Email marketing is a great tool for all businesses to use. It is a marketing technique that allows you to communicate with your audience directly to their inbox that most users check daily. According to The Radicati Group, more than 3.7 billion people globally used email as of January 2017, and the growth isn’t going to slow down in 2018.

Email marketing could be the way your business cuts through the noise of busy social media platforms and algorithm changes that hurt business accounts, but it’s a delicate dance. If you come across too spammy, emailing your audience too frequently, or simply sending irrelevant content, they are just one click away from the dreaded unsubscribe. Follow these three tips to make email marketing work for your business:

Do this: Develop an email content strategy.

Don’t do this: Create and send emails whenever you have time.

Make this your mantra for email marketing: If you can’t send something of value to your audience, don’t send anything at all. If you send irrelevant content, it is a sure-fire way to lose subscribers. Remember, a ton of other businesses are trying to get your audience’s inbox attention, so the last thing you want to do is annoy your audience with aimless emails.

When developing your email marketing strategy, consider these points:

What is the goal my business is trying to achieve? (Sales, brand awareness, etc.)
What messages do I want to communicate? How can I most effectively connect with my audience?
What times/dates will my audience be most responsive to my message?

From there, create a calendar (we suggest planning out at least a month in advance) so that you aren’t scrambling the night before an email is supposed to go out!

Do this: Create a well-designed email template.

Don’t do this: Freestyle every email.

One word: Branding. Branding is everything. Whether you are sending a weekly newsletter or pitching your services, your brand should be identifiable from the get-go. When you create a template (or templates that vary for different content), you solidify yourself in your audience’s minds. Not to mention, it looks professional and will have your business taken more seriously. Make sure your templates are cleanly designed and are simple to navigate.

Additionally, you will want to include a placeholder for images within your template. If you are already experienced in content marketing, you know that images and video are necessary. Humans are visual creatures, and you have about 3 seconds after that email is opened to pull your audience in before they click “delete”. Dive deep into what your audience is looking for when picking your images or creating a video. Is your audience full of business professionals? Maybe imagery of statistics would be the most appealing to them. People like to see things that relate to them, so it’s crucial to uncover what that will be for your audience.

Do this: Include a Call to Action (CTA).

Don’t do this: Leave your audience thinking, “Well, what do I do now?”

The absolute worst mistake you could make is to draw your readers in but not lead them anywhere. Emails should be created to take your audience outside of their inbox and to your platform – whether that be to your website, blog, survey, online store, and so on. Clearly state what action you want your audience to take, and make it bold. If you use MailChimp, you can add buttons directly into your templates – making your CTA easy to find!