This Nugget is one in a multi-part series about email marketing and landing pages to capture customer attention and increase business for retail jewelry stores.
Every email you send needs some sort of additional call to action. Every email should not be viewed as just an email solicitation; instead, it's the first contact for a larger marketing campaign. Call it the tip of the iceberg, if you will.
In the email, offer a link for the person to continue reading on a well designed landing page; that is the second step of your marketing campaign. Let's break down some elements of what you could have on that landing page.
Good Landing Page Elements
1. Appropriate campaign related photo/video
2. Relevant and interesting copy
3. Another call to action
1. The Photo:
When it comes to selecting the photo for your landing page, don't simply slap any old photo you already used somewhere else on your site.
The photo will arguably be the first thing people look at and it must agree with the marketing intent from your email.
Example A.
If your email says "Look at our new line of engagement rings" then perhaps the landing page photo should be a group shot of the entire line of rings.
Example B.
If your email says "Please come to our evening event" then the photo should from your last party showing people enjoying themselves.
Example C.
If you email says "Grandma will really love this new book locket" then you better hire 2 models to play the part of Grandma and grandchild giving/holding that exact book locket.
Some landing page designers will simply suggest you buy an inexpensive photo from BigStockPhoto.com or some other inexpensive photo supplier. You could take this approach, but please take it from us that we've tried this for several years and there just never seems to be exactly the right type of photography for the jewelry industry.
In the end, it's better to take your own photos of people if you want that on your landing page.
2. Interesting Copy:
We're using the correct marketing industry term "copy" to refer to the words you write on your website. Unless you have a bit of a marketing background already you might not know that "copy" refers to the "paragraph of text" on a web page.
This text needs to be interesting, relevant, and you need to make sure it's not convoluted or hard to understand. If you write a sentence that's 10 words, ask someone to help you rewrite it as 7 words.
Write an initial draft of your landing page, then put it down and come back to it tomorrow. After your second review, give it to someone else in your store to look at. Even marketing geniuses work in collaborative teams. You don't want to launch your page with accidental, obvious mistakes because you didn't humbly ask someone else to give their honest opinion about it.
Feel free to use a main headline in a large font size. Write your headline LAST! After your write the rest of the page, your headline should become apparent. Don't write your headline and then try to match the page to it; do it the other way around.
You then need a paragraph of text in a medium font size. This is where you write your primary message, and only the more relevant points you want the customer to read.
You could have a secondary paragraph of text in a small font. This is where you give the fine details and disclaimers of the offer.
3. Another Call to Action
Jewelers typically will not sell from their landing pages. There have been many landing page studies with big yellow "Buy Now" buttons that compel users to make that purchase; but that's not a successful marketing tactic for retail jewelry.
Your customers usually won't impulse buy large ticket jewelry items. Hopefully, they will want to come in your store and see the item in person. But then again, maybe not; maybe they are the Millennial Generation and they want to see more online.
On your landing page, you need to jump to the next appropriate website location.
Referring back to the above examples again, with example A, if you are advertising that new line of rings you need to jump them to individual ring pages with a lot of detail about each ring.
With example B you could have an event sign-up form right on the landing page, and you could also link them to a photo gallery of past events.
And finally with example C, you would want to link them to the product catalog showing that book locket. On that locket landing page, you could also offer links to not only the book locket detail page, but also a heart locket, oval locket, and even grandparents charm necklaces.
Hopefully, by now you see that crafting an email is not simply a half hour project you sit down and send on a Friday afternoon in hopes for a profitable Saturday of sales. You need to put in the time to do it right yourself or you need to hire an agency or employee to do it for you.
Here's to a happy Friday and profitable Saturday of sales!
