Email marketing remains one of the most effective ways of connecting with people regardless of what device they use. It’s been proven time and time again to be a successful marketing tool showing impressive ROI. Not only that, email marketing does it all at a fraction of the cost compared to other digital marketing methods. However, with all the good, there are many examples of poor email marketing tactics which have led to widespread negativity.

Most marketers know that the golden rule to success in any business, when using any form of marketing, is to connect with customers. The personal connection is often lost through mismanaged customer data, irrelevant content and a general lack of understanding. Luckily, there is light at the end of the tunnel as most email marketing mistakes are relatively easy to fix.

5 Email Marketing Mistakes To Avoid

When email marketing is done right, you can inform, delight and drive your customers straight toward a Call-to-Action. Better yet, you can avoid making customers feel you are just cluttering their inbox with ‘spammy’ marketing emails.

Buying Email Lists

If experience has taught us anything is that buying email lists is a big ‘NO’. The risks associated are enormous and companies need to tread lightly, especially with the likes of GDRP and CAN-SPAM. Essentially, you don’t know those leads from a bar of soap and they also don’t have a clue about your business. The companies that provide purchased lists actually can’t guarantee quality data and no matter what they say, it is near impossible to identify spam- or honey traps hidden within these lists.

Instead, grow your database the right way through creative marketing campaigns and always asking leads to sign-up or opt-in to receive your emails. Not only is this best practice for the privacy of customer data, but it’s also safer for you. Double opt-ins mostly mitigate bots which means your customer data is accurate and legitimate.

Here is an interesting article with more detailed information on why you should never buy email lists.

Not Including Pre-header Text

Subject lines and the space that follows for pre-header text is prime real estate for vital information. This short summary of the email content appears in the email inbox view and improves email open rates. It’s unforgivable not to add pre-header text and although some email clients don’t support them, they should not be ignored. It’s a fact that they also enhance the subject line considerably. We recommend limiting your pre-header text to 85-100 characters so be sure the message adds value.

Making New Subscribers Wait

As a new customer, there is nothing more frustrating than delayed email responses especially after first signing up. From a business perspective, lead generation can be challenging and expensive so why wait to get in touch with your new customers? You could risk losing them to a competitor and remember, negative reviews spread faster than positive ones.

Always make sure they keep your business ‘top of mind’ and the only way of doing that is sending a Welcome or Thank you email immediately after they subscribe. After the initial contact, stay in touch with every lead through relevant content but don’t send too many emails either. Find a balance that works for you!

Sending The Same, Generic Emails

Even if you’re a small business selling one item to all your customers, don’t send the same email to everyone. Generic emails have poor open rates as they are not specific to anyone and don’t relate to anything in particular. Did you know that personalising your email increases the open rate by 26%? Get personal with your emails by segmenting your audience accordingly. You could use geography, personal interests, preferences, age, gender and many other variables for segmentation purposes. This also forms part of another critical process in digital marketing namely creating buyer personas.

Dynamic email content goes hand-in-hand with market segmentation. Instead of sending the same email with the same text and images to everyone, use dynamic emails instead. It allows you to customise messages according to subscriber attributes. For example, a business selling running shoes could use dynamic content to send an email to men and women with the content dynamically changing according to gender. Take it a step further and the content could even change according to brand preference or geolocation. The possibilities are nearly endless and you’re only limited by your imagination and marketing creativity.

Not Taking Advantage Of MarTech

MarTech is the combination of marketing and technology where customer relationship management (CRM) plays a vital role. It includes any digital tools marketers use to create, manage and use to automate tasks and make data-driven decisions. Not utilising this powerful blend by sending disconnected one-off emails is another big email marketing mistake.

Implement marketing automation so you can create customer journeys specific to your business or service offering. There are several marketing automation tools at your disposal, each capable of lead generation, lead nurturing and after-sales service. With marketing automation, you can provide customers with personalised content at the right time and through the appropriate channels.

These email marketing tips and techniques highlight opportunities to create targeted email messages that build customer loyalty and increase conversion. Remember to review your progress and incorporate new best practice email methodologies as you evolve. Staying on top of what’s working for you is vital as well as what could help you in the future.

Get in touch if you would like to review the effectiveness of your email marketing strategy.

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