How To Optimize Click-through Rate For Emails
Click-through rate for emails is another important metric to optimize. The more people that click in your email, the more people that will have the opportunity to make a purchase.
Above is an email from Aer Lingus, an international airline. Let’s break the email down into parts you can optimize:
- Simple explicit CTAs: The CTA stands out and explains simply that when you click, you will ‘Find flights’.
- Multiple links for the same action: They also have another CTA towards the bottom of the email, and even though the text is different, this CTA links to the same landing page as ‘Find flights’. It’s important to have more than one link in your email to increase the chances of a click-through.
- Offering deals for a limited time: Here they let us know that this is a ‘Flash sale’, which adds the sense of urgency to the email prompting the user to click through in case they miss the sale.
Testing different colours: They could A/B test this email by trying a different colour for the flight options. They could test a blue variation against the green and see which drives the most clicks.
Mobile devices are in our lives as both consumers and professionals today and it shouldn’t be considered a “trend”. People now spend, on average, 69% of their media time on smartphones, while 50% of smartphone users grab their smartphone immediately after waking up.
It’s important to recognize the high percentage (81%) of people using their phones primarily for email. If you don’t lead with a “mobile-first” email strategy, the audience you’re trying to reach will be less engaged with your messages.
Optimizing your campaigns for mobile is no longer a nice-to-have; it’s central to driving opens, clicks, and revenue for your business.
The main ways of optimizing email for mobile devices are:
A. Keeping the flow of mobile all the way to the landing page: It’s not enough to just optimize the email itself for mobile, the landing page a user visits from your email must also have the same mobile experience.
B. Making images and emails lightweight for mobile devices: Internet speeds on mobile devices will be slower than desktop, therefore if your email includes large images a user may become impatient waiting for them to load and leave.
C.Coding for phone, tablet, and desktop: When coding an email, know that the device the email is opened on will vary in screen size and your email must cater for all types.
D. Using reports to identify mobile device opens: This will give you a better insight into your audience so that you can tailor your content to be more desktop or mobile-focused.
Please note: D is not highlighted on the slide. Reports on mobile device opens can be accessed on your ESP.
Jane works Monday to Friday, 9-5, and gets the train to work. You might think that sending her an email while she is on her commute to work the ideal time? Well, it would be if she was subscribed to our mailing list. As mentioned previously, there are laws in place to prevent unwanted emails being sent to someone who has not subscribed so we can’t send her any marketing emails. If she was subscribed, 7-9 a.m would be a prime time to email Jane.
John works evening and weekends therefore, sending an email later in the day and weekends is optimal. Also, travel-related marketing material would resonate well.
James, who is a product evangelist, would respond well to product recommendations, coupons, and referring a friend emails. He also works shifts, which makes it more difficult to find the perfect send time. The best solution here would be to test various send times thoughout the week, compare the results, and use the highest performing open rate send time.
As you can see everyone will have a different optimal send time so it’s important to segment your audience and regularly test.
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