In spite of popular belief, the concept of email marketing is still very much active and practical. It is simply unbelievable just how much of an impact a good email campaign can have in terms of creating new leads. Why is this? How can it be that emails remain so essential despite the constant technological advancements? Simple – sometimes the most basic of methods are the most efficient. People are often too eager to over-complicate certain operations in hopes of achieving more. And this is not always the right path to take in business. This is why, today, we take a closer look at the email marketing mistakes people make and you should avoid.
Top seven email marketing mistakes to avoid when growing a business
When you look a little more into it all, you will find just how staggering the actual numbers are when it comes to email marketing. For example, how would you react if we were to tell you that over 80 percent of retail professionals prioritize email marketing as the top client retention tool? In fact, a percentage similar to that one claims that the email remains the most effective revenue generation channel, to this day. Just take a moment to absorb this fact – over 74 trillion emails are sent on a daily basis!
And even with all this in mind, there are still so much email marketing mistakes that people tend to make. Why is this? How can this happen when you have all the modern tools that we have? Well, let’s examine the top seven examples and see for ourselves. It might not eliminate the mistakes, but it might just reduce them.
1. The fail of a broken email design
One of the worst things that can happen is for you to send out a massive email campaign, only to discover it failed to appear as planned. In fact, this is definitely the most problematic email marketing mistakes that companies experience today. You have to consider that there are many different email providers that people tend to use:
- Gmail
- Yahoo
- Apple Mail
- Outlook etc.
Not only are there different providers, but there are now diverse devices that people tend to use. Hence, you need to ensure that your email marketing efforts are visible to all users. Companies often consider this to be the job of their email marketing service, but this is true to a certain point. Once you start modifying existing templates, this becomes much more complicated.
So, unless you wish to end up grouped with marketers with broken links, images, and errors in their emails, consider the use of tools such as Litmus. The alternative is for you to risk your email misrepresenting your brand, ultimately being marked as spam email.
2. Distancing your company with the use of generic email accounts
We’re all used to seeing those “[email protected]” or “[email protected]” in our inboxes. However practical this might be for your marketing team, audiences consider it a cold and objective approach. As a result, they are less inclined to read the email, let alone consider the offer you make. The reason why we use emails, to begin with, is to promote our business through interaction with customers. Not only that, but the aim is to offer leads valuable content and instill trust in your expertise. And to accomplish that, we advise that you avoid making the email marketing mistake of using generic email accounts. Instead, personalize it a bit and have an open communication with each lead that replies.
3. Spamming subscribers with promotions and discount offers only
Every aspect of promoting your business has its limits. For you to send promotion after promotion to customers not only leads to irritation and loss of brand awareness but ultimately to a loss of subscriptions. So, how can you avoid this typical occurrence among email marketing mistakes?
Follow the 80/20 rule of thumb
What is this rule? This means that 80 percent of your email content should be primarily useful and informative, as well as appealing to the customers. All the while, the other 20 percent should focus on sales through promotions and discounts.
So, if you are a moving company looking to increase your conversion rate, what would be the right course of action? Rather than showering your customers with $200 OFF YOUR NEXT SALE offers, send them content on how to lower moving expenses. Or you can provide them with packing tips to make their moving day easier. Think outside the box and consider what might prove the most useful, while demonstrating your expertise as movers.
4. Quantity can also be construed as one of the top email marketing mistakes
It all comes down to finding that golden middle when it comes to the frequency of the emails you send. Before you ask – there is such a thing as sending too many or too few emails to your subscribers. Too many emails lead to irritation and annoyance, whereas too few emails result in forgetfulness and lack of brand awareness.
So, to determine the best frequency to send emails, you might want to analyze the following information:
- Time of day when you sent the emails.
- The day of the week.
- Type of the subject line you use
- Click Through Rate (CTR)
- Open Rate emails
- The Unsubscribes
5. A bad choice or overall exclusion of Calls to Action (CTA)
When you prepare a marketing campaign, you need to consider what it is you expect readers to do after it. And the best way to motivate them to do what you need is with an effective call to action. Failing to include a proper CTA in your email marketing can lead to a lack of response. Whether you want them to read an article, apply for certain services that you offer or simply purchase products from you, you need to make it perfectly clear to them. And there are plenty of diverse approaches that people take when using CTAs:
- Sometimes they are aggressive
- Other times they are compassionate (1st person)
- And at times they are simplistic and to the point (e.g. Get Free Quote)
The choice is ultimately yours to experiment with and make.
6. Always remember to segment your email lists
How would you react if you were to receive an email that had no real effect on your interests? Too often do companies tend to avoid investing the time to segment their subscribers into smaller and categorized groups. This lack of organization can often lead to email marketing mistakes where the wrong customer base receives content irrelevant to them. And this is something that can definitely influence the overall response rate of your leads.
7. Not finding the time to do proper market research
Every movers’ marketing effort you make requires post-analysis. Why? Because there is always something to learn and adapt before the next campaign goes out. CTR or unsubscribes – every metric is useful and should be deemed so. This is the best way not to make any other email marketing mistakes in the future. On the other hand, if you choose to ignore this data, you are in for certain hardships in the time to come.
