Email Marketing – What Not To Do

A guest blog post by Ron Finklestein

I receive dozens of marketing emails monthly. I take action on almost all of them. I delete, unsubscribe or block as spam. 

Here is why:

1.       Create a boring subject or create a subject that is not engaging or truthful. You need to think of the subject as the headline of a sales letter. If the headline is not reflective of the email, engaging or otherwise noteworthy, I simply delete it.

2.       Don’t tell me where you are located, how many employees you have, or the technology you use. I don’t care. I will only care about those things when you give me a reason to care. Otherwise it is just noise that I have to try to understand. Just tell why I should care by answering this question: what’s in it for me. The other pieces will take care of themselves. 

3.       Do not write long email. Keep is short. I don’t want to or have time to read a long sales letter. Just tell why we should do business together. If I have interest, I will ask for the supporting documentation.

4.       Don’t use fancy prose or make comments that are not real. Be authentic, thoughtful and real. I once received and email from someone and I was going to call them, until I read the last line. It said, “We will triple your business.” I knew they could not do that. Especially since they were not selling, they were marketing. If they said something like “we will triple the amount of web traffic”, I could have accepted that. If you feel compelled to make a comment, support your comment with documentation, testimonials, facts or endorsements.

5.       Don’t make me look for contact info. Make your contact info easy to find and give me the web site so I can do some research to see if I am really interested.

6.       Don’t use endorsements that are not real or lack credibility. I once asked to speak with a client who worked with this company to see if they would deliver on their promises. I was told we do not give out customer info. I ask them to send my contact info to selected customer and have them contact me. They would not do that. I finally asked for some testimonials. The testimonials were so weak and so badly written I was embarrassed to receive them.

Selling via email is no different than writing a direct mail piece. The same rules apply. Keep it simply. Be honest. Tell me why I need to care about what you do. Tell me why you are the expert. Finally, prove that you can do what you say.

Ron Finklestein
Business Growth Experience
ron@businessgrowthexperience.com
330-990-0788
Helping Business Owners Grow, Prosper and Get Results.