How to Get Your Emails Read Every Time

Part with a buck, pull in thirty-eight.

Email's ROI is remarkable, according to the Direct Marketing Association.

But you'll never hit that average, if your emails go unread.

"There are many reasons for failure and many relate to design," says Tanya McGinnity, brand journalist for Onboardly. 

She offers 10 rules to get your emails read:

1. Stay consistent. Discover a look and stick to it. "When recipients hear from you, they shouldn’t have any doubt that it’s you," McGinnty says. Where to start? Mimic the look of your website.

2. Choose a tailor-made template. "Just grabbing the first template you see and slapping some branding and copy in there isn’t going to make you any fans," McGinnty says. Choose the template suited for the job (newsletters aren't product pitches; event invitations aren't customer surveys; new-product announcements aren't time-limited offers; and so forth).

3. Leverage graphics. "Some of the best emails are simply visuals with a simple call out," McGinnty says. 

4. Leverage copy. Smart, well presented copy can grab more readers than graphics.

5. Keep it brief. Don't be the guy at the party who won't shut up. Remember, you can always blast the same readers another day.

6. Think small. Don't go overboard on big images. Big images will send your emails to the spam folder, or blow up a reader's inbox.

7. Optimize the size. Readers use a variety of devices. Make sure your emails are viewable on them all.

8. Trust the inverted pyramid. McGinnty urges you to think like a journalist about your emails. "At the top, a snappy headline that highlights the core message, supported by information and visuals that help persuade readers to click through. Then a no BS call to action button that gives no room for confusion on what to do."

9. Use one call to action. Ask readers to take just one action at a time, because that’s all they can take. "An infinite series of calls to action only confuse the recipient," McGinnty says. Philips Sonicare split-tested two different emails, one with a single call to action and one with four. The email with one call to action produced 371% more clicks and 1,617% more sales.

10. Edit, edit, edit.  Strive for clarity by cutting anything that can distract readers or go into another day's email. "Be tactical and review your email marketing piece like a chef eyes a plate before serving it up to a popular food critic," McGinnty says.

The Top 10 Worst Marketing Problems and How to Fix Every One of Them!

Clickbait, "just another name for language editors have always used to try to get readers to pay attention," has a long and checkered history, says renowned editor Terry McDonell.

Ever since Joseph Pulitzer moved to outsell William Randolph Hearst, clickbait has assured editors fat readerships—and the fat bonuses traditionally tied to newsstand sales.

"If you were good at writing smart, selling cover lines, it was like a gift," McDonell says. "Some of the best editors I worked with were lousy at it, in the way some people can’t tell a joke."

But if you lacked the comedian's gift, you could turn to tabloid tricks like "Garden of Eden Found!” and “Hillary Clinton Adopts Alien Baby.”

Today's hacks use slightly—but only slightly—different gimmicks.

"If you want a clickbait mantra to use this afternoon," McDonell says, "it helps to think like a behavioral scientist and not forget about the pull of upworthy motivation, information gaps, exclaimated questions (?!), pre-programmed cute-seekers, listicles and, of course, why everything works better if you include odd numbers."

But while clickbait builds readerships, it doesn't build trust; in fact, it diminishes it. That's why it's bad for your brand.

Trust comes from standing for something—from owning a viewpoint and covering a subject avidly, reliably and without compromise. And trust is prerequisite to any purchase.

As content marketing expert Tom Webster says, "When you continue to write "20 Ways to Write 15 Great Lists of 10," you're not standing for something other than traffic."

POSTSCRIPT: I initially considered headlining this post "Crap Content is Destroying the Ozone!" But headlines that start with "The Top 10" anything attract more eyeballs.

Without Wallander, We Don't Care

Storytelling is the most powerful way to put ideas into the world today.

Robert McKee 

Henning Mankell, the creator of Wallander, said his crime novels—like your company's products—took root in an idea.

Returning to his native Sweden from a stay in Africa in the spring of 1990, Mankell noticed racism had taken a stranglehold on the nation.

"It soon dawned on me that the natural path to follow was to write a crime novel," Mankell said. "This was obvious because in my world racist acts are criminal outrages."

Writers like Mankell understand: while ideas alone don't compel audiences, stories do.

