We have an abundance of data at our fingertips and yet somehow we don’t always make the best out of the opportunity that email marketing provides. What is the fix?
Getting it right by using valuable insights and tips for email marketing. Below are a few actionable tips, that when used the right way can help you leverage the strength of email marketing and even supplement your campaign with other marketing channels.
Actionable Tips for Email Marketing
SUBJECT LINE
A good subject line will:
- Gain the attention of the recipient
- Communicate exactly what the email is about
- State the timeline to create a sense of urgency
- Highlight curiosity, relevance, and value.
The subject line of an email can greatly reduce the chance of your message getting ignored, deferred, or deleted without being read. By following the simple rules and avoiding the below-mentioned mistakes, you can greatly improve your open rate.
Use of CAPS signifies shouting. If it is something important, you can use email hashtags such as: ACTION:, IMP:, STAT: at the start. The only exception would be abbreviations such as;
“Your Feedback Required on the EDI Proposal by Thu 22/4”
Special characters and symbols such as $, &, *, and @ are likely to be viewed as spam by the ESP or the recipient. Moreover, one cannot use spam words in the subject line.
For a detailed analysis of top email spam terms, check out Top Three Spam Keywords to Avoid in Email Subject Lines.
Avoid using subject lines longer than 50 characters. Your email subject lines should be short and concise. That said, avoid using single word subject lines either.
You cannot use misleading or vague subject lines. To avoid this, use a subject line that conveys the key of the topic.
EMAIL ADDRESS & “FROM” NAME
Studies on email open rates show that trusting the sender is the most significant factor in whether an email is opened or not. It’s imperative to choose an effective and consistent email address and “from” name.
EMAIL ADDRESS:
Below are a few things to consider when picking the email address.
- Don’t use a no-reply email address.
- Don’t use a free webmail address.
- Use a valid email address.
- Match your “from” name to your “from” address.
“FROM” NAME:
For deliverability reasons, it’s good to use a “from” address that invites readers to contact you. Choose a name that will be recognizable to your subscribers.
VALUABLE EMAILS
A lot of marketers keep sending follow-up emails that offer no value to their readers. This is a cold sale. Instead of being spammy, provide something of real value to your customers and be helpful. By offering something new within every email, you’ll be able to build a relationship with your customers over time and even grow your list.
RELEVANT EMAIL LIST
The more you pay attention to your email list, the better it will be for you to focus on your email campaigns and get the right outcome. Segmenting your email database on basics like demographics, firmographics, buyers’ behavior, etc. may help you develop the right email message and content. You may also choose to buy email lists from a reputable email marketing company.
A relevant and accurate email list will help you significantly strengthen the relevancy of your email campaign and maximize the relationship with your audience.
CALL-TO-ACTIONS
This is a commonly held notion in marketing that the higher the number of calls-to-action, the bigger your chances of generating more leads. By adding too many calls-to-action, marketers confuse the reader and dilute the effectiveness of the email campaigns. Moreover, this would make it harder to gauge the effectiveness of the email campaign.
Think about the action you want your recipients to take – register for an event, redeem an offer, visit your website – and make it easy as possible for them by adding a clear call-to-action.
EMAIL-A-GEDDON
A lot of businesses keep emailing the same audience over and over again. Now this won’t be a problem in the beginning, but as their inbox keeps filling, they might start ignoring those emails.
If you keep emailing people who aren’t responsive, this will cause some email providers to start pushing your emails in the junk mail (based on low open rates).
To prevent your emails from directly going into the junk box, stop emailing people who aren’t opening your emails.
EMAIL PERSONALIZATION
Did you know that 94% of companies say that email personalization is critical to the current and future success of your email campaign?
Email personalization is a relatively simple, yet sophisticated way of making the most of opportunities that digital marketing provides.
Below are a few ready-to-implement ways of email personalization:
- Simply ask your audience the right questions to create incredibly targeted emails.
- Create a customer persona using attributes and actions they take.
- Segment your audience into different time zones, with the aim of sending emails at a reasonable time for your audience.
- Set up automated behavioral triggered email to your customers for multiple actions such as re-engagement, welcome, cross-selling, up-selling etc.
- You may also pair personalized emails with landing pages to increase subscriptions and generate more leads.
As you can see from the above-mentioned suggestions, to get customers engaged with your business, you first need to enhance your email marketing strategies.
If you have questions about email marketing, leave a comment below.
