It’s predicted that 333.2 billion emails will be sent and received each day in 2022.
It’s proof that email marketing is far from dead. So, if you haven’t gotten your brand moving to take advantage of email marketing, now is the perfect time to start building up your email list.
With so many emails sent daily, how can you make sure your emails stand out in a crowded inbox? How do you ensure people take notice? What do you need to do to make sure they consume your content?
We’ll cover the answers to these questions and more as we share 10 hot email marketing tips you can use in 2022 and beyond.
10 Hot Email Marketing Tips for 2022
It’s safe to say most of us subscribe to a lot of email newsletters, especially if you run a business. And there’s a good chance many of them get sent straight to the trash unopened. If you want to prevent the same fate from happening to the newsletters you send, keep these email marketing tips in mind:
1. Keep Your Target Reader in Mind When Writing
To write truly irresistible emails, you need to put yourself in the shoes of your target reader. What would they want to see in an email from you? What kind of content would they enjoy reading? Whatever it is, that’s what you want to send to them. When they look forward to seeing your name in their inbox, they’re more likely to open and eagerly engage with the content you send.
To take it a step further, consider segmenting your email list based on interests or where they are in the buyer’s journey. This makes your content more focused and personalized for the groups of subscribers you target with each campaign. Essentially, it ensures they receive the content they’re most interested in seeing versus getting bombarded with other information. Not only does this increase open rates, but people will be less likely to unsubscribe.
2. Write Subject Lines That Grab Attention
Of all the email marketing tips in the world, this is the one you should take the most seriously. Your subject line could make or break the success of your email. It might sound like a lot of pressure, but your subject line is crucial. It’s what people see first thing. Those few words help them decide whether they open your email or send it straight to the trash.
If you want to increase your open rates and get people to read the content you so painstakingly crafted, your subject line needs to grab attention. It needs to be descriptive while still being short and sweet. And most importantly, it should never mislead your subscribers. Clickbait subject lines can reduce your read rates by 9% or more.
3. Schedule Emails to Send at Optimal Times
After you finish crafting a compelling email, it might be tempting to hit send immediately. However, it might not be the most optimal time for an email to land in your subscribers’ inbox. You want to reach them when they’re more inclined to open and read your content.
The tricky thing about finding the right time to send emails is that it tends to vary based on the industry. Although, there is some data you can use to help you narrow down a few times to experiment with. Then, you can see what your unique audience responds to.
Stick With Daytime: It’s better to send emails to your list when your subscribers are awake. Because you can have subscribers based across the globe and in different time zones, consider the location of most of your audience when choosing your ideal time.
Avoid Mondays and Weekends: Many people arrive in the office first thing on Monday morning and delete any unnecessary emails, so you don’t want yours to fall into that category. Emails are often ignored on weekends as well, which is when people tend to disconnect.
Go With Tuesday, Wednesday, and Thursday: According to MailChimp, these three days tend to be the favorites when sending email campaigns. Try sending emails on these days to see if one triggers a higher open rate than another. Then, you can choose one day for weekly consistency.
At the end of the day, be willing to test and tweak your schedule. Once you’ve figured out the best day and time to send your emails, it’s one less thing you to worry about. Instead, you can just focus on implementing the rest of these email marketing tips.
4. Make Sure Your Emails Are Optimized for Mobile
Because you’re sending your emails from a desktop website, it can be easy to forget to check how the result looks on a mobile device. But, most of us are reading our emails on mobile. That’s why you need to take the extra step to ensure your email template and all your content suit a smaller screen. Otherwise, your subscribers will have a hard time reading what you’ve sent, and they could delete your email without engaging.
Luckily, many platforms allow you to preview your email on mobile. Often, you can even send a test email to yourself before it goes out to your list. Then, you can make any final tweaks to ensure it’s mobile-friendly and looks great. Take the extra few minutes to do this before sending!
As a good rule of thumb, you’ll want to stick to a single-column email template. You’ll also want to choose a font size that’s legible on mobile since subscribers won’t be able to make it bigger. Additionally, you’ll want to double-check the size of any images and buttons that you’ve added.
5. Engage Subscribers Right Off the Bat
If you’re not already sending a welcome email (or even an entire welcome sequence) to your new subscribers, you’re missing out. The smartest thing you can do to take your email marketing and your business to the next level is to engage with people while they’re hot. Someone who’s just subscribed is likely the most interested they can be in your brand, and you should use that to your advantage.
