How to get more clicks from your email marketing

Here are two quick and easy tips to improve your email marketing calls to action (CTA).

1. Use buttons for your CTAs

Buttons will always generate more clicks than text links, especially for mobile users.

Consider which of these is more likely to get clicked.

The 10th annual Comic Arts Festival is taking place in Brighton next month, and you can register here to get your tickets online.

Or

The 10th annual Comic Arts Festival is taking place in Brighton next month.

2. Keep your calls to action short and avoid friction words

This first example is far too long, and everyone will know it’s a link, so you don’t have to instruct them to click.

The second example is much shorter and reiterates the benefit.

Friction words are those that imply your reader has to do something they don’t necessarily want to do.

Common friction words include:

  • Download
  • Buy
  • Order
  • Submit

This example is for a free copywriting guide.

The second example reiterates the benefit. It doesn’t even need to state the need to download it – readers will know this.

• About the author

Julian Wellings has 17 years’ email marketing experience and works with clients across the UK.

 

 

Improve your email marketing open rates with a pre-header

A pre what?!

A pre-header is the summary text that follows the subject line when viewing an email from the inbox.

Many mobile, desktop and web email clients display email pre-headers to provide a preview of what the message contains before you open it.

Pre-headers deliver a seven per cent higher open rate, on average.

Pre-headers also come in handy if the subject line has been truncated as in the first example below.

In this example, which is landscape view on an iPhone, both the subject line and pre-header are visible, thus complementing each other perfectly.

In the examples above, without a pre-header, subscribers would only see “No images? Click here”.

• About the author

Julian Wellings has 14 years’ email marketing experience and works with clients across the UK.

 

 

5 easy ways to instantly improve your email marketing

Here are five really simple tips which you can use immediately to improve your email marketing.

With opens on mobile devices now exceeding 50%, it’s vital to design with mobile in mind, while not forgetting desktop users.

Recent research shows that if an email doesn’t look good on mobile, many users will delete, or at worst unsubscribe.

All these tips will make your emails more mobile-friendly and help you produce succinct, compelling copy.

1. Use buttons for your calls to action

Buttons will always generate more clicks than text links, especially for mobile users.

Consider which of these is more likely to get clicked.

The 10th annual Comic Arts Festivals is taking place in Brighton next month, and you can register here to get your tickets online.

Or

The 10th annual Comic Arts Festivals is taking place in Brighton next month.

If you’re using a platform such as MailChimp, buttons are straightforward to add.

2. Keep your calls to action short and avoid friction words

This first example is far too long, and everyone will know it’s a link, so you don’t have to instruct them to click.

The second example is much shorter and reiterates the benefit.

Friction words are those that imply your reader has to do something they don’t necessarily want to do.

Common friction words include:

  • Download
  • Buy
  • Order
  • Submit

This example is for a free copywriting guide.

The second example reiterates the benefit. It doesn’t even need to state the need to download it – readers will know this.

3. Always include a pre-header

A pre-header is the summary text that follows the subject line when viewing an email from the inbox.

Many mobile, desktop and web email clients display email pre-headers to provide a preview of what the message contains before you open it.

Pre-headers deliver a seven per cent higher open rate, on average.

Pre-headers also come in handy if the subject line has been truncated as in the first example below.

In this example, which is landscape view on an iPhone, both the subject line and pre-header are visible, thus complementing each other perfectly.

In the examples above, without a pre-header, subscribers would only see “No images? Click here”.

4. Keep it succinct. Use short sentences and paragraphs

Subscribers are more likely to read and act on short and punchy emails.

After you’ve written your copy, re-read it, and remove any superfluous words.

We’d like to take this opportunity to thank all our customers for their business over the past year.

becomes

Thank you for your business in 2019; we appreciate it.

5. It’s not about you. It’s about them

I regularly receive emails from businesses headed “Here’s what we’ve been up to”.

Yawn.

Often, these include articles such as “Here are some websites we’ve built recently” or “We’d like to welcome John Smith to our accounts team. His hobbies are rambling and trainspotting”.

