Email marketing is probably the last thing people think of regarding SEO. After all, emails, even circular ones, are part of private correspondence, while SEO is supposed to be out there for everyone to see. SEO is about increasing your visibility; it’s about being noticeable to everyone, even people who are not actively looking for you, while emails are direct, targeted messages with a specific purpose.
So, is there a connection between email marketing and SEO?
Of course, there is. There is a connection, and one could argue that there is no SEO without email marketing. Why? Well, there are many reasons. Here are some of them!
1. Increasing website traffic
You can use emails to tell people to come visit your site. This will increase traffic, probably the largest ranking metric in SEO.
You can send people emails, inviting them to your platform. You can facilitate their journey by giving them a link, but even if they refuse to click on it (out of their fear of phishing), they may still look you up later.
There are so many ways for you to incentivize this link-following, though. You can offer them a special discount for following this link or find a different way to reward them for answering your CTA.
While this is not an SEO technique (email marketing is its own thing), increased traffic will lead to higher rankings. This means that you can use this method to supplement your overall SEO methods.
2. This SEO method will remain relevant no matter what
With so many developments in AI, voice search, virtual reality, etc., it’s getting harder and harder to future-proof your marketing campaign. Still, you can rest assured that email marketing has a secure place in the future of SEO.
The thing is that there’s probably no digital marketing method that was proclaimed dead more times than email marketing. Still, it seems like the ROI of email marketing is not fading, and its popularity remains at its peak.
People are just used to using email for official correspondence, and with modern tools, a marketer can identify and reach out to thousands of leads in a matter of minutes. With email marketing platforms powered by AI tools, prospecting emails and customizing your message have never been easier.
3. Link building
Link building is essential to SEO and heavily relies on your email outreach ability. You need to find sites where you can guest post your content, reach out to these sites, and establish a partnership.
The key thing to remember is that, while looking for blogs with as high DA as possible in link building, you also want a decent number of sites to spread your reach. Email marketing automation may help you cast a much wider net. Of course, this doesn’t mean neglecting the quality of your content.
In other words, without email marketing, there are no building backlinks. Sure, you can convince someone to post your piece on their blog, but ideally, you would nurture a relationship with these blogs. You want to post there, which takes long-term correspondence regularly.
It’s also incredibly important that you team up with as many content producers as possible. Just think about it, they could use your link as an external link even if you don’t pay them (or for a modest sum), provided that you have a good enough relationship.
Finally, monitoring brand mentions is great, but when you notice them, you want to email them and ask if you could earn a tag, a link, or a hashtag. Even this will happen via email.
4. Retargeting your audience
Return visitors are great for your website’s SEO; you can use email marketing to retarget old visitors. Return visits are valued more than first-time visits. This shows the algorithm that your page provides continuous value and gives it even more legitimacy in the eyes of social media.
Also, the majority of your audience will develop an interest in stages. Sure, initially, you may have to remind them that you exist, but visiting your site may become a part of their routine after a while.
Remember that this type of retargeting doesn’t just boost your SEO rank but also increases your sales. Moreover, return visitors are definitely more likely to share your content or give you brand mentions. This is important for both SEO and social media marketing.
5. Lowering bounce rate
You’ll drastically reduce your site’s bounce rate by telling people exactly why they should visit your site and even giving them a glimpse of your website’s content. You see, a high bounce rate often happens for one of three reasons:
- Non-responsive site
- Low-quality content
- Misunderstanding
This last part is the most painful since it can never be completely eradicated and can be prevented in the simplest way possible. People click on your link, recognize that they don’t care about your site’s content or that it’s not something they’re interested in, and leave.
Unfortunately, the algorithm immediately interprets this as click bait or even assumes it’s for one of the first two reasons they’ve left.
Via email, you can manage their expectations.
6. Feedback and user-generated content
Email feedback is usually invaluable in improving your online presence. Customers responding to emails tend to be concise and accurate in their statements.
You can gather, analyze, and use this feedback to learn more about your customers and even create fairly accurate customer profiles. This way, email marketing will help you target your audience more accurately and even figure out what kind of content your audience would be interested in. Their phrasing may even help you with your keyword research.
Moreover, people may praise your business and express their gratitude via email. Then, you can ask them for permission to use this UGC as social proof.
Wrap up
So, while the connection between email marketing and SEO may not be immediately obvious, anyone who has ever dealt with SEO knows just how quintessential email outreach is to this industry. You want to use email marketing because your outreach scope and accuracy heavily affect every aspect of your SEO.
