 So your email creative is highly relevant, the subject line is compelling and your landing pages are primed and ready to convert. Ready to hit "send"? STOP! Unless you've taken the right steps to ensure email deliverability, hitting send could actually damage your reputation with subscribers and ISPs. Here's what you need to know about email deliverability and how to ensure your message reaches the inbox every time.
According to MarketingSherpa's 2010 Email Marketing Benchmark Report, there are five top reasons why consumers unsubscribe from email lists:
1. They find the content irrelevant
2. They get messages too frequently
3. They believe that their address has been sold
4. They don't remember signing up with your business
5. They have concerns about how you will handle their private information
It's easy to see from the list above that trust is a huge part of your relationship with your email subscribers. To build that trust, you must invest the time and effort necessary to build and maintain your company's positive online reputation - which requires an unwavering commitment to follow email marketing and deliverability best practices. We'll explore the specifics of deliverability best practices in this two-part series.
At the risk of sounding like a broken record, our first suggestion is to ensure that you get people's permission to send them email. Gaining opt-in permission is not only a best practice - it's also the law. However, some companies choose to go above and beyond what the law requires and request a double opt-in, which confirms a subscriber's intent to join a specific list. If you've ever signed up for a mailing list and then received an email with a link that allows you to confirm your subscription, you've successfully completed a double opt-in process.
Companies are also giving subscribers an easy way to both unsubscribe and to change their email preferences. How often do they include these options? In every email they send. From your opt-in confirmation email to your standard newsletter, consider providing subscribers with an option to "update your profile" or "change your communication preferences". By assuring subscribers that they are in control of their email experience with your company, you are building a stronger relationship with them.
Consider it an investment in the future of your email marketing campaigns. Sending anything that even seems like unsolicited email jeopardizes your company's reputation among consumers and ISPs, and resolving deliverability issues and spam complaints that result from unwanted communications is both time consuming and expensive. Think of the double opt-in and subscriber preferences options as a bit of insurance against future deliverability issues.
According to the previously mentioned MarketingSherpa Benchmark Report, the double opt-in process that can have such a positive impact on deliverability is one that is being largely ignored by email marketers. While it is true that a double opt-in process may reduce your email list's growth potential, it also substantially decreases your list churn, which leads to increased subscriber engagement and improvements in email deliverability. In this case, the advantages of the double opt-in process outweigh any perceived or real disadvantages.
Give Email Subscribers What They Want, When They Want It
During the sign up process or the welcome program, ensure that you ask your subscribers about their preferences and then follow those preferences. Did your subscribers sign up for an exclusive list of tips to help them improve the ROI of their advertising spend? Then ensure the list is exclusive - not just something they can browse through your site and see. Did your subscribers sign up for a weekly newsletter? Make certain their newsletter is delivered on time, but resist the temptation to send them additional messages during the week.
Following through on what you've promised email subscribers by communicating with them in a way that works best for them shows them that you value their preferences and that you are a company that keeps your promises - and can likely deliver on even greater promises like your service's benefits or product's features.
Don't Forget About Spam
Even if you've had your head under an email marketing rock for the last decade you've heard of "spam". But did you know that there's more to spam than simply sending an unsolicited email? It's important that you keep up with the laws and understand what the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) defines as spam, so that you can take the proper steps to protect your online reputation and your email deliverability.
The FTC, working with consumers and online industry experts, has created and enforced a set of laws known as CAN-SPAM. These laws clearly define exactly what is permissible and what is not when sending commercial email marketing. But the FTC isn't the only player in the game - ISPs also play a big role in determining what is considered spam. And the ways that ISPs determine spam have more to do with email recipient behaviors and filtering techniques than a legal edict.
For example, ISPs pay close attention to those email messages that are added to a blocked sender list, as well as those that are consistently ignored or moved to a spam folder. They also use advanced automated filtering techniques to try to stop the flow of spam, though many legitimate messages are inadvertently caught in the filter.
When it comes to improving deliverability, there are a number of things that email marketers can do to address the challenges that spam creates:
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Double-check that every email campaign follows CAN-SPAM laws
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Follow email marketing best practices in every campaign
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Regularly review your unsubscribe methodologies to ensure CAN-SPAM compliance
Imagine that you've just spent some time looking around the ABC Online Shoe Store at winter boots. Seeing a sidebar element that says “sign up here for coupons, special offers and more!" on their website, you decide to see just what kind of special offers and discounts they have in mind. However, when you check your email a little while later, a quick glance shows you that you haven't yet received anything from them, so you head back online and start browsing another site.
