We've said it before; email marking is the good old trusty steed of online marketing, time and again delivering consistently good results and a high ROI. Although email has been declared ‘dead’ countless times over the past decade, it always makes a solid industry come-back. Each time, bringing with it better tools, greater functionality, bolder designs, new ways to get around spam filters and increased opportunities to engage with customers and subscribers on their terms (like via their preferred social platforms and mobile devices.) I think by now, everyone can (if they haven’t already), accept that email marketing isn’t going anywhere soon.

This doesn't mean we should be sitting back on our laurels though, far from it. Instead, we should be constantly looking ahead and working pro-actively to ensure that we’re maximizing our email marketing ROI.

With this in mind, we look at a few steps that, if done on a regular basis, could help you to improve your email marketing results.

STEP 1: A/B Split Testing

Here are some interesting stats for you. Did you know that according to findings from the Marketing Sherpa 2011 Email Marketing Benchmark Report, 61% of marketers do not routinely test email campaigns to optimize performance. In a 2009 report by Forrester Research, results showed that marketers who test well and consistently earn up to 20 % more than those who don’t. Whilst the first stat is worrying, to say the least, the latter should be motivation enough to get back on track with testing your campaigns before you send them.

A/B Split testing allows you to test two different variables at the same time. The subject line, call to action, body content, landing pages, images, background colours and time of day can all be tested against each other. Winning combinations are then tested against new variables on an on-going basis, which is then known as champion/challenger testing. This ensures that you always have the most effective combination at any given time. Yes, it might initially be time-consuming, but if you want significant results then this is part of what you have to do.

STEP 2: Segmenting

It’s highly unlikely that your entire database is homogenous. The broader your target audience, the more diluted your email newsletter results are going to be. However, if you segment (and target) effectively, you have a much better chance of maintaining concentrated results.

The beauty behind segmenting is that it can be as done as simply or advanced as you want or need it to be. Gender, age and location might be effective enough for what you want to achieve, but some email marketers take it much further and start segmenting according to industry, income bracket (if this is disclosed in a preference centre), purchase history, buyer behaviour and customer loyalty.

STEP 3: Triggered Emails

Triggered emails are relatively simple to set up and can be used for a number of different purposes. Some of the most common uses include: abandoned cart messages, email newsletter sign up confirmations, event registration and confirmation details, transactional messages, subscribers birthdays, updated user-profiles and surveys and friendly reminder (‘remember us?’) emails.

Triggered emails keep your subscribers up to date with information they need to know and also gives you the opportunity to engage with them and show them how much you appreciate their loyalty.

STEP 4: Aligning content, subject lines and landing pages

It might seem simple enough to achieve this, but it doesn’t mean that everyone gets it right all the time. Your subject line needs to clearly (and honestly) state exactly what your subscriber can expect to find in the body of the email message. You certainly won’t win any friends (or new subscribers for that matter) by having an enticing subject line and then a completely unrelated or misleading offer in the content.

Follow through on your promises. The same applies to your landing pages. If your button says: ‘Sign Up Here’, then make sure the link takes them to the sign-up form on your website. ‘Buy now’ should equally take them to the purchase/checkout page. You get the idea, double-check your links to make sure they’re taking your visitors to the right places. Giving your subscribers misleading information will only ensure that in the future they ignore or distrust any other emails you send.

STEP 5: Email List Cleaning

When was the last time you went through your email database and removed any inactive or invalid email addresses? It’s time to get tough. Firstly, remove (but don’t delete) any subscribers who haven’t clicked on or opened any of your email messages in the last 3 or 6 months, depending on how often you send emails. Next, go through your list and check for any typos that might be affecting your bounce rate. Commas instead of full stops are one of the most common errors and are easily corrected. You should also remove any role accounts from your list, on which your efforts are surely wasted. These include addresses such as [email protected], [email protected]. You might be pleasantly surprised to find that these simple steps make a significant difference to your overall bounce rate.

Really what it comes down to is that you should be focused on bettering your email marketing all the time. For sure, it’s an on-going and sometimes frustrating process having to test campaigns, monitor your subscribers and scrub your database lists, but there is no doubt that these steps will help you to better understand and target your customers, which is, of course, the ultimate goal.