Your Email Marketing Failing? Try This Instead

Email marketing has been around for quite a while, but it’s still one of the most effective ways to reach your audience.

It’s also one of the most cost-effective ways to do so, which makes it especially appealing to small business owners who may not have a lot of money to spend on advertising. However, email marketing can be tricky if you don’t know how to do it correctly. For example:

Your email isn’t getting opened;
Your email isn’t being read; or

The content is so boring that no one wants to bother with it.

If any of these sound familiar, don’t worry we’ve got some ideas for how you might fix them! In this post we’ll go over some common mistakes people make when sending out emails and what you can do about them.”

Is Email Marketing NOT Working For You? Try This Instead!

Key Takeaways
1. Integrate outbound marketing strategies for a balanced approach.
2. Explore interruption marketing to capture prospects’ attention.
3. Implement outbound email marketing using a step-by-step process.
4. Embrace personalized content to enhance email engagement.
5. Address common reasons behind marketing email failures.

Table of Contents

1. Trickle-Down Your Email Marketing

With trickle-down email marketing, you keep your readers coming back to you. This is similar to the way a popular restaurant brings customers in through its food and then keeps them there with the drinks and desserts.

It’s simple: You give away something valuable for free with every purchase of one product or service, then send that person an email reminding him or her about the freebie as well as encouraging him or her to buy more from you.

For example, if every buyer receives two hours of consulting services for free with his purchase either directly from his sales representative or via an automated message, and if those same buyers are told about this offer when they sign up for your mailing list.

Then this strategy means that readers have already had their appetites whetted before they ever reach out for dessert (or in this case email).

Building a strong email marketing strategy requires understanding the balance between inbound and outbound approaches. Discover how outbound marketing relates to content and how it can complement your email campaigns effectively.

2. Create An Email Strategy

It’s hard to create a good plan if you don’t know where you’re going. Before you start writing your emails, ask yourself why someone would want to read them. What will they get out of it? How can I help them? When setting email goals, it’s important to be ambitious but realistic.

You won’t see results if your expectations are too high or too low you’ll give up before reaching the finish line!

Here are some examples of tangible fitness goals that could realistically be achieved in 3-6 months:

Lose 10 pounds
Add 10 pounds onto your squat max
Get your first pull-up

3. Don’t Leave Anyone Out

The third and final thing to avoid is leaving anyone out. Your emails should be written in a way that is accessible to everyone. This means, among other things, avoiding the word “sale” in your subject lines and CTAs even if it is a sale!

If you want your emails to resonate with readers who don’t have formal education or work for large companies (or both), then avoid industry jargon as well.

For example, instead of using the term “red tape” when describing bureaucratic procedures that slow down processes at work, try using phrases like “wasteful bureaucracy” or “inefficient red tape.”

Finally, make sure that your content doesn’t become stale over time; stay on top of trends so people can learn something new from each email they receive from you

Starting with outbound email marketing might seem daunting, but breaking it down into a step-by-step process can make it more manageable. Learn about the essential steps in getting started with outbound email marketing to enhance your email outreach.

4. Test, Test, And Test Again

After you’ve tested different subject lines and email templates, it’s time to test your content. What works for one audience might not be the right fit for another segment of your list.

You’ll also want to test when you send emails out, as well as how often. Are certain times of day more effective than others? Should you send out a newsletter every week or just once a month?

These are all things that will help improve your open rates, click-throughs, and sales/conversion rates over time.

The last thing we want to mention is that it’s important not only to test new offers with different segments but also different CTAs (call-to-action buttons).

For example: If someone signs up for a free webinar about social selling but hasn’t yet bought the product being promoted in said webinar…you might want them directed toward an offer page where they can purchase at a discount instead of towards another webinar download link which doesn’t have much value at this point because they haven’t completed step 1 yet!

5. Adopt A Mobile-First Approach

Mobile devices are now the primary way of accessing the web, and they are also your main channel for email marketing. Unfortunately, not all email clients support HTML emails properly and even if they do, some devices don’t render them correctly.

To ensure that your emails look good on every screen and on every device, you need to adopt a mobile-first design approach.

To build a responsive website or optimize your existing website for mobile devices:

Make sure it’s easy to navigate around with one hand when viewing it on your phone or tablet;
Limit the number of links and buttons so users can easily interact with them; and
Review all images (including logos) for appropriate size/resolution for high-quality delivery across multiple platforms

Interruption marketing, when done right, can actually be welcomed by your audience. Find out why an effective approach to interruption marketing is something to welcome as you work on engaging your prospects in meaningful ways.

