Email is an increasing part of the marketer’s armoury. So, first things first, how do we get our recipients to open our emails? Some experts argue that using a person’s name as the sender, rather than the company name, is preferable. For people that already know us; maybe. But for those who don’t, seeing a name they don’t recognise will immediately make them think ‘spam’ and ‘how has Joe Bloggs got my email address?’
The importance of a short subject line is key as the majority of people are now picking up their emails from their phones while on the go. If you’re reaching out to those who have shown an interest or have already signed up, personalisation is vital, be it with their name, which product or service they were interested in or why they should stay loyal to you: ‘John, your membership benefits are coming to an end!’ For those who perhaps haven’t heard of you yet, you need to persuade them to consider you, and at a time of great competition and full inboxes, standing out is a challenge.
When it comes to the email content itself, there is a list of words experts advise we don’t use in order for the email to pass through the spam filter, so another hurdle is ensuring it actually reaches the audience in the first place.
Less is more, as they say, so if people are bombarded with a page of text alone, they are less likely to read it. Give the recipients enough information and clear calls to action: links to your website or a contact at the company to get in touch with. Pictures have a big part to play within an email but large files can again prevent your campaign from getting through to your recipients so be selective and keep file sizes down to ensure this doesn’t happen.
Depending on whether you are sending your campaigns to a personal or business email address, the time of day and the day of the week you choose to send can have an impact on open rates, which is something that all companies analysing their data are interested in.
Say your recipient hasn’t unsubscribed or seen your content, but instead just hasn’t opened your email, then it is always worth considering re-mailing your campaign with a new subject line to try to prompt them further to view your content.
Getting email right can be difficult. Here are five common mistakes to avoid in B2B email marketing.