But what makes a story a story? How do you tell one? 

You have to find a hero. Forget about Citizens United v. FEC. Corporations aren't people. Your story can't be about your damn company. It has to offer us a flesh-and-blood hero who struggles to overcome a cruel world. Without Wallendar, we don't care.

You have to create suspense. Page-turners, plays, movies and TV shows grip audiences because of suspense. The setup teases and you want to know, What happens next? No tease, no story. Right away, you have to put Wallander in a mysterious jam.

You have to appeal to emotions. Most facts are unmemorable. And most people aren't fact-minded. Stories tug at emotions. Fear. Uncertainty. Confusion. Ambition. Greed. Admiration. Wonder. The soft stuff.

You have to personify. An idea like "racism" is intangible, difficult to understand, and not especially gripping. Not so Wallander combatting victimizers of people on the margins. Convert ideas into characters and storylines.

You have to paint pictures. "Show, don't tell." Lightly sketch each scenario as your story unfolds and let your audience connect the dots. Don't feel compelled to lecture. You're a storyteller, not a preacher or teacher.

You have to find a niche. Long-term success comes when you find a niche you can own. Wallander tapped the popular niche known as "Nordic Noir." Every novel in Mankell's series is propelled by a backdrop where mean streets are walked by morose Swedes who themselves are neither mean, nor tarnished, nor afraid. You can tell stories—endlessly—when you find a niche that appeals to your audience.

Preaching to the Choir

Today's post was contributed by Michael J. Hatch. Mike is managing director of DARE, a one-day conference that helps CMOs leverage the spend on B2B events.

So often we hear from event-industry leaders and organizations how powerful and important face-to-face is. 

More often than not, though, they are preaching to the choir.

While attending a family wedding in Detroit recently, I heard that message delivered loud and clear in a most unexpected setting—a Sunday morning church service.

Here's an excerpt from the sermon delivered by Rick Barry, Middle School Pastor, on August 7 to the congregation of Oak Pointe Church in Plymouth, Michigan:

"I want to pause and talk directly to my middle schoolers and millennials here this morning about my sixth and final point about communications and relationships. 

"Put down your electronics! Face to face is the best way to communicate. 

"In our technology-driven world, with texting, phones and emailing so prevalent, we need to make sure we are committing to communicating face to face.

"Hands down, face to face is by far the best and most effective way to communicate with anyone. Because in face-to-face communication, we see all of the non-verbals that are missed in digital communication: we see a person's eyes; see their smile and facial expressions; hear the tone of their voice; see different emotions that are being felt; and the body language that you never see, hear or feel when texting or emailing. 

"If you find yourself hiding behind a text or email, fight that urge and try to go face to face with the person you want and need to communicate with."

After hearing this message from the pulpit it occurred to me that the event industry does not need a big-budget ad campaign to get our "power of face to face" message to mainstream America. 

Rather, we should adopt a completely new guerilla marketing strategy.

All we need to do is rally the preachers of America to deliver the message about the power of face-to-face communication and relationship-building to the millennials in church every Sunday—allowing our message to take root and rise throughout the land, and into the halls of Congress and the board rooms of Corporate America.

Event-industry Brothers and Sisters, can I get an Amen?

POSTSCRIPT BY BOB JAMES: With a little push, Mike's idea is could catch fire. Clergy often turn to online sources for sermons. Were the event industry to submit a sermon like Rick Barry's to these websites, who knows how quickly the message might spread? Influencer marketing worked wonders for the gas industry. Why not the event industry? Now you're cooking with gas!

DISCLOSURE: I am a part owner of DARE.

Businesses Need to Avoid Schlocky Content

Erik Deckers contributed today's post. Eric is the president of Pro Blog Service, a content marketing agency with clients throughout the US. He is also the co-author of Branding Yourself and No Bullshit Social Media. He has been blogging since 1997, and has been a newspaper humor columnist for over 20 years. Erik was recently writer-in-residence at the Jack Kerouac House in Orlando.

A couple years ago, when Buzzfeed and Upworthy first started making a digital splash, we all saw the headlines on Facebook.