In the meantime, the ABC Online Shoe Store's email is sitting in your inbox. How could you have missed it? Because some companies still don't recognize the value in a recognizable “from” address. In this example, imagine that ABC Online Shoe Store's from address is “Virginia Smith”, the name of one of their online customer service representatives, rather than from “ABC Online Shoe Store”. Now it's much easier to see how the email may have been overlooked.
Subscribers are more likely to open messages and click on the links within them when they recognize the sender's name, and they're also more likely to white list (i.e. add to safe senders list or address book) your from address when they realize it's consistent across your communications. If you're truly interested in improving your deliverability and ensuring your legitimate email makes it to its intended destination, pay attention to your from address.
Format, Then Test
We've mentioned it in other articles and newsletters, but it's still worth repeating here: format and then test. Ensure that your email message looks the way you intended by testing it in a variety of email clients. Oddly formatted emails raise the eyebrows of recipients and ISPs, so be certain to perform your due diligence when it comes to your email's design and rendering. After all, if recipients can't read your message, they can hardly take advantage of what you're offering.
If you're like many marketers who handle your company's email marketing and your other online marketing activities, you understand the importance of keeping it relevant. Whether you're doing a PPC campaign, designing a landing page, developing an ad or launching another email campaign, ensuring that your content and offer are relevant to your audience is a key to any campaign's success. All of these elements are aspects of your brand that are related and can have an impact on each other, as well as your deliverability. It is not enough to be relevant within one email campaign; strive for relevance across channels in order to reassure people that they are making the right choice by clicking on your ad or opening your email.
Take Advantage of Authentication Methods
If you've been putting off incorporating authentication into your current IT infrastructure, there's no better time than the present to make the move. Authentication simply verifies that the email sender is who he says he is, so that recipients can then make the decision of whether or not to read the email. You can incorporate authentication systems by going through a vendor like DomainKeys or, if you're a Lyris client, you can sit back and know that it's taken care of because authentication methods are a standard part of all of our email marketing solutions.
Keep it Consistent
As we've mentioned before, one of the ways that ISPs gauge whether an email sender is legitimate or not is by gathering information about recipient behavior. If your email recipients routinely open your email, click through your links and take other actions, they're sending the message to the ISP that this is email that they want and that is relevant to their needs.
The consistency between your marketing messages, your landing pages, confirmation pages, etc. can have a huge impact on how subscribers relate to your site and subsequently, how ISPs view you. If your campaigns, landing pages and website lack continuity and consistency, you're likely looking at higher abandonment rates, lower conversion rates and a black spot on your online reputation. Keep consistency in the forefront of your mind as you're developing your marketing program and assessing its supporting materials.
Another important email deliverability factor is good list hygiene. Regularly update and review your email list to determine things like which subscribers haven't opened or clicked through your email in the last six months; then, send that group an email asking them to confirm their desire to be on the list before purging their email addresses. Also, make use of automated tools that manage hard and soft bounces, time-outs, and list preferences and unsubscribes - trying to do these tasks manually has too high of a potential for error.
Develop and Maintain Good ISP Relations
When it comes to marketing, we all realize that the key is to develop a strong relationship with our prospects and customers. But did you realize that relationships can also have an impact on your email deliverability? It's important to build and develop positive relationships with the most common ISPs or to align yourself with an email solution provider (like Lyris) that already has strong relationships with ISPs in place. Don't underestimate the power of relationships and a good email sender reputation when it comes to correcting a misunderstanding that led to a deliverability issue.
Email Deliverability Made Simple
Deliverability is one of those things that email marketers may tend to ignore until it presents a problem, but like many things, it's better to prevent deliverability issues than to try to recover from them. By sticking to a double opt-in process, meeting your subscribers' expectations, ensuring you're in compliance with spam laws, paying attention to your from address, and keeping email messages relevant and consistent, you'll be well on your way toward reducing the potential for deliverability problems. Taking the additional steps of employing authentication methods, practicing good list hygiene and working well with the ISPs will ensure that your email marketing makes it to the intended destinations today as well as in the future.
For more email deliverability tips and best practices:
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About the Author
David Fowler is the director of email strategy, deliverability and privacy compliance for Lyris. He consults with email marketers to help them get better results from their email programs.
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