Email marketing is still one of the most effective ways to reach customers online. This is true even when marketing to younger, more tech-savvy customers. That said, an email campaign won’t deliver the best possible return on investment if your emails aren’t reaching subscribers’ inboxes.
That’s why it’s important to it’s important to not only focus on maintaining a strong email reputation, but also understand how your sender reputation impacts the deliverability of your email content.
Maintaining a strong email reputation score is key to optimizing your marketing efforts. Also the success of your email campaigns is largely dependent on a number of factors that need to be considered, monitored and maintained over time in order to get the best results.
Negative Domain Reputation
A negative sending reputation most clearly manifests as poor or declining open rates and it can also influence the decision of some receiving servers to bounce your emails.
If recipients often report your messages as spam, that will definitely impact your reputation. Low open rates will have the same effect. So, too, will a high bounce rate. A high bounce rate is the result of sending emails to multiple addresses that are no longer valid on a consistent basis.
The impact of negative data can lead to the damage of your IP reputation score. Before sending any marketing emails, check your list for invalid addresses and remove any you find. Keeping your subscriber list clean and avoiding bounce emails is essential for safeguarding your email sender reputation. Understanding that every decision you make when it comes to data sources, list quality and content can have implications both positive and negative for your future email sends is the first step to taking control of your sending reputation.
The Basics of Building a Strong Sending Reputation
You’re more likely to have a better email and IP address reputation if the people to whom you send emails actually engage with them. Taking steps to boost engagement will improve both your email domain reputation and the overall strength of your campaigns.
Always include a recipient’s name in the subject line of an email. Doing so can boost open rates by as much as 50%. If you are using general contact forms or competition forms to source recipients ensure that there is an opt-in checkbox so that those people can give their permission to be added to your mailing list.
Send your emails using an email address at your own domain The success of your email sends is tied to the reputation of your sending domain.
Your domain sender reputation will also suffer if followers unsubscribe from your list at high rates. This is another reason to segment your list. People are more likely to unsubscribe if they frequently receive irrelevant content from you. That said, it’s also a good idea to solicit feedback from your followers. Finding out what they do and don’t like about your email marketing strategy helps you address their concerns before they unsubscribe.
How To Improve Your Sender Score
Start by performing an email reputation check, also known as an IP reputation check. There are several sites where you can check your IP reputation to determine your score.
Be honest, only ever use a person’s email address for the purpose that you stated when you asked for it. Only email people who opten in. You need to get permission from everyone on your list. No exceptions or excuses, also never buy lists. Segment your list. The more relevant each email is to the recipient, the better your engagement, and thus your reputation will be.
Finally, use an email verification tool to check your subscriber list before sending any messages. This kind of tool will help you remove invalid addresses from your list, which helps to preserve your IP reputation.
By following these tips you can improve your sender score reputation little by little. Start mending your reputation and you’ll soon see more successful email marketing campaigns.