Top Email and Social Media Marketing Tips for 2019

Total Retail recently released its 50 Best Retail Tips of 2018 report, featuring valuable insights from our e-newsletter (Total Retail Report) and website over the course of last year. The 50 best tips were chosen by Total Retail's editorial team, and they cover nearly facet of running a successful retail business in 2019 and beyond. As part of our coverage of this report, we'd like to share select tips with you. Today, we're revealing tips from the Email Marketing and Social Media categories. In addition to the tip itself, each source article will be linked so that you can enjoy the full-length articles.

• With Gmail being the most popular email service provider, optimizing messages for Google is highly advisable. Offering an incentive, whether it be a discount, free shipping or a chance to win a prize, proves to be the fastest way to grow your email marketing list. Additionally, offering a social sign-up option and reducing the number of personal questions asked could be beneficial for consumers that would like a quick opt-in process.
  Joe Montgomery, 250ok, “Lessons in Email Marketing From the Top 500 Internet Retailers,” Total Retail Report, Jan. 9
• Enrich your loyalty emails by adding relevant data visualization to them. You can easily create infographics using free tools like Canva or Piktocart and include them in your email template.
  Sreeram Sreenivasan, Ubig, “5 Tips for Building Better Loyalty Emails in 2018,” Total Retail Report, Feb. 20
• Use feedback emails. Marketers don’t have to make all the sending decisions. Sometimes asking subscribers for their input is the best way to foster engagement and understand their needs. Consider asking for a review on a recent purchase, soliciting suggestions for a new product or service, or gathering information about a new customer.
  Bonnie Malone, Return Path, “The 3 Best Triggered Email Messages to Send,” Total Retail Report, March 26
• The use of Facebook offline conversions is necessary. The majority of retail sales still take place offline — 90 percent in the U.S. But brick-and-mortar stores face an uneven playing field online. By not utilizing their in-store data, retailers are missing out on a huge opportunity to measure how well their digital ads are performing. That’s where Facebook offline conversions comes in. By integrating in-store data to Facebook offline conversions, marketers can then measure the value of their ad spend, target more of the right people, and fully optimize performance.
  Conor Ryan, StitcherAds, “6 Ways to Get Omnichannel Marketing Results Through Facebook and Instagram,” Total Retail Report, Nov. 19
• Be selective about where and how you make posts shoppable. Just like in popular store locations of the past and present, sometimes people want to browse, either to dip their toe in the water or learn about new products. Sometimes you need to simply educate and engage the potential customer, rather than lead with the hard sell.
  Pau Sabria, Olapic, “Beyond the Borders of Brick-and-Mortar: 4 Tips to Leverage Social Media as the New Storefront,” Total Retail Report, Dec. 10

To gain access to all 50 tips, which cover a variety of categories, including marketing, merchandising, inventory management, omnichannel, and others, download the full report today!