Email marketing is an excellent way to raise brand awareness, generate leads and nurture long-lasting relationships. But if you’re not in the inbox, you’re not in the game. That’s why you need to do everything you can to maximize your email deliverability.

Here are five ways to improve the deliverability of your email campaigns.

Protect Your Reputation

According to a study by Return Path, 77 percent of email deliverability problems come down to sender reputation. The best way to gauge this reputation is to monitor your Sender Score.

Think of this as your “online credit score.” While a high Sender Score won’t guarantee inbox placement, it opens doors that would otherwise be closed.

To keep your Sender Score as high as possible, try to keep bounce rates, spam reports and unsubscribes as low as possible. One of the best ways to do this is to clean your data regularly.

Maintain Your Email List

Nothing wreaks havoc on deliverability like a poorly maintained email list.

If you’re not cleaning data upon import, you’re likely introducing spam traps, honey pots and other bad data that can contaminate your database and cause your bounce rates to go through the roof. And if bounce rates get too high, ISPs may take notice, impeding your deliverability.

But even an initially clean database can degrade over time. That’s why ongoing list maintenance is essential – it keeps your data up to date and maximizes email deliverability.

Stay CAN-SPAM Compliant

The CAN-SPAM Act establishes firm guidelines for commercial emails, whether you’re sending B2B or B2C, and violations can be costly. Briefly stated, CAN-SPAM requires the following:

• False or misleading information, including deceptive subject lines, is prohibited.
• You must provide a clear and easy way for recipients to opt out of future emails, and you must honor opt-out request ASAP.
• A physical business address must be provided to the recipient.
• Ads must be clearly identified.
• You must take responsibility for any email marketing done on your company’s behalf, even if it’s being handled by a third party.

When you think about it, following these guidelines makes perfect sense. If a recipient doesn’t want to receive your emails, it’s better to honor an opt-out request than to risk being reported as spam.

Monitor Response Rates

Monitoring the results of your email campaigns is essential to improving future performance. But those same key metrics can be used to improve your email deliverability. For example, a sudden spike in bounce rates can mean a problem with your data hygiene, which can be easily corrected.

In addition to the surface details, keep an eye on how recipients are responding to your content. Low engagement over time can come back to haunt you. Recipients may tire of your emails and report you as spam. Even if they do not, ISPs may filter your emails and prevent inbox deliverability.

Take note of engagement levels. If response is low across the board, it may be a problem with the content. Otherwise, consider segmenting your list based on engagement.

That way, you can focus the bulk of your email marketing efforts on an audience that is engaged and nearing conversion. Meanwhile, low engagement recipients can be nurtured accordingly or phased out entirely, if appropriate.

Use Email Lead Generation Software

Clickback’s Email Lead Generation software provides the tools you need to protect your reputation, maintain data hygiene, comply with CAN-SPAM and monitor your campaign results – all of which maximize your email deliverability.

To learn more, sign up for a free one-on-one demo and get started today!