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With the rise in social media, B2B marketers need to rethink how they use email marketing. Email marketing has largely been either a passive experience, like sending newsletters, or one of driving conversions. But rarely has its goal been driving conversation.

To be effective, email will need to evolve. It must engage readers and encourage conversation – just like social media does. In the near future, marketing communications will likely move from being email-only messaging to being multi-channel. What once may have been delivered only to an inbox may soon be delivered as a tweet, Facebook post, blog post, YouTube video, post to a LinkedIn Group and/or text message. And what is received in one channel may be answered in another. Marketers will want to stimulate engagement, and email will need to play as important a role in this effort as the social media channels.

This will go beyond including social media icons in your email and even moving past sharing with your network. Sharing is great, and having your message spread will lead to positive results. But when your email can create interactions with your business, then its effectiveness as a marketing channel will be fully realized.

So how do you create conversation? Understanding your audience is key. Knowing what social networks they use and when they use them will allow you to prepare your content accordingly. And creating relevant content that encourages conversation will require considerable strategic thinking, copywriting skill and testing.

For B2B marketers, many of us know who we want as our audience and we may already have a relationship with existing customers. By engaging those people further and building a meaningful relationship, B2B marketers can dramatically impact their perceived value which can positively impact ROI.

So do you have any good examples of emails that encourage conversation? Please share your ideas on how you plan to use email marketing in the future and if social media will change your email marketing tactics and approach.

This post originally appeared on SocialMediaB2B.com on March 24, 2010.

Tags: b2b, conversation, socialmedia

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