By sending a welcome email, you engage with people immediately after they’ve joined your list. This is your opportunity to introduce people to your brand, so they’ll know what you’re all about. They have a clear picture of what to expect from your upcoming content. Plus, you get the chance to start building that relationship with them early on. As you do, they’ll start to see you as a thought leader in your industry, and it gets the ball rolling when building trust.
Whether you send a single welcome email or an entire email sequence is up to you. Consider what your audience would most resonate with. If you opt for an email sequence, just make sure you don’t go overboard. Keep it valuable and engaging.
6. Keep the Body of Your Emails Short and Sweet
While it may be tempting to share all your thoughts in a novel-length email, that might not appeal to your subscribers. One of the best email marketing tips we can offer is to keep the body copy of your emails short and sweet. A gigantic block of text can be a turn-off for your audience, and they will likely stop reading.
Instead, be concise. Focus on the main ideas of your content and avoid rambling. This way, your subscribers can read your email, receive the intended value, and move on to the next step.
7. Don’t Forget the Call to Action
Speaking of that important next step, it’s wise to end your email with a call to action (CTA). Now, this can change depending on the goal of your email. Sometimes your CTA might be to get someone to visit your website and read your latest blog post. Or if you’re in the middle of a launch, your CTA will be intended to drive sales. Do what’s appropriate and relevant to the email.
The CTA is so important because it tells people what that next step is. If someone has read your email and enjoyed the content, they’re likely poised and ready to take action. Take advantage of that by letting them know what they should do after reading your email. It’s a great way to boost engagement.
8. Never Buy Email Addresses
No matter how badly you want to grow your email list, avoid purchasing email addresses. That should be a given, but unfortunately, it’s still happening in the world of email marketing. Many companies are desperate to gain subscribers and purchase the personal information of those they believe to be their target customers. These people wonder how they wound up on an email list they don’t remember joining. It’s a turn-off and reflects poorly on your brand.
If you want more subscribers, you need to go about it the right way. For example, create a freebie that would appeal to your ideal subscriber, which you can then provide in exchange for their name and email. This freebie could be a downloadable PDF, a challenge or short email course, or even a store discount. The options are endless, so you can test to see what works best for you and your audience.
Doing it this way will take more time and effort, but it ensures you have a list of subscribers interested in your brand and your content.
9. Always be Respectful of Your Subscribers
You know how busy your inbox can get. It’s the same for your subscribers. For that reason, you never want to spam them with a bunch of unnecessary content. Instead, only send emails when you have something of value to share with them. For example, stick to just sending a weekly newsletter to keep your list warm, and don’t bombard them with anything else.
49% of consumers stated they’d like to receive promotional emails from their favorite brands every week. So, that’s a great goal to aim for when it comes to your email marketing efforts!
The only time you want to increase the number of emails you’re sending is when you’re going through a launch. Then and only then is it acceptable to send daily emails, and in some cases, multiple emails per day. Even during a launch, it’s smart to give people the choice to opt-out of launch emails and only receive your regular newsletters instead.
10. Don’t Be Afraid to Clean Your List from Time to Time
To conclude our round-up of email marketing tips, we also want to encourage you to delete subscribers from your list periodically. While that may sound crazy, there’s a good reason for this advice. Generally, the platforms you use to send emails charge you based on the number of subscribers you’ve accumulated. And many of them are probably inactive.
If you don’t purge inactive subscribers from your list, you’re only costing yourself more money in the long run. That’s why it’s helpful to make one last move to re-engage your list and then delete those subscribers who have gone “cold.” Cold subscribers haven’t opened your emails in a long time and, most likely, have no plans to open any you send in the future. Don’t keep them around to hurt your open rates, remove them from your lists.
Let Us Put These Email Marketing Tips to Use
Don’t have a lot of experience writing emails? Don’t stress. You can take your time to learn more about email marketing or outsource to a content writing agency.
Express Writers has a team of expert email writers experienced with writing engaging and professional email copy. They put the email marketing tips we’ve covered to good use and craft copy that will boost your open and click-through rates. Want to learn more?
Contact us today to learn more about how we train our email writers.
Alecs is the Client Accounts Manager at Express Writers. Content is a little bit like clothing.
We all know which types we like best and, after awhile, it’s easy to get stuck in a rut so to speak, recycling the same 4 items time and time again, leaving 90% of the vast closet untouched.
While you may not be literally reusing the same pieces of content over and over again, I’m willing to bet you probably reuse the same types of content – blogs, tweets, links, etc. While there’s nothing wrong with this content on its own, it can make your brand feel stale, boring and predictable if you don’t branch out – just like that dingy grey sweatshirt you love so much.
