Increase email open rates

Increase email open rates

1. Use your analytics platform to track the performance of your email campaigns so that you have a baseline to start from.

Make sure you include email open rates, but other metrics like click-throughs and conversions will also be useful.

2. Set up double opt-in for your mailing list signups to ensure that people on your lists actually want to receive your emails.

Tell people on the opt-in form that they’ll need to confirm, add a CTA to your thank-you page, write a custom subject line for the confirmation email, and optimize your confirmation thank-you page.

3. Optimize the subject lines in your email campaigns. Use previous successful campaigns as a guide.

Analyze subject lines from campaigns with high and low open rates, segment the audience for each campaign, use your audience’s language, add personalization and a sense of urgency, and edit the subject line down to under 30 characters.

4. Use voice-of-customer data to write more natural subject lines and preview texts.

A/B test subject lines, record voice-of-customer during interviews and surveys, segment subscribers and personalize content for each segment. Use a subject line research tool, and write preview texts that support your subject lines.

5. Improve your signup process for newsletter subscribers and write useful, consistent content.

Clean your email list, follow opt-in best practices, improve your content, find the best send time, experiment with personalization, and track email open rate performance.

6. Use a recognizable sender name on your email campaigns to build brand recall.

Start with a sender name that your subscribers will expect, then add an alternative that creates a sense of exclusivity or personal friendliness. Split-test your sender names to see which ones perform better.

7. Spam test your emails before sending them to pick up any issues that will cause email platforms to hide or flag them as suspicious.

Remove common trigger words, excessive images, misleading messaging, broken links, and misspellings.

8. Check your analytics platform to see how your email campaigns are performing.

Now that you’ve made some changes to your email campaigns, you should be seeing improvements in your email open rates.