How To Improve Your Open Rates And Click-Thru Rates In Your Email
Campaigns by Dejan Bizinger
In this article we will give you several tips that can help you in improving
your open and click-thru rates.
1) Open rate
In order to your email campaign be successful the first necessary thing is that
people open and read your email newsletter. Online publishing is very similar
to traditional publishing. When you buy a daily newspaper, you probably don't
read everything. You don't have that much of free time and not every subject is
equally interesting for you. If you are a sports fan you will read the sport
section but you might skip an article about latest movies . In most cases you
will decide what you are going to read upon subject titles.
Same thing with email newsletters. One of the two most important factors that
influence whether or not your subscriber will open your email newsletter will
be your subject line. In order to have good open rates and click-thru rates you
have to know your audience. Your message has to be well targeted.
There are several rules you have to follow in order to make effective subject
lines.
Subject lines
Your subject lines should be short and snappy to get attention of your
subscribers. Many people receive dozens of emails every day and some other
people that have web sites and often make posts on different places like web
forums, discussion lists, publish articles, can get more than 100 emails per
day. So your message will have a very big competition in your subscriber's
inbox. That's why your subject line has to grab attention of your subscriber.
This doesn't mean that you have to use usual spam techniques. On the contrary.
Avoid using words FREE, GUARANTEED, Make Money Fast, Limited Offer and other
get-rich-quick schemes words. Not just because of your subscribers. If you use
these words it is most likely that your emails will never even reach them.
Their ISP will take care of that with their spam filters. Also don't capitalize
every letter and don't put several times exclamation. You don't need to shout,
people will "hear" you if you know how to "tell" them your message.
So your subject line has to be short and snappy, best thing is that you include
one title from your articles in your subject line. It can be some breaking news
or exlusive interview. People like to read breaking news or exclusive
interviews that can't be found anywhere else. Also, people often read how-to
articles (for example - How To Choose The Right Email Marketing Software) or so
called "number" articles (for example - 7 Tips For E-publishers On A Shoestring
Budget).
Good thing is that you put your newsletter name in brackets, at the beginning
of your subject line in order to be easily recognized from other emails in
inbox.
Please bear in mind, that your subject line has to be consistent. What do I
mean by that? Of course that you will change the title in your subject line but
you have to find the best subject form and stick to it. For example:
[NewslettterName] Your Subject Title, Issue #x, Date Don't forget, in order to
make effective ads and this apply to subject lines, as well you have to
remember 3 words - test, test, test! You have to experiment with different
models and find out which work best for you. From field
Beside Subject line, From field is another info that your recipients will see
in their inbox. People have to trust you in order to decide to read your
emails. You don't open your doors to every person who knocks, don't you?
If you are well-known person, trusted expert in your industry, for example some
reputable Internet consultant and you are the only person that is involved in
creation and publishing of the newsletter put your name in From field. If
several people are involved in that process and if it is a corporate
newsletter, use your company name.
Most important thing with From fields is that you don't experiment with it.
Choose one From field and stick to that. It is very un-professional that you
often change your From field and beside that, in that case, your open rate will
decline.
Useful tip is that you ask your subscribers to make a filter rule for your
email newsletter, based on your email address, From field or some part of your
Subject line. For example, they can put [YourNewsletterName] in a filter rule
for your newsletter or your From field name so every time they get the email
newsletter that matches that rule it will be moved to a specially designed
folder, for example YourNewsletterName. So this way your newsletter won't end
in their Bulk folder. That is also one of the reasons why you should be
consistent with your From field and subject line.
2) Click-Thru Rates
Clicks come once your email newsletter is opened. With good open rate you have
finished only one part of the job. Now, your newsletter has to be well designed
with appropriate content and concept, and most important, well targeted in
order to have a decent click-thru ratio (CTR). You have to know your audience.
You can increase your CTR if you put your most important articles and ads at
the top of your email newsletters. Don't write too long articles. It is better
to write articles where you will list several tips. Also, don't overload your
newsletter with ads. People want to read useful things and not lots of ads.
Also, you know that a picture is worth more than 1000 words, so it is good that
if you publish a HTML newsletter that you include photos that will be relevant
to your articles and that are clickable. Click-Thru rates get higher if you
give some value-added services to your subscribers. You have to make a good
relationship with them. Treat them well, write useful articles, give exclusive
discounts to your subscribers and they will show their appreciation.
Different types of email newsletters have different click-thru ratio.
Click-Thru ratio is important, but it is not the most important. Just because
many people click on your follow-up article or offer doesn't mean that they
will actually buy your software or service. In some cases, lower CTR can get
you more sales than some good CTR. Think about that next time you start your
email campaign.
About the Author
Dejan Bizinger is a Contributing Editor for Infacta. Infacta is email messaging
services company providing powerful, yet easy-to-use award-winning Group Mail,
software for sending highly-personalized email messages and Group Metrics,
software for email tracking. For more information visit:
http://www.infacta.com
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