Email remains the most popular method of business communication, despite the development of instant messaging and other forms of internet communication.
Email marketing data show that for every $1 invested in an email marketing campaign with higher email deliverability, the average expected ROI is $42. Think about that. Any marketer would consider a staggering 42x return to be gold.
But everything worthwhile has a price that is hard to pay. Although it doesn't cost a fortune, email marketing is undoubtedly challenging. Deliverability of emails is a major concern for all sizes of businesses.
One of the main problems that email marketers encounter is getting their messages sent to recipients' inboxes. Even after spending so much time and work creating an effective email, it's frustrating to watch it end up in spam.
Do you know 50% of the 306.4 billion emails sent every day end up in spam?
This indicates that 50% of emails sent never reach their intended destination. Sales and marketing activities are severely impacted by poor email delivery.
It always leads to a decrease in productivity and, as a result, revenue losses.
We'll go over all of the best practices for avoiding spam in your emails.
Before we get to the best practice, we want to clarify that email delivery and email deliverability are two distinct metrics.
Email delivery evaluates the recipient's ability to accept your emails. If an email does not bounce, it has reached its intended destination. Consequently, you'll observe a high email delivery rate.
The email delivery rate does not differentiate between emails delivered to the inbox and those delivered to the spam folder. It counts how many emails were not bounced.
Deliverability of emails refers to their ability to reach the recipient's inbox.
There is an entire process an email has to go through before reaching the recipient’s inbox. The email has to move through different filters designed by various email service providers, like spam filters, content filters, etc.
After that, the email is delivered to one of the recipients' inbox folders, such as spam, primary, promotions, updates, and etc.
Here is a list of the most effective ways to help you increase your email deliverability:
Authenticating your sender domain is one of the crucial steps in creating the appropriate email infrastructure.
In order to prove to your recipient's server that the email is from a verified and valid domain and not a scammer, email authentication must be used. Email authentication is therefore required to ensure that your message gets to your subscribers' inbox and not a spam folder.
There are different ways through which you can authenticate your email:
SPF is an email authentication technique to ensure that incoming email is sent by a verified sender and not by a relay server.
DKIM makes sure that the message isn't changed during transmission. One method for encrypting a specific communication is public-key encryption. It entails connecting the domain name in the DNS to the digital signature. The public key can be used to decrypt the signature and be verified by the receiving system. It guarantees that the message is not changed while being transmitted, making the email authentic.
By using DMARC, you can be sure the email is not a phishing or spam attack. SPF and DKIM methods are both used by DMARC to validate emails. Additionally, it stops all fraudulent mails coming from a particular domain.
It's essential to perform an IP warm-up before sending emails from a new IP address.
You should contact your ESP (Email Service Provider) because they will assist you in setting up the entire warm-up routine.
Send a few emails to your most engaged and active users. This is how the process should work in theory. When these users open and interact with your emails, it tells ISP that your emails are relevant and supports the development of IP reputation. You'll be able to send a lot of emails without any deliverability issues in a week or two as your reputation score increases.
Having a solid sender score or reputation is crucial. It can be evaluated using:
· Complaints the user has made against you
· How many spam complaints your business has received overall
· Current email history for your company
· Reputation of your company's domain
· Stay away from email bounces
· Email list should be verified
On your email list, make sure every subscriber has a working email address and is truly interested in getting your emails. Using double opt-in is one approach to ensure that.
It's simple to check an email addresses validity by asking users to confirm it once they join up. Additionally, it stops emails from being sent to individuals who are actually interested in your offering, hence boosting email interaction and engagement.
The primary factor that determines whether your email will be delivered to the recipient's inbox or spam folder is the content of your email. To create good content for excellent email deliverability, follow all of the best practices listed below
When an email is received, the subject line is the first thing the receiver sees. Based on the subject line, 69% of receivers mark emails as spam.
The same is also true of spam filters. Subject lines with spammy keywords or anything irrelevant to the recipient are more likely to be flagged as spam, either by algorithmic filters or by the recipient themselves.
This will ultimately have an impact on the deliverability of your emails.
It's important to limit the use of spammy words in the email's content and subject line.
This list of spammy words is updated frequently by different email service providers' algorithms that filter your emails. Even one spammy keyword can have a significant negative impact on how well your emails are delivered.
Some of these triggers words are as follows:
· Claim your discount NOW!
