Email is one of the simple and cost-effective ways to connect to prospects and customers. It helps companies engage with existing clients, build and maintain long-lasting & reliable relations with customers.
In order to get success in email marketing, it is important that your subscribers open and read your emails. If your recipients aren’t opening your email, they will not be able to take any further action or making a purchase.
If you are experiencing poor email open rates or your email open rates are gradually declining then you have to search for the root cause of the issue.
Look at the industry-wise average open rates.
This article will show you the top 3 reasons why your emails are not being read. Read and analyze which one applies at your end.
Bad Email Subject Lines
Hundreds of emails people receive in a day, some irrelevant and some irrelevant. If your subject line isn’t eye-catching, it’s going to get deleted or worse mark as spam.
Your subject line is the first thing recipients sees, it is like a headline. It has to be attractive enough for someone to open your email.
According to Convince & Convert, 35% of email recipients open an email based on subject line alone.
A subject line should be short, concise, and non-deceptive. As per the CAN-SPAM Act, it is against the law to intentionally mislead someone with your subject line in order to induce them to open the message.
Your Content Isn’t Unique Enough
If your content isn’t unique, every time you are using the same or almost the same content, they will stop reading your emails.
You must know your audience well enough to be able to create a message that is useful for them. If on receiving your emails, their expectations are not satisfied, they will stop opening your emails next time they receive them.
You are sending at a wrong time
If you are sending emails at odd hours, chances of a low open rate can be high. Depending on your audience type you can fire your campaign. For example, if your targeted audience includes 9-5 job people, try to send them in the mid-morning or late evening, you may find better open rates.
However, there’s no set rule to send emails. Mailchimp’s analysis found that opens increased after 12 pm, and was highest between 2 and 5 pm. But Kissmetrics has found that the highest open rates occur in the early morning hours.
Nobody knows the “perfect” time, the only way to find it out is by testing, testing, and testing. Run the AB test and figure out the right time to send emails to your audience.
Apart from these three, there are some more important factors which one should pay attention to:
- You haven’t optimized your email for mobile devices.
- You are overdoing- sending emails too often.
- Your ‘From’ address isn’t personal or missing.
- You haven’t segmented your email lists.
- Not providing enough value.
- Messages going into spam.
- Stale email lists.
- Your recipients may no longer be interested in your emails.
- You used keywords that triggered spam alerts.
- You sounded deceptive in your email.
Take Away
If your open rate is really low, take it as a hint that something is wrong. Customize your email copy, don’t use ‘test’ in the subject line, etc. Above all this, make sure you study your prospects and learn their behavior. Monitor analysis and determine what areas you need to work on.
Remember, give the right information to the right people at the right time. Hopefully, this post will help you to do better email marketing.
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