5 Simple Ways to Optimize Your Email Marketing Campaigns

It’s easy to just shoot out any mass-email to people on your mailing list. If you have a high volume of emails, you’re likely to make some money from your campaigns. But if you have an email list, why not optimize your email campaigns?

You already have people’s information, and you can communicate with the 10,000 people on your email list better than you can with 10,000 new people who you’d have to somehow reach through other means (i.e. advertising, media, etc.). Optimizing your email campaigns means lower costs and more money in your pocket. There are many simple ways to make sure you’re making more from your campaigns.

1. Segment email subscribers into ‘buckets’

Understand their demographic, their purchasing preferences, if they’ve purchased before, and how well they received your product or service. Then tailor specific messages for each of the ‘buckets’ to give them relevant and interesting offers. Let them know you understand their situation and that you have the proper solution to their needs.

2. Record when customers last purchased and target times to re-sell

The customer needs time after they last received product to be ready to purchase again. Depending on your offering that time can be less than 1 day, a whole month, or maybe even a year. Make sure to follow up with them with new offers and deals when they are ready to purchase again to remind them to turn to you for needs fulfillment.

3. Depending on frequency, you will have to adjust your offers – more frequent emails mean more compelling offers

If you send an email immediately after someone has purchased something from you, you need to make sure the offer is compelling enough for them to pay you more money, because they are less likely to purchase again in that immediate time since they’ve just spent money with you. But you do not necessarily have to have less compelling offers if you email your list less frequently.

4. Test different email subject lines and body templates

Testing different headlines and messages is important to improving open rates and conversion rates. Send test emails (perhaps only to 5-10% of your email list) to see how well your consumers react to the different messages. Then you can figure out what are the best messages which will lead the remaining people on your email list to open and convert at a higher rate.

5. Have permission email lists – past customers, people that downloaded a whitepaper, signed up for an update, etc. Don’t buy databases and SPAM. No one appreciates that

Online consumers are becoming more and more tech- and web-savvy. They’ve learned to use their email filter better and have also learned to tune out most unfamiliar sales messages. Sure you can buy huge email lists, get a 0.01% open rate and a 0.005% conversion rate and get some sales because you played the volume game, but the quality of your email list will always be better if you opted for permission marketing. You also save money because you didn’t pay for a HUGE (and sometimes worthless) email list.

This article was written by the Chief Evangelist of Blank Label, Danny Wong.

Blank Label co-creates men’s dress shirts online for stylish professionals and suave dressers. You can read more about what he’s doing at Blank Label and fashion musings on the men’s fashion blog.

Photo Credit: Mzelle Biscotte