1. Objectives

The majority of e-mail marketing is to drive people to a website, but the underlying objective is to improve sales and increase profits. It is obviously more desirable to have fewer visitors and great sales, than having millions of visitors and a poor conversion rate.

E-mail marketing is also used to improve brand awareness. A well thought out email marketing campaign will help readers to remember your name, products or services. As potential customers gain more exposure to your relevant and useful marketing emails, they will grow to trust you and be more likely to purchase from you now or in the future.

2. Data Management

Look after your data and your data will look after your profits.

Essential for effective communication! Data needs to be kept up-to-date and relevant. Inaccurate data is not only a waste of your budget, but can also affect your business' image through: wrong addressing; duplicated mailings; personalisation errors.

Whether developing your own list or purchasing lists from others, the option for recipients to subscribe or unsubscribe is essential and these requests must be adhered to avoid the possibility of being flagged as sending spam email.

3. Subject Line

Your first point of contact, and you need to ensure that it won't be the last. A great subject line must be newsworthy and eye-catching. It must grab the readers' attention and evoke an emotive response such as appeal, controversy or intrigue.

An intriguing subject line will capture the readers' curiosity, ensuring they read on. However, be careful that the subject line is not misleading or you will lose their trust.

4. Content

Your intriguing subject line has left readers no choice but to read your e-mail content, but to keep them interested, a friendly and inspiring tone is mandatory. Personalise the greeting message, make them feel important. Be sure to inform but in a friendly manner.

Content must be both grammatically and factually flawless or readers will be turned off. Run spell and link checks to ensure perfection. Include an obvious and effective Call To Action, be it click to a free trial, a purchase, or even forward the email to friends. Interaction means a successful campaign.

5. Links

Links enable readers to interact with your website. They should be clearly visible without being too obvious. Include two or three so as not to take away from the e-mail content and lead readers to them by enticing them with more information rather than telling them to "Click here". Ensure all links are work and direct to the correct page. A broken or incorrect link could destroy a campaign.

6. Website

Your e-mail campaign is ready to go but is your website ready? On leaving the e-mail, bring readers directly to what they have clicked on, otherwise they will be put off. Encourage and teach them about the product or service until they are convinced.

Web pages must be ready to convert visitors to become buyers or subscribers. Call To Actions must be clearly visible and ready to complete the sale.

7. Deliverability

Testing your deliverability is essential prior to sending a campaign; it could mean the difference between success and failure.

Rather than having your message lost in people's €junk' folders, check how your message rates through a spam filter. A good email marketing service, will do this by default as it immediately identifies the elements most likely to trigger the filters and can allow you to make adjustments accordingly.

8. Timing

The timing of a campaign can have a significant impact on its effectiveness.

Overnight, most people's emails fill up; in most cases, many of them are spam. This leaves a very real chance that they will simply ignore or delete your email without noticing who sent it, what it is about, or whether they have any interest in reading it.

Consider your target market and when they are most likely to be sat in front of their email. Those with a global market may find this more difficult because of the time difference, but always bear it in mind.

9. Tracking

Tracking the performance of a campaign is essential. It is the only true method of determining a campaign's success and your ROI.

By adding tracking tags, it is possible to track a user's trail from the time a campaign is sent, to a recipient's final purchase of a product or service. You can also track: who opened the message; which links they clicked on; and how long they spent on the site; and whether any action was taken.

With this ability, potential customers' can now be monitored and understood; enabling you to target them in a measured and relevant way.

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