Every day, people from all over the world participate in risky behavior.
We all know the dangers, we’re aware of what can happen, but we still don’t put an emphasis on getting tested before we engage in what is a daily activity for many.
Of course, I’m talking about sending emails.
For those of us sending only a few emails to a small group of acquaintances, we’re probably fine. But for those of us with bigger lists and more potential recipients, the risk really starts to add up. And we may be in more danger than we think.
In an earlier post, we talked about common email marketing mistakes and how to avoid them. We were astounded to learn as high as 37% of emails were going out completely untested.
While marketers are seemingly getting better about this, we’re still not perfect (imagine that).
MarketingSherpa recently presented findings from a survey of 1,493 marketers to learn how they were addressing the issue of testing email prior to hitting “send.”
Their results?
Our take?
- The heavy-hitters (subject lines and calls to action) are getting the most attention from email marketers, and are tested regularly at the highest rate. We expect this to only increase as getting someone to open an email and perform an action are top priorities in the board room (can we state the obvious any more?)
- Marketers are commonly asked by their supervisors or clients: “What is the best time or day to send my email?” As the answer varies for every demographic and audience, this is a question that can only be answered through testing of an individual list. (Results may vary, and they will. Learning the nuances of your subscribers will only help performance).
- Our obsession tends to focus on getting readers to open and click, but we sometimes ignore the importance of how email body copy and landing page layout can alter results.
- We wear name tags to events, identify ourselves on the phone, and put return addresses on every piece of direct mail we send, but we don’t seem to put as much importance on worrying about how we look in our email “from” lines, which answers the most basic question the reader may have: “who is this from?”
What do you test that didn’t make this list?
[image: myklroventine]
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