A successful email marketing strategy plays a big part in maximizing revenue generated from online stores. Email marketing is one of the most profitable marketing channels, offering a chance to increase overall ROI.
Not only does successful email marketing help with the bottom line, but it can also boost web traffic, establish a brand voice, or even allow direct communication with a target audience. To make sure that an email marketing strategy returns all of the benefits, the current best practices must be followed.
A good email marketing campaign has high click-through rates and positive results, but a bad one could backfire and cause email subscribers to become disinterested. This article will focus on some of the email marketing best practices to ensure that your campaign is on track for success.
What is Email Marketing?
Email marketing is the process of drawing up a digital marketing strategy that involves sending emails to potential customers to promote and market goods or services. A good email marketing campaign consists of sending customers messages, newsletters, promotions, and other various updates on products and services.
These emails help build relationships with the audience and can even deliver personalized content or tailored messages based on user preference. Building up a successful email marketing campaign involves some key steps. Segmentation, content creation, analytics, and automation all come into play.
Once an email marketing campaign is in place, its success can be measured using metrics like open and click-through rates and conversions. Email marketing campaigns are also a very cost-effective way to communicate and engage with existing or potential customers.
Why Is Email Marketing Important?
Email marketing is important for business for a variety of reasons. Some of the biggest benefits have been detailed in the sections below.
Cost-Effective Marketing
A good email marketing campaign lets businesses communicate with their audience in a very cost-effective way. Designing and sending out emails has barely any cost, allowing businesses to reach a larger audience without incurring too much expense. When compared to more traditional advertising channels, email marketing has a low entry cost and a high ROI on average.
Personalized Communication
Targeted and personalized communications are more successful than a one-size-fits-all advertising campaign. A good email marketing campaign uses segmentation, message personalization, and automation to ensure that tailored emails reach the intended audience.
Segmenting the audience based on demographics, preferences, or behaviors makes it easier to write emails relevant to the recipients. Targeted and personalized emails can enhance audience engagement and boost conversion rates. Most buyers expect personalized emails, with some customers providing their data to ensure a more personalized experience.
Improved Customer Relations
Email marketing campaigns give businesses an outlet to directly interact with customers. These relationships can be nurtured by staying on top of newsletter delivery, exclusive offers, and personalized updates. It is estimated that 45% of marketers send weekly emails. This consistent communication cultivates trust and brand advocacy, resulting in increased customer loyalty.
Easily Measurable Results
One of the biggest benefits of an email marketing campaign is how measurable the results are. Businesses can easily track the metrics of the campaign by keeping up with open and click-through rates as well as conversions using analytics tools. Data-driven approaches allow companies to measure the performance of an email campaign and make more informed decisions and strategies in the future.
Improved Sales and Conversions
An effective email campaign guides customers through the sales funnel, driving conversion rates. Emails with calls-to-action, discounts, and quality content can lead customers into the sales funnel and increase the chances that they make a purchase.
Increased Brand Awareness and Reach
A good email marketing campaign can offer businesses a global platform to raise brand visibility and reach. There are billions of email users all over the world, so being able to tap into new audiences is a major benefit. By regularly appearing in a subscriber’s inbox, companies can stay on the minds of potential customers and foster stronger connections with the audience.
Email Marketing Best Practices for 2024
Some of the best email marketing practices have been detailed in the sections below.
Do Not Buy Email Addresses
A common mistake businesses make when setting up an email marketing campaign is buying email marketing lists. While it may be legal in the US to purchase these lists, actually sending email messages to the addresses is a different story.
The emails included in purchase lists have not opted-in to receive email campaigns. Because of this fact, it is difficult to achieve good results using purchase lists. Many of these emails will be inactive or not the target audience. This will reduce engagement and run the risk of a campaign being labeled as spam when it reaches the inbox.
Use Lead Magnets to Build Subscriber Lists
Instead of purchasing email marketing lists, businesses should use a lead magnet to gain subscribers. Lead magnets are used to convince website visitors to sign up voluntarily for email marketing campaigns.
Good lead magnets usually offer some kind of incentive to convince visitors to sign up. A common incentive to use is a one-time discount code upon signing up for the email campaign. Lead magnets are a great way to organically grow a big subscriber list of potential customers.
Segment Audiences
Segmenting audiences into smaller groups is a common practice when creating email marketing campaigns. This allows businesses to send out targeted campaigns to certain customer segments. Common segmentations include customer interests, product type, location, and current position in the sales funnel. The more data a business has on its customers, the easier segmenting and delivering targeted emails will be.
Collect Zero-Party Data
Zero-party data refers to all the information that a website visitor shares with a brand willingly. It is common for people to hand over data in exchange for improved shopping experiences or monetary value. The more zero-party data a business has on its customers, the easier it is to craft successful email marketing campaigns. An easy way to collect zero-party data is by using on-site quizzes or surveys.
Clean Up Lists Regularly
Keeping an email marketing list up-to-date is important for a successful campaign. Up-to-date lists will lower the chances of sending emails to inactive accounts, which can affect the metrics of the campaign. Removing users who have unsubscribed is also important to avoid fines or other legal issues.
Test Subject Lines
The subject line of emails used in a campaign is really important for the overall success. The more compelling a subject line, the more likely it is to be opened by the recipient. It can be hard to predict what subject lines will be the most effective so using A/B testing is a good way to figure out what works best. Proper testing can ensure that email campaigns reach the intended audience and are opened consistently.
Use Personalized Greetings
Connecting with subscribers personally is a key part of a successful email campaign. The more personalized the email, the higher the likelihood that recipients will open the email. The easiest way to do this is by including the subscriber’s name in the email. Many email marketing tools do this automatically when generating emails but names should be manually added when necessary.
Include A Compelling CTA
While the subject line is arguably the most important part of a promotional email, the call-to-action is a close second. A good promotional email should prompt the recipient to complete a specific action. A good call-to-action statement must meet three main criteria:
- Simple
- Clear
- Short
The call-to-action should encourage customers to move to the next steps of the sales pipeline without any confusion. A good CTA can increase email campaign metrics naturally, increasing conversion rates in the process.
Optimize Landing Pages
A newer trend in email marketing is personalized landing pages. Since subscribers have already provided their first names, it makes sense to customize the landing pages for a website to greet them personally.
Fully personalized landing pages can boost conversion rates and improve overall ROI. Many people will enjoy seeing their name on the landing page and increase the chances of purchasing goods or services. Landing pages must remain high-quality and personalized no matter what device they are viewed on.
Include Images with Alt Text
There has been a big focus on web accessibility in recent years, so ensuring that email campaigns can be viewed by people with disabilities is important. Alt-text can provide textual descriptions of images included in email campaigns. This makes it easy for subscribers using screen readers to have the image described to them. Alt-text will also handle issues where images may not load properly because of blocked photos. Call-to-action buttons should also be labeled with alt-text to ensure that recipients can understand and navigate using the CTA link.
Final Thoughts
Email marketing campaigns are a cost-effective way to engage with audiences and improve conversion rates. Using the best practices detailed above can improve the success metrics of a campaign and improve overall ROI. Developing a good email marketing campaign takes time and effort but the results will speak for themselves.