Email Marketing Fixes

Image courtesy of hongkiat.com
Image courtesy of hongkiat.com

Email marketing is a very common form of advertising for many companies, and with the ever-increasing popularity of smartphones, it can be a very effective marketing tool. However, many companies aren’t giving email marketing all the creative and strategic attention it deserves. The trick is to get your email recipient to actually open the email rather than delete it right away or report it as spam. (Consumers are not afraid to click the spam button. 43% of email recipients mark an email as spam solely based on the name of the sender, and 69% mark an email as spam based on the subject line.)

With the odds stacked against your email campaign, it is important to thoughtfully plan your campaign before you send it out. Outlined below are some helpful guidelines to give your email marketing campaign a fighting chance.

Plan ahead
Sadly, many marketers choose vital information such as the subject line and secondary subject line just seconds before they send out the eblast. There is not another scenario in business where such important decisions would be made so flippantly. Today, 65% of emails are opened on smartphones and tablets, a platform where the subject line may be the only aspect of the email the customer sees. Having the right “catch phrase” to your email is essential to your open rate success.

Easy fix: Create a campaign plan to outline the specific goals of the email campaign. Within this plan, include options for the subject line so you can test before committing to them.

Utilize the data
There is a plethora of metrics you can obtain from your email service provider (or ESP). A simple eblast report will tell you stats such as deliverability, open rate, click-thru rates, and much more. Marketers need to consider and analyze all of the data available to them, rather than just comparing their delivery rates month to month. As cliché as it is to say, knowledge is power, so don’t waste it.

Easy fix: Partner with your ebast provider to set up email tracking pixels, a one pixel by one pixel transparent square that assists you in being able to track what pages were accessed and who actually opened the email.

Have a team dedicated to email
The job of creating and sending the eblast is often dropped in the lap of someone who has other things to do, and doesn’t have the time (or expertise) to craft a high-performing campaign. The disinterested designer/marketer will most likely not spend as much time as they should on the eblast, thus resulting in lack-luster email performance.

(Not so) easy fix: This may be difficult for smaller marketing departments, but having a dedicated team supporting your email efforts can have a huge impact. A dedicated team will be able to design and code the email to maximize its potential for open and click-thru rates. The emails need someone advocating for them, believing in them, so the reader will believe them as well. Another option? Hire an outsourced marketing resource that can act as your dedicated online and email marketing team. This is a more cost effective way to bring on the best talent.

Respect the email
Don’t let other marketing and business efforts push email to the side. It’s important to share your findings with other departments within the company, share what worked and what didn’t, and regroup to create an even more successful email campaign. The communication will make your email marketing efforts more visible within the company, thus gaining the respect of the other divisions.

Email marketing may have lost its luster because it seems “old school” to many marketers, but it should not be undersold. Eblast, when utilized effectively, can still impact sales at a high level, especially when you consider that the people who do open their emails spend 138% more than their non-email opening counterparts. It is important to take the time to create a successful email marketing campaign by planning ahead and properly analyzing the data. These poor abused emails need your help, so be an advocate for change and adopt these helpful email strategies.

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