Use the analytics from your previous email campaign to learn from for your next campaign. When you are putting together your next email marketing campaign, it’s crucial to look back on the analytics of your previous campaigns. When using a mail merge service, you will have access to analytics not available on email services like Gmail. These analytics can show you who is opening your emails, how long they are reading them for, if they are ending up in a spam folder, and more. Take a look at these five different ways to take advantage of the mail merge analytics to ensure that your email message converts into sales.
5 Tips to Increase Sales With Mail Merge Analytics
1) Decrease Spam
While you are sending emails at high volumes with a mail merge, there is the possibility that the messages will end up in a spam folder. Without proper research and insight, you might assume that only spam emails end up in this folder — unfortunately, that’s not the case. Spam filters aren’t perfect and can detect emails sent in high quantities or opt-in emails as spam. With the mail merge analytics, you’ll be able to find out what emails of yours are ending up in the spam folder. After determining what messaging is ending up in spam, discuss how to fix this issue.
If the email receives a large amount of negative engagement, this could be a reason for landing in spam. Consider tweaking your language or researching your target audience more to find out what can lead to more positive results. Ensure that your email is compliant with CAN-SPAM, an act to establish a set of requirements for commercial email messages. If you are still having issues with spam, consult with your mail merge service to find out if there is an issue with your authentication.
2) Track Conversion Rates
Conversion rates are one of the most critical analytics when it comes to email marketing. These analytics will help you understand if you are receiving successful results for your campaign and ultimately building your revenue. In most cases, conversion rates mean how many purchases were made because of this campaign. The rate will be calculated by how many emails were sent out compared to how many subscribers purchased your product or service. Of course, this is not the only email goal, but it is crucial to understand this rate for retail stores or those selling a service. You can also calculate how many sign-ups or responses you received to your email.
3) Increase Open Rates
You won’t receive any sales if no one is opening your emails, so it’s essential to make sure that your open rate is booming. The open rate shouldn’t be the only analytic you rely on because just because a person opens the email does not mean they feel inclined to read the message. Instead, the open rate is most helpful to study what language and messaging catch the subscriber’s attention best and assist you in adjusting your campaign accordingly. When looking at the open rate statistic, the average rate will vary across different industries. On average, you will want to see an open rate between 25%-50% depending on the industry and what kind of email it is.
4) Lower Your Unsubscribe Rate
Every email you send will have a different unsubscribe rate, but you want to make sure it is as low as possible. This rate will depend on how active and responsive your email list is, but it should be under 0.2% in most cases. If you have to see a sudden jump in people unsubscribing, you’ll need to reevaluate your plan and try to uncover what the problem may be. It could be the topic, the wrong time of day, or something else, but it’s important to pinpoint it as soon as possible not to happen again. Consider researching different trends in the industry to keep your subscribers informed and interested in your messages.
5) Research Your Delivery Rate
Not to be confused with email deliverability, the delivery rate will tell you the percentage of emails you send that get delivered. There are many different reasons why your emails do not get delivered, but it’s vital to reduce the number as much as possible. Those that bounce, or do not get delivered, will hurt your email list health. There are two different categories of emails that do not get delivered, hard and soft bounces.
Hard bounce: These are also known as permanent bounces and mean that the email address you sent the message to is no longer valid.
Soft bounce: A soft bounce is when an email does not get delivered for a temporary reason, like the recipient’s inbox is full or an error with the email server.
Using your mail merge analytics will allow you to understand your email marketing campaign’s success and will enable you to plan for the future. You and your team will see what messaging and emails worked the best to use in your subsequent campaigns. It’s crucial to have these advanced analytics to ensure that you are spending your time and money increasing your revenue.
