SPAM!
There is no scarier label for an email marketer to be connected with than SPAM! There are PhDs written on the topic of how not to be associated with spam and how to pass through the countless roadblocks put up by Google, Microsoft, and Yahoo email sorting algorithms. Although so much knowledge on this matter has been accumulated, corporate algorithms continually change, causing problems for marketers all over the world.
So, what is the best way to keep your email newsletters out of your customer’s “Spam” folder?
Let me share some of the tips I've learned over the years from doing email marketing campaigns.
Let your patient or client know WHERE the email is coming from and WHY. It is crazy how many people miss the basics of sending an email to the customer – to have a clear indication of WHO IS CONTACTING THEM and WHY THEY ARE BEING CONTACTED. According to the recent study by Finances online, almost 45% of clients will decide to flag an email as “Spam” solely based on sender name, subject and sender’s email fields without opening the actual email.
The spam algorithms include the reputation factor so make sure that your sender field looks like a personal address. For example, something similar to ‘johngates@gmail.com’ or ‘iluvmycustomers@mycompany.com’ and not something generic such as ‘customerservice@live.ca’ (‘customerservice@mycomany.ca’ would be fine) .
Make sure your subject line draws the reader in and gives them a good reason to open the email. THe more often you send email that is deleted without being opened, the lower your email reputation becomes.
Test your emails. It’s always a good idea to send a test email to your personal email or to your colleague’s inbox. By doing that, you can track where your marketing email lands and check out the crucial email fields that I discussed in the previous point.
Another way to test your email is to send it to a targeted group of customers and collect the deliverability KPI’s (key performance indicators) on it. Pay particular attention to the number of “bounces”, “unsubscribed/complaint” and “delivered” to get a better picture of how your email avoids being put in Spam.
Stay away from “Spam” content and keywords. The content of your marketing email matters. Most of the spam recognition algorithms use a special database of spam trigger words and phrases such as “million”, “free”, “no obligation”, “time-sensitive”, “advertisement”, “prize”, “cash” and similar marketing-heavy stuff. Some of these are okay to use sparingly if used responsibly. The AI in spam filters will look at context these days as well. Here are some more tips on avoiding spam words to avoid.
The best way to approach writing copy is to have a clear message, framed in multiple proof points. It is also beneficial to space out your content into paragraphs that can be easily glanced over when reading – this will make sure that your email’s point is delivered clearly even if the client doesn’t read the whole thing word by word.
Thank you for reading this blog, I hope these tips help to make your marketing emails stand out and stay out of the spam folder! Now you are ready to test your new knowledge on the real thing.
If you need some direction on how to set up your next email campaign, let us help.
