E-mail marketing has been one of the pioneers of the online digital marketing world. Even in its’ earliest days, way before social media and online news, the internet had been used primarily for e-mail messages. And with them, came commercial e-mails, often spammy, sometimes dangerously loaded with viruses, many times irrelevant and annoying. What has changed since then is that spam mail is better identified, filtered and sent to the Spam folder. What has also changed is that legitimate advertising that is probably relevant for the receiver of the message now operates on an “opt-in” rule, which means that the people receiving the messages have actually approved being targeted by the advertisers.
Now, with the rise of other methods to attract customers in the digital world, has e-mail marketing lost its’ appeal or is it still relevant and effective?
E-mail marketing results are very good
Most data suggests that it is as relevant as it has ever been. Optinmonster claims that more than 90% of people over the age of 15 use e-mail in the United States, and for most of them, the e-mail is still the “first check of the day”. The same source shows that e-mail marketing has a 22.86% open rate and a 3.71% CTR across all industries, which is a lot higher than the rates offered by social media advertising. Other sources provide slightly less optimistic statistics on this, but we’re still in the same ballpark. According to Marketing Insider Group, the best open rates come from hobby-related businesses, at 28.46% and the worst are from the vitamin supplements industry, with a still more than decent 17.26% open rate. For the first category, the CTR is 5.13%. So, in this scenario, if you send a marketing e-mail to 10.000 potential customers, 2846 of them would open the e-mail (and, presumably, read it), while about 146 of them will also click on the link(s) inside.
Not too bad, considering the context and the fact that with e-mail marketing software, sending out e-mails to large target groups is quite easy. It’s certainly a better rate than what an average Facebook ad will offer.
Tips to make your e-mail marketing more effective
In order to get higher open and click-through rates, it’s important to build messages that are attractive and relevant for the receiver.
The first rule of email marketing is to make sure that the HTML-formatted message you are sending is being shown correctly on all devices and that It is functional. People won’t react well to an email message that is all scrambled.
Choose carefully your delivery schedule. Studies show that Tuesday is the best day to send e-mails, scoring way better than other days on open rate. Several times of day are recommended, but the best is 10 AM, while 8 PM (for those checking their email before bedtime) is in second place.
Focus on the email subject line, as it is the first thing about you message that the receiver sees and reads. Try to write something both catchy and relevant. Some may even try to use a click bait, but keep in mind that the message has to match the promise made in the subject line.
Highlight the offer you’re making, using any means necessary, like bigger fonts or readable color contrasts.
Connect to the relevant landing page, which is not always the homepage of your website. Sometimes it can be a product page in your store.
Akby Digital Marketing can take care of all these aspects for you, with an experienced team that has many successful e-mail marketing campaigns in its’ resume.
