When creating an email marketing campaign there are some special hacks that can be used to increase your conversion rate.

Even if you’re increasing the open rate by 15%, for example, then that leads to many more potential buyers of your products. If the size of your email list is large then implementing small changes can lead to big results.

In this article, we will show you how to improve the effectiveness of your email marketing campaign. You’ll learn some actionable tips that you can implement today, and get results on your next batch of emails.

1. Email Segmentation

Once you learn more about your email list, you should segment the members based on their interests.

For example, if you are sending out coupons, links to products, entertainment articles, news and how to videos, then that represents a wide range of content. It might be the case that a specific portion of members only came for the coupons or how to videos.

Bombarding them with all types of emails might lead to more unsubscribes than you’d like. Therefore, conduct a survey and ask users what type of content they prefer. Consequently, segment the list based on their preferences. This ensures that the rate of engagement for each member of your list will be much higher. Consequently, this leads to higher chances of a sale.

As the Annual Email Optimizer Report found, 39% of marketers received an increase in open rates when they segmented their list. Furthermore, 28% of marketers had lower unsubscribe rates. This shows that not every email list benefits from segmentation in a tangible way. However, there is enough evidence to point in the direction of giving it a shot.

You can segment the list based on variables such as demographic data, behavioral data, customer sign up date and customer email client data. By paying attention to your customers, you can learn even more ways of effective segmentation

2. Test Delivery Times

A lot of email marketers test the different variables of the emails themselves but forget about other elements, such as delivery times.

When you deliver the email can be just as important as what is inside. For instance, if the recipient is getting the email when they are swamped in the middle of the work week at lunch, then the response rate might be low.

On the other hand, the same email sent on the weekend could provide a much higher ROI. The only way to find out is to test for yourself to see what works and what doesn’t You could execute an A/B testing campaign where the same email is sent on different days of the week. Alternatively, you can send it on the same day, but one is sent at 1 PM and the other at 8 PM.

Testing removes the emotion out of it because you get to see the tangible results for yourself. You do not need to use guesswork to figure out when the best time to send the email. Over time as you test with different delivery times, the precision of when the email is most effective will improve.

3. Call To Action

Every email that you send should have a call to action. In fact, for every piece of content that you put out, anywhere, should have a call to action. Even on the “Thank You” page after a website visitor has submitted their email address.

The lack of a call to action is a missed opportunity to get the desired result, which is typically the sale. The call to action doesn’t always have to be aggressive by drawing a lot of attention. Mixing it up increases the visibility of the call to action. That’s because if you include the same call to action on every email, the viewer will begin to tune it out.

A call to action can be as simple as including clickable text with the words: “Start my trial,” or Read the ebook.” However, you can use a sentence or two to build up to the clickable text so that the audience is persuaded to be interested in the offer.

As John Adverton from Rush My Essay, says: “a successful call to action should have a sense of urgency and indicate what’s in it for them.”

You understand the psyche of your audience best. Therefore, the type of call to action that works best for your audience is up to you. However, make sure to test to see what readers are responding to the most.

4. Avoid Spam Filters

Spam filters are the arch nemesis of email marketing.

Spending time carefully crafting the email for it to only end up in the spam folder is the worst case scenario. In some cases, if the email contains certain elements, then it might not even make it into the spam folder at all.

Cutting out the words that trigger spam filters is the first thing you should focus on. These words include common phrases like no credit check, MLM, free money, earn per week, big bucks and so on. For any given niche there are some spam triggering keywords that you must keep in mind.

In the thank you page you could ask the user to check their spam inbox for your email. Ask them to place you on the whitelist so that further emails end up in the main inbox. You also need to offer an unsubscribe link at the bottom of all your emails to pass the spam test.

Finally, study the CAN-SPAM Act 2003 of what you can and can’t do. This information is straight from the email authorities themselves, so it’s a no-brainer to familiarise yourself with what’s shared here.

5. Provide Value to the Reader

The purpose of email marketing from your point of view is to achieve conversion and turn a subscriber into a buying customer. However, forcefully going after the sale with just marketing material is not the best strategy.

You need to provide value in every email. This shows you’re looking after your audience and giving them a reason to stick around.

For example, let’s say that you’re in the metabolic cookbook niche and are promoting a product that helps people lose weight by eating fat burning foods. In every email you could make it your mission to share three recipes free of charge.

This does two things: it keeps people on the list opening emails to read those recipes, and it builds you up as an authority building trust in the process. If the quality of the recipes is good, then eventually they will want to buy what you’re selling to get access to more of the same.

6. Mobile Responsive

It’s estimated that around 65% of emails are initially opened on a mobile device. Therefore, not optimizing the email for the mobile platforms is essentially shooting yourself in the foot.

Audiences will be put-off by unoptimized emails. So even if your open rates are great, the user engagement and number of people reading the call to action might be low.

To improve mobile optimization keeping the email simple is key. Avoid complicated formatting list tables and social sharing buttons that are large. Furthermore, keep the width at around 500-600 pixels. A mobile user can scroll down to read more text, but horizontal scrolling is undesirable – even on the desktop platform.

The font size should be 13pt for the body, and the header size fonts should be at around 22 pt. This ensures that size of the font is friendly for the mobile user. Also, avoid unreadable fonts and weird symbols that mobile devices might struggle to format correctly.

For images keep the files sizes to a minimum. Loading up an image via a wired home based connection might be a piece of cake. However, outdoors on a mobile device, the same might not be true.

7. Resend Unopened Emails

Resending an unopened email is a delicate matter that you need to get right to avoid high unsubscribe rates. You’ll need to weigh the chances, and merit, of getting the open a second time versus the chances of an unsubscribe.

Some people might have missed the email the first time around, or they might have been too busy to open it. Therefore, by sending it for the second time, you increase your chances of catching them at a more convenient time. This is especially true if you send it at a different time.

However, some list members will notice the fact that they received the same email twice. They might get annoyed and feel like you’re acting like a spam bot. Therefore, they will naturally unsubscribe from your list, which is the last thing that you want.

As a compromise consider changing aspects of the email when sending for the second time. For example, change the subject line – it doesn’t take long to do. If you’re using images, consider switching them up to give the email a different feel.

You can segment your email list and only send the same email a second time to a limited number of your list to see how they respond. If you notice far too many unsubscribes, then you can avoid making the same mistake with the majority of your email list.

Conclusion

There is an art to email marketing, such as getting the copywriting spot on and ensuring the value inside matches the expectations of the user. However, as you’ve learned in this article, there is also a science behind the process. For example, by taking steps to avoid spam filters and improving the mobile optimization, you’ll increase the effectiveness of the email marketing campaign.

Take the time to implement all seven pieces of advice from this article and your email marketing campaign will be better off. Just don’t forget to do your testing regarding what works and doesn’t. After all, every niche and email list is unique and therefore requires a unique approach.

Author Bio:

by Brandon Stanley

Brandon Stanley is a professional independent journalist. He is also interested in writing articles concerning marketing and advertising. Apart from that, Brandon loves traveling and playing the piano. Follow him on Facebook and Twitter.