Boost Your ROI Using Targeted Email Campaigns – Complete Guide [2024]

Email marketing can often get challenging. Sometimes, even if you make great offers, you don’t seem to get a lot of conversions from your leads.

But why? Is it just due to poor copywriting or poor product/service? Not necessarily.

More often than not, an email campaign may fail if you do not target the right audience. And the solution to this is to segment your leads so that you can run targeted email campaigns for maximum ROI.

According to MailChimp’s data, a segmented email campaign can deliver twice as much click-through rate as your usual email campaigns.

For example, let’s say you created a course on email marketing. Now, if you send an email to a list of 100 web designers to purchase this course, there is a high chance you may end up getting 0 conversions.

At the same time, if you send this same email to 100 digital marketers, there is a great possibility that over 20% of these leads will convert.

Today, you will learn how you can segment leads effectively so and make your next email campaign two times more successful.

After reading this article, you will be able to –

• Understand when and how to segment your leads.
• Plan the right targeted email campaign efficiently.
• Generate highly-qualified leads with effective lead segmentation.
• Learn about the right tools to use to execute all the necessary steps.

And eventually, you will be able to plan an effective marketing campaign that will get you two times more results than you would normally get.

So let’s begin.

It Starts With How You Collect Your Leads

While email marketing is the most effective marketing strategy, its success really depends on the quality of your leads. And this quality depends on how you collect your leads.

In the example above, the first scenario was a generic way of collecting leads, while the second approach allowed you to identify what the prospect was interested in. Hence, you will be able to personalize the emails more effectively and set up a more lucrative offer for the second set of leads.

Remember, while you collect your leads, you should segment leads as per your future marketing plans.

This means you should have a pre-decided marketing purpose behind collecting leads.

Let me explain.

While basic digital marketing is all about getting traffic and conversion, as you dive deeper into marketing, you will realize that whether you have a good ROI or not will depend a lot on how much you can optimize your cost-revenue ratio. Hence, you can’t afford to waste time or money on poor leads.

The best way to maximize ROI is to run well-planned lead-generation campaigns before running a full-fledged marketing campaign. What this will do is it will help you ensure you are not spending unnecessarily on acquisition costs or wasting time on fewer potential leads.

**This, however, will be a bit different in the case of e-commerce stores. For e-commerce businesses, you would rather need run instant email automation campaigns based on user actions. You will learn more about it later in this article.

Now, there are a few ways you can segment leads depending on the type of business you run and the marketing campaign you want to execute. And these will define the type of email campaigns you can run.

Let’s dive deeper into this matter.

How To Achieve Greater ROI Using Lead Segmentation & Targeted Email Campaigns

So, you have planned your next marketing campaign, and you are ready to start planning your lead generation efforts.

• How will you decide on a proper way to segment your leads?
• What should be the factors based on which you will segment your prospects?
• How do you set up a proper ‘targeted email campaign’ that works?

Well, there are 3 main factors you can look at to segment your leads or run successful targeted email campaigns.

1. Demography
2. Purchase actions
3. Specific interests

Let us look at each of them more closely.

1. Lead Segmentation & Email Campaigns Based On Demography

Demography mainly refers to the age, location, or gender. And if you sell products that are exclusive to a certain type of demography, then you may segment leads accordingly and run relevant promotional campaigns for them.

For example, let’s say you sell home decor and have two locations – one in Germany and one in England – under the same brand. In this case, what you can do is you can run a lead-generation campaign where you may ask people to sign-up to get a discount coupon.
Depending on where they signed up, you may segment them into multiple lists in your email automation tool. In this case, you will have one list for subscribers from Germany and another list for subscribers from England.
Once you have enough leads, you may then run exclusive promotional campaigns where you may send offers via email on products that are popular locally. You may even send emails in the local language.

Similarly, if you have a t-shirt store where you sell t-shirts for both men and women, you may segment your customers accordingly after they make a purchase. During Black Friday, you may run discount campaigns and increase conversion by sending separate emails to each ‘gender.’ Seemingly, you may design emails with a template more attractive to women and send it to its respective list, while having a more manly design for the emails you send to the men. This will help to increase conversion rates quite well.

