Today, I’m going to share my top 17 email marketing tips of all time with you. I’ve been doing email marketing for nearly 10-years now. A lot has changed during that time. What used to be the Wild West has definitely evolved into something much more sophisticated.
I should start by saying that if you are NOT using email marketing as part of your overall marketing strategy, you are WAY behind the power curve. You’re stuck with the 1980s thinking and it’s holding you back!
Email marketing is extremely effective. Plus, it’s practically free to do. With a little bit of education, some testing, and discipline, you can use email marketing to make your cash register RING! How about them apples?
My Top 17 Email Marketing Tips
I believe that if you follow the advice in this article, you will drastically improve your email marketing efforts. Read the article and decide for yourself. With that being said, here are my best email marketing tips.
# 1: Segment Your List
Your email list must be segmented. This simply means that you have multiple lists. You create a list for buyers, one for prospects, one for former customers, etc. The more targeted you can make each email list, the better you will do.
Here’s what Constant Contact has to say about segmenting your list.
The more targeted your message, the better you can expect your results to be. That means you need to gather as much information and insight about your subscribers as possible. Let’s say you run a high street fashion store and are offering a half-price weekend in one of your branches. You want your subscribers who live near that branch to know about the offer, but it’s a pretty useless message for anyone that doesn’t live near the store in question. List segmentation lets you target the people that matter, with a message that matters.
# 2: Use an Auto-Responder
This one should be a given. Hopefully, you’re not working on your Commodore 64 Computer. Hopefully, you’re not emailing each person on your contact list one at a time.
You need to use an auto-responder, such as Aweber. This is nothing more than a software program that manages your leads and sends out emails on your behalf. I can’t speak for you, but my auto-responder is my # 1 business tool. Don’t leave home without it.
# 3: Communicate Frequently
Some people say absence makes the heart grow fonder. Well, not in business it doesn’t. You must realize that your customer is getting bombarded with thousands of marketing messages every single day. Your competitors are relentless and they want your customers to come do business with them.
If you aren’t emailing your list at least three times per week, your prospects and customers are going to forget about you. Why? Life is busy. There’s lots of noise and communication. I personally believe you cannot over communicate with your customers and prospects, as long as you are PROVIDING VALUE.
I email my list three times per week. Most of my millionaire mentors emails their list daily. I am not a millionaire yet. They are. Maybe I should start doing what they are doing.
# 4: Keep a 3:1 Ratio
This ratio has worked very well for me. I try to make sure I send out at least three educational emails for every “pitch” email I send out. I recommend you do the same.
If all you do is send out emails trying to sell stuff, in every single email, you will see lots of people unsubscribe. You will see lots of people not even opening your emails. Plus, you will annoy your subscribers and piss people off.
It’s fine to sell. Your customers know you need to make money. Just put their needs first and offer them something of value, rather than always asking them how much of money they have left on their credit card limit.
I’ll also chime in and tell you that the best way to sell is by educating your prospect, rather than trying to convince them to buy what you have.
# 5: Maximize the P.S. Line
The P.S. line is where the magic happens. Magic baby!
Here’s what I do. I simply make every email I send out educational. I simply use the P.S. line in every email to do the selling for me.
Other than the subject line, the P.S. line is the most read part of your email. That’s what I have found anyway. Make the P.S. line bold. Appeal to your reader’s emotions. Give them irresistible offer they can’t refuse.
# 6: Track Your Metrics
It’s all about the base, about the base, no treble. Well, actually, it’s all about the METRICS.
The numbers do not lie. People lie. But not numbers. Know your metrics like the back of your hand and do everything you can to improve your numbers.
This means you know your cost per lead, cost per action, cost per conversion, open rate, no open rate, etc. It means you clean your list regularly (not with Ivory soap) by removing people who do not open or read your emails.
# 7: Write Like You Talk
Write like you talk. That’s what I’m doing in this article.
One of the worst mistakes marketers make is they are BORING. By the time their readers are a minute into the email they are drooling, snoring and doing the head bob. You want your emails to be fun, conversational and to the point. Act as if you are sitting across the kitchen table from your prospect and speaking to her from the heart.
# 8: Keep Your Emails Short
Attention deficit is at an all-time high. Your reader has the attention span of a gnat. I don’t say that to be mean. I just want you to know that you only have a few seconds before your readers decide to read your email or hit the back button. This is why the subject line is so important.
If you have a lot of information to say, summarize and have a link that says “to get the rest of the information click here.” When possible, try to keep your emails to no more than three or four short paragraphs.
So how do you decide whether to send short or long emails? It depends on your unique business goals, according to Andy Crestodina, a top email marketer and the founder of website consulting company Orbit Media. “If your goal is simply awareness, long or short is less important. If subscribers see it, like it, and smile, you met the goal! If your goal is traffic, then give the recipient the minimum amount of information needed to decide to click. The CTR (click-through rate) is everything and more text just means more noise in their inbox.”
Source: Aweber
# 9: One Central Theme
Each email should be geared around one central theme. Don’t be scatter brained and talk about three or four main points in your email. That will lead to information overload (and remember, a confused prospect does nothing). Keep your entire email geared around one main point. Keep the main thing the main thing at all times!
# 10: Master the Subject Line
If you have two hours to write an email, spend the first hour and a half on the SUBJECT line. This is the most important part of your email. Be bold. Take a stand. Say something crazy! Do what you can to stand out.
