Do you want to know the secret to a stellar email marketing campaign? Are you wondering how your competitors attract subscribers, maintain a sizable email list and align it all with their overall digital marketing strategy? Here’s a hint: It’s all about choosing the right partner. 

Luckily, an email marketing agency is just the kind of partnership you need.

As the name suggests, email marketing agencies live and breathe emails. They know everything there is to know about engagement metrics, social media tie-ins, personalization and other elements that create successful email marketing strategies for every client.

Let’s find out more about email marketing agencies, what they do and how to choose the best one for your business.

Email Marketing 101

Wait a minute — we’re talking about email here, right? You send emails every day. Why do you need an email marketing service to handle the details?

Well, the truth is that email marketing is more complex than it appears at first glance. If you want to see real results, you need to understand and leverage that complexity — often with the help of an email marketing agency.

Here are just a few reasons you shouldn’t tackle this challenge alone:

It’s Becoming More Important

Email marketing represented an average of 21.3% of digital marketing budgets in 2021. (That’s the highest the number has been since the Data & Marketing Association started tracking it!) Plus, more than 90% of surveyed marketing experts say email is somewhat critical to business success, while 41% say it’s very critical. These stats are a sign that more marketers are adopting email campaigns — which means you’ll have more competition. 

It’s Incredibly Effective

Step aside, social media marketing and organic search — there’s a new star in town. Most marketers (79%) rate email marketing in their Top 3 most effective marketing channels, according to Litmus. Many view it as their most effective channel, ahead of even paid search/ads (voted No. 2 most effective) and organic search (No. 3).

Email has the potential to be the most valuable tool in your digital marketing arsenal. However, that’s only true if you know how to handle it properly. If you overwhelm subscribers with pushy promotional emails and overlook key engagement metrics, you’ll lose traction on this channel and potentially jeopardize the rest of your marketing strategy.

It’s Versatile

You can do a bit of everything with email marketing campaigns. Here’s how most marketers use the channel, according to Litmus:

  • Newsletters: 81%.
  • Welcome: 79%.
  • Product: 75%.
  • Sales/promotion: 72%.
  • Event: 71%.

The takeaway is simple: With so many options, you need an email marketing agency to help keep track of your campaign.

What Does an Email Marketing Agency Do?

It’s clear that a successful email marketing campaign isn’t something you can scribble on the back of a napkin in just one evening. You need support, expertise and a team of marketing professionals — and that’s where email marketing agencies come in.

Like other marketing agencies, an email marketing company helps you navigate the fast-changing landscape of the digital world. They can:

  • Gather subscribers: An email marketing service helps expand your client base by attracting subscribers. They’ll research the market and identify opportunities to connect with people who will enjoy your email content.
  • Create an email list (or 10): Once you have all those subscribers, your partner agency helps keep track of them. You’ll work together to build email lists for different campaigns.
  • Provide content: Emails need subject lines, body copy, calls-to-action (CTAs), custom graphics and more. A digital marketing company can make it happen.
  • Manage costs: The cost of email marketing can quickly get out of hand — but not with an email marketing agency keeping an eye on your budget and investments.
  • Consult with in-house teams: Already have an expert or 2? No problem — a good email marketing agency offers consulting services to build a relationship with your in-house teams.
  • Improve personalization: Segmentation and personalization are crucial for any email marketing strategy. Your agency can help weave these elements into content creation and other parts of your marketing strategy.

Why You Need an Email Marketing Partner

An email marketing agency doesn’t just write out a strategy and call it a day. Instead, they’re an active participant in your digital marketing approach, helping you make decisions that lead to real results.

Let’s take a closer look at what this partnership can do for you:

Simplify Strategy Creation

Every marketing channel has “rules,” but not one of them has a rulebook. Helpful, right?

The good news is that email marketing agencies are experts in all kinds of different channels. They understand what works and what doesn’t, how to utilize the latest trends and when to target certain groups of people. They even know how to send personalized emails that make every subscriber feel like your only client.

The result is an email marketing strategy that is never based on guesswork. You’ll collaborate with professionals who know how to manage every element, from content creation to send time optimization, so your emails have the best possible chance of converting every subscriber into a new client. Better yet, you’ll get a say in every part of your strategy so the end product aligns with your business goals.

Build Email Templates

A monthly newsleter shouldn’t have the same format as your promotional emails, and neither should bear any resemblance to your initial welcome messages. That’s why an email marketing agency helps you build an email template for every need. These easy-to-use, ready-to-go structures can be filled in with different copy depending on your digital strategy. This helps make your email campaigns faster and more efficient, keeping you agile in the fast-moving digital world.

Boost Engagement 

Open rate, list growth rate, email sharing and forwarding, revenue per email — these are just a few key metrics that indicate subscriber engagement. Your partner agency helps build an email campaign around these elements, giving you the support you need to connect with your audience on multiple levels. This, in turn, helps you (and your subscribers) get more value from each email.

Track Results

All email campaigns create data. If you’re not tracking this information, you won’t have any idea whether your efforts are making a difference.

An email marketing agency gathers key data and weaves it into a story — one that gives you a complete overview of your results. Better yet, they help you track every change, allowing you to experiment with different send times, subject lines and other key elements until you find out what works for your email list. 

Best Email Marketing Agencies

Your business deserves the best email marketing service out there. But with so many choices, how do you know which partner is right for you? 

If you’ve seen our picks for Top Content Marketing Agencies, you know we have an eye for this kind of thing. Let’s take a look at the shining stars in email marketing services:

1. Brafton

Hey, we deserve a moment in our own spotlight, right?

Brafton is a full-service marketing agency, which means we have expertise from multiple fields to inform our email marketing strategies and recommendations. With a team of content creators, tech experts and digital strategists, we can build campaigns that get the right message to the right people at the right time. We also help:

  • Perfect your messaging.
  • Manage your email list.
  • Navigate different email marketing software.
  • Improve your personalization approach.
  • Create unique personas.
  • Leverage email marketing automation.
  • Measure results.
  • Turn subscribers into loyal customers.

We know we might just be the best email marketing agency, but we’d be far more honored to call ourselves your email marketing partner.

2. InboxArmy

As the self-proclaimed “Swiss Army Knife of Email Marketing,” InboxArmy has a lot to offer. This specialized email marketing agency provides everything from campaign management to email automation. Some of its noteworthy clients include Universal, Spotify and Expedia.

3. Ignite Visibility

Ignite Visibility has won a variety of awards that highlight its marketing, search engine optimization and even workplace culture. They offer custom email strategies, list growth services, advanced analytics and more, all led by industry experts.

4. Soap Media

Soap Media calls itself a “Strategic and Creative Digital Marketing Agency.” This moniker highlights two of their focuses when it comes to email: high-quality strategies and fresh approaches. As a Google Partner, Meta Business Partner and more, they’re more than capable of connecting with subscribers in effective ways.

Find Your Email Marketing Partner

Are you ready to set aside your email marketing worries once and for all? The key is to choose email marketing experts who see you as a partner — not just another business deal.

At Brafton, we believe in building strong relationships. That’s because we know the best way to promote your business and connect with your clients is to understand who you really are. If you want to learn more about our approach to email marketing, there’s only one thing to do: See it in action.

That’s right: Our own newsletter, The Content Marketer, is the perfect way to watch us work our magic. Subscribe today to get this shining example delivered right to your inbox.

Ashlee Sierra is a senior writer and editor from Boise, Idaho. When she’s not buried under her giant dogs, she can be found playing video games, telling ghost stories and having passionate discussions about the Oxford comma.