Earlier this week, we talked about 5 email marketing insights from 2013-14. And we suggested 5 ways in which email marketing will change in 2015. Today, we’re going to wrap up the series by seeing what this all means, practically, for email marketers looking to get ahead in 2015.
But first, if you haven’t done so already, go ahead and download Hubspot’s free “Science of Email 2014” report. It gives email marketers a whole lot to think about when it comes to reassessing and refining their marketing strategy.
We think these insights can be applied in 5 simple steps that will lead to better open rates, click-throughs, and more sales.
1. Images, but not too many
As we mentioned in our last post on 2015 email marketing predictions, Google is changing the email game in a big way with GridView for Gmail and the new Google Inbox. Pinterest for the people!
Yet it seems like a bit of common sense wisdom may still prevail. While two-thirds of respondents to Hubspot’s survey reported they preferred image-based email results (like GridView), clickthrough rates are negatively correlated to the number of images in an email.
In other words, pictures are good. But too many pictures are no good. (Maybe this is why GridView hasn’t caught on like wildfire yet and is still just in beta.)
2. iPhones account for more than half of mobile email opens
One finding that bears repeating is the absolutely massive percentage of emails being opened up on iPhones over all other devices. Specifically, iPhones account for 27% of all email opens in 2014. That’s more than ⅕ of all emails opened. All mobile devices, on the other hand, only added up to 48% of all email opens.
Basically, knowing that mobile-first design is crucial to success in 2015 isn’t enough. Committing Apple’s exact email optimization parameters to memory should be every email marketing exec’s new year resolution.
3. Your English teacher was right. Shorter is better.
Every year, longform content enjoys some newfound popularity. That’s fine, but let’s keep it to inbound marketing, please. Email is not, I repeat, not the place for thought leadership.
The switchover to mobile means email headings should only be 35 characters max (iPhone, Android). It also means that fewer words give less of a headache on a moving subway train or taxi. Images are gaining in popularity for a reason, folks!
If that isn’t enough to sway you, Hubspot also found that email body and subject line length have a negative correlation with clickthrough rate.
4. Get personal. Be conversational.
While the above email gets points for the letter format (it’s almost hard to believe that some companies in 2015 aren’t following this format with their lead nurturing emails), it loses major cred because of the sanitized, hands-off apology.
Would you ever apologize to someone like that in real life? Or do you only apologize to someone like that when you want to let them know full well that this is a generated email and that no one will be held accountable? (Notice “Customer Care”)
Couldn’t they have tried something like this?
Dear Bob,
Thanks for getting in touch with us. We really want to apologize for your bad experience. We want you to know that we hear you. And we‘re going to look into this because you’re our valued customer.
In the meantime, please accept an e-travel certificate we’ll mail to you within the week. We’ll get back in touch as soon as we find out what happened. We really appreciate your patience.
Thanks,
Jane
Most email marketing experts will agree that it’s actually better to put a name after the “Regards” field. Even if it’s a no-reply, customers will feel that much better taken care of when they know they’ve been emailed by a real person rather than a corporate machine.
5. Send out emails at non-competitive times
We found that the overwhelming majority of business emails are sent Monday through Friday, and that work hours were best for open rates. Thursday was the best day, and 10:30am was the best time.
Thing is, “best” is a very relative term. While more emails are opened up during work hours on any weekday, the volume of emails hitting inboxes is also much, much higher. A higher open rate doesn’t necessarily mean a proportionally equal number of clickthroughs.
If you decide to jump on the best-time bandwagon, keep in mind that everyone else is on it, too (including your competition). Counter-intuitive timing may actually work in your favor – especially if you’re just a startup or scaleup.
