Are Your Marketing Emails Part of the 22% That Never Arrive?

According to a new report by Return Path, reported in E-consultancy, “Just over one in five (22%) commercial emails sent globally on the first half of 2013 never made it to the subscriber’s inbox.” Now, that may sound like the odds are in your favor—until you wonder if your organization is part of that 22%!

Aside from billions of messages clogging up Cyberspace, many end up in spam folders. The report goes on to list the top factors that affect e-mail deliverability.

1. Clean and up-to-date lists have the biggest impact on improving deliverability (58%)
2. Relevance of email to recipients (45%)
3. Reputation of sender (44%)
4. Use of confirmed opt-in data (30%)

1. Every time someone sends you an updated email address, ensure you change it in your database.
2. Check the back end of your email service provider account to download those that bounced or unsubscribed. Do some research on LinkedIn or Facebook to find updated information.
3. If you’re buying lists with dud addresses, advise the vendor. You may be entitled to a credit or refund for those that are invalid. If this happens frequently, change vendors.
4. Segment your email lists and send different versions according to their interests, buying patterns, buying/donor history, etc.
5. Make sure the content you send is relevant and helpful to your audiences. Make it about them.
6. If you’re not using an email service provider and sending mass emails using your own email account, stop. Your email address may be getting blackballed by many recipient servers. Improve your deliverability by using an email service provider that provides you with the design and sending tools and, more importantly, the results data.
7. Make sure you aren’t sending emails to people who haven’t subscribed or opted in. This is called SPAM and sending it frequently will negatively impact your sender reputation.