2. Targeted Email Campaigns Based On Purchase Actions

If you run an e-commerce store where you have various categories of products, then it may get difficult to plan targeted email campaigns. But if you can segment your customers based on the category of what they purchase, you might be able to run more profitable promotional campaigns.

For example, you could set automation where if a person purchases anything under “Computer accessories,” he will be on one list, while a person purchasing a product under the category “House appliances” will be on another list. In this case, when you have new supplies of computer accessories, you could run a discount campaign specifically for the respective list. And since you know these people have computers and love to buy accessories online; there is a good chance they may purchase more if the discount is lucrative.

**A person can be part of multiple lists. It’s totally fine and is rather a good thing. It just means you have more opportunities to sell to that person as he is likely to purchase from various category-specific promotions.

In the same way, you can also run email campaigns for first-time buyers with a certain coupon to have them come back and purchase a second time.

Another targeted email campaign that is widely used is the abandoned cart recovery campaign. This doesn’t necessary require lead segmentation, but the campaign is aimed at bringing back and converting someone who was surely interested when he added the product to the cart.

The main idea here is to have specific campaigns that are designed to convert users based on their actions in your store. You will either segment them into lists based on their purchase decisions or run immediate automated email campaigns depending on their actions in your store.

3. Qualifying Leads Based On Specific Interests

This is the most successful way to segment lists for high-ticket marketing campaigns – generating qualified leads based on specific interests or requirements. If you are a personal trainer, business coach, fitness trainer, course creator, or with any high-ticket business, then this approach is the best way to collect qualified leads.

The idea here is to find out prospects who are more likely to be interested in your service. And you will recognize that by identifying a topic or a problem that they are obsessed with. For example, if you are a fitness trainer, then a potential lead for you would be someone who is interested in shredding his body.

But how do you identify this valuable piece of information?

Well, there are a few ways.

• Offer a free resource to identify the interest.
  You could prepare a helpful piece of content that is aimed at educating your prospects on a certain topic they want to learn about or solving a problem they frequently face.
  
  For example, if you are a business coach, you could create a video to teach how to “Improve work efficiency without spending a fortune.” Then you could have interested people subscribe to your email list to get free access to this video.

• Set up a quiz and make a personalized offer.
  A quiz funnel is a great way to collect leads with proper segmentation.
  
  For example, in the case of a fitness trainer, you could run a quiz to identify what fitness improvements a person may require – weight loss, shredding, weight gain, etc. Based on the answers, you may generate a personalized report to point out what exercises the prospect may require to focus on. More importantly, based on these answers, you will be able to run personalized email campaigns to offer the right service.
  
• Give a glimpse of your expertise.
  When choosing high-ticket services, business owners often worry about what to expect in terms of quality and output. In this case, offering a free display of your expertise could be a great way to grab the attention of potential clients.
  
  For example, if you are part of a digital marketing agency, then you could offer a free audit of the prospect’s website and generate a detailed report on what could be improved on the website for better results.
  
  Another common practice is to offer a few hours of free service as a trial, commonly offered by web development agencies or Ad agencies.
  
  Once you have people who have taken your free display of expertise, you have leads on people who probably are thinking about getting help with the issue at hand. Hence, you can then prepare further marketing efforts, such as webinar funnels, email nurturing, value-added discounts, etc., to try and convert them.
  
  The main idea here is to hook potential clients and impress them with your expertise so that they remember you for a while. Then it’s only a matter of time until some of the clients are convinced to take your service (depending on your marketing efforts).

• Live webinars or free online sessions
  In the case of counselors or personal trainers, a more effective approach is to either host live webinars or allow a free session with potential clients.
  
  For example, if you are a couples counselor, you may offer a free 30-minute session before having to pay for your time. Meanwhile, if you are a self-development trainer, you could invite people to join a free webinar session (or series) where you could give valuable instructions and life hacks.
  
  People signing up for these and actually attending the sessions are, in most cases, in need of your help. Hence, you now have highly qualified leads that you can easily convert with well-planned personalized campaigns later.

While these are great approaches to seeking potential clients, the main challenge here is finding the prospects who will respond to your hooks. Initially, you may have to run paid Ads to attract potential clients. But in the long run, you may open up a social group or maintain regular lead nurturing campaigns to keep your leads interested and warmed up.

