Email Marketing Best Practices: the Do’s and Don’ts for Effective Campaigns

Email is still one of the most effective channels to communicate with your potential customers. One of its important advantages is the high ROI that can potentially be achieved through it.

To reap success, you need to follow some rules. Today, we've rounded up 10 email marketing best practices + five bonus things to avoid if you want your campaigns to be effective.

10 best practices for email marketing

Don't worry, the tips you'll read down are nothing complicated.

Nor do you need to do everything from the start of your email marketing. Use our list as a starting point on the road to effective campaigns, satisfied customers and multiple sales.

✔️ Gather subscribers the right way

The options here are many, but let's not kid ourselves, most require time, patience and creativity. Still, the reward is worth it - access to your potential customers' email.

Here are some ideas for collecting email addresses the right way:

• Enrolment form on your website. "Subscribe to our newsletter and get -10% off your first order."
• Magnet for Leeds. This is free content that the user can download after providing their email address. It can be anything from an ebook to a checklist/template to a course. The idea is to give value, be useful and be tied to the industry you work in.
• Organize a game (giveaway) or quiz to be accessed after filling in an email address.

✔️ Bookmark for consent

When you send emails to your subscribers, you need to be sure they agree. For example, if someone has placed an order or downloaded your ebook, they should have ticked the box next to which it says they agree to receive promotional messages.

Otherwise you will anger the GDPR gods!

✔️ Take your time on the headline and subheadline

The user's first encounter with your email campaign happens in the list of messages received.

You have not one, but two chances for love at first sight - your campaign headline and subheadline.

Within a minimal amount of characters, you need to convey to your subscribers what your email is about, what's in it, and why they should open it.

Sounds easy in theory, but imagine having people who receive dozens of emails a day - how will you stand out in the crowd?

✔️ Segment your lists

By location. This will help you in many directions. For example, you can send campaigns when your subscribers will open them if they are in different time zones.

You'll also be able to target your messages more subtly - for example, running a special promotion for your customers in Sofia to celebrate the city's holiday.

By engagement with previous campaigns. Who opened, who read, who clicked, who ordered? And who hasn't? Obviously these people are different in terms of behaviour, so communication with them better be different.

For example, users who haven't opened your last three campaigns might need a little nudge in that direction.

By what stage of the customer journey they are at. Do they have one, two or three or more orders? Or zero?

Tailor your messages and offers to match each customer or prospect's situation.

Those with zero orders should make their first, those with one should be retained, and those with more should be converted into loyal customers with a higher basket value. Each case requires specific measures, messages and offers to achieve the goal.

The options for leaf segmentation are not limited to those listed, but these are the most common.

Depending on what information you collect from your users when they sign up, you will also have additional options such as segmentation by interests (preferences for certain products), birthday in the month, and more.

✔️ Use dynamic values to customize emails

Among the best practices for email marketing that is effective is to use personalization wherever possible.

Besides segmentation, another way to achieve this is to use dynamic values for information such as first and last name, city, last order date, and more.

By giving your subscribers the feeling that you're talking to each of them individually, you'll achieve higher email relevance and better results.

✔️ Use email automation

They're a great way to save yourself the manual work and send emails right when your users need them. Whether it's an automated welcome floo, forgotten items in the cart, or an evaluation of products ordered, the benefits are many.

Key steps here include selecting the triggers where your campaigns will be sent and segmenting the list. Email automations can take a bit of time to set up, but then they practically run themselves, and you just have to tweak them from time to time.

✔️ Build your email marketing strategy

It's super important to have a pre-built strategy for this marketing channel. Especially if you decide to listen to us up front and start email automations, but not only then.

A shaped strategy will help you plan your email campaigns so that they don't overlap with each other, aren't too many in number, and provide value to users instead of lulling them to sleep out of boredom.

And this is the key to working email marketing.

✔️ Diversify design

The appearance of your email is also among the top factors that determine whether or not a user will perform the action you want.

Get creative and break up the usual structure a bit with product boxes and buttons underneath.

Take a closer look at one of your products, highlight its main features as well as its benefits. All of this would be much more impactful in a visual format than as dry text.

Play with shapes and colours, but of course don't overdo it - cluttered design does no one any favours.

✔️ Don't forget about the call to action

When sending email campaigns, you should always have a goal and never forget to tell your subscribers what is being asked of them.

In other words - have a call to action that is clear, precise, unambiguous and perhaps a little more generic than the usual "Place Order". But it works too.

✔️ Analyse previous campaigns

The key to success is learning from our mistakes and achievements.

Of all the email marketing best practice examples, analytics takes centre stage.

In it, you can track what worked well and what didn't. Repeat the successful decisions accordingly and abandon the rest. Constantly monitor and make changes based on real data.

Five things not to do for effective email campaigns

❌ Don't buy email lists

As good as it sounds, don't give in to temptation.

Bought emails are bad news and total obsolescence in the 21st century when digital marketing tools enable us to reach the right people for our business.

They're not on the bought email list, and as mentioned above - to send email campaigns to someone, it's important to have permission. Otherwise you're going straight to the trash or SPAM folder, and that reflects badly on your reputation as a sender.

In other words - you will hurt yourself more with bought emails than you will gain.

❌ Don't send too often

How often is too often depends on many factors. Consider the specifics of your business, what type of people your customers are, and whether you have anything at all to say when creating your email marketing strategy.

Better fewer but higher quality emails that bring value to both consumers and you.

❌ Don't send excessively long emails

Some consumers may find it very interesting to receive educational emails from your brand.

Unfortunately, the reality nowadays is that most people don't feel like reading much, so try not to overdo the information and if possible present it in a visual format so that it's easier for your subscribers to digest.

❌ Don't hide the unsubscribe button

You won't gain anything if you make it difficult for your subscribers to opt-out of receiving emails from you. On the contrary, it's one of those practices that will harm you.

If someone doesn't want to receive emails from you, there's no point in keeping them on your list. We even advise you to periodically purge inactive subscribers.

❌ Don't forget about mobile devices

Today, with mobile traffic at nearly 60%, it's imperative that your emails look and work well on all screens.

Opt for responsive design. Leave complex and slow-to-load animations and other elements aside if you want to make sure your campaign will render the same way across all devices.

Follow our email marketing best practices to ensure the success of your campaigns.

For results that will lead to steady growth for your business, you can always turn to us, the digital wizards at ADvantage. We will help you with all the elements of a winning email marketing strategy.