6. Use A Single CTA

If you’re using more than one CTA in your email, there’s likely no clear primary call to action (CTA). The first place to start is ensuring that every CTA is relevant and easy to understand.

The next thing you should do is pay attention to where the CTA is located about other elements on the page. You want a clear path from the reader’s eyes down through the text and then directly onto the button they can click.

This can be tricky because if you put too many CTAs together, they’ll become visually cluttered and harder for readers to spot.

Finally, consider how big each button is relative not only to its own space but also compared with other elements on the page like its neighboring images or text links.

It doesn’t matter how gorgeous your design looks if nobody takes action because they’ve been distracted by something else instead!

7. Consider Dynamic Content

Dynamic content is a powerful tool that takes the guesswork out of your email marketing. It can be used to personalize content for each subscriber, which in turn improves engagement rates by more than 50%.

Dynamic content can be used to personalize emails based on the recipient’s location and website activity (i.e. if someone has viewed specific products or pages). This helps you make better-informed decisions about what they may want to see next time they open their inbox.

8. Don’t Be Afraid To Use Plain Text Emails

When it comes to email marketing, don’t be afraid to use plain text emails. The content of an email is more important than the format.

And because plain text emails are easier to read and more likely to be read on mobile devices, tablets and desktops, they should form the core of your campaign strategy.

Interrupting prospects with value-driven content is a skill that can set you apart in the marketing world. Explore the techniques for interrupting your prospects effectively and capturing their attention with your marketing messages.

9. Make It Personal

Personalization is your friend.

And you’re going to make it your best friend.

It’s as simple as including the customer’s name in the subject line, email body, and footer of your emails.

You can also personalize by using their birthdate or interests in a friendly reminder that they appreciate getting from brands they care about (and because people love being reminded about themselves).

But the easiest way to go personalized is by using their personal information in all parts of an email: include it in the preview text on Gmail and Outlook;

Use it within email signatures; even mention them by name in an automated email response when they sign up for more information or make a purchase.

It might seem like a small thing but if you don’t do this consistently then you’re missing out on opportunities for increased engagement with each subscriber and ultimately driving sales through better-connected relationships with customers!

10. Make Your Emails Scannable

Create a clear and concise design. Your readers are busy people, so make sure that your emails are easy to scan. Use bullet points, short paragraphs, and subheads.

Use an easily readable font face. When choosing a font face for your emails, opt for something sans-serif like Arial or Georgia that’s easy to read in small sizes (see below).

Use an appropriate size for your fonts. Make sure it is large enough to be easily read by everyone — don’t forget about those who wear reading glasses!

This will help prevent complaints about poor readability later on in the campaign when recipients may be less tolerant of sloppy formatting choices earlier in the lifecycle of an email campaign (i.e., at launch).

11. Optimize For All Devices

As we all know, it’s important to optimize your emails for mobile devices. But sometimes that doesn’t mean just making the text bigger or the buttons easier to tap.

You also have to make sure your design looks good on every device and screen size, from a smartphone up through a desktop monitor.

For example, if you’re using images in your emails (and why wouldn’t you?), don’t use images that are too large: they’ll just look blurry when viewed on a small screen and who wants an ugly email?

Instead, keep your designs simple and clean so they look great no matter what device they’re being viewed on.

12. Avoid Using The Word “Sale” In Your Subject Lines And CTAs

“Sale” is a word that can be very effective when used the right way, but it’s generally best to avoid using it in your subject lines and CTAs. The reason for this is simple: some people don’t like sales.

For example, if you have a product that normally costs $35, and suddenly reduce the price to $20 for an entire weekend.

Many people would feel like they were being taken advantage of–you sold them something at a ridiculously low price just for short-term profit instead of selling them something at market value for long-term benefit.

13. Keep The Design Simple And Conversational

A simple design is a must. It’s not that hard to have a clean and uncluttered email, but many marketers make the mistake of focusing too heavily on design and forgetting to focus on the most important part: writing.

As you can see from the examples above, keeping it clean is key. A good rule of thumb for email marketing is (almost) never use more than one image per email no matter how great your images are!

When you choose multiple images or high-res graphics, it can make your message difficult to read and scan through quickly.

The goal of an email campaign should be to get people to take action — whether that’s making a purchase or simply clicking on another link in your newsletter series.

So keep things easy to scan by using short paragraphs with minimal copy (a maximum of 3 sentences per paragraph), short sentences (fewer than 20 words each), subheadings, and bullet points when possible…

Integrating cold calling into your marketing strategy can lead to remarkable results if executed properly. Discover actionable tips on implementing cold calling into your marketing strategy to engage potential customers and drive business growth.

