According to Hubspot’s State of Marketing 2021* email marketing offers the best ROI as a marketing tactic. And with marketers sending fewer emails but seeing more engagement it appears email marketing is still an effective way of communicating with your customers and generating leads.
So what are the tips to improving your email marketing results? In this article we share the top 5 things you can do to improve your open rate and click-through rates.
1. Don’t sell in your subject line!
Yes, I know you want to tell recipients what they are about to get when they open your email, but no one wants to see the words: ‘Buy now!’ or ‘Special offer’. Remember that people receive lots of emails, and they don’t like to be sold to all the time.
Make sure the subject line is compelling because you only have a few seconds before your prospects decide to open your email or delete it.
Here are some tips to improving your email subject lines.
a. Be personal – use their name in the email subject line. Something like ‘Hey John, I…’ or ‘Good Evening, Jane …’. will help your email stand out from all the other emails people receive on daily basis.
b. Make it interesting and relevant. To get their attention use action words like ‘Learn’, ‘See’ or ‘Attention’. Adding a number will also get their attention, for example ‘3 ways to see x in 2021’.
c. Ask a question. One of the best ways to get users to read your email is to ask a question in the subject line, something that will peak their curiosity or interest. It could be as simple as ‘Quick Question for you …’. Or something relevant to their need, like: Do you know how to get more customers in 2021?’, or ‘Are you ready for 100% increase in sales?’.
2. Keep it short and sweet!
How do you define short and sweet? I personally like to keep it under a couple of paragraphs at most. Focus on one thing only, even if you have multiple things to talk about in your campaign, choose just one.
The shorter the copy, the more likely people are going to read it. Most marketers I know get too caught up in the message and what they want to say, rather than focusing on their audience and what’s important to them. Don’t write a novel! Be clear and to the point. If people have to read carefully to understand what you are trying to tell them, they are not going to bother.
3. Use visuals to improve engagement!
Visuals attract the eye and sell the message. It’s a fact that people respond better to visual content than just words on a page.
Visuals include things like images, charts and graphs. Adding clickable images or videos to your email can help improve engagement. For example, you could add a visual to your email to demonstrate how easy the item is to use.
This also works when you’re trying to promote an ebook on your website. Just include a clickable image or video of the book cover and tell people to read more if they are interested in learning more about the product.
4.Make your call to action clear!
Because of the sheer volume of emails, people are used to quickly deleting any they don’t want. You would be surprised how many email messages I get that have no call to action whatsoever .
What is a ‘clear’ call to action? A call to action should tell your prospects what you’d like them to do next. Instead of saying ‘Click here to check out this page’, say ‘Download your copy today’. It’s a small difference, but it makes all the difference!
Don’t assume people know what you want them to do next. Tell them very clearly and concisely in your email how they can take advantage of what you are offering. Do not give too many options. Consider just one option – the most important thing to you at that very moment.
5. Keep your message consistent!
Consistency in your email marketing efforts is key to long-term success .
You want to create an impression of professionalism and trustworthiness through your brand identity online, so it’s important you make this clear in all communications.
For example, if you are emailing your prospects and they click to find out more about the product, you want to keep the language and tonality of this consistent. If they then return to read your emails, you still want them to sense the same thing.
This is really important as many people won’t take another look at a campaign if it doesn’t engage them straight away.
As a rule of thumb, make your email campaign consistent with your website and blog so that it feels authentic to the reader. If you’re offering a product or service that is completely different from what you offer on those platforms, then you will want to build trust through other channels first before trying to sell people in an email.
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