6 ways to integrate your email and social media marketing strategies

Social media has become a favorite tool of marketing teams everywhere. Still, email remains the true marketer's workhorse. An effective email marketing campaign provides a personal and profitable way of reaching your customer base. It’s a tried and true marketing channel that’s here to stay.

In fact, most consumers would rather receive promotional material via email than see it in their social feeds. Plus, email earns a 3,800% return on investment (yes, that’s a real number).

A successful brand will be able to use all available channels to its best advantage. Email and social media integration delivers a seamless experience for your customers. Your social and email marketing channels should work together from start to finish.

How do you turn your social followers into email subscribers? On the flipside, how do you turn your email subscribers into social buyers? Here are some of the most effective ways to integrate your email marketing and social media marketing strategies.

1. Upload your email subscriber list to your social channels

The first step of email and social media integration is uploading your email subscriber list to your social networks. This allows you to invite your subscribers to like or follow your social profiles.

Uploading your email subscribers into your Facebook, LinkedIn, or Twitter account also gives you a way to better understand your customers. You’ll see their other likes and interests based on who they follow and what they post about. This can lead to some excellent marketing strategy of your own. It may spark ideas for new content, products, or advertising opportunities.

You can also use these lists to run social ads specifically targeted at your subscriber profiles. Facebook's Custom Audience tool lets you create a target audience from an uploaded list of email subscribers:

Reaching your email subscribers on social affords two more benefits:

1. You’re able to share content with your subscribers through an entirely different avenue. The social route often provides opportunity for engagement.
2. You can connect individually with subscribers on a personal level. Answer their questions in real-time or reply to their comments. This helps build a lasting relationship. This is one of the most crucial requirements if you want to grow your business on social media.
   

Don’t waste any more time. Upload that email list. Enjoy the immediate fruits of this simple email and social media integration tactic.‍

2. Collect emails on social

‍Your followers have taken action to connect with you on social media. It stands to reason they're already interested enough to want more from you. This makes them prime candidates to join your email list. All you need to do is give them an easy way to do so.

Facebook makes tying email and social media together easy. The platform has an option to place an email sign-up form directly on your company’s page. This way, your Facebook followers don't even have to leave your social account to subscribe to your newsletter.

The South by Southwest Festival (SXSW) has their email sign-up button at the top of their profile page. Music lovers can't miss it:

Another tactic for growing your email list on social is to promote the benefits of being a subscriber in your social posts. Give your social followers a reason to want to sign up for your email list. There are many ways to incentivize people to sign up. You can promote email-only deals or early access to content for newsletter subscribers. (Free stuff, anyone?)

Farm-to-table butcher shop ButcherBox ups the ante even further. It promotes its email subscriber member deals and its other social accounts all in the same post:

ButcherBox shows us how to turn followers into multi-channel customers. Offer exclusive deals and content specific to your various social and email accounts.

3. Promote your social profiles in email

‍First, make sure your email subscribers know that your social profiles exist! Do this before starting on more complicated email and social media integration strategies. You already have a captive audience in your email list. This makes it that much easier to lead them to your social accounts.

You should include social logos and links at the bottom of your emails. It's also wise to actively promote your social networks in your email content. There are plenty of brands that do this beautifully.

Take McDonald's, for example. McDonald's dedicates an entire email to promoting its social channels. They use a pithy but clever tag line and extremely clear call to action.

Integrating your email marketing and social media marketing improves the return on your investment. Again, your email audience is already interested in your brand. Capitalize upon that interest with every channel you can!

4. Run retargeting campaigns

Your email list is also a sneakily excellent way to increase your selling on social media, particularly through ad retargeting campaigns. Those who are actually interacting with your emails (rather than just marking them read or ignoring them altogether) are more likely to respond to your brand presence elsewhere.

These campaigns are easy to set up and pay immense dividends down the road. Generally, this is how a retargeting campaign works: 

• You install a tracking code on your website. 
• When your email subscribers click through to your site, the tracking code then attaches a cookie with their IP address. 
• The cookie anonymously follows your customers as they browse the web and visit their social media channels. 
• You then set up your social ads that are triggered when your visitor’s cookie is detected elsewhere on the web.
  

Running retargeting campaigns centered on people who already know your brand also saves you a lot in time and resources spent. Ad campaigns aren't cheap. That’s why it's especially helpful to already know the audience you wish to target instead of shooting into the dark. Combine email marketing and social media marketing via a retargeting campaign. This ensures you’re reaching a customer base that's already primed and ready to engage.‍

5. Create a special Facebook group for email subscribers

‍Everyone likes to be a part of something exclusive, especially when it has a low barrier to entry. Private Facebook groups are a creative way to use email and social media integration . Offering your email subscribers access to a private Facebook group creates a feeling of exclusivity and camaraderie. This gives your customers an incentive to connect without requiring them to go above and beyond to do so.

You'll need to dedicate enough resources for your Facebook community to make the group worth their while. Starting and responding to conversations helps your followers feel seen and heard. This is especially true if you put their ideas or feedback into action with your products!

This forum is also where giveaways, sneak peaks, and live videos come in handy. Social media and video are a match made in heaven. Video has even been shown to increase conversion rates by 86%.

Fitness personalities are often excellent at email and social media integration. Many offer private groups for members to connect and share fitness tips and personal journeys. Mari Llewellyn is one such fitness influencer. She offers a members-only Facebook group that customers only access via email.

Another benefit of member-only Facebook groups? You can take advantage of user-generated content for your next email blast or social post. This is an extremely effective form of social proof that encourages new business.‍

6. Use "share-with-your-network" email links

‍The best way to increase your business' reach is through your audience itself. Social shares are one of the most effective tools for growing your brand on social media. Why not make it as easy as possible for your customers to do the hard work for you?

Embed "share-with-your-network" (SWYN) links into your outgoing messages to integrate your social and email efforts. Doing so allows your e-list subscribers to share your content with their social network without having to leave their inbox.

You can specify how much or which elements of your email are included in the shared post. You decide whether it shares a video you included in the email, or a discount code to your website like food delivery service Seamless does in this example:

For SWYN links to be the most successful, make sure you offer more than one network sharing option. You also want to place the buttons in a prominent location so they can't be missed.

‍Start integrating your social media marketing and email marketing efforts

‍On first glance, email and social media may not seem like marketing allies. But by implementing the strategies above, you can foster deeper relationships with your customer base. You also ensure you’re reaching them at every point in the sales cycle.

Before you get started, be sure to check out our guide on how to grow your business on social media. That way, you’ll have a strong social foundation before diving into a full-on email integration.