with prospects requires accurate data and powerful analytics to track and read it.
Primary Direct Email Strategy Trends to Watch in 2022
Now that we’ve gone over some general trends we’ll see in 2022, it’s time to talk more specifically about direct email marketing strategies and the trends we’ll see grow and develop.
Businesses Will Continue to Adopt Direct Email Into Their Everyday Marketing Activities
The pandemic hit brick-and-mortar businesses like a truck, forcing them to evolve and adapt or disappear. The ones that survived and will continue to survive started to use cold outreach for both B2C and B2B consumers; something that will continue to grow.
Emails Being Sent to Cold Leads Will be Highly Customized with Lead-Specific Personalization
Fewer and fewer organizations will use email blast campaigns and bulk send strategies. To be more cost-effective, lead generation teams will use smaller, more targeted email campaigns that reach a smaller audience but have a higher conversion rate and a bigger impact on return on investment (ROI).
B2B Direct Email Campaigns Will Increase Substantially as Tools Like Gmail and Outlook Are Still Primary Channels for Professional Communication
Be on the lookout for an increase in the volume of B2B communication. With lockdowns and quarantines still heavily enforced across the globe, business professionals are continuing on the trend of online meetings vs. offline meetings. B2B direct email campaigns will have a direct impact on ROI for a business’s marketing activities.
Why is SaleAR Dedicated to Understanding Trends in Email Marketing?
The team that we’ve built here at SalesAR is full of direct email marketing professionals. What that means is from morning to evening, we’re thinking about how to turn cold leads into warm prospects and further into sales appointments! Every step of the process from the discovery phase and client onboarding to campaign construction, launch and management, and data analytics and reporting is done with the highest level of care and attention.
How the SalesAR Team Delivers Results
For the last two years, we’ve specialized in getting our clients more business by truly understanding what works and doesn’t work when it comes to messaging leads via direct email.
We take a goal-oriented approach to work with our clients and getting results with B2B lead generation and appointment setting.
For a brief look into how we get started with an email campaign, check out the points below:
- Analyze the market and the target audience
- Generate A/B lists of the target audience (companies)
- Generate A/B lists of the target audience (titles/positions)
- Validate contacts
- Set up the email(s) to be used
- Warm up the email(s) to be used
- Write scripts
- Launch campaign
Conclusion
To sum up, there are many trends that you can expect to see in direct email outreach in 2022. It doesn’t matter whether you’re an in-house Sales Development Representative, freelance Lead Generation Specialist, or outsourced growth agency, being on top of and even ahead of trends in B2B lead generation via email marketing and direct outreach is crucial for your success.
According to Hubspot, 78% of marketers have seen an increase in email engagement over the last 12 months. What this means is if you have optimized your email marketing strategy, you’ll be able to reach the 4 billion daily email users in the most effective ways possible.
I hope that you’ve enjoyed this blog post and have found information that will help you set more qualified sales appointments in the coming months.
