A Guide to Email Marketing

In the ever-evolving landscape of digital marketing where trends are always coming and going, one steady strategy continues to reign supreme: email marketing. Email marketing is a crucial tool anyone can use to expand their business. It’s easy to learn, keeps your customers up to date, and helps provide a personal link between brands and consumers.

While the potential for email marketing is enormous, it needs to be done effectively in order to see results and business growth. If you send out too many emails, or if they seem irrelevant to your audience, you might come across as “spammy” and annoying. With everyone’s inboxes already crammed with outreach from other businesses, work, and personal life, you must stand out to improve your open and click-through rates. Luckily, we’ve put together a few tips to help you get into the world of email marketing without falling into the trap of spamming your audience. These include building a real email list, strategizing on your subject line, and focusing on the email’s design. Let’s dive in!

Focus On Building Your Own List 

If you don’t want your brand to come across as spam, practice authenticity from the start. While it’s tempting to buy email lists, and many businesses do this, it might not be the best idea. There are many aspects to consider when purchasing an email list, such as the consent of the users, the chances of being blocked, and whether or not this would hurt your business more than benefit it. Another downside to purchased email lists is that the content is often marked as spam. If several recipients mark your emails as spam, the spam filters will begin to recognize your brand as one that should be filtered out for all emails—including people who voluntarily signed up. As a result, your future efforts can be seriously affected as your emails go straight to the junk folder.

By building your own email base, you can ensure that the most relevant customers are the ones you focus energy on, and this can thus result in a lower attrition rate. Spend time marketing the benefits of signing up to your email list on your website and social media platforms so that users actively want to hear from you. This can be done in several ways, including offering early access to new product releases, offering discounts, and creating exclusive membership cards dependent on email access. Building an authentic list of real people takes time, but it’s worth the effort towards creating a successful email strategy.

 Subject Line Matters!

Another important part of effective email marketing is standing out in someone’s inbox so your email is opened and read. The subject line is the first aspect of an email that anyone sees. As such, it is a crucial marker that decides whether or not subscribers open it. Make sure your subject lines accurately convey the content of your email while also being eye-catching and intriguing. For example, if you have a sale that you want to alert customers to, there are two ways you could promote it in your emails. One way is to write a subject line in all capitalized letters saying there’s a sale, or you could also market it in a way that conveys some mysterious and special secret that intrigues the reader. The latter would be more unique and exciting for customers, separating you from the rest of their inbox competition! Take the time to test various subject lines and see what performs best with your audience.

Work On The Email Layout

Once a customer opens your email, you want to immediately make an impression with gorgeous designs and enticing copy. If you’re new to email marketing, you might have questions on how to best frame the layout. How many images should there be? Should there only be images? How should I integrate words with designs?

Spam filters function under an algorithm that removes all emails with just one image from an unknown sender to the spam folder. To go around this, ensure your email has more than just one image if you’re marketing to a group of people who have never interacted with your brand before. Other than this, experiment often with the layout and constantly ask for feedback and refer to email metrics for informative data. If there are specific recurring complaints, change things up, and see if there’s greater engagement with different types of designs.

Less Is More

Now that we’ve discussed the importance of a solid email list, exciting subject line, and visually-appealing layout, let’s go over some general tips for email marketing! First up: less is more. Sending an email every day to your customers will remind them of your presence, but it might also act as a source of annoyance and irritation, leading to many unsubscribes. The trick is to carefully craft your emails so that you only share relevant information in an exciting manner. For example, if you want to promote an upcoming sale, you could send an email every day for 10 days reminding customers about the countdown. However, this might get you marked as spam and could also work negatively, leading to more disinterest. On the other hand, you can send a reminder about the sale two days before it’s scheduled. This way, it’ll be fresh in your subscribers’ minds, and you won’t send too many emails! When in doubt, make sure your email adds value to your consumers’ inboxes before sending.

Let Them Leave

Last but not least, it’s crucial to have an “unsubscribe” button in your emails. Subscribers should always be free to choose whether they still want to receive your emails. Don’t make the process of leaving necessarily tricky, and let subscribers go without any pushback. This shows that you, as a brand, respect their preferences and avoid negative consequences. For example, if you have a subscriber who decides that they no longer want to be a part of your email list and you make it difficult for them to unsubscribe, it could lead to a bad impression for you and your brand. If you fail to provide an unsubscribe option, they may become frustrated and resort to marking your emails as spam. This not only hampers your reputation but also undermines your efforts to maintain a positive relationship with your audience. If someone opts out, you can always attach a feedback form that helps you understand why they left so you can adjust your marketing strategy accordingly!

Email marketing is an exciting tool as it offers a cheap, personal, and continuous method of engagement with your customers. If you keep our tips in mind, you should be able to build a lasting relationship with your audience through your emails. Remember to experiment often, ask for feedback, and be transparent and human!

Always in your corner,

The Content Queens