Tips To Make Your Targeted Email Campaigns More Effective

So far, you have seen how you can segment your customers and run email campaigns accordingly. But that’s just half the task.

The success of your campaigns will depend largely on your email copy, the offer, and the USP you offer.

Following are some ways you can optimize your emails to get higher conversions.

1. Deep Personalization In Your Emails

Since you already know what your prospects are interested in, you should ensure your email subject line and your email copy are properly personalized.

The idea is to make sure you are hitting all the right keywords that your clients need help with. If they see that you can understand their dreams and seem to have a plan to help them succeed, they will at least look into your offer.

2. Use AI To Speed Up Your Email Writing Process

This is an obvious one. Many of us aren’t that good at writing emails. It just seems very difficult to write a promotional copy in such less words (as it is ideal not to make an email too long).

But we are no longer on our own, thanks to ChatGPT.

You can now easily write complete emails in a few minutes using ChatGPT. All you need to do is provide proper instructions on what you are trying to convey in your email, along with specific ideas on the tone you want to maintain.

Now, the problem here is most of us think we can simply write the perfect instruction, and ChatGPT will deliver. But no, you have to correct ChatGPT with more instructions multiple times to get a suitable result.

Simply treat it like a human. Give an instruction, if the output is not right, it means ChatGPT did not understand the requirements properly. So you can then further explain what was wrong and what should be the right approach in mind.

For example, I initially gave the following instructions:

I have collected leads of people who may require my service to teach them how they can get more results out of Paid Ads. Now, I want to offer my service at 50% off, but most importantly, I want to highlight the end results he will get after taking my service. Write a persuasive email copy for this.

It generated a very long email while highlighting the 50% offer more than the benefit of the service. So I further instructed:

Make the email short, and only mention the 50% off near the final CTA.

As you can see, I was pretty straightforward with what I wanted. It then gave a more cluttered output which I did not like. So I gave more instructions:

No, I want it to be more specific. I have collected these leads via hosting free webinars, so maybe you can address that. And I want you to use bullet points to breakdown the end results.

This gave a very good email, but it still needed some work. So I gave one last set of instructions:

Do not use the term "I hope this email finds you well" and stop sounding too formal. Plus, you made the email long again.

This time, the email was pretty good:

Subject: Exclusive Offer Inside: Unleash the Power of Paid Ads for Unbeatable Results!

Hi [Name],

I wanted to reach out to you following the insightful free webinar we recently hosted on maximizing the potential of paid advertising. As an attendee, I have an exclusive offer tailored specifically for you.

Imagine the remarkable results you can achieve by harnessing the true power of paid ads. Here's how my coaching program can help you transform your business:

1. Double Your Conversion Rates: Learn proven techniques to captivate your target audience with compelling ad copies and irresistible offers.

2. Outshine Your Competitors: Gain a competitive edge by unlocking advanced targeting methods.

3. Maximize Your ROI: Say goodbye to wasted ad spend and experience optimized ROI.

4. Scale Your Business Exponentially: Expand your reach and scale your business to new heights in no time.

Here's the best part: for a limited time, I'm offering an exclusive 50% discount on my premium coaching service, specifically for webinar attendees like you. This is an exceptional opportunity to access my proven strategies and insider knowledge at an unbeatable value.

Don't miss out! Secure your spot now by clicking the link below:

[Insert Call to Action Button/Link]

If you have any questions or need further information, please feel free to reach out.

Let's revolutionize your paid advertising efforts together and pave the way for extraordinary success!

Best regards,

[Your Name]
[Your Title]
[Your Company]
[Contact Information]

Now, this still needs some human touch, but it’s quite on point with the type of email I wanted.

And though it probably took you about 10-15 mins to read these, it took me only 5 minutes to give those instructions and generate this great email.

Hence, using AI is not only more efficient in terms of time, it is also a great way to get quality emails ready without much effort.

You could use ChatGPT directly, use an AI copywriting tool such as CopyAI, WriteSonic, or Jasper, or you could use an email marketing tool that has integration with ChatGPT, such as Mail Mint, MailJet, Omnisend, etc.

3. Use An Email Automation Tool That Gives You More Control

We have all heard of using popular email marketing tools such as Brevo, ActiveCampaign, MailChimp, etc.

