5 Email Marketing Best Practices That Actually Drive Results

When your emails are getting low open rates and no responses, you may start feeling frustrated. You may begin to lose faith in sending cold emails to prospects and other questions may begin to creep into your mind. 

Is email marketing dead? Do cold leads ever become interested in a product/service and convert to warm leads? 

While some email marketers may be making mistakes, others are doing it right - and attain success! 

According to an article in Forbes in 2020, email marketing is still the most powerful tool to take your business to the next level - and this holds true now too! 

However, it may be difficult to get results because readers are now wary of being sold to and many emails do end up in spam. 

Promising the highest ROI of all marketing channels, email marketing offers $42 off of every dollar spent. Now, how do you achieve that? Here are 5 tips to help you drive results: 

1. Segment your audience

No two people are the same and we know that. So how can you expect your whole email list to be the same? 

You need to segment your audience carefully based on some mutual characteristics such as where they are in the buyer journey, are they a warm or cold lead, their demographic characteristics, personal preferences, etc.

For example, you can segment your audience according to whether they opened the last email or not - those that have are a warm lead while those that haven’t may still be classified as a cold lead. 

You can also segment according to age, gender, occupation, previous purchases, geographic location, etc. as mentioned above. 

Create separate email lists so you can treat each group of customers separately. 

2. Prevent your emails from landing in the spam folder

If no one sees your emails, there is no point in sending them. Your prospects will not see your email if it lands in spam and this usually happens when your email domain reputation begins to deteriorate for one or more of the following reasons: 

• You send thousands of emails a day 

• Your emails are rarely opened 

• Many people unsubscribe from your email list or mark as spam

• Hardly anyone replies or your click-through rate is low 

In order to avoid this situation, you may want to use opt-in lists, but you don’t always have to if you are sure you are sending emails to people who might be interested in your content and will subscribe once they read your first message.

Make sure your messages are relevant/educational instead of just promotional. Never use click-bait subject lines. Be genuine about what’s included in your message. 

There isn’t much you can do yourself if your reputation has already taken a hit. This is where GoCustomer comes in. 

GoCustomer warms up your domain, so you will have higher chances of being seen, read, and eventually, increasing your revenue. 

However, GoCustomer is not only for those who have a weak domain reputation, but even if you have just started sending emails, you can first warm-up your domain with GoCustomer to prevent your messages from landing in spam. 

3. Captivate your audience at first contact 

The first impression is the last impression - and this is so very true for email marketers. The first contact that you make with your audience determines whether they will ever open your email again. 

First of all, you need an amazing email subject line to encourage them to open the email. You can find a few tips to write compelling subject lines on the article: Ready to Find Your Marketing Zen with Email Subject Lines?

Then, once they read your first email, what they do determines the rest of the buyer journey. 

Do they unsubscribe? Do they click-through? Do they reply? This all determines your email domain authority score. In order to make that first impression, send a very interesting first email.

The cold email should not be cold in personality. Inject a bit of warmth into it with a personal touch and a little humor. Your email should be an overview of what you offer, how it can benefit your target audience, and what they can do next. 

An article on The Harvard Business Review mentioned that cold emails are more effective when they are tailored to the audience. 

4. Include a clear CTA

You know the pain of being left on seen, so you don’t want that to happen to your emails as well. 

Your prospects shouldn’t just open the email, read it, and do nothing. Your emails should be sent for a reason - you want your prospects to do something. 

Make sure your CTA (call-to-action) is very clear and you provide a good reason for your reader to click-through. Call-to-actions can include Read More, Buy Now, Add to Cart, Tell me more, etc! 

According to Wordstream, you can use enthusiastic language or language that inspires emotion to create a sense of urgency and desire in your prospects to click on your CTA. Hook, Line, and Sinker is the formula for a great CTA! 

5. Manage email frequency

It is important to know more about your buyer journey when sending emails. A warm lead or someone who has expressed some kind of interest in your product/service will more likely respond favorably to your emails. Therefore, a warm lead can be contacted twice a week - going overboard can annoy a warm lead as well. 

However, a cold lead may have no interest in your offering and sending them an email everyday or every other day may lead them to opt-out or mark your email as spam..

This is when your email reputation starts to sink, and you need a warm-up tool to help your emails land in the prospect’s Priority inbox. 

Cold leads may be contacted at most once a week to remain top-of-mind. 

Databox mentions that about 33.3% of professionals send emails on a weekly basis with 13.33%  sending them more frequently. It is important to manage frequency well because more emails does not necessarily mean more revenue. 

Also Read: 10 Email Marketing Blogs Every Marketer Should Follow in 2023

If you use all of these tips, your email marketing campaigns will be effective whether you are sending cold-emails or trying to convert warmer leads! Try them now to make a lasting impression on your audience and grow your revenue.