Email Marketing 101: Increase Your Business With Emails (Part 2)
In part 1 of our email marketing series, we went over the basic understanding of an email as well as the types of emails you can send. Read Part 1 of our Email Marketing 101 series.
In part 2, we’ll conclude by telling you about the best times to send emails, what key metrics to look for, best practices and which email platforms you can use to send emails.
BEST TIMES TO SEND EMAILS
Your customers and audience will tell you when they’d like to receive your emails simply by looking at your analytics (see below).
However, the general rule of thumb is to send an email earlier in the day – between 4 am – 6 am.
This ensures that people who like to read emails get it in the morning. If your customers check their inboxes in the afternoon or evening, it will also be waiting for them.
If you want to be certain that you’re sending it at the best time, you can either test different times (e.g. morning, afternoon and evening). You can also change your email client settings to automatically send the email at the best time based on their inboxes.
ANALYTICS
You want to know that your hard work is paying off. Optimizing and testing your emails will ensure that you can continue to improve the messaging for your audience. Although every email client is different, there are some things that you should watch for.
Pick one or two metrics to watch for a few weeks to get comfortable before moving on to the others.
Open rate – This indicates how many people opened your email. If you have a high open rate, it could mean you have a great subject line or people know you, the sender.
Clicks – This shows how many times people clicked on links in your emails.
Click-through rate (CTR) – The CTR of your emails is more detailed than just counting clicks. Simply, this means the percent of people who clicked on the links in your email. If you’re not sure which metrics to track first, start with CTR as it is one of the most – if not the most – important metrics. This gives you direct insight on how many people on your mailing list are engaging with your content.
Unsubscribes – Unsubscribes shows you how many people unsubscribed from your mailing list after receiving an email. If you sent an email and immediately saw a lot of people unsubscribe, it could mean that they didn’t like what you sent them.
BEST PRACTICES
Here are some best practices to build your emails.
Consistency – Try to send your emails on a consistent basis. Weekly or monthly newsletters are a great way to do this as people will come to expect your emails on a particular day.
Don’t send too many emails – Unless you have a really good reason to send an email to the same list every day, don’t do it. Where you can, try to segment your audiences based on different interests to make the emails more targeted and relevant to each audience.
Make sure you have permission to use images – If you’re going to use images or photos of your clients, make sure they’re OK with you using them. Alternatively, stock photos are a great way to convey your message.
Some great paid websites for stock images are iStock, Adobe Stock and Stock Photo Secrets. There are also plenty of free stock photo websites like Pixabay, Pexels and Unsplash, but you’re limited in the choice.
Include your social links in the footer – If you have active social channels, put them in the footer of your emails. This will help widen your social media audience and give your followers another way to stay in touch with your business.
EMAIL PLATFORMS
There are a lot of email platforms available on the market, each with their own pros and cons. Most email platforms will charge you based on the number of contacts you have in your email database, so the bigger your database, the higher your fees.
Some email platforms which are less costly include Constant Contact, MailChimp and Get Response. Full marketing automation systems like Marketo and Hubspot also have email functions, but are more expensive.
Whatever email platform you choose, make sure you get familiar with all its features.
No matter what kinds of emails you send, make sure to be consistent and deliver what your audience wants to hear. Don’t be afraid to test different parts of the email, whether it’s subject lines, colours, or CTAs.
With the right email strategy, your fitness business can attract new customers, build trust and engagement, and help your business grow.