Is email marketing dead like some have claimed? Or is it alive and well, proving more effective and beneficial over other key channels of communication? As you’ll see below, email communications should not be underestimated and e-Newsletters in particular, combined with Email Campaign Reporting, can be essential in building and nurturing relationships with those in your real estate contact management database.

ExactTarget’s 2012 Channel Preference Survey paints us a picture of why we shouldn’t neglect email communications, such as e-Newsletters, but instead embrace them.

Over all age brackets, 63% of people were found to use email to share content. Email was the number one way people said they shared content compared to sharing through other communication channels like Facebook, the phone, Twitter, and blogging.

And guess what ExactTarget found to be the preferred method of contact. Yes, it was email, with 77% of respondents saying that for companies they’re interested in, they want to receive their email.

That’s not all. The vast majority (91%) of people in the study said they check email every day. There’s no other means of communication that can surpass that.

Email is also more cost effective then other marketing and communication channels like direct mail. Let’s say you pay a subscription fee for a real estate contact management system. Every month you send out 1,000 emails/ e-Newsletters and you pay $35 per month. Now, let’s say every month you pay to send out 1,000 direct mail pieces every month. At a 50 cents per piece (a great price), your cost is $500. Significantly higher than email at $35.

Of all the ways you can build relationships with your sphere of influence (SOI), and nurture your leads, email is one of the easiest and most effective. And an e-Newsletter is a great way to keep fresh in the minds of your clients and real estate leads while providing them with useful and interesting content on a regular basis. A monthly e-Newsletter should be an important aspect of your real estate marketing strategy.

Even better, clients and prospects will look forward to receiving your e-Newsletters because they’ll be filled with useful information that your recipients will find interesting (home design tips, how to assess the value of one’s home, etc.).

Here’s what happens when you’re continually providing your SOI with useful real estate related tips and information: they’ll come to think of you as a true expert in your field. You’ll find more and more past clients and prospects reaching out to you for advice and information on their home and homes on the market. And as a REALTOR®, isn’t that what you want?

But of all the business-building benefits e-Newsletters bring to an agent, one of the biggest advantages is that you can track and measure the success of what you’re sending out.

Email Campaign Reporting is the feature that lets you gain this key insight into your email communications.  After an e-Newsletter has been sent, you can see who read your email, how many times each person has read it, open rate, click-through rate, forward rate, and more. Only the best real estate CRMs and dedicated email marketing solutions have Email Campaign Reporting.

If you find that certain messages are not working, you can experiment and see which types of communications/ messages lead to the highest open rates or click-through rates. You’re not marketing with a blind-fold on.

What’s more is that if you find that certain prospects are reading or forwarding your e-Newsletter more than others, you know these individuals are interested in what you have to say. They are potentially hot leads. You can give these hot leads a call or set them up on a drip email campaign targeted specifically to them.

For example, Jorge, one of our clients, has been using our Email Campaign Reporting feature since we launched it. He sends out e-flyers to his real estate contact management database whenever he has a new listing. Recently, Jorge listed a downtown property at new, trendy condominium development and of course, he sent out his e-flyers.

Jorge ran an Email Campaign Report one week after the flyer was sent. He noticed that there were three people in particular who read the email/ e-flyer an excess of three times and each forwarded the email once.

Jorge gave each one of these people a call. Sure enough, they were interested about the listing and wanted to view the property.

Jorge also periodically sends out e-flyers on new housing developments, their pricing, and what makes them unique. He sets up his “hot prospects” on drip email campaigns where once every other week they receive an email on this development, what it has to offer, and how he can be a big help if they were to make a purchase.

It’s important that you use your real estate contact management system to send out e-Newsletters and other email communications, to your database. People check email, read email very regularly, respond to their email, and share their email. Email is highly cost effective and fast, efficient, and easy. And you can deliver a message immediately. These things cannot be said about other communication channels, such as direct mail.

Realtors who take advantage of email to keep in touch and build relationships with those around them will and do have a competitive edge over other agents. Start now with an e-Newsletter and you won’t look back.