Email Marketing - No not spam

Email Marketing - A Step By Step Guide (cont...)

Step 6 - Deployment

Any good email marketer should be able to ensure an excellent delivery rate. A challenge for email marketers today is getting past the various spam filters on the path to the readers inbox. It is worthwhile to check emails against various spam filters, like Spamassasin, to ensure your legitimate message is not mistakenly picked up by one of them.

Delivering emails at correct and consistent times also contributes to the reader fostering a relationship with your organisation. A good offline example of this relationship is the daily newspaper delivery which arrives at your door at the same time every day, week or month.

Step 7 - Tracking and Reporting

It is crucial to determine the success of your email campaign on the short and long term basis. For this you will need an email tracking system which produces statistics in a user friendly manner. It is important that these statistics are used in a way which improves and refines the email campaign to boost your goals and return on investment (ROI). The following measurables contribute to your understanding of the performance of email campaigns:

  • Subscriber Growth vs. Decline - Tracking the growth or shrinkage of your database can help you analyse what is or what is not working in a newsletter. A significant or consistent loss in subscribers is a key indication that you are not meeting the needs of your subscribers. A high pass on rate indicates that your list values the content enough to constantly share with others. Splitting the list and testing 2 versions of the newsletter can help determine the cause of high unsubscribe rates. The size of the list however, is not as important as the quality thereof as a high percentage response from your existing newsletter recipients carries more impact than subscriber growth which may still yield low response rates.

  • Click Through Rates and Conversion - This measures the effectiveness of your email via the links placed therein. When a reader clicks through to a webpage, these can be easily measured as a percentage against number of delivered, opened or sent emails. By analysing these statistics, the email marketer will be able to tell which content or promotion was the most enticing for the reader. Measuring the click throughs and conversion rates will ensure that you are able to track differences and trends the same way over time in order to improve the newsletter content and its impact.

  • Feedback and Interaction Handling - The feedback from readers is probably the best way to gauge what impression your newsletter is making on them. If you are receiving regular positive feedback, chances are that many of your readers are impressed with the style and content of the newsletter. Evaluating what they are saying about you in other areas on the Internet will also help you get a better picture of the reputation of your brand online.

  • Split testing - This is one of the most important parts of an Email Marketing Campaign! Split testing across a host of factors like open rates, across different subject lines, different days of the week and times of the day, different copy styles and email length, for example, will enable you to see what is working best for your campaign. In short, there is no alternative to putting a lot of time and energy into testing and fine tuning your email marketing strategy - your open rates will improve and the results are well worth it!

Well there you have it; we now know email marketing is controllable and measurable: making it one of the best means to ensure a return on your investment, by acquiring new customers and new sales.

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