Some discount the value of email marketing, but smart marketers know that it is a cornerstone of any effective Content Marketing programme. With investment returns in excess of 4300%, it is difficult to argue against the channel.
That type of return doesn't just happen though. Email marketing - like all tactics - takes time to develop and master a formula that works well for your specific business. Fortunately, there are a number of tips we can use to fast track our success.Learn how to optimise the elements of a marketing email with these best practices.
Email Marketing Best-Practices
1. Send Only Permission Based Emails
The golden rule of email marketing is to have permission to send emails to your recipients. Never, ever buy in databases. Your open and success rates will plummet, and you risk being labelled as a spammer if you do. Promote opt-in opportunities on your website and blog to grow your database organically.
2. Craft Compelling Subject Lines
Subject lines and associated elements such as your ‘from name’ field are critical to open rates, clicks and ROI. People receive hundreds of emails per day and scan their inboxes for emails of interest, based primarily, if not entirely, on the subject line. Some practical tips include:
- Use your first name as the sender address to provide a more personal touch, as opposed to generic info@ or sales@ email addresses
- Keep subject lines under 50 characters to evade truncation in inboxes, especially on mobile devices
- Avoid gimmicky tactics like using all caps or excessive punctuation in subject lines
- Provide a great sense of value with your subject line, using specific numbers, percentages or monetary values where appropriate
3. Personalise Offers and Email
Personalisation goes beyond simple personal data tokens. In order to be effective, offers need to be selected and presented to specifically targeted segments of your database based on various criteria. This could be demographic, location, transactional information or stage of the buyer cycle.
Without being creepy, drop in personalisation tokens that will enhance your message and create a personal connection with your reader. This could be using their first name in your opening line or their company name within the body copy.
4. Use Impressive Design
Design plays an important role in your email marketing. Tacky, unprofessional looking design and layout will in most cases lose out to clear, specialised design that utilises best-practices to deliver your message effectively. Guidelines include:
- Preserve your branding by using only on-brand imagery and design elements
- Use white space to draw attention to important aspects of your email
- Make use of contrasting colours to highlight critical elements such as your call-to-action
- Keep your message independent from your design, i.e. don’t convey your message wholly within imagery as many email readers automatically block images and if your reader doesn’t physically download images, your message will be lost
5. Present a Mobile Friendly Email
Recent reports claim that up to 66% of email is now being opened first on a mobile device. This means that if your email template is not optimised for mobile viewing it’s likely that you are losing valuable opportunities to reach your readers.
Use responsive design to ensure your emails are mobile friendly and adapt for the screen your recipients are using to view your mail. Take care to ensure your call-to-action is big enough to press on with a finger and utilise sufficient white space between links so as to avoid confusion or wrong ‘clicks’.
6. Find Your Sending Sweet Spot
A GetReponse study, featured on MarketingProfs, highlights that top engagement times for email opens is between 8am and 9am and 3pm to 8pm. Click-through rates peak between 8am and 9am and from 3pm to 4pm, but warn to consider time zones if you have a global audience. Make use of A/B testing to hone in on the time or day of week that garners the greatest rate of engagement for your particular industry and product.
7. Provide an Option to Unsubscribe
I know that you don’t want to lose your cherished email readers, but it is imperative (and a legal requirement) to provide an unsubscribe option for your marketing emails. This is generally found in the footer of your email. While unsubscribe rates may be a sore point for marketers, there is some humour to be found in HubSpot’s excellent use of video on their unsubscribe page. It’s worth a watch.
Consider including a simple exit survey to uncover why your readers are leaving and use this information to plan your email strategy going forward. You may also decide to offer alternative subscribe options. Perhaps they don’t want to leave entirely but would prefer to receive a wrap up once a month as opposed to a daily email. Give them the option to keep in touch on the terms they are comfortable with. HubSpots email marketing functionality is also a great aid in assisting you setup you email marketing campaigns.
