Email is one of the simplest and most efficient ways to connect to your current and potential customers. No matter who you reach out to, you have just got seconds to catch the reader’s attention in what’s most definitely a busy inbox.
Ok, that’s the challenge. In this blog, we outline a few strategies that can take your email campaigns from good to perfect without a lot of detailed technical knowledge. If your overall Click Through Rate (CTR) is low, you have a problem; the good news is that sometimes all you need is some small tweaks to boost it.
What’s the Ideal CTR Rate?
Before we talk about how to boost your rate, first of all, it ‘s important to get a sense of where your current ones stand in the context of your market, company or product. Some suggest that 10% or more is a decent number to target. You should also be able to find information about your CTR through your email provider.
If you are trying to boost your CTR-which is always a good target, no matter where you are with it-here are some tips for producing amazing emails that will drive more traffic to your website and boost sales.
1. Setup Opt-In Form
Setting up your marketing campaign to persuade people to actually send you their emails is really the first step in the lead generation at the top of the sales funnel. You may choose to have a single or double opt-in lead. A single opt-in is typically just an email address that is sent without a confirmation, and a double opt-in refers to the type of signup where there is a confirmation email after the successful registration.
A single opt-in is more immediate and direct, but you may also end up with a lot of fake and incorrect emails on your list, which is a waste of everyone’s time. Using a double opt-in option prevents this from occurring and confirms the user’s interest in entering the list. It will shield you from spam, too. You can also use software such as Optin Monster to set up subscription forms and create campaigns.
2. User Experience
You know your own inbox is too full, don’t you? Don’t you get upset about all the “extra” stuff that seems to be stuffed with every morning? You have to presume, at least in a general sense, that your own experience is not much different from that of your clients or customers. That’s why you need to concentrate on UX ( user experience) when you are doing some kind of digital marketing. This basically means that you need to put yourself in the shoes of your audience and be sure to offer something of value every single time, rather than stuffing their mailbox with junk mail.
3. The Subject Line
Subject lines, like any headline, matter more than ever before because of the attention of the average Internet user these days. Customized subject line emails are 26% more likely to be opened. If you visualize a user who might be yourself, scrolling through your Facebook feed, for example , you know that it’s only a matter of seconds that makes you click on one headline versus another.
Read Also: How To Build & Nurture Email Marketing List Of Quality Customers
Subject lines, like headlines, are the first people that people glance at as their going through their inbox in the morning. This is the hook that will get them to open an email, or not. This is also the first step in deciding your CTR.You have got about two seconds to hook up with the reader. How are you doing this? In a concise way, you demonstrate clear value. You need to fix a pain point, ignite curiosity, make them feel something in the span of five words.
Open rates will depend on the type of value you express in the first few seconds. And doing this well would also boost the brand awareness. Here are some basic suggestions for the creation of eye-catching subject lines:
- Customize – create a buyer persona
- Create urgency – highlight an offer that is time-sensitive or scarce.
- Question – Ask a question
- Be concise – especially for mobile devices where space is limited
- Incentive – make them an offer they can’t refuse (to be curious about)
4. Design and Layout
The first thing you need to consider when you are dealing with emails is that your mobile phone may still be a little finicky when it comes to UX. This means that it is important to have a mobile website and an email setup. The issue is that many email programs that provide a mobile-friendly setup might not really be that usable on the mobile for some certain email elements, such as buttons, do not match the screen properly.
Read Also: Why Digital Marketing Is Important To Small Businesses
Another thing you want to remember when it comes to layout is getting colorful, easy-to-see HTML buttons as your call to action. It’s as easy as looking at a bid, an interesting article or a sale. You are going to want to play around with the scale of these kinds of visuals in relation to the text, both in scale and positioning. Any visual has the potential to interest a person, or to do the opposite, so be sure to always have a few versions to test.
5. Segmentation
Depending on how you actually create your email list in the first place, your product and other variables, generally, you can’t presume that a generic email “blast” is going to be a successful way to reach every corner of your audience. That’s why most email programs have a segmentation option that can be focused on factors such as:
- Demography
- Location of
- Age
- Gender
- Date Subscription
- Interest group
It’s all about targeting the market. According to MailChimp’s study, segmented campaigns have an average open rate of over 14 percent higher than non-segmented campaigns. It may seem like a second-nature to keep a close eye on your most engaged group of followers, but what you can do is the opposite; monitoring the actions of your least interested segment, including keeping an eye on the unsubscribe rate. Generally, the low end of unsubscribe rates drops by 0.2-0.3 percent, and this varies depending on the sector.
6. Get Creative About Testing
There are so many factors that can impact your open rates, which is what makes this more of an art form than a science. Of course, you are always going to draw data to help you define and refine your strategy, but there are some things you can consider as you do so.
First, you will have to position your offer. Should it be at the top? The bottom? Is it in a bold color? Is this connected to an important article? You will want to consider how many times you send the same email of the same deal or turn it around to advertise different products at different times. If you start with a lower discount offer and do not see an increase in the click-through rate, for instance, you can point to a higher discount in the next email.
Other examples of things to try during testing include dividing your list by half and a/b testing different subject lines, sending them at different times of the day, experimenting with emergency indicators in subject lines, being slightly vague in subject lines, changing your sign-off strategy, using statements versus questions, and experimenting with layout.
7. Make it Action-Oriented
Any successful content marketing professional would know that in order to have an effective marketing strategy, you need to start with your call to action (CTA) or your main marketing target and make a clear user experience through different channels. To this end, you need to make sure that you include your CTA in your emails very clearly. This often takes the form of a long-form sales page, but sometimes including your CTA early in the email can be just as successful. And getting action-oriented phrases and vocabulary all the way through is a must.
Consider creating a CTA in the form of a demo video, a coupon, a “press for more” button, or a lead to an interesting post. The point is to illustrate the value for your customers, which is easy to absorb, as the reader is always unnecessarily text-heavy. Give people a reason to act almost as soon as they open an email, make it as quick as possible to take action, and they will do so.
Conclusion
For almost everyone, boosting their CTR is a bit of a trial-and-error process, but so long as you have some time, the right tools, and some creativity, it can actually be fun to experiment with. Keeping an open mind and trying new things is what digital marketing is all about, so if you and your team keep working at it, you are bound to see success.