5 Goals to Unlock Growth in 2020
It’s hard to teach an old dog new tricks, but we can learn from years past, right? If we don’t set our intentions for the new year, we’ll end up with stale and unrealistic resolutions.
When it comes to growing your organization’s reach and influence this year, resolve to set these 5 Goals to Unlock Growth in 2020.
1. Improve Email Open Rates
This year, set a realistic goal to improve your broadcast email open rate.
Do you know the open rate of your most recent campaign? It’s reasonable to aim for at least 15% of your contacts to open an email from you, which they’ve agreed to receive. Need to increase that number?
Improve your email subject line.
It’s a unique alchemy of gut instinct and science when you test (and retest) your email subject lines. Campaign Monitor calls this piece of copy “crucially important,” and we agree.
Like we’ve said before, data is your friend. Segment your audience and experiment with different subject lines, tracking the results and changes along the way. Don’t overthink it! Your targeted audience is still being reached, you’re just learning while you do it.
Pro Tip: Use this amazing tool by CoSchedule to analyze your subject lines.
Learn more! Check out 5 Insider Tips to Boost Your Email Marketing.
2. Clean Up Your Contact List
Do your email campaigns result in a high volume of email bounce messages, also called NDRs (non-delivery reports)?
If your list is neglected or simply assumed to be clean, your bounce rates might begin to build, and this could have a damaging effect on your current and future campaigns. Why? As explained by Active Campaign:
Email networks monitor bounce rate trends for all your current campaigns to decide if they’ll accept your email later on.
It’s important to keep your undeliverable email rate below 2%. In addition to sending quality emails regularly and using opt-in lists only, here are some suggestions for cleaning up your list:
- Show that you’re listening by importing updated information regularly.
- Analyze bounce back email error codes and address each issue.
- Properly capitalize names.
- Respect your subscribers’ privacy by never sharing or selling your list.
- Always offer an opt-out option (it’s kind, and it’s the law).
Make this the year to clean up your contact list. Your conversion future might depend on it.
3. Refocus Your Hero
There’s a reason everyone’s talking about stories: they’re powerful.
Who’s at the center of your organization’s story? Is it you? Does your website read as a resume?
As explained by the Storybrand expert Donald Miller:
You are not the hero of your brand’s story. Your customer is. You’re the guide — the person with the right kind of heart and experience to help your heroic customers overcome their problems and win the day.
With that in mind, start by considering just one project. Your website? Social media? Ask yourself:
- What kind of language are we using? Who is positioned as the hero?
- Is your church or organization described as the solution or the guide to the solution?
It’s a subtle difference, but it’s critical. Your customer wants to feel empowered and understood, and a well-curated story can do that.
To continue building your story, take a look at other projects and even your overall branding using the same line of questioning.
Get more ideas for growth at 3 Blueprints for Outstanding Online Growth.
4. Build Your Online Community
Make 2020 the year of strategic and interactive social media.
Gone are the days of using the social channels to pass the time. Users want more than cat videos. As you’ve likely noticed, social media is now, well...more than social. Forbes has reported:
Social media has become the main source of news online with more than2.4 billion internet users, nearly 64.5 percent receive breaking news from Facebook, Twitter, YouTube, Snapchat and Instagram instead of traditional media.
This is an unprecedented opportunity for players like you to position yourselves as the “go-to” in your field. Develop a social media calendar and build your brand to become an authority. Regularly inform your customers about interesting information in your sector, curating their news for them.
Be sure to still post fun and personable content (people really do like cat videos!), but schedule it wisely in the mix of great information and helpful tips. This will build a robust online community of followers who are likely to make it into the conversion category.
Are your customers finding you? Get noticed online with 6 Expert Ways to be Found.
5. Take a Risk
Try something new this year. To generate more leads, take a risk.
Have you ever hosted a webinar or offered an e-course? Lead generation from this kind of investment has a high level of conversions, but there’s also a sizeable investment. To make it pay off, follow these steps:
- Personally experience a webinar or e-course. Take a course with content that interests you, but also use your participation to gain experience and best practices for designing one of your own.
- Once you determine your target audience and value proposition, pull together the resources necessary to design your presentation or course. We like the suggestions outlined by Thinkific, like creating your ideal student avatar.
It doesn’t have to stop there! Use portions of your webinar or course to create content for your website and social media channels, which will in turn direct people back to you.