For every dollar spent on email marketing, the average ROI is $44.56 (according to Direct Marketing Association). That’s huge!
But if you want to make the most of your investment, you have to follow the latest email best practices.
Here are three to get you started.
1. Always Use Clean Data
Quality data is the heart of your email marketing program, so it’s no surprise that keeping your data clean is among the top email best practices. When bad data is allowed to contaminate your database, bounce rates go up and email deliverability goes down, both of which can hurt your Sender Score reputation.
Threats to your database include:
- Outdated information
- False information
- Typos
- Abandoned/closed accounts
- Spam traps
Whether you’re collecting the data yourself or purchasing lists from a reputable vendor, email best practices state you should always clean the data before importing it into your existing database.
2. List Segmentation/Targeted Content
Not everyone on your list is going to respond to the same message.
For example, a new subscriber’s needs are going to be much different than that of a long-time customer. You haven’t had time to build the same trusting relationship with the new subscriber. They haven’t had the benefit of your nurturing process.
Follow email best practices and segment your list into smaller categories. List segmentation can be done in a variety of ways. In the case of our current example, you might separate prospects based on where they exist in the buyer’s journey.
No matter how you do it, proper list segmentation allows you to follow email best practices and create a more targeted message that will resonate with your audience.
3. Monitor Your Results and Adjust Your Strategy
This may be the most important of all email best practices. To maximize your ROI, track your campaign results, determine what’s working and what isn’t, and adjust your strategy accordingly.
Key metrics include:
- Email deliverability rates: Potential deliverability problems include bad data, triggering filters by not following email best practices and poor sender reputation.
- Email open rates: Low email open rates can be the result of recipients not being familiar with your sender name (who the email is from) or not being interested in your email subject lines.
- Click-through rates: Make sure your message and call to action (CTA) are clear and follow email best practices for copy – and make sure you’re providing something of value. Give them a reason to click through and continue the conversation.
- Hard bounces: This can occur when an email address or domain no longer exists or if the recipient’s server has blocked delivery. Remove these addresses from your database.
- Soft bounces: These are usually temporary delivery issues, such as a downed server, full inbox or a message that’s too large to deliver. You may want to separate these addresses into a “try again later” category.
- Unsubscribe requests – Contacts may bail on you for a number of reasons. Maybe they’ve changed careers and your content is no longer of value. Maybe they’re receiving too many emails in general and want to clear their inbox. Whatever the reason, respect unsubscribe requests and remove them immediately.
- Spam reports – The best protection against spam reports is to prevent them. Make sure recipients are receiving appropriate/valuable content. Remove unsubscribe requests immediately. Sign up with Feedback Loop services to monitor complaints and remove offenders ASAP.
Clickback’s Email Lead Generation software can help you with these and other email best practices.
To learn more, sign up for a free one-on-one demo today!
