10 Great Email Marketing Tips All Businesses Should Use

Email marketing continues to have a place in many campaigns, and for good reason. Chances are you already have one running. However, you could always find more ways to improve its functionality and strengthen your company’s hold on your consumer base.

The following ten tips will help show that your emails shows that you know your customer’s needs, you can effectively communicate to them on all platforms, you have a compelling offer tailored for them, and you are constantly strengthening your offerings.

1.    Personalize Your Messages 

Most consumers do not want to feel like they are part of multitudes. They may be, factually speaking, part of a large group. However, treating them like that will yield poor results for your campaign. Instead, personalize the messaging for your customers. You don’t need to treat them like a best friend. You just need to treat them in a manner unique to them. For example, you can opt to only send them deals that their previous purchases indicate they would be interested in.

2.    Make the Email Look Good 

Aesthetics matter. A poorly formatted email looks unprofessional, and worse, looks like spam. Keep the paragraphs short so they don’t look like massive blocks on a mobile device. Whenever possible, use bullet points to give people the option to skim without losing any of the important details. While images can help illustrate your point, minimize usage, as the pictures can end up blocked, ruining the layout. Worse, using too many images can get your message marked as spam.

3.    Make It Easy to Leave 

Locking people into a conversation with you might seem like a smart move for your email marketing campaign, but all it does is create animosity and hurt your brand. Make it easy to unsubscribe from your mailing list. It’s better to lose a customer than to fester negative feelings in them. Besides, you can always get their attention back in the future.

4.    Embrace Mobile Devices 

While desktop computers will never truly go out of style, the fact is the majority of people use their mobile devices for email. It’s what most people look at when they first wake up, and it is what they use as the doze off at night. You need to ensure that your messages look good on a small screen, or you will find your email marketing campaign fall apart.

5.    Test Everything 

If you want to make an effective email marketing campaign, you need to test as much of it as possible. The more testing you do, the more information you can work with, and the more refined your campaign will be. For example, you can look at your message layouts on a variety of email platforms to ensure that they will look exactly the way you want. You should also employ A/B testing to see which formats or word choices result in better responses from your audience.

6.    Put Time and Effort Towards Your Subject Lines 

The subject line is your message’s handshake and introduction to the recipient. If it is not tempting or interesting, even the most ardent fans of your startup will likely just ignore your email. Put effort into your subject lines, and people will respond positively. Be sure to check out the character limit for each email provider to ensure that important information shows up in the inbox before it gets cut off.

7.    Ensure That You are Not Tagged as Spam 

One of the worst events that can happen to your email marketing campaign is to have your messages tagged as spam. Fortunately, avoiding spam filters is a matter of being sensible. Just don’t do what spam email does, such as have an obnoxious amount of exclamation points or utilize hyperbole. If you are not sure what to do, check out how the biggest email providers determine what is and is not spam, and follow those rules to the letter. Additionally, you should also ensure that everyone receiving your messages opted into your mailing list, to ensure that you are not breaking any laws.

8.    Have a Strong Call to Action 

Every email your company sends must have a purpose. It must have something it wants the customer to do – and the biggest mistake many campaigns make is assuming that the consumer knows what that action is. Don’t leave it up to chance. Tell people what you want them to do after reading your email, whether it’s to buy a product or to sign up for a new deal. Additionally, make it as easy as possible for them to follow that action. Often, that just means adding a visible link to your message and pointing it out.

9.    Keep Your Eyes on the Metrics 

Your email marketing campaign must constantly evolve if you want it to consistently produce positive results. Keep your eyes on critical metrics, such as clicks and leads generated, and track customers across the customer journey. However, don’t neglect smaller details such as how many emails were actually clicked or how many messages bounced. Use that information to steer the campaign in the right direction. If you do not have access to that information, ask your email service provider help. Google Analytics, for example, offers all that information and more – you just need to know where to look.

10.    Make Your Emails Valuable to the Recipients 

If you are sending out emails to your mailing list, make sure what you have to say is interesting and valuable to the recipients. A mailing list is not like a YouTube channel or a blog. Consistency is not as important. What is important is that every time a customer clicks on your message, they open something that improves the consumer experience. If you have nothing good to say, say nothing.

Making your email marketing campaign successful is not a one-time effort. That is an ongoing task, one that will require you to adapt to your audience if you want it to work. However, the effort is very much worth it. Keep looking for more efficient ways to reach your audience through email, and your company will be rewarded with more sales and a stronger brand.