One thing that has helped me a lot is to keep a swipe file. Every day, before I delete all of my emails, I write down the subject lines of the emails that really get my attention. I keep these subject lines in a swipe file and use them as a template for my own email subject lines.
Here’s what lyfemarketing has to say about your subject line:
Our list of email marketing tips would not be complete without talking about the subject line. Look at it as the main, opening headline of your email. Which is why it needs to be transparent and not shady or gimmicky. The more straightforward you are with it, the better. Because your ultimate aim is not only get your emails opened once, but build a trusting relationship so your subscribers open your emails again and again.
The open rate of your email solely depends on your subject line. If people don’t open your emails, the content of it wouldn’t matter. So investing in it will immensely help your email marketing campaign.
Out of all of these email marketing tips, this one is easily the most important. You need a powerful SUBJECT line if you expect people to open your email.
# 11: Follow the CAN-SPAM ACT
Uncle Sam passed the CAN-SPAM Act to protect people from receiving unsolicited email messages. Here’s the bottom line. Include your physical address on each email. Include an unsubscribe link on each email. Honor people’s request to unsubscribe. And never email people who have not opted-in to your list. Do that and you should be fine!
Violations of the CAN-SPAM Act can result in significant penalties. For each email found to be in violation, penalties can range from $42,530 (as of 2021) per email. The Federal Trade Commission (FTC) and other law enforcement agencies are responsible for enforcing these penalties.
# 12: Tell People What You Want Them To Do Next
Tell people EXACTLY what you want them to do. If you don’t tell them what you want them to do, they will do something. You know what they will do? NOTHING.
Have a strong call to action in each email you send out. If you’re selling a product in your email, tell your readers to click on the link and order this product TODAY! This will lead to more sales.
If you want your readers to call you, tell them to call you. If you want them to redeem a coupon on your website, tell them to do that. Also, tell them how to do it and use a cutoff time of when the offer expires. Fear of loss is often the best motivator. You must have a sense of urgency in your offer.
Here’s what BenchMarkEmail.com has to say about your call to action!
What’s the purpose sending an email touting products if you don’t ask your customers to do something beyond look? Your call to action can do many things: ask customers to click on a link, ask customers to fill out a survey, ask customers to make a purchase. Whatever call to action you choose, just make sure you actually have one in the emails you send.
# 13: Add An Email Forwarding Option
In each email, have a forwarding option where people can forward the email to their friends and peers. This is a great way to get added exposure, and best of all, it doesn’t cost you a dime.
# 14: Make the OPT-IN Process Simple
A big part of email marketing is to BUILD YOUR LIST. If you have a website or capture page, you need to make the opt-in process SIMPLE.
Have a popover on your website. Have an opt-in form on every page of your website.
Also, make sure you turn off the confirmed opt-in option in your auto-responder. Just ask for the email and nothing else. The more fields you require in your opt-in form, the less likely the person is to opt-in.
# 15: Embed Videos
People love videos. While some people still like to read, a large percentage of people prefer videos over the written word.
In each email, feel free to embed a video. It will make your emails more effective. Even better, be interesting. Be memorable and funny.
Put on your Santa Claus hat and give them the information. Smile and laugh. Be yourself. People will like that. People want to know you are a person, not some big corporation.
If you link to a video within your email, you can also include the word “video” in your subject line. It’s something we have tested and including the word video increased your open rates by 6%!
Source: SuperOffice
# 16: Link Back to Your Website
Once you build up an email list of a few thousand people, and you communicate with them frequently and provide value, you can get a TON of traffic back to your website. All you have to do is include a link at the bottom of each email redirecting people back to your website.
If you want to be effective doing this, you need to give them a strong call to action. Give them a reason to click. Get creative and mix things up.
# 17: Include Your Phone Number On Your Website
I just said a bad word. Phone number? Yes. I talk to people all the time who own websites and don’t want people calling them. That is a huge mistake. I personally think it’s dumb not to include a phone number on your website.
Why miss out on sales because someone had a question and couldn’t get in touch with you? One of the biggest things I have people tell me when they call is “you actually answer your phone?” I’m always in awe, because I expected more bloggers and website owners would do it.
This doesn’t mean you need to answer your phone 24/7. Get a free Google Voice number and let that screen your messages for you. That way, you aren’t at the beck and call of your phone. But whatever you do, give people more than one way to get in touch with you.
Bonus Tip
This might just be the most important tip on this list. Make sure that EVERY email you send out provides value to your reader. Here’s what Prontom Marketing has to say about providing value to your audience.
Great email marketing ultimately comes down to giving your audience something that sticks with them. Something that keeps your business on their mind, whether that’s educational information about your industry, operational messages about your service, or marketing messages about the products you offer. Otherwise, that message is just going to end up in the trash.
Final Thoughts
There you have it folks. These are my top 17 email marketing tips of all time. None of these email marketing tips are SECRETS. Most of them are really easy to do. They’re also easy not to do. I hope you will follow the advice in this article and improve your email marketing efforts so you can take your business to the next level.
What are your thoughts? What are your top email marketing tips of all time? Leave a comment below and let me know what you think. I look forward to hearing from you.
Suggested Resources
- Get Your Own AutoResponder Today!
- Email Marketing Case Study
- Best Email Subject Lines
- Email 90,000 Prospects Daily
- How to Write Emails That Sell
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