17 Life-Changing Travel Hacks: #14 Will Take Your Breath Away

12 Super Foods That Will Make Your Jaw Drop 

87 Photos of Cute Baby Pets That Will Give You All The Feels. #63 Will MELT YOUR FACE OFF! (Slideshow) 

Most people soon blocked the two "news" sites from their Facebook streams, and now Facebook has even begun looking for ways to block all Buzzfeed-like headlines from their news feeds.

Can I get a 'hallelujah?'

But that doesn't mean you can escape them completely. There's still Twitter and even LinkedIn, where some people share this dreck.

The problem with it is, it's still popular, and still gets traffic, which means people think it's okay to do. And if people think it's okay to do, I'm worried businesses will begin to adopt this kind of writing. They're already well on their way with schlocky content and Buzzfeed-like headlines.

It's Some of the Worst Writing Ever

I've read some pretty bad writing in my day, but Buzzfeed and Upworthy have been some of the worst-written content I've ever had the misfortune of looking at.

And I say that as someone who read the Star Trek/X-Men crossover book.

Imagine an article composed entirely of 18 full-motion GIFs and their 5-word captions, and you have an idea for some of the things that pass as "writing" on these websites.

I had never actually seen someone use "(lol)" in journalistic writing until I read some Buzzfeed articles while researching this post. I'm waiting for them to punctuate their sentences with some damn emojis!

Now I'm sure your business' blog is not going to have anything as terrible and soul-crushing as a Buzzfeed "18 Times 'The Walking Dead' Referenced 'Saved By The Bell'" (not a real article), but that doesn't mean businesses haven't put out schlocky business writing before.

Here are a few ways you can avoid schlocky content for your own writing.

Get GOOD writers. Writing may be a skill we all learned in school, but don't assume everyone can write. Everyone who played a recorder in middle school music isn't in the symphony. Everyone who played softball in gym class isn't a professional ball player. So don't assume that everyone who can string two sentences together is magically a good writer.

If you want good content on your website, get good writers. Get people who are passionate about the written language. Get people who understand the importance and gravitas of language, and would never add "(lol)" to a professional article. Find employees who love to write as a hobby. Better yet, hire or outsource to a professional writer. These are the people who will make your content amazing, and attract people's attention.

Keep list posts to a minimum. I'm a big fan of list posts, because I know it brings in readers, often more readers than my "normal headline" posts. But that doesn't mean I'm going to make every article I write a list post. If I limit those to only once every 8, 10 or 12 blog posts, they have a more dramatic impact.

Remember, "if everyone is special, then nobody is special." So don't overdo it on the special content that people clamor for, or you'll dilute its effectiveness.

Avoid 101-level content. Content marketing has been around for many years, but I'm still seeing basic "Five Secrets to Content Marketing" articles that still include "write good content" as a "secret." You can find the same five secrets on thousands of marketing blogs, and they all say the same damn thing. No one has said anything new on this subject in years.

You're going to run into the same thing in your industry. So many companies will try to be thought leaders that they'll publish the same basic content as everyone else. That means everyone will only cover the basics and never really say anything new or of any consequence. Talk about new regulations. Respond to other blogs or trade media articles. Tell success stories about your clients. Just don't try to educate people like it's their first day at work. That's been done to death.

Dive deep into a subject. I've often said, if you want to blog about a large, generic topic like "marketing," you'll run out of things to say in three weeks. But if you write about something specific like "content marketing for the manufacturing industry," you'll never run out of things to talk about.

Use your blog to explore your industry and your specific niche. Your blog is an opportunity to establish you and/or your company as an industry expert and a thought leader. You're not going to do that by only scratching the surface of your field and writing 101-level content. Get deep into your subject, explore the nuances, and talk a lot of inside baseball.

Businesses that truly want to have an impact on their industry, and want to reach their customers effectively, need to avoid being a Buzzfeed-like source of information. Skip the easy, low-hanging fruit of list posts and animated GIF stories; there are hundreds of other writers already plucking at it. Hire some real writers who have a respect for language, as well as their readers. And sink your teeth into your topics and explore them the way the schlock writers would never dream of doing.

This is the best way to make your blog and your content marketing campaign be a true success. And you can do it all without a single cat GIF.