"Quality over quantity—Emails may best cost efficient but it’s no excuse to not produce quality content to give to a targeted audience." – Benjamin Murray
Email marketing is a key part of a good digital marketing mix, but the person in charge of this direct channel is often overlooked. When companies finally do decide to invest in a position that oversee the strategy and execution of email marketing and CRM, it’s tough to identify the skills this person needs to help your company succeed.
An Email or CRM Marketer needs to be data-driven but not so buried in technical execution that she forgets the bigger strategic picture. Even though this position usually lives in the marketing department, your email marketer will find himself with a foot in marketing and a foot in tech/engineering. Email Marketing budget growth—but many companies struggle to do email in a way that contributes to the bottom line.
Email is now a large enough part of your integrated marketing strategy, and you need to hire someone to manage this channel, but what do you ask them? With the constantly changing digital landscape, various email software providers, and new laws, you need to know what to ask and the types of answers that will show you that this person is your new Email Marketer.
Use the infographic below, highlighting 10 interview questions, as guide during the hiring process for this position.
Related Article: 10 Interview Questions to Ask When Hiring a Product Manager
1. How do you stay up to date on the latest software updates, technologies and best practices?
This will show you the level of commitment and passion candidates have for the industry and their career.
2. What companies do email well - campaigns, designs, mobile-friendly, frequency, etc.?
Credible candidates will be able to site other companies and organizations as examples.
3. Tell me about a time when you had to break down complex, technical issues for a stakeholder.
Good digital marketers know their softwares and technical requirements well, but great digital marketers can explain processes and roadblocks in laymen’s terms for smooth collaboration.
4. How do you prevent being treated as SPAM and what’s your deliverability success?
Applicants should be able to technically speak to deliverability codes and methods they have taken to improve deliverability to inbox.
5. What’s your email marketing philosophy?
While open-ended and seemingly extraneous, this question helps you get a great grasp of the applicant’s comfort in the field. They should have 1-2 personal truths that they have either found through experience or learned along the way that have helped shape them as a marketer.
6. What metrics and actions do you use to measure the success of a campaign?
Some of the obvious answers are Open Rate, Click Rate, CTR and conversions. Experienced candidates will be able to speak to which metrics are preferred for different situations and goals.
7. Email marketing has many components—campaign strategy, project management, design, analytics/database management, coding—which one is your strongest area, and which is your weakest?
Especially when you are hiring onto an existing team, you want to make sure the candidate fills your skills gap and isn’t missing anything critical to your team’s success.
8. What types of emails do you use to move prospective customers down the funnel?
This question gives the candidate an opportunity to demonstrate marketing knowledge and application of the email channel. The applicant should be able to name a few types of emails and how they will be used to move customers down the funnel.
9. How would you scale email, knowing that we have a limited budget and resources?
Look for answers that include using templates or leveraging similar designs for multiple projects. It’s also nice if the person has a network and agencies as a starting point. This question can also be used to gauge how the candidate prioritizes company goals.
10. How would you improve the emails we already have in place?
Prepared candidates will know what kinds of emails you send currently and should be able to speak to improvements and filling the holes in your existing program.