At the height of the Digital Marketing wave , Leads are worth more than gold bars! We know that, in the end, the contacts that enter our funnel will be converted into customers, providing the return on investment (ROI) of our digital strategies.
However, it is still very frequent the number of companies that have difficulty in moving those Leads through the marketing funnel. And this occurs due to a lack of good metrics.
The objective of this post is to help you build an efficient and low-cost strategy to treat your contact base in a scalable way.
Why is good email marketing important?
Email marketing adapts to all types of businesses. If it is well executed, its customization and segmentation capacity allows good results to be achieved. These couple of reasons allow you to consider the channel within your marketing and sales strategy. However, here are a couple more:
- Channel in constant growth: Statista points out that 3,930 million people in the world used email in 2019 and it is expected that by 2023 this figure will reach 4,371 million users. Did you think you're dying? Could not be farther from the truth.
- Attractive ROI: Return on investment is one of the most important metrics when implementing a strategy. In the case of email marketing, different studies indicate that for every dollar spent, USD $36 is generated. This makes the channel one of the most productive in lead generation strategies.
Metrics and indicators in email marketing
1. Bounce rate
The percentage or bounce rate allows you to evaluate the deliverability of your emails, by showing you what percentage of your campaign did not enter the inboxes of your contacts.
If you're having trouble getting your emails to reach your contacts' inboxes, make sure you're applying good practice when creating and sending your campaigns.
2. Open rate
The open rate is the metric that allows you to know the engagement. It tells you if your subscribers are interested enough to open your emails and see what you have to tell them. The higher this number, the better. It is recommended to have this rate around 20%.
3. Click-through rate
Click-through rate is the best metric you can use to measure the performance of your email marketing campaign. It shows you the rate of your contacts that interact with your emails and their interest in obtaining more information about your product or service.
This metric depends on the number of emails delivered and the open rate, so the higher the value of this metric, the better.
4- Reactivity rate or Click Throught Rate (CTR)
Also known as CTR, this metric looks at the rate over people who have already opened your email and clicked through. This metric allows you to evaluate your calls to action, because it is the interaction rate of your contacts once they have read your message.
If you have a low on this metric, it means that the content of your email was not engaging enough for your readers.
5. Cancellation fee
The churn rate can also shed light on how your subscribers see the content you send them. It can also tell you if there are any serious issues with the content or frequency of your shots.
If you have a high rate, you are probably sending too many emails. The lower your cancellation rate, the better. A low number in this metric means that your contacts are satisfied with your emails and want to continue receiving your emails.
In the following infographic, you can learn how to calculate each of the rates described above:
Tips for a good email
That is the secret to the success of companies that have a better use of the conversion rate between one stage and another of the funnel . Here at RD Station, for example, a good email sent after conversion in one of our materials gets an average of 37.5% opening and 7.12% click-through rate.
But what is a good email? That's a constant question we get. The answer tends to vary between "it is excellent content" and "the one that had a better performance" But that is not enough for us, who are directed by the data. We need clear metrics to judge accurately.
For this reason, we developed the Growth Machine Methodology here in the DR . It is a clear step by step to succeed with Inbound Marketing, created from the experience of the DR itself and our best clients. With it we affirm that good emails have the following metrics:
- Have at least 60 recipients;
- At least 98% delivery rate;
- At least 15% open rate;
- At least 2% of clicks;
- At most 1% unsubscription;
- And have no more than 0.1% spam rate.
From these data, we have a basis to judge the quality of an email and the assertiveness when establishing what should be modified, adjusted and optimized. With these numbers in hand, we carry out improvement experiments and are able to determine the success (or not) of a Digital Marketing action.
At this moment you must be wondering how to work each of these rates. Next, we are going to help you with that!
1. Select recipients and delivery rate
One of the principles of writing emails is: you have a message to get across and the first step is to know who to send it to. Establishing the people who will be impacted is essential to create an email with the right message, guaranteeing commitment to your content.
Do an analysis of your Lead base. At that time it is important to segment your contacts by grouping them into lists. If you are our client, it is quite easy to do this through the Lead Segmentation section of RD Station Marketing .
You can group those Leads based on something they have in common, such as:
- They downloaded the same material;
- They attended the same webinar;
- They are from the same state;
- They are all decision makers based on the function or position they hold within their companies.
In other words, that they have some interest or characteristic in common and that your email is going to be relevant to all of them.
Establishing that relationship of the type of content to the correct targeting is what guarantees the relevance of the message, thus contributing to the open rate and all other engagement metrics.
A classic example is when you receive an email with content about motorsports if you have no interest in cars. It just doesn't make sense in your context and you won't connect with the message, which leads to the simple act of not opening or discarding the received email.
Another very important factor at the time of building the list of recipients is the certainty that you have a complete Lead base.
This means that your Leads are, in fact, the conquest of a personal job or relationship with previous forms and not bought through companies that sell mailing, for example. This point is crucial. You don't relate to someone you don't know, for the obvious reason of not knowing the person!
The delivery rate is directly related to the quality of the email address and the frequency with which you send messages to that Lead's inbox.
That Lead's email address needs to be valid and current. Importing a database of emails from 1999 or buying an email list (the famous mailing) is not going to help but, on the contrary, it can harm you. It is known that most of those companies that sell mailing have false and non-existent contacts within the bases to give it "volume", however, quantity is not better than quality in this case.
When you send emails to an outdated, fake, or non-existent database, email servers understand that you're trying to circumvent a system that was built for a healthy relationship, and because of this, they simply don't deliver your email.
That being said, your delivery rate represents the quality of your Lead base and that is why you must always keep it updated to guarantee good performance.