But what if you brought in fresh new infographics, ebooks and brochures into your content wardrobe?
It might make your brand feel a little like this…
3 Amazing Content Forms & How to Benefit From Them: Infographics, Ebooks, Brochures
In order to switch it up and give your brand new life, try experimenting with the following types of content.
1. How To Use Infographics
Infographics are the belle of the ball right now in content. Their most obvious winning factor is that they drive insane traffic to your site. Just how insane, you ask?
Infographic search volume has increased over 800% in the last 2 years.
The brain processes visual information at a rate 60,000 times faster than it does textual information.
65% of people classify themselves as “Visual learners”
People who use infographics on their site grow an average of 12% faster than those who don’t.
Infographics are shared on social media 3 times as often as all other types of content, which means they have a high potential to go viral.
Personally, our brand infographics, like this one, have garnered 3x the average shares one of our blog posts gets.
How’s that for content that is in-demand? In addition to being in-demand, though, infographics are also amazingly functional. This owes to the fact that infographics pack a ton of information into a small, easily digestible mechanism and can help your readers better understand your topic. Because of this, they’re shared more often, viewed more often and understood more comprehensively than text-based content.
In order to use infographics effectively in your content, there are several things you need to consider. First of all, the infographic should be strictly information-based. Don’t ever use an infographic to pitch your company’s many virtues. These infographics defeat the point (viral information sharing) and use the infographic’s power for evil rather than good. Instead, focus on taking an issue your industry faces, a hot topic that will encourage sharing or an interesting development and breaking it up to provide your audience with further information. If you need help coming up with an in-demand and genuinely interesting topic for your infographic, consider consulting resources like Google Trends or viral Twitter hashtags.
Once you’ve chosen a topic, you’ll need to gather information. When citing sources for your infographic, make sure they’re reputable sources comprised of industry experts and high-profile sites. Pulling information from obscure sites increases the likelihood that the information will be incorrect and decreases the likelihood that your infographic will receive a good reception (people don’t like sharing faulty information, after all). When gathering info, think about which statistics will make a good visual. Increase or decrease in revenue, for example, can be illustrated by a bar graph. Stick with great sources and highly visual statistics and you’ll have a great infographic in no time.
When it finally comes time to design your infographic, you can either pay a designer (don’t be surprised, though, if prices top out around $1,000) or you can do it yourself. Free web-based platforms like Easel.ly, Piktochart, Infogr.am get the job done with professional results and can help you stand out from the pack in an instant.
2. How to Benefit From Ebooks
Ah, eBooks – the quiet princesses overthrowing the palace one step at a time. Ebooks now top paperbacks in sales numbers and are set to completely overtake the paper dynasty any day now. As a marketer, though, it’s possible that you don’t want to sell your eBook and that you only want to use your eBook as an incentive. This is without a doubt how eBooks rose to prominence in marketing and is still one of the primary ways they are used within content strategy.
The reason for this is that bundling has long been a market strategy to help consumers make purchasing decisions and to help differentiate a company from its competition. For example, when a consumer purchases a piece of clothing from an online outfitter and finds a $100 voucher for a new online wine club (a sister company of the clothing retailer) enclosed, that consumer is much more likely to buy from that retailer in the future. Similarly, when a customer visits your site and finds that you’re offering samples of your content or (better yet) entire courses for free in eBook form, they’re very likely to stick around to see what else you have to offer. This approach also proves to consumers that a company is so confident in the quality of its product that it is happy to literally give some of it away.
Though compiling an eBook may sound complicated, it’s pretty simple. All you need to do is find a topic you want to write about (consider serialized topics you’ve blogged about in the past, consistent questions your customers ask, a problem many of your customers have or a new development you’re excited to debut) and write content (for more information about how to actually write an eBook, check out this HubSpot resource). In order to ensure that your content is as good as it possibly can be, ensure that it compliments your current brand, that it looks professional and that it is executed with precision. Enlist professional help to get your cover image on point and then give the eBook away as an incentive to subscribe to your company’s email list or as a promotional item bundled into more extensive courses or workshops.
3. Brochures Are Coming Back & How You Can Use Them
Did you think that brochures were an archaic form of marketing that nobody used anymore? Did you think that they were reserved for medical companies in doctor’s office waiting rooms and weight loss products? Think again. When done correctly, brochures can be a helpful piece of content that is ideal for spreading the message about your services and helping customers understand your mission. Alternately, brochures can be used to announce new products or services or to promote excitement surrounding sales.