So what? How does this “news” benefit the reader?

Taking the second example, by all means, announce John, but explain the benefits for the customer. So it could become:

New appointment brings faster turn-round for your PAYE enquiries

We’re delighted to welcome John Smith to our accounts team. John has ten years’ payroll experience, and he will be your dedicated point of contact for PAYE enquiries. As a result our turn-round time for queries will reduce from 48 to 24 hours.

• About the author

Julian Wellings has 12 years’ email marketing experience and works with clients across the UK.

 

 

Massive fines for GDPR breaches? ICO will use powers proportionately and judiciously

In a recent blog post, the Information Commissioner, Elizabeth Denham has dispelled some myths about the forthcoming GDPR legislation.

Scaremongering in the media has led some businesses to feel fearful of the maximum £17 million or 4% of turnover penalties allowed under the new law.  It has also been falsely reported that these increased fines will help fund the work of the ICO.

Denham comments “If this kind of misinformation goes unchecked, we risk losing sight of what this new law is about – greater transparency, enhanced rights for citizens and increased accountability.”

She adds “It’s scaremongering to suggest that we’ll be making early examples of organisations for minor infringements or that maximum fines will become the norm. The ICO’s commitment to guiding, advising and educating organisations about how to comply with the law will not change under the GDPR. We have always preferred the carrot to the stick.”

For the ICO, issuing fines has always been and will continue to be, a last resort. In 2016/2017 they concluded 17,300 cases and only 16 of them resulted in fines for the organisations concerned.

Read Elizabeth Denham’s blog post >>

How new EU new privacy legislation affects email marketers

There is new legislation arriving in 2018 which affects anyone who carries out email marketing. 

EU legislationThe General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) is the EU’s new privacy law and it’s due to be enacted on 25th May 2018.  Its aim is to bring uniformity to a plethora of different legislation across all member states, and to replace the Data Protection Act and the Privacy & Electronic Communications Regulations (PECR) which are no longer fit for purpose.

GDPR will affect every company that uses personal data from EU citizens. If you collect email addresses and send marketing emails to subscribers in the EU, you’ll have to comply with GDPR — no matter where you’re based.

Penalties are due to increase significantly up to a maximum of €20 million or 4% of global annual turnover.

The key points are:

1. New subscribers will need to affirm that they want to opt in.

This affirmation must be via a dedicated subscription form, or via an unticked check box in situations where you’re collecting data for other reasons, such as order processing or membership applications. Pre-ticked boxes or “Tick here to opt out” will not be permitted.

2. You will need to tell subscribers how their data will be used.

For example, if they give you their email address to download a free article you must tell them if you plan to use that email address for marketing purposes and give them the option to opt into this.

3. You will need to keep a record of consent.

For example, if you use a provider such as Campaign Monitor they will store details of how and when a recipient subscribed along with their IP address. It is not clear at the moment whether such information will be sufficient. I’ll monitor how this will need to work in the coming months.

4. The following commonly adopted scenarios will no longer apply.

(i) An existing business relationship will no longer imply consent. For example, where you have an existing database of customers and suppliers and you use that for email marketing.
(ii) The current soft opt-in where you can email people if there is an existing business relationship.

[UPDATE 06.09.17] There is however a “legitimate interests for processing” test which means in some cases it might be possible to continue emailing a subscriber without the above in place. The Information Commissioners Office (ICO) is due to issue guidance on this towards the end of 2017. Read more from the DMA >>

5. You will need to get your existing data up to GDPR standards.

If you can’t provide sufficient proof of consent for existing subscribers, you won’t be allowed to contact them anymore. You will need to run a re-permissioning campaign.  This includes subscribers you have added using soft opt-in.

What next?

I’ll be working with all existing Expertise on Tap clients to ensure they are compliant when the new legislation comes into force. If you are not a client and need help running a re-permissioning campaign do let me know.

There are other aspects to GDPR in addition to email marketing. There’s more information here from the ICO.

The above content should not be used as a substitute for professional legal advice.

