Email Marketing 101 for Nonprofits

Email Marketing 101 for
Nonproﬁts
Copyright © 2018 Image in a Box | imageinabox.com | (256) 886-8269

Email marketing is a form of both
inbound and outbound marketing
that allows you to customize and
personalize your marketing eﬀorts.

The Components of an Eﬀective Email Marketing Strategy
● Deliverability
● Email Design
● Segmentation
● Analytics
● Optimization

Deliverability
/dəˈ liv(ə)rəb(ə)lədē/
Ability to successfully get emails into subscribers’
inboxes

Maintaining Good Email Deliverability
● Only send emails to contacts who opted in to hearing
from you.
● Set clear expectations about your content and the
frequency you will send emails with your subscribers.

Email Design
/ēmāl dəˈzīn/
Developing the visual appearance of an email to
effectively deliver the content

Why Email Design Matters

Email Design Tips
● Set a goal—and stick to it.
○ Avoid different calls-to-action
● Write for scannability.
○ Avoid walls of text
○ Keep mobile view in mind
● Use headings and
subheadings.
○ Highlight the most important
information
● Use responsive templates.
○ 54% of emails are opened on mobile
● Avoid email message being
one image.
○ Use alt-text
● Include CAN-SPAM
compliant details
○ Organization name, physical
address, and unsubscribe link

Segmentation/segmənˈtāSH(ə)n/
Dividing the contacts in your database into lists
based on shared characteristics

Why Segmentation Matters
56%Users unsubscribe to an email
list because the content is no
longer relevant.
● Send users relevant content
● Develop quality relationships

Ways to Segment Email Contacts
● Target Audience
○ Job Role
○ Industry
○ Other target persona characteristics
● Behaviors
○ Page views
○ Email opens
○ Conversion
■ made a donation, signed up to volunteer, etc.

New
supporters
Thank you emails, welcome emails, links to blog posts, nonprofit
news, event invites
Recurring
supporters
Impact of recent donation (blog post), nonprofit news,
event invites
Advocates
Annual giving campaigns, social media request,
nonprofit news, event invites
3 Distinct Stages of Supporters

Email workﬂows are a series of
emails that nurture your leads and
ultimately asks them to take a
speciﬁc action.

How to Create an Email Workﬂow
1. Select an Overall Goal
2. Create an Introductory Email
3. Send Valuable, Relevant Content
4. Finish with a Conversion Email

Creating an Introductory Email
● Thank you/Welcome email
● Be sure to mention that you
will be following up with more
emails.
Example of Email Copy:
Hey New Donor,
Thank you so much for donating to XYZ Animal
Rescue. Because of donors like you, we are able
to find animals their forever home!
To see how your donation helps animals like
Phoebe (pictured above), read our latest post.
We’ll keep you updated with how your contributions
help our cause.
Thanks,
Jane Smith
XYZ Animal Rescue
Meet Phoebe

Creating an Email with
Valuable Insight
● Should contain content
relevant to reader and overall
goal
● The speciﬁc goal for the email
should be to read the content.
Hey New Donor,
Since you’ve contributed to XYZ Animal Rescue in
the past, we wanted to share with you a look into
the journey of a rescue animal.
This is Piper. She was a shy, scared puppy at a kill
shelter who has blossomed into an outgoing pup at
XYZ. Thanks to contributors like you, she can wait
for her “fur-ever” home in peace.
Thanks,
Jane Smith
XYZ Animal Rescue
Read Piper’s Story

Creating a Conversion Email
● Should contain call-to-action
of overall goal
● Inform them how the goal
beneﬁts them, not just you.
Hey Donor,
I hope you’ve enjoyed hearing about how
donors like you make a huge difference in our
organization!
We update our blog every week with content
about new animals at our rescue and our latest
success stories!
To keep up with the XYZ Animal Rescue
bunch, subscribe to our blog and receive
news straight to your inbox!
Thanks,
Jane Smith
XYZ Animal Rescue
Subscribe Now

Analytics
/anəˈ lidiks/
The results of measuring your metrics to see how you
performed

Why Analytics Matters
“Half the money I
spend on advertising
is wasted; the trouble
is, I don’t know which
half.”
- John Wanamaker, pioneer in
marketing
● Data provides you with actionable
insights by showing the impact of
your efforts.
● It allows you to determine what
content resonates with your
audience.

Email Marketing Metrics
Equation DeﬁnitionMetric
The percentage of email recipients
who opened your email
1 Open rate
2 Click-through
rate
3 Click-to-Open
rate
(unique opens / total recipients) x
100
(unique clicks / total recipients) x
100
who clicked on a link in your email
who opened and clicked on a link in
your email
(unique clicks / unique opens) x
100
4 Conversion
rate
5 Bounce rate
(recipients who clicked and
converted / total recipients) x 100
(bounced emails / emails sent) x
100
who clicked on a link in your email
and completed an action
The percentage of emails that were
unable to be delivered to your
recipients’ inboxes

Optimization/äptəməˈ zāSHən/
Improving your work to be as effective as possible
based on your analytics

Problem:
● Tweak subject line
Solutions:
Open rates are low
Causes:
● Bad subject line
● Irrelevant content
● Missing
expectations
● Fix segmentation
● Send less emails in
workﬂow

Problem:
● Tweak CTA button
Solutions:
Click-through rates
are low
Causes:
● Ineffective CTA
● Too many CTAs
● Bait-and-switch
● Set 1 goal per email
● Send valuable
content
● Unresponsive
template
● Design with mobile
in mind

Thanks!
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Email Marketing 101 for Nonprofits

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