Thanks to today’s technology, it’s completely possible to design web-based brochures that can be downloaded as a PDF or delivered directly to your customers’ inboxes. No matter what form you choose for your brochure, there are a few rules you should always abide by when creating brochures. The first is to be knowledgeable about your customer. Consider what the point of the brochure is – are you looking to promote information? Boost excitement? Introduce a new service? Now think about how the brochure needs to be laid out in order to communicate that – what kind of information does it need? Which questions should it answer? Once you’ve answered those questions, you can dedicate yourself to the writing process. In many ways a brochure is a small sales pitch and, as such, you should be writing great headlines and ensuring that your CTAs are on point. Even though a brochure is a somewhat rare form of content nowadays, it needs to fulfill all of the tasks of any other piece of content: provide information, intrigue audiences and tell them where to go next.
The Case for Content: How Infographics, Ebooks and Brochures Can Overhaul Your Brand
Today, everyone is online. That much is obvious. What people do online, though, is a bit more of a toss-up. While you may have a good audience for blog posts or podcasts, expanding out into other forms of content can help you reach new audiences and promote your message in a different way.
There are dozens of different types of content but for the brand that truly wants to overhaul its image and put forward a brave new face, there is no content so heavy-hitting and valuable as infographics, eBooks and brochures. Customizable, highly distributable and easy to create, these pieces of content are a fantastic way for you to spread information, drive people back to your site and ensure you’re casting your net as widely as possible.
Because, hey, while we all love that dingy grey sweater, it’s time for a change every now and then, don’t you agree? Who wouldn’t want their brand refreshed and dressed as well as a Marilyn Monroe? Check out our infographic service to get started!
If you’re a retailer, you depend on good copy to help sell your products and services.
With good copywriting, you can garner interest in your brand, cultivate trust, and provide value to your audience. In turn, these aspects make them more likely to pull the trigger. This is when leads convert to sales, and you score.
Fantastic retail copywriting, however, is what sets apart the merely successful from the true stars of the market.
However, that level of writing is often hard to achieve. In short, you need the pros.
This is where a content creation and copywriting service swoops in to help you.
At Express Writers, we’re staffed with skilled scribes who know how to write engaging copy. We employ slick sentences, nimble turns-of-phrase, and alluring adjectives to present valuable information to your customers.
We write copy that gets you noticed. We do this in a few different ways, including using the same techniques that the big retailers use.
Get the gist of what we offer, then find out which major brands we love to emulate.
What Express Writers Offers for Retail Copywriting
Our Content Shop is a treasure trove if you’re looking for great retail copywriting. Just a few of our offerings include:
We write your copy so you don’t have to, and we write it professionally. This means you’ll be a step above your competitors with snazzy copy that holds attention. It’s clean writing that alternately entices and engages your readers.
Your copy will be unique to your business and what you’re selling. Whether you offer products or services, we’ll make them desirable. We’ll answer the readers’ questions and position you not only as useful, but necessary to your potential customers.
Our Track Record
We have helped thousands of clients edge out the competition with solid, smart, well-written copy that’s SEO-ready and optimized for discovery.
Our successes are proven: our services have given clients boosts like high conversion rates, big increases in revenue, saved time, and high-ranking pages. We have worked with brands big and small and helped speed their way to standing out among their peers.
Our services make it possible – we’re ultra-flexible and can give you just what you need.
Our Products and Services for Retail Copywriting
You’ll find all kinds of options for custom retail copywriting in our Content Shop.
Product Descriptions
Excellent product descriptions highlight what you’re selling in a way that makes them unique but understandable. Customers will quickly get the gist of key features with well-written descriptions, but, more importantly, they’ll be enticed to click “Add to Cart.”
Ad Copywriting
You only have one chance to grab attention with your click-through ads. With professional ad copywriting, we write the kind of creative, fun, targeted copy that gets web users to stop scrolling, take a closer look, and click.
Web Pages
If you want to grab the customers who are looking for businesses like yours, you need SEO-friendly web pages that are easy on the eyes. We write readable, professional, custom copy that is up to Google’s high standards. This means more traffic and conversions for you.
At Express Writers, we know quality retail copywriting. As such, we’ve collected some of our favorite examples of awesome brands doing it right. When we work for you, we’ll aim to emulate these successful brands by using their tried-and-true techniques.
