Top 10 Tips for Email Marketing

 

Email marketing has been proven to convert better than social media and most other digital marketing platforms. Yet many brands still don’t have an email marketing strategy in place, or they have no idea how to go about getting started with one. If you’re looking to build your email marketing skills, here are some of the top tips and tricks you should know.

 

Tip 1: Know Who You Are Writing To

Why is your business using email marketing? Who are you targeting with your emails? These questions will help you write a more targeted email, which is crucial. Targeting means writing copy that speaks to your customer base and what they’re interested in, not things like our company or even worse (and more common) you. Emails written directly to people on a personal level tend to convert better than those that don’t. Think about how you talk to your friends, then apply that when sending out emails. It’s important to remember everyone communicates differently too; some people prefer short and direct emails while others want their own space to respond when they feel comfortable. Experimentation is key here. This is why knowing who you are writing to is so important. If you know nothing about your target audience other than they have an interest in sports cars, do some research! This may seem obvious but it’s often overlooked. When done right, it can lead to very high open rates and conversions as well as repeat customers down the road. Another benefit of knowing who you are talking to is avoiding any mistakes based on gender bias or cultural misunderstandings (even if unintentional). The best way to avoid these issues? Make sure every single person involved in creating an email has been involved from beginning to end in a face-to-face meeting with every person receiving that email!

 

Tip 2: Study The Competition

There’s no better way to get an idea of what works in email marketing than studying your competition. Take a look at how other companies do it, and see if there are any interesting or unique approaches you can take to really make your emails stand out. A/B testing is also a great way to figure out what works—and what doesn’t. If you have enough users on your list, consider running an A/B test with two different versions of an email and see which one brings better results (leads, sales, etc.). Even changing things as simple as subject lines can affect response rates significantly. You don’t need to spend thousands of dollars on an A/B testing tool either; many email service providers offer free A/B tests that allow you to send two separate emails through their platform. This allows you to keep complete control over your campaign without having to fork over hundreds of dollars. Once you find something that works, stick with it! Your audience will be familiar with those subject lines and they may even come to expect them from time-to-time. This isn’t necessarily a bad thing though; familiarity often breeds trust! However, try not to go overboard with boring subject lines. Experimenting is important too! As long as you’re staying within your brand guidelines and keeping user experience in mind, you should feel free to experiment all you want. But remember: sometimes boring is good! The majority of subscribers probably signed up because they were interested in hearing about your business and they’ll continue reading your emails because they want information that's relevant to them. So if sending out a newsletter about company updates once every month seems like a good idea, then by all means - go ahead! It's definitely okay to have some boring newsletters now and then. It'll help ensure that more people open your more exciting ones later on down the line when you're ready for i.

 

Tip 3: Start With a Good Subject Line

Just like you can't build a house without a solid foundation, you can't have an effective email marketing campaign without starting with a good subject line. While many first-time email marketers put all their energy into crafting beautiful emails that are packed with enticing graphics and engaging content, they forget about one important element the from line. If you send out emails that don't make it past spam filters or collect tons of trashed messages in your subscribers' inboxes, then your hard work is going to be lost because it never made it to them in the first place. To keep everything running smoothly, start with a good subject line so your subscribers will read what you wrote and open up each email you send them. Your message should be clear and concise while appealing to your audience's needs. It should also offer some sort of value or incentive to get people to take action by clicking on links within your email or visiting certain pages on your website. Don't just send generic subject lines such as Our New Product or Update You're Looking For. Be specific instead, such as 10% Off on Our New Product or Here's How You Can Save $50 This Month. As long as you make sure not to go overboard with too much text (more than 100 characters), your recipients will appreciate receiving personalized messages straight from you. When writing a new subject line, use keywords that relate directly back to your business goals.