These are amazing tools, but whether you should use them for your targeted email campaigns will really depend on your CMS.

For example, if you are using WordPress and WooCommerce to run your e-commerce site, then you won’t have much control over the type of campaigns you can run. In fact, if you want to run an email campaign for people that purchased a specific product, you won’t be able to do it. You won’t even be able to suggest products dynamically to your buyers; you will have to manually design the product preview blocks in the email and link them to the products.

Rather, you should choose a tool that works natively. In the case of the example above, it’s better to use an email automation tool such as Mail Mint to set up your email automation campaigns. Since the tool is a native WordPress plugin, you will have full control over when you want leads to be added to various lists and when to trigger automated email campaigns.

The idea is to use a tool that lets you organize your lead management and email campaigns with you in charge – your plan, your way of execution.

How To Run Targeted Email Campaigns In WordPress & WooCommerce Easily?

So far, you have learned in detail how you can segment leads and run well-planned email campaigns to convert your potential clients.

But, to execute the whole process, you will need to use the right tools to help you out.

1. Use A Reliable Funnel Builder

Since you will need to run a lead generation campaign, you will need a proper squeeze page with an opt-in form, followed by a thank you page.

You may use WPFunnels to create your squeeze page funnel quite easily. It is an easy-to-use funnel builder on WordPress that comes with a visual canvas to allow you to plan your funnel steps and then integrates with native page builders to help you design the funnel pages easily.

In fact, you may rather use one of the available funnel templates and make quick changes to get your funnel up and running real quick.

**Templates are only available if you use Gutenberg, Elementor, Divi, or Oxygen. For other page builders, you have to design the pages from scratch and use the plugin’s shortcodes to make the funnel functional.

2. Use An Efficient Email Marketing Automation Tool

Mail Mint is a self-hosted email automation plugin in WordPress that can directly integrate with WPFunnels to help you collect and segment leads easily.

Normally, you can use Mail Mint’s lead form on your website (without using WPFunnels) to collect leads if you want to. But using the two plugins together gives you an added benefit – a single visual canvas for funnels and email automation.

The exclusive integration means on the same visual canvas where you set up your squeeze funnel, you can then define the email automation flows based on user actions in the funnels and automatically add the leads to specific lists.

For example, once someone submits the opt-in form, you may trigger an email to send him the link to the free resource and then add the user to a specific list for whom you want to launch your next email campaign.

Mail Mint also allows you to create lead segments based on the data you have of your prospects (which could be their basic details or any custom details that you may have collected).

Once you have the leads collected, you can then run personalized email campaigns whenever you want.

3. Set Up Purchase-Based Automation Flows For WooCommerce Stores

While you can collect leads, segment them, and send email campaigns to them using Mail Mint, another one of its specialties is automation for WooCommerce.

Since targeted campaigns for e-commerce don’t always involve a sales funnel or lead collection, you have to rely on a tool that can trigger email campaigns based on users’ purchase actions.

For example, you could set an automation flow for people who purchase a specific product, let’s say an ‘Avengers’ t-shirt, who will then be emailed with a discount coupon and product suggestion of more t-shirts that the buyer can purchase later on.

In this case, since you know the main interest of the user is a superhero t-shirt, you could personalize the email accordingly and showcase other superhero t-shirts for the user to look into. The coupon will act as an extra push.

**Meanwhile, you could also think about running personalized sales funnels depending on what the user has added to the cart and offer them relevant products such as order bumps and upsells. These could easily be created using WPFunnels’ Global funnels feature.

Final Thoughts

Targeted email campaigns are very effective if done right, and as you have seen, you can successfully run targeted campaigns as long as you know your target prospects thoroughly.

Once you have learned well about your target audience, planning a lead generation campaign to collect qualified leads and running personalized email campaigns will become so much easier. And, if you use the right tools, it will become more affordable and efficient as well.

If you have a WordPress site or a WooCommerce store, then you should try using WPFunnels & Mail Mint. They are super affordable and work together perfectly to make your targeted email campaigns highly successful.

So go ahead and plan your next marketing campaign. Start using lead segmentation and targeted email campaigns actively and double your revenue in no time.

Cheers.