5 Examples of Big-Time Brands that Nail Retail Copywriting
According to Econsultancy, there is a formula to great retail copywriting. It includes:
A unique approach
A knowledgeable perspective
Seamless keywords
A readable format
An inviting, friendly tone of voice
Not too much technical jargon
Some of the best brands out there nail every aspect – and they make it look easy.
1. Apple
Time after time, Apple keeps on producing crisp, clean copy that grabs your attention and holds it. In fact, their words are like their products: sleek, crafted, and to-the-point.
But what are the nitty-gritty reasons behind why Apple’s retail copywriting works effortlessly? According to Kissmetrics, it’s based on a couple of key techniques:
There’s always one big idea. For example, in the above screengrab, the idea is simple: the iPad Pro is just like the older model, but better. With it, you can still carry out all the tasks you used to do – just better.
Sentences are short and broken. Most of the ideas Apple puts out there are rather abrupt in their wording. However, they all give you the sense that the company is making a firm, bold statement that they absolutely stand behind. They’re not suggesting, they’re telling.
The copy is memorable. The line “Anything you can do, you can do better” is not just catchy. It actually riffs off memorable song lyrics from the Broadway musical, Annie Get Your Gun. As such, it has a ring to it. It sticks in your head. Of course, that’s totally the point.
2. ModCloth
If there was an award for “best use of plays-on-words in product descriptions,” women’s clothing retailer ModCloth would win it.
Just listen to the names of some of these clothing pieces:
The Flair and Back A-Line Dress
Pull Up a Cherry A-Line Dress
Flourishing Flirtation Top
Patio Chatting Tank Top
According to Hubspot, ModCloth accomplishes enticing product names and descriptions because they know their buyer persona inside-out. This includes what will appeal to them. They know that the gals who shop their website are smart and savvy – and they run with it.
3. UncommonGoods
UncommonGoods immediately grabs your attention on their homepage with their unique product categories. Instead of settling for your standard “men,” “women,” etc., they instead zero-in on fun categories that directly appeal to special interests.
It’s fun and a little silly to name your “bestsellers” category “Selling Like Hotcakes!” – but it totally works.
4. Old Spice
Old Spice has set themselves apart from other men’s brands by just plain going for it. Their wacky, hilarious ad copy is everything from attention-grabbing to tongue-in-cheek.
Just look at that tagline in the screengrab: “Don’t smell yourself short.” It’s simple, memorable, witty, and funny. Old Spice’s ad copy takes itself incredibly seriously, but that’s part of the joke – and you can tell that they’re laughing right along with us.
5. Avocode
Avocode is nailing the simple, straight-to-the-point strategy. Combined with their clever and cool name, their copy tells you, in plain language and large font, exactly what they can do for you in one sentence.
As Kissmetrics notes, it’s not pushy or complicated, and it doesn’t scream for your attention. It tells it like it is.
Unsurprisingly, this makes you feel like their program might be equally as simple to use. That’s just smart retail copywriting.
[clickToTweet tweet=”Learn which brands are killing it at retail #copywriting in this post from @ExpWriters!” quote=”Learn which brands are killing it at retail #copywriting in this post from @ExpWriters!”]
How to Emulate the Pros and Get Effective, Attention-Grabbing Copy
If you want to emulate the big guns and cultivate creative copy that translates into a tidy ROI, you totally can.
There are a few basic principles to follow.
1. Keep It Concise
Short and to-the-point is always better than long-winded and rambling when it comes to good copy.
As you probably noticed from the examples above, keeping it short keeps things punchy. After all, which is more likely to grab your eye: a huge wall of text explaining a product or service in fine detail, or a short sentence that captures its essence in one try?
2. Be Creative
Creativity will take you far with retail copy. Creativity is what makes you stand out from the pack. It’s what sets your message apart from the thousands of other brands that are similar to yours.
3. Be Approachable
Don’t be afraid to poke fun at yourself, and maintain a friendly tone. Approachable writing makes people feel warm and welcome – it invites them in and draws them closer.
4. Consider Your Target
Don’t write for teenagers if teenagers aren’t your target audience. Pay attention to exactly who you’re addressing with your retail copywriting, and think long and hard about what will appeal to them.
5. Hire Fantastic Writers
If you want to skip the hard parts and let someone else do the creative legwork for you, then you should hire fantastic writers to make your copy sing.
At Express Writers, our team is ready and waiting to take your retail copy needs and run with them. We have a variety of products and writing services that can get you noticed in the best way possible.
So, what are you waiting for?
To kick-start your retail copywriting, visit our Content Shop today and get rolling on your way to new heights with great copy.
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