Bob's Blog

Email Marketing Mistakes

Go on, admit it, you still rely on email, don't you?

And amongst the contents of your inbox you'll find a whole variety of marketing messages. From the plain, simple "cold call" type email through to the newsletter you subscribed for, they're all means by which other companies are communicating with you.

Common email marketing mistakes

  • The wrong sender name.
    Many people, when faced with a full mailbox in the morning simply scan the list of messages and look at the sender name. They get to know senders they don't want to hear from and delete those messages immediately. So try someone's name and maybe add your company name. People will soon get to know the sender's name so stick with it.
  • Poor subject line. Given an unknown sender, the next step is to scan the subject line. If that doesn't spark any interest immediately then those messages get deleted immediately too. Keep your subject lines short and to the point while ensuring that you point out what's in it for the reader to open the email.
  • Too many images & graphics. Your email may look lovely when you send it with lots of colourful images, but how does it look to people who don't enable image display in their inbox? If all your marketing messages are built in to the images then your email is deleted. If you've got lots of design to get across, save it for the website - don't complicate the email.
  • Not pretty enough. Maybe plain text is the way to go? Well yes, and no. A very plain looking email often appears at best unprofessional and at worst like a scam. So use enough styling to make your message look good, but don't go over the top.