Email remains one of the most effective marketing channels around, but what do you do when your campaigns aren’t getting the desired results? If your click-through rates and conversions are languishing way below your targets, it may be time for an email marketing audit.
Regular audits make sure every area of your email marketing is fine-tuned, whilst also keeping you compliant with data protection regulations. Keep reading for our tips on conducting a comprehensive audit that will get your email marketing in top-notch condition.
How to audit an email marketing program
There are many aspects that go into creating high-performing email marketing campaigns and an audit aims to address all of them. Here’s how to make yours as successful as possible.
Preparing for the audit
Before doing anything else, it’s best to decide what your goals are. Your priorities will likely be primarily performance-based but don’t forget about your data privacy responsibilities along the way. Adopting a risk management solution early on can help you monitor security and compliance, so you can efficiently find and address any vulnerabilities.
This will give you peace of mind as you also work towards improving the results of your email campaigns. Whether it’s boosting engagement or improving conversion rates, having a clear idea of what you want to achieve will guide your efforts.
For example, if your main goal is to improve customer retention, it’s a good idea to focus your email audit on metrics that reflect engagement over time. Another thing you want to organize before you get started is the right tools. Just as you need the right free proxy list for your IT department, you need to look at the tools that will best serve your email campaigns.
Start with your email service provider (ESP) dashboard to plan which metrics you want to look at. An email analytics platform is also an important tool to help you track your progress, ideally one that integrates with your SP, so you have everything in one place to assess progress and make informed decisions.
Reviewing email content
Take a good look at your email content. Does it reflect your brand voice? Is it consistent with your messaging across other platforms? If you think there is room for improvement, an AI email assistant can be a big help.
Start with your subject lines and consider whether they are clear, inviting, and engaging. A subject line works best when it makes the recipient curious but also gives them a clue to what’s in the email. Look at the body of the emails next and assess whether there is continuity in style and tone across your communications.
What’s more, is it in line with the goals of your campaign? You want the messaging to be engaging with relevant content. Plus, it’s advisable for every email to have a strong call to action (CTA) that will drive your email clicks, and make them enticing and actionable for the best results.
Finally, take stock of the visual elements of your emails, are they adding value? Do they look good on all kinds of screen sizes? Getting the email design elements right will maintain a professional look and also help the engagement rates of your campaigns.
Analyzing email metrics
Another important part of an email marketing audit is tracking the right metrics. They will give you the information you need to make changes and create a more effective email marketing strategy.
- Open rates: It’s good to get a clear idea of how many people are actually opening your emails. However, bear in mind that some privacy features, such as Apple’s Mail privacy Protection, can skew this data so it’s not always reliable on its own.
- Click-Through Rates (CTR): If your recipients actually open your emails, how many then take action? Your CTR will show you how good your email engagement is and tell you how well your content is working.
- Bounce rates and unsubscribe rates: A high bounce rate indicates deliverability problems, suggesting you may have a lot of invalid email addresses or potential email list management issues. Unsubscribe rates, on the other hand, will tell you whether your recipients are switching off from your content.
A/B testing as an optimization tool
To really understand email performance metrics, A/B testing is required. It’s a valuable tool for achieving continuous improvement within lifecycle email marketing and will help you to understand what’s working (and what isn't) much quicker.
For the best results, test one element at a time. That could be the subject line, the CTA, or even the time of day you send the email. Send two different versions to small segments of your email list and analyze the performance metrics to see which one does better. Going forward, you can keep the best elements of each test to optimize every email you send.
Email list hygiene and segmentation
Regular housekeeping of your subscriber list will keep it clean and make sure your emails are received by an engaged audience. A good starting point is to try re-engagement email campaigns to get inactive subscribers involved again. Still, it’s also wise to routinely identify and remove those who remain inactive after a reasonable attempt at re-engagement.
You can also improve the effectiveness of your email marketing campaigns through segmentation, which targets specific demographics or behaviors for a more personal approach. Use data from your CRM platform and CRM call center software to create more precise audience segments and tailor the content of your emails for the biggest impact.
It’s also vital to maintain compliance with regional data protection laws such as GDPR email marketing requirements by carefully managing consent and acting on unsubscribes efficiently, thereby safeguarding your brand reputation and the security of your data.
Email deliverability and technical settings
Technical configurations are responsible for getting your emails into recipients’ inboxes. Email authentication protocols such as SPF, DKIM, and DMARC verify them and prevent them from ending up in a spam folder.
Keep reviewing email frequency and send times too, as sending them at the wrong time can harm engagement and present issues with deliverability. Additionally, keep up to date with email practices to avoid spam traps and protect your reputation.
If you’re handling sensitive customer data, getting your infrastructure in line with SOC 2 audit requirements will make sure that your email system is in full compliance with security and privacy standards. You can then be confident that your customer's data will be kept safe and their trust maintained.
Building a future-ready strategy
A successful email marketing audit will give you the knowledge to develop a strategy to scale and continuously improve in the future. You might identify opportunities to automate repetitive tasks to improve the consistency of service and save time.
Another way to improve your campaigns is a content calendar, which will keep you on track with your goals and important events. You might also consider integrating your email with other channels, such as SMS marketing, to create continuity in omnichannel communication.
Remember, if you do incorporate SMS marketing, TCPA compliance is essential. It regulates how and when you can send marketing messages to customers. This is important from a legal standpoint, but will also make sure you don’t damage the trust your customers have shown in you by sharing their contact details.
Your first steps towards a better email strategy
An email audit is a health check of every aspect of your email marketing campaigns. It means taking the time to analyze what you’re doing currently so you can work out where you’re most in need of improvement. The result is a detailed picture that allows you to take action and optimize your email marketing efforts for better engagement, clicks, and conversion rates.
