Email Newsletter Best Practices
By Ryan Vielma
Email marketing and email newsletters have been around since the beginning of (internet) time. It’s one of the most effective forms of online marketing that a company can produce.
For every $1 spent on email marketing $44 is made in return.
— Campaign Monitor
Intrigue employs a variety of different email marketing strategies to engage audiences and provide meaningful content. We know that email is a very powerful tool to get our clients’ messaging in front of their audiences and keep their brand top-of-mind for consumers.
5 Tips for Email Newsletters
1. Value First, Asks Later
The “Value First, Asks Later” approach is beneficial for all of your digital marketing efforts, particularly emails.
- The power of the dreaded ‘unsubscribe’ option for emails means that it is important to be delivering newsletter content that your customer will view as valuable.
- Positioning yourself as the expert in the field by answering frequently asked questions, updating your audience with changes in the industry, and providing useful tips can shed a positive light on your brand and your emails.
- Once your audience trusts you and the content you put out, you can begin to incorporate different offers, asks, and actions that you would like them to take.
People buy from people they like and trust. Make sure that you have the ‘like and trust’ aspects covered before you try and sell to them.
2. Don’t Underestimate Your Subject Line
The importance of your subject line cannot be understated!
- Think of your subject line as the cover and title of a book. You want your “book” to entice a reader to pick it off the shelf, regardless of those hundreds of other books.
- Your subject needs to stand out, catch the reader’s attention, and convince them that it is worth their time.
- People have dozens of emails flying into their inbox every day. You want them to engage with your content over the other offers they have received.
If your subject line isn’t captivating, chances are that your email will go unread and end up in their trash folder.
2A. Conduct Split A/B Subject Line Testing
Split A/B testing is when you send two different subject lines to a small percentage of your total audience to determine which has a better open rate. Once the testing has been determined, the winning subject line will be sent to the remainder of your email list.
- To create action-inspired subject lines that will motivate your audience to open and engage with your newsletter, look to use power words and adjectives like “latest”, “special”, and “exclusive”.
- Asking questions in subject lines can also encourage people to want to read more.
- Adding personalized or time-limited phrases, like “just for you” or “don’t miss this” are also enticing.
Split A/B testing will help to understand what your audience is responding to in order to craft successful emails going forward.
3. Short, Sweet, Simple = Success
For the content inside an email newsletter, remember to follow the 3 S’s: Short, Sweet, Simple!
- Short: Offering bite-sized content that can easily be digested gives the reader a glimpse of the message you are trying to communicate, with an option to continue reading.
- Sweet: Giving your audience the most important, attractive, compelling pieces of your message will leave them wanting to find out more.
- Simple: Keep your message simple and your call-to-action clear. The best messages are the ones that everyone is able to understand and decipher quickly.
4. Mobile, Mobile, Mobile!
Ensuring that your email newsletters are mobile responsive is critical.
50% of emails are opened on a mobile device.
If your email newsletter is not optimized for all mobile devices it will reduce your open rates, user engagement, and can significantly impact your list size.
&
15% of readers will actually unsubscribe from your email list!
Make sure to use properly sized images, format text properly, and incorporate call-to-action buttons to improve your audience’s experience.
5. Timing is everything!
Email newsletters require good timing. This includes both ‘when’ you send your email newsletter and ‘how often’ it gets sent.
- The best way to figure out the optimal time to engage your email audience is by testing different days of the week, times of the day, and frequencies.
- Different demographics, industries, and subject matters all have their own norms and tendencies, and finding the sweet spot can result in greater email success.
- The second part of timing is around the consistency of the email newsletters. Once you have determined the optimal time to send your email newsletters, you should aim to create consistency for your audience. Humans are creatures of habit and your email newsletter should cater to this need. Having an email sent at the same time every month with semi-predictable content can create a habitual routine for your audience.
Successful email campaigns can be measured by the consistency of their audience and the engagement they show on a email by email basis.
Employing the proper strategy, incorporating valuable content, and using an engaging approach will have your audience waiting and excited about getting your email newsletters!
Contact the experts at Intrigue, and we’ll help you craft a winning email newsletter campaign.