Many businesses across the South West will have been collecting the email addresses of potential and existing customers for years and years. Whilst obtaining them is reasonably commonplace (we’re not talking massive CRM systems here, it could be in a simple spreadsheet or even if they’re still nestled in your inbox!), the understanding of how to then use them to your marketing advantage is still surprising less known.

Let me explain six simple ways to make more from your email addresses…

How often should you send?

It’s a given that you should be using email marketing, and that you should be using it to keep in regular contact with potential and existing customers / clients. But how often should you be sending? As a bare minimum, you should be sending an email campaign once a month. At the most frequent, once every two weeks. If you fall outside once a month you’re going to be more sporadic (remember they won’t read every one), so when it comes to making or encouraging them to make a procurement decision, you could end up missing the boat.

How long should your subject line be?

You only get one chance to make a first impression, and with email this is your subject line. It’ll be the initial element that dictates whether or not they’re going to open the email, so making sure it’s great is vital.

Less is more with these; subjects with less than 30 characters gain more opens, and if you go beyond that half of your subject line could be hidden behind an ellipsis, depending on how wide that element of their email client is.

So keep it short and snappy, and monitor open rates over time to see what works for you. Once something works, keep it that way to breed familiarity (people like it when they know what they’re getting).

Don’t use !! or uppercase words unless you want a serious collision with a spam filter.

Who should you be sending it from?

People buy from people, so when it comes to sender name make sure it’s coming from a human. Sending from Mark at MiHi Digital rather than simply ‘MiHi Digital’ increased our own open rates, and it’ll likely increase yours (particularly if the person is well known to the recipient).

When should you send it?

This depends on whom you’re sending to. If you’re sending to other businesses then you’re going to want to send inside office hours, and you’re going to want to avoid Monday (nobody likes Mondays), Fridays (nobody makes decisions at the end of the week and will have forgotten by Monday, when they’re unhappy again!), the start of the day (inbox is full) and the end of the day (they’re going home!).

That leaves you with 11:00am to 2:30pm on a Tuesday, Wednesday or Thursday. Trial and see what works for you.

If you’re sending to individuals and private consumers it’s a different kettle of fish; go with when they’re at home and when they’re likely to make decisions on buying; for example a Sunday evening or late afternoon is great for ecommerce. If you’re selling holidays you might want to go Thursday or Friday evening so they have time to think about it and make that decision over the weekend. Again, make sure you trial this and find what works for you. There are no exact answers here as every dataset will have its own preferences.

How do you increase clicks on your email?

Simply by getting your content right, and also your layout. We have no doubt you’re good at what you do, so having a branded template (free from a Mail Chimp monkey in a hat) will be essential in increasing your performance.

If certain topics gain more clicks then share more information on those areas! It’s not rocket science but it is something a lot of people miss with their email marketing.

Big buttons… or just buttons to be honest!

People know where they stand with buttons; they click on them. Having large clickable areas in the form of a button will increase click throughs. It’s as simple as that! Also make sure that your images are also clickable links, as well as the titles of articles / blog posts. That’s an easy win that does work!

For more information on how we can help with your email marketing, turning your emails into a potential goldmine, please give us a call on 01566 232323 or email us at hello@mihidigital.co.uk