Some top tips for eMarketing

HTML – not as important

HTML is not as important as having great content, a subject line that generates interest, a trusted source that the email is coming from and an action that the preview pane can give the viewer.

Designed for Preview Pane

Always design the email message with the preview pane in mind. The first 6 lines are the most important part of your email and the message you want to send across.

A Newsletter needs to be…

RELEVANT. ENGAGING. USEFUL

Trigger Interest

80% of Direct Marketing (Including email) should be from an initial trigger, e.g. found interest in something, after a sales visit, etc…

Start with a plan

Have a strategic goal in mind. What is the reason for sending the email in the first place? What do you hope to achieve from it? How does it fit in with the rest of your plan?

Split Test It

Split testing it, means you can figure out what the most engaging message is and the overall response rate between different versions of the same email. This allows you to hone in on what motivates the viewer to read the email and click-through.

Funnel Conversion Rate

Use Google Analytics to figure out your conversion rate and whether the user is actually upon click-through, viewing what you want them to see on your website.

High Individualisation

Make the email and individual / personalised as possible… Just before the point where it is no longer a good ROI. Play on the fact that people love to read about themselves.

Educate your audience

Don’t over promote your company and services… If this is all you have to offer in ways of communication, then people will switch off and start to automatically delete your messages. Start with educating the audience on something relevant and interesting and work your way up into linking your company into it. Based on the information you learn from what they like / what they don’t like. You can then target them with services and products that will be of interest.

A few more rules..

If at all possible, make the email anticipated, relevant and personal

Understanding the customer

Measure and understand the customer, based on the information that you collect on their click-through / opens / conversions

SPAM Phrases – Learn Them

Some words can be automatically tagged as potential SPAM indicators. Learn which specific words can put your SPAM score up and then change the email to be sure it gets through.

Add Text

Along with the HTML email, include a text version. This will lower the SPAM score by 1 point potentially.

Purpose of each part

Each part of the email has a different purpose and should follow some set rules…

- The subject line should be about generating interest. Enough for the viewer to view the rest of the email and its content.

- The FROM field needs to also be consistent / trusted, meaning it comes from someone they know already, who will be in their address book and any subsequent emails also come from that contact. Otherwise make sure the email address is at least “masked” so that it comes from your own domain name, instead of generic email software one, e.g. noreply@12422ccsend.com

- The preview pane needs to contain the most vital of information that is to be contained in your email and MUST include an action.

Email Objectives

Some basics objectives to use as a template…

1) Who is the reader?

2) What will they get out of it?

3) What is the action you want to achieve?

4) What is the response you want to receive?

Eye Tracking – Some points about the design

- People look from left to right

- Bolden the areas you want people to read

- The first 2 words of everything need to be strong, no point in wasting “The” and “Is”, etc..

- Heading copy – Focus on the copy in the headers for most impact

- Make the header the click through, instead of a separate “Click here to read more”