Unfortunately, recent changes in technology have meant the approaches from previous years will not work anymore. Here are three secrets to help you get ahead of these changes to succeed while your competitors continue to get ignored.
1. Avoid the dreaded "U" word
While marketers are required to include an unsubscribe link in email messages by the U.S. CAN-SPAM Act, the word “unsubscribe” is a trigger that causes emails to be pre-sorted into Gmail's promotional tabs. Research has found that using the word “unsubscribe” reduces open rates in marketing emails by at least 25 percent, and since our audience isn't exclusively using Gmail to read email, 25 percent is understating the impact of this word.
Fortunately, there are ways to get around using “unsubscribe” and still comply with government regulations. Use more casual language such as “click here if you prefer not to hear from us” and hyperlink to your unsubscribe page.
Other words to avoid are "preferences" and "read online" — no friend who's ever sent you a personal email has started it with a link to "read online" have they?
2. Optimize emails for a small screen
More consumers are viewing emails on their smartphones rather than desktops. This has pros and cons for marketers.
On one hand, people will read your messages in real time and your interactions are highly personalized. On the other, people who view messages on their smartphones are not likely to reopen the email later on their desktop, giving marketers only one opportunity to make an impact.
Regardless, it’s critical to design your email marketing campaigns specifically for a mobile user. If your email templates were designed for desktops, throw them away.
Additionally, ensure your email load time is fast since mobile devices and networks are generally slower than desktops. Unless you're selling a particularly visual product, we'd actually recommend dropping images entirely. The more an email looks like it was written from Gmail rather than Photoshop, the more likely it will be read on a mobile device.
3. Keep it simple
Last year, Google replaced its single inbox format for all incoming mail with a categorized inbox featuring five tabs: primary, social, promotional, updates and forums. Gmail’s new "promotions" tab, although great for staying organized, is basically where messages to your customers go to die.
While not everyone uses Gmail as their inbox, competitors like Microsoft, Apple and Yahoo have a habit of copying the innovations that work, so you can be confident that most of your audience will soon be looking at an inbox pre-filtered to exclude marketing emails.
These changes, combined with growth in smartphone adoption, should lead to a return to simple, plain marketing emails. By creating more personalized email messages in plain black text with a standard font, you can increase the effectiveness of your email campaigns, avoid Gmail’s promotions tab, and encourage reading and response from users on mobile devices.
Limit your use of links, bullets and bold text. Most importantly, avoid using images. It may seem counterintuitive, but this is the key to getting your marketing message through on mobile and into the inbox.
There's no doubt that pre-sorted inboxes are the future of email, and mobile-first email consumption is already the reality. Instead of fighting this change, marketers need to take these three proactive steps to address this change and increase open rates.
Create and track emails that integrate with your website.
EMAIL MARKETING
Add a signup form to your website to gather email addresses from visitors. Easily see how your emails are performing — how many were opened, which ones got the most clicks and stay connected with your customers.
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