 

Tip 4: Write an Attention Grabbing Copy

Your marketing emails will only be as effective as your content. If you want to build a relationship with your target audience, focus on creating catchy subject lines and well-written copy. A study found that subjects with numbers received almost 20% more clicks than those without numbers, so include relevant digits in your subject line to make it stand out. Use action verbs and phrases that appeal to emotion; words like inspire or unlock grab people’s attention while words like up-to-date might sound dull or boring. Make sure you use a conversational tone in order to convey an attitude of transparency  consumers can smell fakeness a mile away! Lastly, test different versions of your email before sending them out and see which one gets more responses. The best way to do that is by using A/B testing software. This allows you to send two different versions of your email (A & B) at once, then measure which one performs better based on open rates and click through rates. It’s important not to forget about mobile either – over half of all emails are opened on mobile devices now! So if yours doesn’t look good on mobile devices, chances are they won’t even bother opening it at all.

 

Tip 5: Put Your Readers First

You wouldn’t be where you are today without your email subscribers. It doesn’t matter if it’s a small list or a large one each person on that list is there because they like what you have to say and want to hear more. When you look at your email marketing through that lens, it changes everything. Instead of thinking about how to get more signups or improve click-through rates, focus on delivering value through every message. Send things subscribers will find useful and take action on, rather than just sending out new content without any consideration of who will read it. Put yourself in their shoes and ask yourself what would make them open your emails. If you don’t know, ask them! Ask people in your target audience why they subscribe to certain newsletters or what kinds of messages they prefer receiving from brands. Take note of their answers so you can apply those learnings to future campaigns. There’s no better way to understand your readers than by talking with them directly.

 

Tip 6: Tailor Your Email To Each Audience Segment

Most email programs, such as MailChimp, allow you to tag subscribers and segment them by how they engaged with your campaign. For example, those who opened your email might receive additional updates about new features. If that doesn’t apply to you just go ahead and send a more personal email next time. This will help generate trust between you and your customer base and lead to more sales down the road. A great way to find out what people want is through surveys or polls. You can create these yourself or use services like SurveyMonkey, which are free and easy to use. It’s important to get feedback from your customers because if they don’t respond well to one of your emails it could hurt future engagement rates.

 

Tip 7. Include Links

As people are checking their email, many of them are just scanning through to see if there’s anything important. In that process, it is likely that your visitor may not see a sentence or two in your message. Make sure you add links to any details that they may need to know in order to get more information on a topic. It will save them time in having to go back and search again later. The key here is giving them what they want before they even realize they want it. Give them exactly what they are looking for, when they want it. This can be done by providing useful content, while also including links to products or services that might interest them. If you have an e-commerce site, make sure to include a link at the end of your newsletter which takes customers directly to your online store. This helps ensure that customers don’t forget about you and also provides another avenue for converting new visitors into buyers! Another benefit of adding links is that most email marketing software will track how many times each link is clicked on. You can use these statistics to determine what type of content works best with your audience and then focus on creating more pieces like that in future newsletters. The great thing about using email marketing as part of your overall digital marketing strategy is that it allows you to build a strong relationship with prospects over time. So, once you’ve added those hyperlinks into all your messages, you should be able to easily capture those leads and convert them into customers because they already know who you are and trust what you have to say.

 

Tip 8. Use Images, But Keep Them In Context

Images are a great way to get your point across more quickly and, more importantly, drive engagement with your content. According to CoSchedule, 70% of all emails are read on mobile devices and 67% of mobile users say that if an email has an image they’re more likely to open it. That’s a lot of power right there. The key here is contextual relevance. Images should be relevant to what you're saying or giving insight into, otherwise you run into spam filters. Make sure your images are relevant and encourage engagement! Here's an example You could have an image in your email about how to make a delicious chicken recipe and then have another one showing someone making said recipe. This gives context to both pieces of information, while also providing visuals for each step along the way. If you want some inspiration on how to integrate visual elements into your marketing strategy, check out our guide on How To Use Visual Content In Your Email Marketing Campaigns . It'll give you some ideas on how to use visual content in ways that won't jeopardize your deliverability rate.

 

Tip 9. Convert First Time Visitors Into Subscribers, And Ask Them For a Review (Social Proof)

You can encourage your website visitors to sign up for your email list or opt-in to receive an email from you. Another option is to offer a discount, a gift, or something else that creates value (and entices people to join). You can also make it easy by offering popups and check boxes on every page so that people who visit your site will immediately see how they can start getting your content. Finally, you can leave reviews on popular review sites such as Yelp or TripAdvisor. This social proof will attract more subscribers because when potential customers see that others are already subscribed, they are much more likely to join too. (In fact, social proof is one of my favorite ways of encouraging someone to take action.) 

