Email marketing is one of the most effective methods for growing your business. A successful email channel offers many benefits and is a convenient way to increase ROI. However, there are problems with emails that can make even the best email list ineffective.
Some of these problems include people ignoring emails, not taking the desired action, or unsubscribing. Why do these issues happen, especially with all the great tools to improve email marketing and managing subscribers?
We’ve put together some of the main issues that can happen with a company’s email marketing strategy. And you’ll find information on how to avoid these problems.
Being Too Late
The problem here is not having an email strategy implemented at all. When a beginner starts creating a website, they usually focus on content creation, social media posts, SEO, and other aspects of building a site. While that’s all very important, the beginner may not create and implement an email strategy. This is “being too late” to the party and missing out on all the advantages an email list and strategy can bring to your site and business.
Thousands of site visitors will never return to your site. That’s a hard fact to digest, yet it’s true. They usually leave during the first levels of the marketing funnel. However, with a regular email strategy, you keep them engaged or even from unsubscribing.
These delays in creating an email strategy only benefit your competitors. So, don’t wait to implement your email strategy until you have enough contacts. Instead, start your email strategy as soon as possible.
In addition, don’t flood subscribers with emails. This causes annoyance and people to unsubscribe. Instead, control email frequency and create a strategy that works with your target audience.
Disregarding Client Expectations
Another huge problem is that many people unsubscribe if emails are not relevant. But this happens even more when client expectations are disregarded and unmet.
Here’s an example. Some sites may say they send out weekly emails. However, they change their strategy and begin emailing every day. That’s a problem. The subscribers on their list signed up believing they would only receive emails once a week. That’s manageable and keeps their inboxes from being overwhelmed. However, when the strategy is changed, and subscribers are not informed, they’ll become annoyed and angry! You can’t blame them.
Be upfront with your readers, and don’t change your email frequency without informing them. You might even take a poll to see if readers would like a change in email frequency. This way, they feel included in the process.
Another issue is off-topic content. Subscribers want content that’s related to your site. For example, if your site is about a certain body wash, then email subscribers expect each email will include relevant content about this body wash. They don’t want to hear about other topics.
So, be sure to match your communication style, email frequency, and other subscriber expectations. Otherwise, you’re sure to lose subscribers quickly.
Bad Market Segmentation
Here, again, it’s essential to pay attention to relevance when it comes to your target market. The goal here is to provide your target audience with the content they want. It’s important to avoid sending generic emails.
How do you find your target audience? Contact your target audience directly to learn what’s important to them. You can do this by updating preference forms in emails and on your site. You can allow subscribers to choose the content they want.
It’s also helpful to use surveys, polls, sign-in forms, AI segmentation techniques, and more. Smart algorithms are a great tool for tracking site user and customer behaviour. The data can be processed to find your target market.
The more you get to learn about your subscribers, the easier it is to know your target audience. This data can also be used to create a better segmentation of your contact list. Doing so makes it easier to send targeted newsletters to respective segments within your target audience.
Insufficient Personalisation
Another problem is that some email strategies do not implement personalisation. Instead, the messages are generic and land flat with most subscribers. They may become annoyed and unsubscribe from the email list altogether. However, personalised emails have higher open and click-through rates.
So, you may want to consider adding personalised subjects and content to your newsletters. These may include recommendations based on previously browsed products and more. Such solutions can be easily generated through AI automation.
Underestimating Mobile-Friendliness
Most people use their smartphones and other devices for just about everything these days, including opening emails. Emails are opened most often on smartphones than on PCs and notebooks. This is a fact you can’t afford to ignore. Your newsletter needs to be responsive on mobile devices.
When it comes to layout and design, these are not a problem. Most template editors feature automated responsivity. However, your design also needs to be mobile-first when it comes to the layout and content.
Ensure your newsletters are mobile-friendly and responsive. That means the layout, design, buttons, fonts, and content must all be mobile-friendly. This is a great way to increase subscribers and get them to take the desired action when they’re out and about.
Non-Professional Approach
It’s a fact that many people are wary of new brands. So, it’s necessary to work hard to attract and convince site visitors your new company is professional. Each part of your site, newsletter, content, and more must be done professionally.
So, ensure your newsletters do not look amateurish, or they will repel rather than attract. What’s more, an amateurish appearance can ruin your brand’s identity and make customers distrust the business. So, pay close attention to every aspect of design and ensure the newsletter follows your corporate style.
Summing It Up
These are a few of the issues that can have a huge impact on your email marketing strategy. What’s more, pay attention to trends and never ignore them.
Finally, ensure that your email newsletter is accessible to everyone, including those who have special requirements.
When you pay attention to your target audience and ensure your newsletter meets their expectations, you’re sure to have a successful email marketing strategy!
