6 tips to get the most out of the highest-performing digital marketing channel
We see emails every day. But few manage to make an impact and imprint on our memory. It's not surprising, since running a successful email marketing campaign calls for both creativity and the analytical know-how to make sense of ever-growing amounts of data. That’s why even the savviest marketers can get stuck – especially if they only ever look at their own results.
To get fresh ideas and inspiration, it’s often worth taking a step back to see what others are doing. The new GetResponse Email Marketing Benchmarks report helps by providing plenty of insight into how successful companies create memorable, impactful email campaigns.
Here are five lessons from the report based on the latest email benchmark statistics, in the reports plus actionable tips to try in your own campaigns:
1. Email at the right time
If a billboard is placed…
Chart of the Day: Do you do any structured testing for your email marketing?
Why is testing important?
Yes, yes I know I drone on about testing, my little Email Geeks, but like the nagging mother I am, I will repeat myself again.
Testing your marketing campaigns is as important as creating them. The fun thing about testing email campaigns is that what you think your client wants, is completely different to the results.
If we sent a marketing email from two years ago today, do you think it will do well? Like all digital trends, email marketing, and automation changes. Especially in marketing automation. Clients aren't impressed by a welcome sequence - they expect it. But is it doing what you want it to? If you don't have a welcome sequence, do you know that your clients will notice? (Take our Quick Win, "…
Create a webinar email that encourages more sign-ups
When it comes to promoting your webinars, you just can’t beat email. We recently asked the live webinar audience how many pre-event promotional emails they send, and over 57% said they sent at least three. But, are they getting the most from those emails? On average, you have less than eight seconds to convince the reader that your message is worth spending time reading through all the way. How do you make those eight seconds work for you? These are the five elements of great event promotion emails:
1. Enticing subject line
Without a killer subject line, people may not even open your email. There is definitely an art and a science to crafting that killer subject line. The art lies in crafting a line that sounds cool enough to make people want to engage and read more. It should promise…
4 tips to send your email newsletter at the perfect time
One of the worst things you can do is send an e-newsletter at the wrong time.
If you do not pick a good time to fire off an email it will run the risk of being deleted rather quickly, because the other emails sent at the same time will make it fight for attention and all your hard work will be wasted.
This is why it drives me a bit crazy when people or companies send their email newsletters all at the same time. No one wants to check their phone in the morning and have 30 emails. Or be hit up with a bunch of emails during dinner time. Those emails run the risk of being sent straight to the trash.
After many months of deleting email newsletters sent at inopportune times, I knew there had to be a better way.…
Chart of the Day: 2017 global email benchmark report
It's that time of year!
We have up-to-date email marketing statistics from the 2017 GLobal Email Bench mark Report from Sendgrid, best of all it's broken-down by industry. Here the statistics are taken from 2016 vs 2017 (although remember that 2017 isn't finished yet). But it does give a good indication of where we are in regards to industry standards. So, run your reports and see where you stand against the industry standards.
So, fire up your ESP, run your reports and see where you stand against the industry standards. You could be doing better than you think. If not it could be time to make all those improvements you've always wanted to make.
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Source: 2017 Global…
What does your email font say about your brand?
No email marketer EVER says, “I am happy with my email design and the ROI it brings.” Because the day you say so, you stop being successful. From start to eternity (and even beyond) email marketers are in constant search for something new to delight their subscribers.
Right from experimenting with an embedded video to including certain interactive elements, email marketers are looking for the next best thing. But in the quest for finding the “next best thing”, most email marketers oversee the potential of experimenting with colors and fonts or say typography in emails.
How Fonts Can Affect Email Engagement – An Analysis
An email is made up of basically a header image, email copy, and footer. So in short, a combination (and appropriate placement) of colors, text, and images make an email interesting. While colors are based on the brand personality,…
Chart of the Day: How many email platforms are you using (Sending) - Part 6 of 6
This week is the final post in our series, and we will be looking at the number of email platforms that are currently being used to send segmented, triggered, and
transactional emails? (Catch-up on previous episodes.)
Why have more than one email platform? Doesn't that sound a bit dodgy?
Email Service Providers (ESP) have had a reputation of being simple send engines. Some may have had slightly different functionality but if you wanted something more, you had to pay for it. But what would be a legitimate reason to have more than one email platform?
Cost: prices increased with the number of email contacts in your database. So to keep costs down, many would split their lists and join another ESP.
Multiple…
Chart of the Day: Looking to increase sales? Abandon Cart programs could be just what you need
The opportunities Marketing Automation provides your business is immense. I've always found that it is more difficult to decide which sequences to launch first as there are so many. I went back and counted the number of automation's ideas, in our 'for prioritization' queue and found we had over 30, which is crazy.
If you just starting out on your journey to automate your marketing comms, you should build an Abandon Cart sequence.
MailChimp, the email marketing provider, studied the results of 150,000 of its own users and found that Abandon Cart Series provide the greatest increase in orders per recipient.
Source: MailChimp - Identifying the Most Profitable Automation for E-Commerce Businesses
Sample Size: Automation data—collected from 150,000 businesses that use MailChimp
Recommended Resource: Essential Marketing…
Chart of the Day: Finance, Manufacturing and Travel Industries reach the email inbox 9 out of 10 times
For email marketers, the prospect of your emails not reaching the inbox has been a consistent worry. Email services for consumers (Gmail, Outlook etc) are always trying to do the best for their users and have protection in place so spammy looking emails don't clog up their inboxes. This level of protection means that 1 in 5 emails don't reach the intended recipient.
In a recent report by Return Path the email delivery experts on average, 85% of emails from all industries globally ever reach the recipient's email inbox.
Banking & finance, distribution & manufacturing, and travel marketers are achieving the best inbox placement rate with 90% or more emails hitting the inbox
On the flip side, automotive, education/nonprofit/government, and social & dating industries are having a harder time reaching their audience with inbox placement rates of less…
A concise list of the most popular email marketing systems
With a multitude of email marketing systems readily available, it can be hard to find the right one. Your email system needs to benefit your goals!
5 steps to selecting a new email marketing service:
Review your current situation
Know your requirements for a new vendor
Research the market
Test/ request demos for your shortlisted vendors
Make a decision and start the migration process
Before switching you need to determine your requirements. Have you outgrown your current provider? Do you need extra features that they do not provide? When choosing a new vendor you need to make sure their features will help you achieve your business needs, now and in the future. Do you need more robust reporting and analytics? Integrate SMS messaging into your content strategy? Or, do you need greater capabilities in segmentation and personalization? When choosing a new vendor, think about :
Integration
Functionality
Usability
…