Watch this video I produced for Cheltenham Chamber of Commerce. Matthew Clayton from Willans LLP talks about GDPR and how it will affect businesses.

Why the plain text version of your e-newsletter is important

When you create your e-newsletter or e-shot, if you’re using an email service provider such as Mailchimp or Campaign Monitor, a plain text version is automatically created for you.

It’s vital to include a plain text version otherwise ISPs will assume your email is from an untrustworthy source and could block it as spam. Another reason is some recipients prefer to read in plain text rather than HTML.  In fact, some corporate email systems still use plain text as their default.

It’s also important that you then edit your plain text version, not just to aid readability but also to increase the chances of conversion.

Campaign Monitor have produced some excellent tips on plain text emails.

Read “How to turn your plain-text emails into conversion machines” >

How to avoid your email marketing looking like spam

Have you noticed how spammers and scammers use personal names rather than brand names in the “from” section of their emails? 

Here’s a recent example.

Spam example

The reason why they do this is hopefully obvious. It’s so that the email looks like it’s from a real person.

My tip to avoid looking like a spammer.

Use your business name as the “from” name. 
If you use your own name, and not everyone on your list knows who you are, this may affect your open rate.  I receive a lot of email marketing emails done like this. Another option is to use your business name followed by your own name.  Eg.  From: [Expertise on Tap – Julian Wellings]

Email marketing – how NOT to manage your unsubscribe process

I’ve blogged before about why your unsubscribe process should be as simple as possible – ideally a one click process.

The screen shot below from Avid is a good example of how not to do it. Instead of a one click unsubscribe, where you click a link in the newsletter and it’s sorted, with Avid you’re taken to a web page with a myriad of choices. In fact it’s not an unsubscribe page at all – it’s a subscribe page.

Only on looking closely do you find a tiny unsubscribe link at the foot of the page. When you click this, it won’t process until you enter your email address. Again, with a one click process you should not have to enter your email address.

To summarise:

  1. Keep your unsubscribe process simple.
  2. If you want subscribers to be able to manage their preferences or interests, if you use an email service provider such as Mailchimp or Campaign Monitor it’s possible to add a link to enable this. Make sure the preferences are kept to a minimum.
Avid unsubscribe process

Example of Avid unsubscribe process.

How BBC Radio 2 recognised the power of email to engage with listeners

BBC Radio 2 has recently launched Radio 2 Mail, a weekly e-newsletter with the strapline “Sharing what we love about Radio 2”

Radio 2 MailThese days the BBC has many ways of engaging with it’s audience ranging from phone ins, texts into programmes, and of course Twitter and Facebook. So, I found it refreshing that Radio 2 has recognised the power of email newsletters as an additional way of engaging with listeners.

And they’ve executed it really well.

The copy on their Radio 2 Mail web page is full of benefit statements and emotive keywords. For example:

Handpicked by our very own presenters.
Each week, a different presenter will round up their favourite moments on Radio 2.
They might even let you in on a few behind-the-scenes secrets!

The welcome email you receive after subscribing is warm and inviting, with a link to a video featuring four of the presenters. See below…

How could you use an email newsletter in your business to engage with your prospective clients and build brand awareness? I can help. Ask me how.

Example of Radio 2 Mail welcome email

Radio 2 Mail welcome email

 

Why this e-shot from Apple is perfect. In every way.

Apple have just sent me the email below promoting the new iPhones.  Apple’s email marketing always stands out from the crowd, but this one is special.

Here’s why.

The opening paragraph is brief yet sells lots of benefits. Apple is all about making it easy for the consumer, and that’s what they’re doing here. “We’ll ship it for free”.  “We’ll set it up just how you want it”.

The two product sections have lots of white space and are uncluttered. The product shots don’t even have a front view. My assumption is iPhone brand awareness is so high that they don’t need to even show the front. The side shot perfectly encapsulates the range of colours available.

The “Buy Now” buttons are small and understated.  It’s just not Apple’s style to use massive BUY NOW!!! calls to action.

Apple e-shot