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Newsletters are an important communication tool in any effective and comprehensive digital marketing strategy. Several companies use newsletters to communicate with their customers, but do they know how to measure their effectiveness? Ultimately, it’s very simple. The success of your newsletter is measured using the open rate and the click-through rate.
If we use a newsletter, it’s because we want to attract the members of our mailing list – probably current or potential customers – to something we have to offer. We also want to inform, but not exclusively for entertainment purposes. We need to encourage action. If we offer an exclusive promotion through our newsletter, it’s to attract consumers to our product or service.
The click-through rate or conversion rate is the number of times a recipient has performed the action that we want (clicked a link to our product’s website, made an appointment, booked a test drive in we are a dealership, etc.). It determines if the newsletter has reached the desired goal. But before we evaluate the click-through rate, we have to look at the open rate.
The open rate will be largely dictated by the subject of the newsletter, the moment it is sent, the quality of the information that is conveyed, the relevance of this information, and the visibility of the CTAs (call-to-action) which are the links we want the recipient to click or the number we want them to call, or even the promo code we want them to use.
We must also consider our mailing list. Take for example a dealer who wishes to promote an interesting discount on the purchase of a new vehicle. If the recipients are all customers that have already purchased a vehicle in the last few months, our open rate and click-through rate will be disappointing. Such a list would be better suited if we want to promote a discount in the service department.
It’s essential to measure the success of each newsletter that we send. This way we are able to make the necessary corrections. We can measure this success by comparing the statistics of our newsletter with our industry’s average. For example, newsletters sent by companies in the automotive sector have an average open rate of 24%, while 8.4% of those receiving the newsletter will click on a link inside according to recent stats published by Smart Insights.
If our open rate is not equal to, or higher than the average for our industry, we have a sign that our newsletter may be targeting the wrong recipients, or that we are sending it at the wrong time. It may also mean that we are not clear enough on the value offered by our newsletter. For example, if we are offering a discount, it would be wise to mention it in the title of the email.
If the open rate is satisfactory, but the click-through rate is not where we want it to be, it may be that our newsletter is too long, or that the message is not specific enough. Maybe our call-to-action buttons are not visible enough.
What is important to understand is that to be able to make that kind of determination, we must monitor and measure the success of our newsletter closely each time we send it. Use every tool at your disposal to do so in order to quick make any adjustments that are needed. Suddenly, you will have a lot of success with your email marketing campaign!
If you want to develop an effective email marketing strategy, contact your account manager today who will help you establish a plan and measure its success afterwards.