2. Higher open rate = eye-catching subject line
The first thing you do before deciding whether to open an email or not is to read the subject of that message in your inbox. It's simple: the matter is of interest to me: I open; it is not: I discard. There are writers who will say that the topic is even more important than the content of the email. I wouldn't go that far, but I would say that they are proportionally relevant.
Treating the subject of the email with the same seriousness with which we treat the creation of a content for the blog or an eBook, is fundamental for an effective action. A good email subject usually has the following characteristics:
- Non-imperative verbs with the aim of generating immediate action;
- Questions to incite curiosity;
- Objectivity and relationship with the main subject of the body of the message;
- Personality, such as mentioning the first name of the reader or the company in which he works to generate immediate affinity;
- Avoid, when possible, marketing jargon, such as promotion, just for today, off , clearance, free , discount;
- Leave the main message in the first 40 characters, since that is the average number of characters that appear on mobile devices (the most used tools for reading emails, according to studies );
- Emojis , when the context allows.
Below, you can see one of the emails we sent after conversion in our 28 Actionable SEO Tips to Boost Your Site on Google . This one currently has a 29.44% open rate and 4.39% click-through rate!
Another example is this email that we send to our clients inviting them to download our editable Worksheet for a successful business proposal. Here, the open rate was 36% and the click rate was 6.30%.
3. Guarantee the click-through rate
“You had my curiosity, now you have my attention.”
That phrase from the movie Django Unchained translates exactly what your Lead is feeling after opening your email! The reader will take only two attitudes with your message: commit or reject. He already gave the vote of confidence when opening your message (first step of the commitment), now it's up to you to dictate the next step he should take.
And that is where the famous Call-to-Actions or, simply, CTAs come in. Your email needs to have a clear CTA of what the reader should do and, mainly, that CTA should be a link that will direct your Lead towards the next logical action of your email strategy. Only then will your engagement and follow-up metrics make sense.
Here's a personal tip: place links in different parts of your email. Whether in your logo, header, image of the eBook that you are offering, button, email signature, etc.
This way you optimize the chance of clicking and you manage to identify which is the best CTA to replicate in the next actions.
4. Avoid unsubscription and spam
If you do a good job with your targeting list, there is a high chance that you will perform well with unsubscribes and spam. Here less is more, that is, the lower the unsubscription and spam rates, the better result your shot will have.
The people who unsubscribe are those who received your email, opened it and asked not to receive them anymore. Some email triggers give the option to ask the Lead the reason for unsubscribing (this is the
case of RD Station). Usually the causes are related to:
- High volume of emails that you send to the same person;
- The person has no more interest in your content.
For this reason, in addition to keeping your contact list updated, it is important to have logical consistency in the type of content that you will send so that there is a connection within the same context.
Guaranteeing an email sending schedule that is suitable for your Lead base is another fundamental point to avoid unsubscriptions. Do not send many emails in the same time interval, nor few emails so as not to be forgotten, it is a difficult equation to balance at the beginning. But, with the passage of time, you accumulate knowledge about the behavior of your Lead base in relation to communications and it becomes easier to establish that interval of days.
The spam rate is another essential issue.
Emails that your trigger server failed to deliver to your lead's inbox are considered spam. That means that your email went directly to the Lead's spam folder or was received in the inbox, but marked as spam.
Spam happens when you do not use good Email Marketing practices, that is, you send content in an invasive way, without segmentation, without context, without your Lead having chosen to receive your emails or by using a sending server that is not from quality. For this reason, it is very important to follow the step by step of this post and be sure that the tool you are going to use for the shot uses a trusted server.
5. Write good content
Good content is not only the one that has a subject that will interest your Lead, but the one that brings the clearest idea about the message you want to convey. When in doubt between writing more and writing less, focus on the classic: less is more.
Always remember that you are writing for another human being , so it is important to keep in mind that your content must generate a connection with the reader. Here are some tips that will help you:
- Personalize: call your recipient by name, tell them why you are sending that message, how your product or service will help solve a problem that afflicts them. He needs to feel unique and special (using software like RD Station Marketing will help you in this task);
- Be authentic: don't promise everything, just be true;
- Be clear and concise: no one wants to read "filler." Objectivity is an art today;
- Use topics: choose to break large paragraphs with the famous bullet points to reduce the visual load of your email;
- Avoid very elaborate emails in html if you are not an ecommerce. The more text and fewer images, the better. The reader will feel as if that email was sent "exclusively" to him;
- Make it clear what the reader wins with your email: an eBook, a blog post, a discount, an invitation to an event…;
- Make it clear what the reader must do: click on a button, on a link, or any other necessary action
- Always be cordial;
- Do a good spell check before sending the email.
Whenever you are going to write your email content, put yourself in the place of your Lead reading that message and ask yourself if that email is going to be to their liking, if it makes sense and if they would do what the email asks for. If not, you should rearrange your ideas and start writing again.
Now is your turn
Aristotle already said that habit leads to perfection. Therefore, you need to start relating to your Lead base as soon as possible.
At first it may seem like an obstacle, but the pleasure of seeing Leads engaging with your messages, clicking on your CTAs, advancing in the funnel and your email rates getting better and better, is the certainty that you are on the right path. .
I hope this post has helped you clarify what good Email Marketing is and that it serves as a guide to make your own shot.
Start engaging with your Lead base today. They are the fuel for your funnel. If your Leads provide their email address, it is because they expect you to send them a message. Don't keep them waiting!
To help you with the elaboration of a good Email Marketing campaign, I leave you the following Checklist with all the things that you need to take into account in the elaboration of yor strategy.
Good results!
