As you may know, most people now spend more time reading their emails than they do surfing the web.
Email is one of the most powerful mediums that you can use to talk to visitors, customers and prospects.

In this article I will discuss 15 best practices that you can use everyday in your email marketing activities.
Used wisely and consistently, there’s no doubt you’l see an increased response from your subscribers —
whether it be for more feedback, more product/seminar registrations, or even more orders.

1. Avoiding the Spam Filters
The majority of large Internet service providers now use rigorous spam protection mechanisms to trap
unsolicited email before it gets into their customers inboxes. Spam filters generally “rank” each email by a
number of different criteria, and, if that email rates above a certain level (such as 10 spam points), then it
is flagged as spam and deleted.

To make sure your emails don’t get flagged as spam — and deleted before they even get to your
subscribers — avoid using words such as ‘Free’, ‘$$$’, ‘Save’, ‘Discount’, etc in both the subject line and
the content of your email.

2. Maximizing Click-Thru Rates
Both web pages and emails can contain a lot of text and graphics, and this sometimes makes it harder to
get your subscribers to perform a certain task, such as clicking on a link to see your special offers.

Numerous research papers tell us that the majority of Internet users respond better to a plain, bold, blue
text link — such as this — as opposed to a banner or button. So, if you’re going to include links in your
emails, make sure they are bold, blue and underlined. This wil mean that more subscribers click through,
meaning more conversions/sales for you.

3. The Power of Personalization
If you were standing in a crowded mall, which of these would get your attention: “HEY, YOU!” or “HEY
JOHN” (assuming your name is John). The power of personalization can and should be used in your
emails. In-fact, by simply starting your email with “Hi [subscriber_name]” instead of the boring “Hi there”,
you can increase both your reading and click-thru rates by up to 650%. Why? Put simply, it’s because
your subscribers feel like they already have a relationship with you as you’ve addressed them by their first
name.