Back to basics: email marketing

Jackie West

This last week I’ve had yet another conversation about ineffective email campaigns.

Although it’s all pretty basic stuff, I thought I’d record my ‘end’ of the conversation here:

Subject Line:
don’t leave it as an after-thought or the last thing you do before you push your message out.

Think about it. Ensure that you don’t use any of the no-no words or phrases.
It’s always worth splitting your list, and trying different subject lines, and see which gives you the best open rates.

Timing:
avoid Monday mornings, and Friday afternoons, for obvious reasons. Also avoid other workday mornings, at least for the first hour. Think about it, what’s the first thing you do with your emails in the morning – prioritise and delete (well, that’s my agenda, I’m sure I’m not alone). And, I’d always try to make the last mailing of the day no later than 4pm.

Images:
some email clients block images. If your address is in the recipient’s address book it should be fine. Worth asking people to add your email address (in some cases they may have to submit your address to their IT department to add to the company white list).

Frequency:
are you mailing your lists too often? Perhaps they are fed up with hearing from you (people are lazy, they don’t always click your unsubscribe link).

Review your frequency.

Content:
why should people read your mail? You’ve sorted out the subject line, and they’ve opened it – you’ve got their attention. Now what?

Provide them with a compelling, what’s-in-it-for-them, read.

I’m assuming(?) that you have segmented your audience, and you are directing appropriate messages?

Outline benefits, don’t be top heavy with all the singing/dancing features, features and more flippin’ features.

I still feel to best way to ‘keep in touch’ is with a newsletter, alongside your own company messages, provide them with other items of interest. .

Get someone else, not in your department, to read and give you feedback. Sometimes we are too close to a subject, and a fresh pair of eyes will work wonders.

Attachments:
don’t send attachments, more than likely these won’t get opened, and probably attract the spam filter. And, if you must attach a file, just make sure they are not mega in size.

If you have a document give them a link to a landing page (where you can collect their details), or if it’s available to download from your website then give the link. And track.

Tracking:
if you don’t use email campaign software I’d recommend you do, there are lots out there, some free, and all of which should give you tracking facilities, campaign reports, etc, and will manage your lists easily for you.

Most will also give you links to embed into your emails, and html coding to place on your website with a ‘join our mailing list’ message.

Read more here:
Lyris HQ: 8 R’s of Email Marketing Success

15 simple and effective email marketing tips

How to Write Effective E-Mails

Email Marketing Essentials: A Beginners Guide To Using
Permission Email To Promote Your Business