How to Improve Your Email Marketing Today

Despite some people continually arguing that “email is dead,” the statistics tell a different story. A full 95% of consumers check their email every day and 60% of consumers prefer to be contacted by brands via email.

Since so many in-person networking events are still on hold, email marketing is more important now than ever. If you want to take your business to the next level, it’s time to double-down on your email marketing strategy.

But which email marketing platforms are best? And how do you ensure your efforts will be successful? Start with these eight tips.

1. Build a Solid Email Marketing List

One of the keys to succeeding with email marketing is having a solid contact list. After all, if you don’t have anyone to contact, what’s the point?

That being said, it’s important to engage with people who are actually interested in your brand. This is one reason why you should buy consumer email lists from reputable companies only. This offers a fast way to build up your email list while also avoiding wasting your time with contacts that are likely to delete your emails, or even worse, report them as spam.

2. Know Your Audience

You need more than just a name and email address. If you want to get real results with your email marketing, it’s important to understand your audience. Do some research to find out the demographics of your email list, the types of communication they prefer, and what sets them apart from the general population.

This will help you create a marketing strategy that your recipients are likely to actually engage with.

3. Segment Your Contacts

Successful email marketing requires sending content that people are actually interested in. Stop trying to be all things to all people!

It’s critical to segment your email marketing list so you’re sending the right emails to the right people. For example, you may have some subscribers who are interested in low-fat cooking, others who are interested in baking, and a third group who only wants keto recipes. If you send all your recipes to your entire list, you’ll always end up alienating someone.

Using the right software, it’s easy to segment your lists and send customized emails to each group.

4. Check Your Deliverability

If your emails end up in the spam folder, all your efforts are wasted. Some email marketing platforms have built-in features that test for deliverability issues. They’ll look for certain words that are likely to flag emails as spam and any other problems that could reduce your deliverability.

If the program you’ve chosen doesn’t offer this feature, look for an add-on testing tool. It only takes a second to test your emails and will greatly improve your results.

5. Use Advanced Features

There are literally hundreds of email marketing services for you to choose from. When evaluating your options, look for some advanced features that can streamline your efforts. Some of the features that may be important to you include:

• Ability to create drip campaigns
• Abandoned cart follow-up
• Automated newsletters and product promotions
• Order tracking
• Customized responses
• Ability to track, monitor, and analyze campaigns

Some other options to consider may include the availability of pre-designed templates, advanced email list management tools, and the ability to perform A/B testing.

6. Follow Up

Once you’ve connected with a prospective customer, you’ll need a way to follow up and close the deal. This is why it’s so important to choose an email marketing software that integrates with your customer relationship management software (CRM).

A program that easily integrates with your social media platforms and other third-party apps will also help with your follow-up efforts.

7. Track Your Analytics

If you can’t tell whether your email marketing campaigns are working, you won’t be able to achieve optimal results. This is why you need an email marketing program that provides analytics.

By reviewing your analytics, you can learn more about who opens your emails, which formats have the highest open rates, how many links they click on, and more. This will also help you choose the best send times, determine the optimal send frequency, and make other adjustments that can help ensure you’re getting the best possible results from your email marketing campaign.

8. Protect Your Reputation

The last thing you want is to end up with a reputation as a spammer. Every time you send an email, remember that you are a guest in the recipient’s inbox. Be respectful of their space and always include an opt-out button.

There are many reasons a subscriber may opt-out of an email, and it doesn’t necessarily mean they’re not interested in your brand or what you have to say. They may simply get too many emails, have subscribed using multiple email addresses, or have another legitimate reason for wanting to opt-out.

Make sure it’s easy to see the opt-out option and that you don’t make your subscribers jump through a bunch of hoops to do it.

Start Growing Your Business Today

Email marketing isn’t going away any time soon! If you want to continue growing your business, now is the time to choose the right email marketing tools to support your efforts.

While this is a great start, there’s still more to do. Staying on the cutting edge of technology, marketing, and business services will help ensure you keep moving forward. Take a look through a few more of our articles for some inspiration.