THE 10 BEST HACKS TO INCREASE YOUR EMAIL OPEN RATE

by Steve Grant

Email marketing is still one of the best strategies to get your business in front of your target audience. However, it's getting more and more difficult to catch people’s attention and have them open it. You may have the best content, but everything becomes pointless when your email gets thrown to spam or trash.

 Monitoring your open rate is a great way to monitor how effective your email marketing efforts are. If you want to keep your leads interested and if you want your content to stand out in a crowded inbox, follow these 10 clever tricks that will increase the open rate of the email marketing you send out.

1. CHOOSE A FUN OR QUIRKY SUBJECT LINE

The subject line of your email is the first thing that prospective leads see. If it doesn’t grab their attention, then expect that they won’t open it. Having a slight obscure and intriguing subject, or one that gets them wondering about what happens next will stir up their curiosity and this will increase the chances of your email being opened.

2. MAKE IT PERSONAL

Keeping a casual tone makes the reader feel more connected to you, it makes you more relatable. Make the reader feel that you wrote the email just for them. Write is as if you are writing something to a friend. When sending your emails, refrain from sending it from your company name. Use the name of a person in the sender ID because getting an email from an actual living person makes it more engaging.

3. OPTIMISE FOR MOBILE

Over 80% of people access email via their mobile phones, so make sure that your email is displayed correctly when accessed on a phone or tablet. When using CTA’s check that the page the links lead to are also optimised for mobile.

4. SEGMENT NAMES INTO INTERESTS

Sending emails to new subscribers is a great example for this. Have multiple lists or lists with different criteria. Have lists that are segmented by gender, fitness goal etc. The list you use will depend on the content of the email that you want to send out. Having this in place will ensure you are getting the right content in front of the right people and not triggering people to unsubscribe.

5. DETERMINE THE BEST TIME OF DELIVERY

Avoid sending campaigns Fridays because there’s a notable drop going into the weekend. A bit of A/B testing will help you determine the best days to send emails to your target audience.

6. STAY AWAY FROM SPAM TRIGGERS

Having an unsubscribe option will help you avoid being redirected to the spam folder. There are certain words that automatically send your email to spam, and people will never see your campaigns when they end up here. Avoid using sales-y words such as discount, free, cash, or buy. Aim to have all followers opt-in or whitelist your email so it doesn’t go to junk.

7. ALL KILLER, NO FILLER

A button that leads a reader to further content is the best way to keep your emails simple and direct to the point. Make all of your content engaging and relevant. It’s better to send out shorter emails more frequently than sending out content that your audience doesn’t want to read.

8. USE CTA’S

Call to actions are very important tools that you have to incorporate into your email marketing. They help add value to your content and make your emails drive a point. A CTA button is usually used as a conclusion to an email and can be used as an incentive for your audience to open future emails that you send out.

9. KEEP YOUR LISTS HEALTHY

If you are getting a lot of unsubscribes or bounces, take some time to clean up your lists every quarter. Take off inactive emails and check in with people who haven’t opened anything and confirm they wish to continue to receive content.

10. KEEP YOUR CONTENT INTERESTING

Injecting new info, research or humour into your emails can help engage your audience. People respond well to being treated as an actual person and change it up a bit by adding animate GIFs or incorporating videos into your content.