Achieve higher open, click through & conversion rates

At this point, most all retailers send promotional emails to their customers to promote their businesses. But how can you achieve higher open rates, click throughs and conversions?

1. Keep it simple!

There is a lot we want to say to our customers, but the reality is that our customers don’t have the time or patience to consume all of our information. So it’s best to keep your emails short and simple- and to the point- keep focus on your one key message.

2. Send emails at the optimal times.

It used to be that we would never want to send an email on Monday or Friday or too early or too late in the day… but those ‘rules’ have gone out the window now with consumers all equipped with smartphones and connected all day, every day. Tracking your email metrics will help you determine which days and times are best for each segment.

3. Make sure your emails are mobile optimized.

Our retailers are seeing up to 80% of their online traffic and activity done through mobile devices- so it is essential that your emails are mobile responsive so they can be easily and automatically reformatted properly regardless of the device it’s opened on.

4. A/B Test Your Subject Lines.

It’s a good idea to test two different subject lines (maybe one including the sales promotion and another more personal subject) and use your email platform to run an A/B test. This means the system will send a portion of your emails with subject A and another with subject B, then send the remainder to the more successful version.

5. Clean your email list often.

While it’s sometimes thought, ‘let me send all of my emails to everyone on my list’, in hopes that someone will eventually respond- this is not the right approach. If you are using a list that you have built up over many years, we recommend you run a report and remove those who have not interacted with your messaging in the past 2 years.

6. In your subject lines, ‘Tell’, don’t ‘Sell’.

Subject lines that are clearly trying to ‘sell’ typically perform worse than subject lines than might be more educational or informative. Instead of talking about how great your products, company, or promotion is, explain more about why and what you are showing.

7. Send from a recognizable email address.

The first two things a consumer looks at are the subject line and the email from address. If they don’t recognize who the email is coming from, they typically will not open it. If the ‘Sent From’ clearly states your company name, there’s no need to repeat your company name again in the subject line. Sending from a recognizable email address will help increase your open rates.

8. Send from your own domain name.

While you might have your own personal Gmail or Yahoo email account, remember to always send your promotional emails from your website domain name. If you don’t have one, it’s time to get one. This can also help increase your open rates.

9. Offer different opt-in list type options.

Offer different opt-in list types so users can segment themselves into lists based on their various interests. A good way to do this is to add an area on your website or subscription form where customers can opt-in and sign up for the email lists they select. By providing your customers with the flexibility to choose the types of emails you send them, you will ultimately increase the likelihood they will open them.

10. Send more emails, to smaller segmented lists more often.

Segment your email lists by customer preferences and/or sales history, so that you can send more targeted personalized emails to smaller groups of customers, based on what their interests and the types of products they’ve purchased in the past. Personalization will lead to much higher monthly ROI.

Remember, there is no one magical answer to achieving better email marketing success, but one thing we know for sure, when you use personalization, segmentation and test your messaging, you can pretty much guarantee you’ll see improved email results and increased ROI.

Want to learn more about integrating email marketing with your POS?

Please feel free to contact us or email us at sales@camcommerce.com for additional information.