Every year, email users increase at an alarming rate. Over 4.2 billion people will use email by 2022, according to estimates. These numbers demonstrate that email is still the most preferred method of business communication. However, email marketing is essential to reach potential customers and get the best marketing strategies.
It’s not surprising to be asking the question, considering that 293,000,000 emails are sent each day. How can you stand out in a sea of emails and increase sales through higher open and click-through rates, and make your business standout?
- Be Personal, but Know Your Boundaries
Email personalization has been proven to be a powerful tool for boosting your mailing campaigns. Invesp shows that personalized promotional mailings have 41% more unique click rates and 29% higher open rates than non-personalized. These benefits go even further. A Epson research shows that 80% of customers will purchase from brands that offer a personal experience.
It’s important to build a relationship with your customers. However, it is also important to not go over the limit. You will look strange to your customers and ruin your reputation by using too many names.
In a study conducted by YouGov, 32% of the participants stated that they don’t like personalized messages because it felt like they’re invading their privacy, while 29% stated irrelevance as their top reason for disliking marketers using their name in emails.
This is where the right customer data can make a big difference. Personalization can also be achieved by using general data such as birth dates.
Experian’s research revealed that birthday emails are more profitable than promotional emails. They also have 179% higher click rates, 481% higher transaction rates and 342% more revenue per email. This seems like a good reason to include personalized emails in your email marketing strategies.
Personalization goes beyond mentioning the customer’s name in an email. There are many other options, so it’s up you to try them all and find the one that works best for your mailing list.
- Keep Your Subject Lines Short
47% open emails based on their subject lines only. Personalized mails are 22% more likely be opened. Subject lines are crucial for a successful Email Marketing Tactics. Statistics show that subject lines are not only important for the content, but also the number of characters. Email subject lines that are between 6-10 words have the highest open rates. A second statistic that can work in your favor is that subject lines that convey urgency or exclusivity have 22% higher open rates.
Although it may seem like a one-liner, it can take quite a bit of effort to write the right one. Your campaign’s success depends on the subject line. When you are creating one next time, remember that the more information you share with your subject lines, the greater the chance of a successful campaign.
- Choose the right time to send an email
Your email campaigns’ success depends on the timing. It is obvious that you want to increase your open and click-through rates so it is important to choose the right time. Another reason is that loyal customers may be more inclined to share your content with their friends on social media. With that in mind you need to use all tools available to help you determine the best time for your users.
It is not possible to send the same message every time. This is a huge consideration, as well as the type of business that you have. This table will help you determine the best timing for your business type.
51% are using automation currently. This is not surprising since there are many marketing automation tools that can help with advanced multivariate testing to determine the best time for messaging users. This will save you time and allow you to focus on the most important aspects of your email strategy.
These tools allow you to incorporate AI delivery. This basically means that your automation software learns from your audience what is most popular by tracking their actions. Based on past behavior, it takes some time for the app to decide when users are most likely to engage with it. Users will therefore receive your messages at the right time. This method of email optimization will save you time and money from wasting resources on the wrong email marketing strategies.
- Give Away Freebies
Giveaways can not only increase the number subscribers but also increase your income. Although you might be skeptical about giving away free content, many subscribers love this type of promotional content and will give their email address to you in return. Templates and tools are very popular, with a 26% to 60% click-through rate.
While you would love to see your email list grow, there are some rules that must be adhered to. We mean the CAN-SPAM Act, Controlling the Assault of Non-Solicited Pornography and Marketing Act. The CAN-SPAM Act states that an email should contain a subject line and your commercial email address. Every mail must also include an unsubscribe option.
Even though you received your subscribers’ email in exchange for a complimentary product, you must still follow the law. Not only because of the legal consequences but also because building trust between your company and customers is the best marketing strategy.
- Send mobile-friendly emails
Imagine sending an email that looks great. The images aren’t visible on your phone and the design is poor. Your subscribers won’t be able to interact as a result. This can severely impact the success of your campaign.
These are some design tips to help you avoid subscribers’ dislikes in your marketing strategy
- Mails should be one-column
- Place important text-centered
- A simple-to-use, call-to action button
- Use a larger font size
- Small images displayed
80% Internet users have a mobile phone, and this number will continue to rise over time. Mobile-friendly email design is a must in your marketing strategy. No matter where your subscribers are located, you must always send high-quality emails.
- Segment Your Subscribers
Segmenting your email list communicates more directly with your users. Segmenting gives your users the right information at the right time. The results will be assured if you do it correctly. Optimove’s research on the effectiveness of segmentation in marketing campaigns found that customers with 150 or more customers saw a minimum $1.90 increase per customer. The most significant uplift was seen in groups with 1,500+ customers. This group had an average of $0.90. This indicates that campaign outcomes can vary greatly depending on the size of the group.
Lyris’s Annual Email Optimization Report shows that email segmentation has been shown to increase sales by 24% for businesses. Subscribers desire to be able to access relevant content according to their preferences and needs. This creates a seamless customer experience. To maximize engagement, segmenting your lists is essential.
Here are some quick and simple segmentation strategies that will help you get started.
- Segmentation based on demographic data One way to segment your list by basic demographic data (gender and age, location, income level or company position, etc.) Knowing the gender of your customers is essential information if you’re a clothing retailer. For B2B software developers, demographics like company position are of great importance.
- Segmentation for email engagement This may seem simple, but it has a significant impact on overall results. These metrics include the open rate, click-through rate, and other important metrics. This segmentation allows you to identify active users vs inactive users (ex. A person who hasn’t opened your emails in the last 90 days. This segment can be used to target inactive users with a targeted re-engaging campaign.
- Segmentation based on previous purchase – Another simple, but effective, way to optimize your targeting. Sending recommendations to users who have made similar purchases can help you get started. Let’s suppose someone has bought a hair product on your website. It is possible to make an educated guess as to when the product will run out, and then send an email suggesting that they reorder.
- Segmentation based on the position within the sales funnel A great way to personalize your messaging is to segment users based on where they are in your sales funnel. You can’t target users at the bottom with the same message as those at the top. You should send them more general messages, offering a variety of products and features if they are at the bottom. If they have signed up already and interacted with your content, you can use this information to target them more precisely.
- Re-engage With Inactive Customers
If you fail to provide relevant and engaging information, you will lose approximately 25% of your subscribers each year. Although email list decay is inevitable and something you can do to prevent it, there are some things you can do. How can you keep your subscribers engaged? Or, to put it another way, how can you get inactive subscribers back on track?
Re-engagement email campaigns, or also known as win-back campaigns, include sending a sequence of emails in order to get the inactive subscribers to interact with you.