Email marketing is still a huge part of any digital marketing campaign and if you're putting out newsletters which aren't engaging your customers, you could lose them from your mailing list, or worse, lose them to your competition. I've listed 8 key points below which can help you to create good content and build a brand personality worthy of that high click through rate.
1) Ensure your subject line and preheader really capture attention
Please be aware that your emails are appearing in the same inbox as emails from friends and family. Your newsletter subscribers are allowing you in to their lives, their personal online space, embrace this opportunity so that when writing that subject line, it is as much about the reader as possible. The preheader then helps to drive that subject message home. If for instance we refer to a food business campaign, we could use the subject "Time to plan YOUR month" preheader reads "March is nearly here, time to take control and plan a month's delicious recipes". When a solid subject and preheader are used together, they really can give a reason to click through.
2) Create your campaign with the person in mind, not an audience
Consider writing your email with two very different readers in mind. For example, one could be a twenty something young professional who is on the move, always busy at work. Your email is their guide to what’s hot in your business. The other could be... your mother! She may have a wicked sense of humour but do you want your mother to see or share anything that could be deemed 'not safe at work'. So ask yourself, does your email content satisfy the needs of your two very different readers? If the answer is yes, then you'll be on to a winner.
3) Be consistent and remain personable
As mentioned earlier, your email lives in the same inbox as emails from family and friends. Ensure that you always adopt a personable approach to your content and that it's a consistent source of informative, interesting, relevant content. If you do this, I can guarantee your subscribers will keep reading and sharing your emails.
4) Keep honesty in mind and write honest yet amazing headlines
Many editorial publications invest a huge amount of time into making sure their headlines aren’t creating false expectations. If their promising "The ten best moments from the Oscars" then they better had be the ten best moments. Please, under no circumstances try to trick the reader into clicking. Your readers are too smart to put up with it and not unsubscribe.
5) Share stuff, even if it doesn't directly help you
Popular editorial website 'BuzzFeed' has their highest open rate for their Sunday newsletter. This gets a staggering 40-45% subscriber open rate every week! It's also the newsletter which features the most content not featured on the BuzzFeed website. Sharing only their own content would help to drive more clicks in the short term, but this open minded sharing approach has made their Sunday edition even more inviting to open.
6) GIF images.... embrace them!
Perhaps don't include one just for the sake of putting it in there, but if you find a really amazing animated GIF image consider including it. These animated GIF images really help to make your email stand out. They also look cool on mobiles too.
7) Mobile, mobile, mobile.... and more mobile
With today’s technology and the access your subscribers have to that technology, to not embrace the mobile movement would be foolish. If you're not building your emails with mobile readers in mind, you're losing out on half your audience. Try to keep the content easy to scroll down through and that it’s fluid-width. This means your email newsletters will look fab on mobile devices as well as a desktop.
8) If in doubt, feature a cute puppy or kitten picture
Never fails :)
****
So if you're considering improving your email marketing campaign, perhaps you want to make it look better, increase click throughs, help write more engaging content, then my content writing and newsletter design services could be just the ticket. I hope you've enjoyed this blog post and I look forward to hearing from you soon.