4 Email Marketing Myths You Shouldn’t Believe

Email marketing is a large and ever-growing industry filled with professionals willing to give you their advice. If you were to type ’email marketing advice’ into an online search engine, literally millions of results would appear. But not all advice is created equal, and some so-called ‘facts’ are actually ‘fakes’. Here are four common email marketing myths that you should never believe.

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Myth #1: Email marketing is on the decline.

Reality: Whilst many so-called experts have predicted the decline of email marketing almost as quickly as email marketing was developed, the reality is that it still remains an effective strategy in your overall online marketing plan. Consider these eye-opening email marketing stats from the DMA National Client Email Report.

  • For every pound invested by businesses into email marketing, they received an average return of nearly £29. That’s an incredible return on investment measuring nearly 29,000 per cent.
  • Nearly 90 per cent of UK business owners — that’s nine in ten — say that email marketing is either ‘important’ or ‘very important’ in their overall marketing strategy.
  • Email marketing delivery rates, open rates and click-through rates all increased by nearly 50 per cent or more in recent years, whilst unsubscribe rates continued to decline.

Myth #2: Tuesday is the best day to send a marketing email.

Reality: Whilst certain days of the week may have slightly better open rates than other days, the reality is that they differ by only by a few per cent points. What’s more, the day you send isn’t necessarily the day an email user will open the message. Global email marketing agency Alchemy Worx found that 85 per cent of email opens occur two days after an email is sent, whilst 32 per cent of all email-derived purchases take place nearly two weeks later.

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Myth #3: The more emails you send, the more you’ll be ignored.

Reality: Whilst there’s some research that indicates more emails can lead to more unsubscribes, there’s an important caveat that should be noted: the number of unsubscribes is not so much related to the frequency of the emails, but rather the relevance of the content being sent. This is a very important distinction that should not be overlooked. In fact, one study found that sending one extra email per month could result in a significant increase in sales (nearly £530,000 in one case). Bottom line: it’s ok to send more than one email a week to your subscribers. Just make sure the content is well prepared and relevant to your email base.

Myth #4: Emails should always be short in length to keep a reader’s attention.

Reality: You’ve no doubt heard the mantras: ‘keep your emails short’ and ‘shorter is better’. Whilst these generalisations are sometimes true, the reality is that email length is more about the interest of your subscribers and not about some arbitrary number of words. When composing emails, ask yourself:

  • Who am I writing this for? Know your audience and their preferences. Long emails may work better for some people (intellectuals, for instance, or those very interested in your topic) whilst other readers may prefer their emails be short. It’s difficult and often dangerous to make broad generalisations about subgroups of people, but you should always remember that at their core, your email subscribers are individuals, and every individual is different.
  • What is my message? Announcing a major product release would obviously call for a longer email than sending another discount code. Keep the message in mind when you’re considering email length.
  • What type of email will this be? More frequent, consistent emails — think your monthly newsletter — require different lengths than less frequent, more ‘in-the-moment’ messages. Use the email type to help guide your word count.

Distinguishing marketing fact from marketing fiction requires careful research and consideration. Fortunately, now that you’re armed with knowledge, you’ll never fall for these email marketing myths again. If you’re ready to maximise your email marketing, give Bouncezap’s exit intent popup software a try. It’ll help you increase your email subscriber list in no time — and that’s no myth!