· Act immediately
· Claim your discount NOW!
· Jackpot
· 100% FREE
· For only XXX amount
The best conversion is achieved by graphic material, but it is likely to reduce email deliverability.
Readers don't favour plain text emails, but an email with much HTML content appears spammy. The optimal approach is to keep a 60:40 text to HTML ratio in order to have the best balance of both.
Email links are necessary for conversions. However, including too many links in one email attracts the ESP's attention and sends your message to the spam folder.
It's quite risky because it has an impact on email deliverability and your sender reputation score.
Email tracking links are among the extra links. Several ESPs typically ban the tracking link, which has an immediate effect on your email deliverability rate.
The open rates of personalised emails are typically 29% higher than those of regular emails. Since everyone enjoys being treated personally, this is evident.
The deliverability of your emails, customer engagement, and conversion rates all eventually improve with higher email open rates.
Enalito, an email automation platform, enables the sender to add customized emails depending on the recipients' shopping, browsing, and cart behavior. This raises the deliverability of your emails and significantly helps you achieve email goals
PeText formatting is essential for increasing user engagement.
Spam filters are activated when a subject line is written in ALL CAPS. It is advised to write as if you are communicating with a friend.
Additionally, avoid using several colors while writing the email as this is a terrible practice and lowers email delivery.
The quickest way to connect with the largest audience could seem to be to purchase email lists. However, it can affect the delivery of your emails for the following reason:
· You do not have the receivers' consent.
· The email address might not exist or be incorrect.
· It is against the rules regarding email and may result in legal action.
Therefore, use appropriate email marketing techniques when building your email list.
You must engage your subscribers with relevant content to improve deliverability. Nobody wants to read a generic email that appears impersonal and useless. This is why you should segment your email subscribers based on various criteria, such as
· Behavior Data: Purchase behavior, Email behavior, Cart behavior, Monthly buying behavior & customers property
· Stage in buyer's journey: Awareness, consideration, or decision-making
· Lifecycle stage: New or existing customers, frequent buyers, loyal customers
· Demography: Gender, age, ethnicity, occupation
· Geography: Country, city, pincode
An email that has been segmented is more relevant and resonates with the receiver. The effectiveness of your email is affected by how hard you work and how far you go. Additionally, segmentation and personalisation together will result in a dramatic rise in email interaction, which will raise your deliverability rate.
Enalito helps you to not only segment your customers or email list on above mentioned criteria, but also helps you to personalize email based on user’s behavior on your ecommerce store.
Some of your subscribers will eventually stop responding to your emails or will change their email address because of a change in employment status or for any other reason. You risk losing their engagement if you keep emailing them for these reasons.
It is crucial to regularly remove these addresses from the email list in order to maintain a high deliverability rate.
Here are some guidelines for maintaining the cleanliness of email lists:
Get rid of hard bounced email addresses,
The following users should be on a suppression list.
· Inactive users
· Whoever stopped responding to your emails
· Individuals that unsubscribed
According to CAN-SPAM regulations, you must include an unsubscribe link in your email campaign. A recipient searches for an unsubscribe link if they want to stop receiving your emails.
If they are unable to locate one, they are quite likely to flag your email as spam.
Being reported as spam is worse than being unsubscribed. Your email deliverability and domain score will directly decrease as a result of an increase in spam reports.
To prevent individuals from ignoring your emails, you must create a regular routine for delivering them at the appropriate frequency and time.
Considering your industry, the type of email campaign you are running, and the interaction patterns of your receipts will help you choose the best time and day to send emails.
Enalito helps you to identify what time of the day your customers are engaging with you email campaign that helps you to send relevant content to your customers at right time which ultimately contributes in to better deliverability.
For E commerce the best day to send email campaign is Tuesday to Thursday & best time is 10 am to 12 noon.
It is nothing less than a success when your emails are sent to the right folder of the right recipient at the right time.
Before you begin sending your campaigns, be sure to adhere to all the best practices we listed above for the best outcomes. As a result, email deliverability will be improved, your sender reputation will grow, and your domain reputation will rise.
Contact the Enalito team if you'd want to know more about email deliverability. At Enalito, we make sure that users have the highest deliverability and send email campaigns that convert well. Personalized & segmented emails increase user engagement, which encourages more users to open and click the emails, enhancing email deliverability.