Believe me, we know it takes time to build a quality email list. But never, ever buy a list. It’s a waste of your hard-earned money, you’ll see virtually no results, and worst of all you’ll get tagged by spam filters, not to mention the possible fine of $11,000 for each offense, according to the Federal Trade Commission based on the CAN-SPAM Act of 2003.
So let’s assume you have a credible email list. Now, how do you get your customers to take notice?
It’s now time to get happy as we have the inside scoop on what’s working in the world of email outreach!
Over 12 million outreach emails where analyzed and here are the results…
Let’s face it. The success of your business strongly depends on your ability to reach clients. Here are some tips and tools to help you engage with clients through email marketing.
10 Ways to Improve Your Email Open Rate
1. Open Rates
The average open rate for all industries analyzed is 20.81%. This number represents how many people opened your email. Different industries, i.e. Retail, Restaurants, etc. have different averages. So for a more specific count for your business, you should Google open rates for your specific industry.
2. Click-Throughs
After open rates, come click-through rates. This means that someone has opened your email AND clicked on a specific topic for more information. The average click-rate for all industries analyzed is 2.43%. Again, for a more specific count, Google your industry.
3. Subject Lines
Less is not more, when it comes to email subject lines. Long subject lines have a 24.6% higher response rate compared to short subject lines. The ideal outreach email subject line length is 36-50 characters (interesting note, our email subject line “10 ways to improve your email open rate” is 40 characters including spaces).
4. Multiple Contacts
Sending emails to businesses reaching multiple people in the same company lead to more success. The response rate of email outreach that is sent to multiple contacts is 93% higher than that sent to just one person. So get multiple contact names from the same business.
5. Multiple Times
The most successful outreach email campaigns reach out to multiple contacts multiple times. This is where email automation comes in handy. Basically, sending out email messages more than once, to more than one person boosts response rates by 160%. This is also where marketing frequency, consistency and regularity come into play.
6. Spam Filters
If you want people to open your email, you have to avoid spam filters. There is no magic button to bypass spam filters, but there are best practices the help you avoid them. Personalizing the “To:” field of your campaign, always provide an unsubscribe link and you must include your physical mailing address.
7. Personalized Messages
In addition to the above, emails with personalized messages, i.e. “Hi Kathy,” have a 32.7% better response rate than no personalization. Let’s face it, we all want to feel special so including the person’s name goes a long way vs. being generic or nothing at all.
8. Best Days
Wednesday tends to be the best day to send outreach emails. Saturday was deemed the worst. However, studies show there is no significant difference in response rates between days, it’s just that Wednesday is slightly better.
9. Social Media
Linking your social media in your email signatures have better response rates and click-through. Instagram was correlated with a 23.4% increase, LinkedIn 11.5% and Twitter 8.2%. This validates that cross-promotion and multiple touchpoints are key to increasing client engagement.
10. Email Analytics
Review your email analytics. Look at past performance to see which campaigns got the best response and which got the lowest. This will help you craft future campaigns based on past success rates.
FREE Consultation
We at Exceller Marketing are experts at email marketing and automation. We’re here to help you. Whether you just have a question, or would like a FREE consultation, we welcome you to contact us today.
Best regards, until next time!
Kathy Argyros
Founder and Chief Consultant
Exceller Marketing, Inc.
914-450-9149
kathy@excellermarketing.com
excellermarketing.com
Exceller Marketing is a boutique-style, full-service web design and digital marketing agency in Westchester County, NY. We empower small businesses and entrepreneurs with outstanding web design and expert digital marketing services that keep our clients ahead of their competition.
Sources: Backlinko, Pitchbox, MailChimp
