What good is the content of an email if no one opens it? If you are dedicating time and effort into creating valuable email marketing campaigns, but finding that your emails have a low open rate, you may want to rethink how you are approaching the creation and distribution of your emails. Here are six strategies that can help you improve your email open rates in 2019.
Fix Your Subject Line
Think of the subject line as a first impression. It is the first thing the recipient sees and it helps them determine whether or not they are going to open the email. Many people will open an email solely based on the subject line. By being honest with your readers about what the topic of the email is within the subject line, you will increase your open rates. Be creative, but concise and don’t lure recipients in under false pretenses with misleading subject lines. The shorter the subject line, the better. Don’t use capital letters or a lot of punctuation.
Be Timely
Timeliness is a big factor in whether an email will be opened. If someone signs up to receive your newsletters in October and they don’t see anything from you until March, your open rates will not be very high. By sending an automated “Thank you” email or a “here is what you can expect from my newsletters/emails” message, you can ensure higher open rates. Set a schedule and keep it consistent. Use testing to see what send times your emails have higher open rates for.
Be Personable
The biggest way to increase your open rate is to be real and be human. People are far more likely to open an email that is from someone they have a personal connection with. Never send emails from a generic email address and try to personalize the content as much as possible. Spam filters are much more likely to see an email from a business as spam than from a person. If your email comes from a person and not a business, it has a much higher chance of being opened.
Don’t Purchase Email Lists
This is a given. You are practically asking for your email to be sent to a Spam folder if you purchase an email list. Open rates are always low and bounce is always high in these situations. This isn’t worth the risk. If you are looking to increase open rates, you need genuine subscribers. Add a subscribe form to your website and your email signature. You should also consider sifting through your email list and eliminating old email addresses or duplicates and removing inactive subscribers.
Recap
A great subject line, sending the emails out at a prime time, sending to genuine subscriber lists and including personable content can help increase open rates. Since email marketing is one of the top forms of marketing in today’s world, as a real estate agent, you need to be utilizing all it has to offer your business.