Over the past five years, email marketing has become one of the most effective ways to reach your targeted audience, because it offers so many different ways to present your content.
But as online marketing guru Barry Feldman discovered when he interviewed email marketing expert Hunter Boyle, one of the main reasons emails fail to persuade recipients to engage with a site is that they are often written with boring subject lines and bland content.
So your job as a business owner is twofold: create great emails, and then decide how to best use those emails to attract your target market.
The problem is that there are three myths out there that can derail your carefully built campaigns.
1. Keep the Emails Short and Pithy
Your email newsletters shouldn’t be as long as a Russian novel, but you can’t make this a hard-and-fast rule when it comes to your email marketing strategy?
Why?
Because there are some marketing emails that require links and offers that can take up more space and require list recipients to scroll down the page.
And that may not be a bad thing, depending on the subject of your email.
For example, if you’re introducing a new product or service, a longer email is necessary for you to detail what makes the product or service beneficial to the targeted consumer.
If you’re offering a discount or announcing a sale, a short and concise email listing the items on sale or the specific deals you’re offering is sufficient and more likely to lead to a click to your landing page.
And as social media strategist Donna Moritz advised in this piece, an email list also gives you the perfect opportunity to survey your consumers and find out more about their wants and needs.
2. A High Unsubscribe Rate Means Your Campaign Is Failing
Consumers who actually take the time to unsubscribe from your list may have been a wrong fit for the goods and services you’re offering.
Just because you were careful in targeting a consumer doesn’t mean you will always be right about that person’s wants and needs.
Your unsubscribe rate may actually be trimming your email marketing list in a way that you could never do on your own, and the truth is, those consumers weren’t likely to engage with your products and services.
To help offset your unsubscribe rate, you should target new consumers to replace the email recipients you have lost.
3. Don’t Send Frequent Emails
Send as many emails as you’ve determined through analytics and targeted consume research that is required to engage your customers.
But here’s the key.
You also have to give them clear, actionable ways to opt-out if they feel that you are overwhelming them with too many emails.
That’s the balance needed to mitigate any discomfort your consumers might feel.
That means opt-outs with multiple options such as monthly emails only, weekly emails, emails only when there are sales and discounts, and emails only tied to new products and services.
It’s All About Balance
It’s a bit misleading to call these “myths,” as there are substantive truths in all three of these marketing strategies, but adhering too closely to each one of them can drive you off-track.
The best way to handle these myths is to analyze how each can help or hinder your existing email marketing campaign, and adjust accordingly. And by following the tips outlined here, you won’t feel as if you have to go all-in on a strategy that may not help you achieve your business goals.
