How to increase email marketing open rate? Tips and analysis

For email marketing to be truly effective, your emails need to be opened by recipients. Email marketing open rate is one of the most important performance indicators of a campaign, as it shows how many people were actually interested in your content and clicked to read more.

But how do you increase your email marketing open rate? What are the best practices for creating emails that capture the attention and curiosity of your contacts?

In this article, we answer these questions and more, providing tips, ideas and analysis to help you optimise your open rates and improve your results. Check it out!

What is the email marketing open rate and how is it calculated?

Email marketing open rate is the percentage of sent emails that are opened by recipients. It is calculated by dividing the number of emails opened by the number of emails delivered (i.e. emails that were not rejected by email servers or marked as spam).

For example, if you sent 1,000 emails and 200 were opened, your open rate is 20%. If you sent 1,000 emails and 100 were delivered but only 10 were opened, your open rate is 10%.

What is a good open rate?

According to a report by Campaign Monitor, the global average open rate for email marketing in 2020 will be 18%. But that doesn’t mean you should rely on that number alone, as it may not reflect the reality of your niche or market. One way to know if you have a good open rate is to compare your results to those of your competitors, your industry or your region. In general, we can use the following scale

• Very good: above 20%.

• Good: between 10 and 20%

• Fair: between 6 and 10%

• Poor: below 6%.

What factors influence the open rate of email marketing?

Email marketing open rates depend on a variety of factors that can be divided into two groups: external factors and internal factors.

External factors are those outside of your control, such as user behavior, time of sending, device used to access the email, list segmentation, sending frequency, and others. These factors can vary depending on your audience, your niche, your goal and your value proposition.

Practical tips to increase your email marketing open rate

Now that you know what an email marketing open rate is and what factors influence it, let’s take a look at some practical tips for increasing your open rates and making your campaigns more successful. See below:

1. Reliable sender

The sender is the first piece of information users see when they receive an email. Therefore, it must be reliable and recognizable so that the user knows who is sending the email and feels comfortable opening it. Avoid using generic addresses, such as contato@empresa.com, or names that are unrelated to your brand, such as João da Silva. Instead, use the name of your company, product, or service, or a real person who represents your brand, such as Ana from Company X.

2. Create attractive and compelling subject lines

The subject line is the second element that users see when they receive an email. It is responsible for piquing their interest and curiosity and making them want to learn more about what you have to offer. Therefore, it must be attractive and compelling, grabbing attention and creating value.

Avoid using subject lines that are generic, long, confusing, misleading, or the same as every other email the user receives. Instead, use subject lines that are specific, short, clear, honest, and different from your competitors.

Some ideas for creating compelling and persuasive subject lines include

• Use numbers, statistics, percentages, or dates that give your email credibility and a sense of urgency. For example: “How to increase your open rate by 50% in just 7 days.

• Use questions that encourage the user to respond and open your email. For example: “Do you know the secret to an above-average open rate?

• Use emoticons to add personality and emotion. For example: “🚨 Watch out: are you making these mistakes in your email marketing?

• Use power words that evoke positive or negative emotions in the user, such as curiosity, fear, desire, surprise, etc. For example: “What you need to know about Google’s new algorithm (before it’s too late)”.

• Use personalization that makes the user feel special and valued by using their name, location, purchase history, etc. For example: “Hi John. We have an exclusive offer for you.

3. Use the preheader to supplement the subject line

The pre-header is the text that appears just below the subject line in the user’s inbox. It serves to complement the subject line by providing more information about the content of the email and reinforcing the reason for the user to open the email. For this reason, it should be coherent and consistent with the subject line, avoiding repeating the same information or contradicting what has been said.

Avoid using generic, irrelevant, empty, or unrelated preheaders. Instead, use pre-headers that expand on the value proposition, create anticipation, provide a call to action, or offer a benefit.

Some ideas for using the preheader to complement the subject line include

• Expand the value proposition by providing more details about what the user will find in your email. For example: “Subject line: How to increase your open rate by 50% in just 7 days. Pre-Header: Learn the best techniques and tools to optimize your email marketing campaigns.

