Amidst the buzz that ‘Email is dead’, guess what is the first thing that 58% of adult Americans do in the morning? Check their emails!
Even more noteworthy, 94% of Americans who are over the age of 12 check their emails on a daily basis; even though they may not even login into their social media. Still 72% of consumers prefer email to communicate with brands. Companies also benefit, receiving $44 ROI for every $1 spent on email. This is much higher that the distant second $22 from search engines. There are additionally many reports suggesting that companies investment in emails are going to increase in the years to come.
So now that we established that emails are not something to be ignored, let’s talk about practices that you can follow to enhance the reach and effect of marketing emails!
1. Personalization is the key
When you send personalized, relevant, and individualized emails to potential customers, it drives revenue by as much as 760%. Targeted and segmented messages have resulted in 30% more open rates than undifferentiated messages. This is a reward to be expected for understanding the needs of the businesses customers.
Research is so important for proper marketing. You must research your organization’s audiences thoroughly and learn almost everything about them. Knowing your audience allows you to offer customized offers and discounts that you know they will enjoy and use! Us marketers must use research to our advantage, and create personalized deals that will appeal to our customers and potential customers.
2. Automated campaigns
Having campaigns automated is a great way to connect with with customers based on their preferences in a more efficient matter. Automated campaigns combine insights from websites, social media, mobile, and CRM to create solutions that can deliver results without much effort.
What was once the privy of B2B companies has now spread to B2C companies. Even smaller companies are seeing value in marketing automation, as it brings value and ROI to numerous marketing efforts. Nuclear Research reported that 95% of companies achieved positive results through marketing automation. Companies are seeing an increase in marketing staff productivity between 1.5 and 6.9% and sales productivity by 4%.
3. Timing is important
Though there is no universal acceptance on the best day and time to send emails. It pays to do some research in this area with your customer demographics. However, before you carry out your own email campaign research, it is important to look into some industry insights.
As per the data gathered by MailerMailer, MailChimp and GetResponce, the best days to send email campaigns are Thursdays (the best day) and Tuesdays (the second best day). The best time when the open rates are high is between 10.00 am and 12.00 pm. You can also set your campaigns to run on queue and send to your customers at the best time for them personally.
Yes, timing is another area where customization in email marketing becomes necessary!
4. Customize emails for mobile
While using email marketing you cannot ignore the fact that the majority of Americans now own smartphones. Additionally, 88% of smartphone users use their phones to access emails. According to Litmus and MailChimp, the first link in a responsive design email on mobile has a 30% higher click rate than non-responsive design. We have to remember that 80% of customers will delete an email that does not display correctly on their mobile device. The unsubscribe rate will also be high and it will have a negative impact on future campaigns.
Just as mobile websites and apps are so important for the functionality of business, so are mobile emails. We must cater to mobile needs and design appropriate versions of emails for mobile views.
5. Re-engage
When it comes to marketing, it is often less expensive to target a current customer than it is to find a new one. According to Marketing Sherpa, 75% of email subscribers are inactive. Therefore, every company should have a re-engagement strategy to win back those inactive customers. There are many ways to engage an inactive customer — coupons or promotion codes, polls, surveys, and online competitions are a few common tactics used. Based on the responses received from those customers, you can fine tune re-engagement strategies even further to improve customer response rate.
6. A/B Testing
When emails are sent to customers regularly, it is very important to know what resonates with that audiences. You must continuously conduct A/B testing to find out which email template and copy triggered the most engagement. Then use the knowledge of what worked, and what didn’t work, in your future creative campaigns.
With A/B testing, you can tweak the headline, style, content, images, and more to experiment with what the companies audience interacts with most frequently. Overall, testing greatly helps us reduce bounce rates and improve conversion rates.
7. Emails with double opt-in
Having marketing emails structured as double opt-in protects you from sending emails to audiences who are not interested in the product or service you are selling. It also prevents the email message from being marketed as spam. Tougher email laws mandate that all marketers get double opt-in from customers to prevent their domains from getting marked as spam and helps to avoid suspension.
Every year at least 25% of marketer’s email addresses in their CRM become obsolete. So, it is very important to undertake email scrubbing to improve open and click rates. Double opt-in would be a great way to start!
Whether your business is a small standalone retail outlet or a big e-commerce giant, following the best email practices discussed above will help maximize marketing ROI, bring new customers, increase customer engagement, and help establish a brand.
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*All data is taken from various credible online research studies. We did not conduct this research ourselves.
