16-06-2025
Powering the future of email marketing
Petaling Jaya: Despite the rapid expansion of new channels and the rise of social media, email marketing still plays a crucial role in today's digital marketing landscape.
'Email marketing has been around for a long time, and in my opinion, it isn't going anywhere,' Jeffri Shahul Hamid, founder of Malaysian AI-powered email marketing platform Enginemailer Sdn Bhd, told StarBiz. 'Just like the Internet, it continues to evolve.'
The advent of new technologies has enabled more advanced and optimised email marketing methods, providing marketers tools to better engage customers and drive conversions.
'It's no longer just about uploading a mailing list and sending a million emails, but rather an emphasis on quality over quantity,' said Jeffri.
Strong database management systems now allow businesses to understand audiences more deeply, tailoring and targeting them based on distinct interests and profiles.
User-friendly drag-and-drop interfaces and templates offer accessible ways to produce polished, well-made email newsletters. AI technology can help craft effective subject lines and generate content, as well as deliver real-time analytics and insights to inform business decisions.
Additionally, email marketing platforms such as Enginemailer have the ability to automate and integrate various systems, offering synchronisation and interoperability with preferred customer relationship management software and social media platforms.
Jeffri noted that while email marketing is not typically used as a top-of-funnel strategy to create awareness and generate leads, it is highly effective in steering the customer journey.
Through emails, businesses have a wealth of opportunities for communicating, engaging, and nurturing the customers towards making purchases.
For instance, emails can be used to send automated notifications, reminders, confirmation messages, birthday month promotions, which are customised and specific to each user.
'Email is not the only marketing channel, but it is an integral part of the whole customer experience,' he said. 'Our job is to make that part easier for businesses.'
As a SaaS (software as a service) platform, Enginemailer provides database management, email marketing and transactional email for businesses of all sizes.
According to Jeffri, the platform was created to empower more micro, small and medium enterprises and small businesses with email marketing and communication tools that only larger companies typically have access to.
'Our customers range from freelancers who send 100 emails on a monthly basis to enterprises that send 50 million emails a month,' he said.
The platform uses a subscription-based pricing model, with a 'free forever' tier where users can send up to 10,000 emails per month at no cost.
In contrast to other email marketing software services, Enginemailer's paid subscriptions plans are priced based on the number of emails sent, rather than the size of a customer's contact database.
Customers also have the flexibility to upgrade and downgrade their existing plans at any given time to suit fluctuating needs for different seasons.
'It can be a cost burden on smaller companies that want to efficiently maintain their database,' he explained. Due to this, one of Enginemailer's notable features is an unlimited database for all users.
'As a company, your database is one of your biggest assets, so this is our way of giving back to smaller businesses and helping them grow.'
On what makes a successful email marketing campaign today, the founder said relevancy is key.
'Almost anyone can run an email newsletter now. To stand out, you need to be sending the right information to the right people, giving them the content they are looking for using targeted techniques,' he said.
'With emails, you have an average of 10 seconds of the reader's attention. You cannot be putting out long, complex emails with all the information, expecting them to find the specific section that's relevant to them.'
Strategies for email marketing should therefore be geared towards simplicity and personalisation.
Beyond this, the importance of data privacy cannot not be overstated. 'Protecting your customer's data is essential for building trust in your brand,' said Jeffri.
For this reason, Enginemailer's platform is General Data Protection Regulation compliant, and the system is designed to give email subscribers greater control by allowing them to access, correct or delete their personal data at any time.
Lastly, a focus on quality-over-quantity is needed to more effectively reach readers and boost conversion rates, he added.
