According to Statista, last year there were 4.1 billion people worldwide using email as a tool to communicate. Every day, human beings send and receive more than 270 billion emails on our phones and laptop and desktop computers. The world is filled with emails, and it takes a professional to manage all this activity.
Thankfully, there are Email Marketing Managers that enjoy the job. Email Marketing Managers create, implement, track, and analyze email campaigns. Companies use email campaigns to do everything from selling products and services to helping with customer service and sending out subscriber information – and so much more.
What Does an Email Marketing Manager Do?
Email Marketing Managers handle things like newsletter signups or landing page downloads. Just think about all the emails you’ve received over the last few months and you’ll understand the variety of topics that an Email Manager may be responsible for.
To create an email marketing campaign, these professionals must be fairly database-savvy. They should have a strategy for reaching a target audience that shapes the emails they develop. They should also have a distribution strategy for when and where the campaign will go out, along with what messaging will resonate. The goal is usually to convert these emails to some sort of action. This could include a sign-up, a purchase, registration, or just simply having the target open the email and read it. Generally, the Email Marketing Manager is tasked with bringing on more people or selling more products. Or, their job may be to build brand awareness or create customer relationships over a long-term lifecycle designed to bring more sales over time.
The email marketing manager also handles email returns and helps ensure that the database of email leads is thoroughly cleansed or corrected at the end of every campaign.
Who do they work with?
In their quest for crafting and sending the perfect email, the email marketing manager works with a variety of professionals across an organization, including:
- Marketing Managers
- Corporate leadership
- Web Designers
- Graphic Designers
- Analysts
- Content Managers
- Department leaders
- Third-party vendors
Email Marketers must have the patience to test things like the subject line, or whether the email should be personalized in some way. All of these things can affect the email open rate. In fact, the Email Marketing Manager must be fairly obsessed with the open rate. They also must know things like the best time of day to send an email, or if a shorter subject line is better than a longer one. These things may change by audience, which makes the job even more challenging.
No matter the goal, it’s a tough job at a time when we are all saturated with digital inquiries. The data and metrics on the email campaign are tracked rigorously, but the Email Marketing Manager always finds a way to rise to the top of the heap.
Email Marketing Manager Skills Needed
An Email Marketing Manager must certainly know their audience better than anyone else in the company. They also must understand the goal of the email campaign. Email Managers must have an instinctive grasp of language that is short, punchy, and interesting enough to get the attention of that target audience and they must be extremely good at collaboration; they may work with a Content Copywriter to draft the actual email content, and a Graphic Designer and/or Developer to create a graphic within the email.
Additionally, an Email Manager must understand that the email should be responsive, meaning that it can be viewed properly on any digital screen. This usually requires extensive testing of the email campaign before it is launched.
Some of the skills found in a competent Email Marketer include:
- Marketing savvy – they must know what language will resonate with an audience
- Attention to detail – to be certain there are no mistakes in the copy
- Writing competency – especially if they are crafting the email or newsletter
- Analytical mind – they must be able to determine what worked – or what didn’t – by reviewing the data
- Understanding best practices or industry-related compliance laws
- Expertise in SEO or SEM
- Understanding of a variety of analytical tools
- Excellent communication skills
- Organized project management skills
- Good with software, including data analytics
- Coolness under deadline pressure
Email Professionals work very closely with marketing and IT teams as well, so they must be patient and flexible team players in order to get the job done properly.
Suggested Software Proficiency
Email Marketing Managers must know email marketing platforms such as Mailchimp, GetResponse, CakeMail, MadMini, Hubspot, Constant Contact – and more. They must know content management systems and Google Analytics or other marketing analysis platforms. Also, understanding project management tools such as Jira or Basecamp could be very helpful as well. If they know some HTML/CSS or have some experience in A/B testing, that could be a positive and an understanding of databases such as Salesforce is also important.
The email marketing manager typically has an undergraduate degree in marketing, communications, advertising, or project management, or even computer science.
Find Your Email Marketing Manager Here
If you’re looking for expertise to manage your email campaigns, Artisan Talent has full and part-time expertise available as well as freelance email marketing managers. Contact us today to find out how Artisan’s creative employment agency can help find you the perfect match!
Find Your Next Email Marketing Job
Are you an Email Marketing Manager looking for work? View our creative employment agency’s list of available opportunities or submit your resume! We’re standing by to help you find the next big thing.
