The holidays are right around the corner and you’ve designed the ultimate e-mail marketing campaign. Before you hit the Send button, give your greetings a boost of holiday spirit with these 7 simple – year-round – tips for e-mail marketing.
1. Personalize: It may seem obvious, but how many e-mails do you receive that do not greet you by name? Every e-mail marketing program has the ability to place a name in the body of the message.
2. Be Personable: Also, remember this is about marketing. Making a good impression will go a long way towards making a sale. Start your message out with something other than “Come to our sale and buy everything off our shelves!” Extend a warm greeting, offer a joke, do something that tells the reader that a relationship with you and your business is worthwhile.
3. Create a subject line that readers can’t resist! Your subject line is your first impression, what do you want that impression to be? Do you want to sound like the clueless SPAMMY types? Do you want to sound like the pushy used car salesman? Of course not! Then be fun! Be Relevant! Be Educational! Be helpful! But whatever you do keep it honest, engaging, and short!
4. Be clear about who’s sending the e-mail: Most people do not open e-mails from complete strangers. Make sure your From Name is the name people think of when they think of your business. And, use your branded e-mail for the From E-mail Address.
5. Be easy to read: An easy to read e-mail is short, puts the important points in bold, has plenty of white space, and includes eye amusement – bullets, numbers, pictures. Content heavy single-spaced type is incredibly difficult to read on a screen, so people don’t read it.
6. Be mobile friendly: Between 30 and 60% of the population read their e-mail on mobile devices. Even if you believe the low number, that’s a lot of people who may not read your e-mail because your message is not mobile compatible. Use simple layouts, limit photos, and use a good sized font. If you aren’t sure if your e-mail is mobile friendly send yourself and a few friends a test message to read from your phones. If you can’t read it, neither can your prospects and customers!
7. Have a clear Call to Action: There is a point to your e-mail, you want your readers to do something. So, get to the point – without being too abrupt, you still want to be personable. And keep yourself to ONE Call to Action. More than one becomes confusing. If you are including a link, put it up top for those readers who do not go past the first screen. If your message is on the longer side, remind readers of your Call to Action along the way with different formatting. Changing the font, bold, and/or color will draw the eye.
Remember, you want your readers to open your e-mail, and take advantage of what you are offering. Make sure your campaign says “Happy Holiday” literally and figuratively.
What are some of your favorite email subject lines? Please share them so we can all learn from them!