• Create anticipation by making the user eager to see what you have to offer. For example: “Subject line: Do you know the secret to an above-average open rate? Pre-header: The answer will surprise you (and help you sell more)”.

• Include a call to action that encourages the user to open your email and take action. For example: “Subject line: 🚨 Attention: Are you making these mistakes in your email marketing? Pre-Header: Open this email now and find out how to fix them.

• Offer a benefit that shows what the user will gain by opening your email. For example: “Subject line: What you need to know about Google’s new algorithm (before it’s too late). Pre-Header: Get a free e-book with the best tips for adapting to the changes.

4. Pay attention to the Design and formatting of your email

The design and formatting of your email are the elements that users see when they open your email. They are responsible for conveying your visual identity, making your content easier to read and understand, and encouraging the user to further engage with your email. That’s why they should be clean and appropriate for your audience and purpose.

Some tips for perfecting your email design and formatting include:

• Use colors, fonts, images, icons, and logos that are consistent with your brand and create a consistent and professional visual identity.

• Use a responsive layout that adapts to different screen sizes and formats to ensure a good viewing experience on any device.

• Use white space, headings, subheadings, lists, bold, italics, and other tools to organize and highlight key information and make your email easier to scan.

• Use high-quality images that are relevant to your content and catch the user’s eye, but don’t go overboard with the number or size so as not to slow down the loading time of your email.

• Use buttons, links, banners and other elements that invite the user to click and interact with your email, but do not distract or confuse the user and keep the focus on your message and desired action.

5. Create content that is valuable and relevant to your audience

Content is what the user reads when they open your email. It is responsible for delivering your value proposition, educating, informing, entertaining, persuading and convincing the user to make a decision or take action. To do this, it must be valuable and relevant to your audience, meeting their needs, expectations, interests and goals.

Some tips for creating content that is valuable and relevant to your audience include:

• Get to know your audience, conduct persona research, understand who your contacts are, what they want, what they need, their pain points, their challenges, their dreams, etc.

• Segment your list, divide your contacts into smaller groups according to their characteristics, behaviors, preferences, buying stages, etc.

• Create personalized content, adapted and targeted to each segment, offering solutions, tips, ideas, news, cases, testimonials, etc. that are relevant and useful to each group.

• Use appropriate language that is clear, simple, objective, direct, warm and appropriate to your audience, your niche, your goal and your channel.

• Use mental triggers, which are persuasion techniques that activate emotions and impulses in the user, such as scarcity, urgency, authority, social proof, reciprocity, etc.

6. Analyze results and run tests to improve your open rates

Analyzing results and running tests are fundamental steps in increasing your email marketing open rates. They allow you to evaluate the performance of your campaigns, identify strengths and weaknesses, areas for improvement and best practices for your audience and niche.

Here are some tips for analyzing results and running tests to improve your open rates:

• Define your goals and metrics, know what you want to achieve with your email marketing campaigns and what indicators you will use to measure your success, such as open rate, click-through rate, conversion rate, etc.

• Use analytics tools such as ActiveCampaign, RD Station, etc. that allow you to track and monitor your results and generate reports and graphs that make them easier to interpret and compare.

• Run A/B tests, which consist of sending two different versions of the same email to a sample of your audience, varying only one element at a time, such as the sender, subject line, pre-header, design, content, etc., and see which version has the best open rate.

• Apply the lessons learned, using the data and insights from your analysis and testing to optimize your next campaigns, replicating what worked and correcting what went wrong.

Email Marketing open rate FAQ

At the end of this article, we’ll answer some frequently asked questions about email marketing open rates that may help you clear up some doubts and deepen your knowledge of the subject. See below:

The bottom line

The email marketing open rate is one of the most important performance indicators of an email marketing campaign, as it shows how many people were interested in your content and clicked through to learn more.

To increase your email marketing open rate, you need to follow some practical tips, such as choosing a reliable and recognizable sender, creating attractive and compelling subject lines, using the pre-header to complement the subject line, paying attention to the design and formatting of your email, creating content that is valuable and relevant to your audience, analyzing the results and running tests to improve your open rates.

By following these tips, you’ll be able to create emails that grab your contacts’ attention and pique their curiosity, generating more clicks, conversions and sales for your business.