1. Keep It Short And To The Point:

People are busy, and they don't want to spend a lot of time reading emails. Keep your emails short and to-the-point. Get right to the point and make it easy for people to understand exactly what you're trying to say with as little extra information as possible. If you can't fit everything in one email, consider breaking up your content into a multi-part email campaign that addresses different points separately

2. Automate The Process: 

If you can set up an autoresponder sequence (whereby you have a series of emails that automatically goes out once someone signs up for your email list) or set up automated messages based on specific actions taken (such as clicking a link or visiting a particular page), that will save you time over manually sending each individual email especially if there is more than one person managing your marketing efforts! .

3. Create New Content Based On Feedback From Your Readers: 

You can learn a lot about your audience by paying attention to their responses to your email campaigns. Once you’ve sent a few of them, look for common themes in terms of likes, dislikes, concerns, interests, etc. and then address these topics in future emails.  

4. Make Sure All Images Are Clickable: 

Don’t just put images into your emails; make sure those images link back to another piece of content on your website. You could link back to an old post that gives more details, or you could link back to another piece of content entirely. Either way, including links in all images makes it easier for people who are interested in learning more about a topic or product featured in an image to quickly find out more information without leaving their inboxes!

5. Use Video As Part Of Your Email Campaigns: 

If possible, include a video along with each email campaign that highlights an important point or offers valuable advice related to your industry or niche market. Including videos in your email campaigns is a great way to increase engagement and improve click-through rates.

6. Always Include An Opt-Out Link In Your Emails: 

Giving people multiple options is always better than giving them only one. For example, instead of simply asking if they would like to be added to your email list, ask if they would like to be added AND get free tips about productivity/social media/blogging/etc. When you give people choices, some will choose not to subscribe at all (because maybe they don’t care about productivity), but many more will choose both options (because now you’re giving them two great reasons why they should sign up).  

7. Give Your Readers Multiple Ways To Contact You: 

One way to grow engagement with readers is by making it easy for them contact you directly with questions, comments, feedback, etc., without having to search through all of your content looking for contact information (which no one wants to do).

8. Give Your Subscribers A Clear Call To Action: 

What do you want your subscribers to do? Do you want them to buy something? Do you want them to go somewhere? Do you want them to read certain articles? Figure out what call-to-action works best for your business, and use that in all of your emails.

 

Tip 10. Measure, Analyze, and Test

Before you start mass emailing your list of potential clients, get a feel for what works and what doesn’t. Take note of which subject lines, calls to action, content types, and offers resonate with your audience. Once you have an idea of what you’re doing right and wrong it’s time to analyze that data. Focus on how many emails went out and how many people actually opened them or clicked through to your site. Afterward test those results by splitting test in other words have half of your list receive one version of a subject line or body copy while another group receives a different version. There are several free tools out there (hello Google Analytics) that make all three steps much easier. But no matter what tool you use be sure to measure everything so you can improve over time. And don’t forget: Your testing will only be as good as your sample size. The more people in each segment, the better representation of your overall customer base you’ll have and therefore a better understanding of what will work best for everyone else too.  A lot of us default into thinking we need long, drawn out paragraphs full of flowery language and jargon in order to be taken seriously but nothing could be further from the truth. In fact studies show readers prefer shorter sentences and smaller word counts than most people think! This is especially true when writing marketing emails where brevity reigns supreme. So keep things short, simple, direct, and tell them exactly what they need to know – nothing more or less!

 

Conclusion

These tips aren’t designed to trick customers into purchasing from you. Rather, they work to attract qualified buyers by displaying your expertise and delivering relevant information that engages your customer. Try each tip on your email marketing messages and see which ones resonate with your customers. This isn’t a one-size-fits-all list; if you notice better results after using some of these tips, than others, tailor future messages accordingly. And as always, keep testing—you may just find an entirely new way to engage and convert more leads into sales!