14. Give Them Something Extra

For example, one of the ways I like to keep things interesting is by giving away a free ebook that’s not related to my book. It’s often something completely unrelated.

I also include links within my emails that take readers directly to my website or social media profile pages.

This gives them more opportunities to interact with me and learn more about my brand, but it also helps build trust because they see that I’m willing to put myself out there and let people see who I am as a person and not just some faceless entity hawking products or services.

15. Try A Video Or Animation

If you have a product or service that can be shown, consider using an animated video to explain the benefits of what you offer. You could also use animation to show the process of how your product works and why it is beneficial for the consumer.

For example, if I was selling an ebook about email marketing, I might create a short video showing how easy it is to use my ebook and how much time it will save people who want to learn more about email marketing.

16. Don’t Let Your Subject Line Do All The Work

Email subject lines are important, but they aren’t everything.

For example, let’s say you have a campaign that sends emails to promote your new product launch. While you’re working on your email marketing strategy, your boss asks you which of these two subject lines would be better:

[New Product Launch] or
[New Product Launch!](https://www.example-site/new-product)

Your instinct may tell you that #1 is the better option because it includes the actual product name in the subject line; however, this can backfire by making people less likely to open your emails when they see them in their inboxes.

Don’t just rely on autocorrect and grammar checks; proofread thoroughly before sending out any message (especially if it will be distributed via social media channels).

17. Keep Your Content Fresh

Another reason why email marketing can fail is when you send the same email to everyone. This is one of the major reasons why people unsubscribe from your list. They don’t want to receive generic emails that don’t add any value to their lives or their work.

If you’re sending out an email about new products and services, for example, make sure that each person gets a customized version based on their interests and needs.

If you’re sending out an update about a social media promotion or contest promo, make sure it’s different than all of your other updates in terms of style, tone and information conveyed.

And also make sure not only do you keep every message fresh but also ensure they are sent at different times so they don’t get lost in the shuffle with all those other emails clogging up our inboxes!

18. Segment Your Databases To Create Personalized Communications

Use real data, not guesswork. Segmentation is the process of carving up your subscriber list into smaller segments based on similar behaviors, demographic information, or interests.

Then you can create personalized communications for each segment to improve engagement rates by more than 50%.

Personalize content for each subscriber. Personalization isn’t just about first names anymore use real data, not guesswork, to personalize content for each subscriber.

19. Personalization isn’t just about first names anymore use real data, not guesswork, to personalize content for each subscriber and improve engagement rates by more than 50% Takeaway: Your Email Marketing Failing? Try This Instead!

Personalization is key to improving engagement rates by more than 50%.

Personalization can take many forms, but it’s most effective when you use real data about your subscribers, not just first names.

Here are some examples of how you can personalize content for each subscriber:

Use the information in their profile (gender, location, interests) to target relevant offers and messages.

Send different emails based on how long it’s been since they’ve opened/viewed an email from you.

For example, if they haven’t read or clicked on one of your emails in a while, send them an offer that’s more relevant to recent trends in their industry instead of trying to sell them something “new”.

Conclusion

We hope that you’ve found this article useful. If your email marketing is failing, we recommend implementing some of these tips as soon as possible. With the right strategy in place, your email marketing will be off to a great start!

FAQs

Why do email marketing campaigns often struggle to achieve desired results?

Email marketing success depends on various factors, including content relevance, segmentation, and timing. A lack of personalized content or sending emails to a broad audience without segmentation can lead to poor engagement and conversion rates.

How can I improve the open rates of my marketing emails?

To enhance open rates, focus on crafting compelling subject lines that pique recipients’ curiosity and clearly convey the value of the email’s content. A/B testing different subject lines can help identify the most effective ones for your audience.

What role does email content play in the success of campaigns?

Email content should be informative, relevant, and tailored to the recipient’s needs. Irrelevant or overly promotional content can lead to unsubscribes and reduced engagement. Providing valuable content can establish trust and keep recipients engaged.

What are some best practices for minimizing email unsubscribes?

Segment your email list based on subscribers’ preferences and interests to send them content they are more likely to engage with. Additionally, provide clear and easy-to-find unsubscribe options to ensure compliance with regulations and maintain a positive brand image.

How can I measure the success of my email marketing efforts?

Key performance indicators (KPIs) such as open rates, click-through rates, conversion rates, and overall engagement provide insights into the effectiveness of your email campaigns. Regularly analyzing these metrics helps you refine your strategies for better results.

Costantine Edward

Costantine Edward is a digital marketing expert, freelance writer, and entrepreneur who helps people attain financial freedom. I’ve been working in marketing since I was 18 years old and have managed to build a successful career doing what I love.