Email marketing is a classic method of reaching out to potential customers and staying in touch with existing ones. 

Whilst some may consider it old school, email marketing will never go out of style. Emails are directly sent to your audience, but also allows them the freedom of viewing it at their own time. This makes it far less intrusive and much more welcomed by consumers as well. 

There is no doubt that almost everyone who uses the internet has an email address, giving you much to work with!

So, how do your campaigns currently look? Are they fully optimised to capture attention and achieve your marketing goals? Or is there room for improvement?

If you’re looking for a little refresher, here are some things on how to get kick-started once more and level up your email marketing campaigns.

Set clear expectations 

This is especially important for welcome emails! 

You want to make a good first impression and let your users know what they’re in for. Be transparent with what kind of content they will be receiving, as well as how frequently they can expect it. 

This will ease their concerns and assure them that registering for your mailing list wasn’t a bad idea. 

It would also be nice to give them the option of personalising the type of content they receive and how often. Some people may get annoyed with daily updates and would prefer them to come once a week instead. Some may prefer long-form articles while some may simply want snapshots of your content. 

Allowing users to pick and choose the type of emails they receive can help improve your retention rate loads. 

Offer value in emails you send out 

Sharing is caring! You would want to offer your customers value that is relevant to why they signed up for your mailing list in the first place. 

Be it free resources, tips, or heads up on a new product, your users would want to feel like they benefit through these emails from your brand. 

Ideally, these little tidbits should give them enough reason to take action as well, such as to visit your website to find out more. 

Segment for personalisation

Letting your audience pick the type of content they receive is one thing, but showing them that you know what they want without them having to tell you, can bring your game to another level. 

What you can do is to segment your audience and provide each group with the information that fits their specific interests or needs. 

When users are signing up for your mailing list, what you can do is to get additional information from them such as their gender, job titles, interests, etc., which can then be used to craft tailored messages that make each other their user experiences feel more personalised.

Of course, the details you ask for should be relevant to how you wish to approach customising your messages, so it would be good to plan ahead and only ask for the information you need.

Research has shown that personalised marketing breeds loyalty and significantly increases conversions. For email campaigns, what this could mean would be increased open rates, sustained interest and prevention of unsubscribers as well. 

Craft an inviting preheader to pique curiosity 

“If you are unable to see the message below, click here to view.” This is one line that many of us are familiar with. While there’s nothing explicitly wrong with the statement, it isn’t particularly compelling either.  A preheader is the line of text that follows your subject when the email is in the inbox. 

A good preheader generates interest and hooks readers in, without revealing too much. This would then leave the reader with no choice but to open your email in order to find out more. 

Do remember that readers would instinctively look out for what they can get out of your offer! So it’s good to keep that in mind when crafting a captivating preheader.

Be smart in your use of images

Visual graphics are always useful in grabbing the attention of your readers and can help reinforce the message you want to convey. 

However, with email clients, you have to be careful. With improper management, image heavy emails often end up looking broken and are unable to communicate the message across at all. 

The default settings or personalised preferences could have automatically have images blocked for many users, making it a risky endeavour if you do decide to include them in your emails. 

However, every marketer still wants to ensure that their messages stand out, especially among all the noise that’s being generated in the digital sphere. So we’re not saying that you shouldn’t use images in your emails, but when you do, please ensure that your message is still legible and actionable even when the images can’t be seen. 

Include a call to action

Prompt your readers to take a specified action. We’re sure that with your email, you have a specific objective that you want to achieve.  This could be more clicks to your website, more sign ups for a programme, more sales for a particular product etc., the actionables are endless. 

As people, we enjoy efficiency and clear directions on what to do next. A call to action helps reduce friction for readers, helping them transition to the next step without much obstruction. Without it, users may be uninspired to take the next step, and simply close your email without accomplishing the task you wanted them to. 

A compelling call to action is important and benefits both your brand and the reader, so be sure to include one!