Open Rates Tips
If more people open the emails you send out, then you’ll do much better with your list. The key to getting a high open rate on your emails is not what a lot of people teach, of having amazing email titles, that somewhat deceive the subscriber to opening the email. This might work once or twice, but “The Boy Who Cried Wolf” tends to spring to mind when I see people doing. By this I mean, people will soon see you as being deceptive, because when they open the emails and it does not match what you promised in the title, you’ll lose trust with them.
A better approach is to train your list to look out for your emails, and to open them regardless of what the title says. If they get used to getting great content from you, they’ll open more of your emails. Sure you still have to make your titles sound interesting, but just make sure you don’t deceive people, give them what you say you’ll give them. Another thing I see people do is placing the – RE: – at the front of the email title, so it looks like the email is a reply to one the subscriber emailed. The idea is that they’re more likely to open and email if it’s a reply to one they sent. However this is just garbage and not ethical, and there’s no need to do these sneaky tricks if you’re providing good quality information.
Promoting to Your List
Obviously we all want to make money from our email lists, otherwise we probably wouldn’t be building them. When it comes to monetizing your leads, there are usually two extremes I see, most falling into the first category. The first thing I see is people doing is being overly aggressive with the selling, and hammering their leads with stuff to buy but neglecting to work on building trust by providing great free content. Ideally someone on your list should enjoy being on your list and see it as worthwhile even if they never buy anything you recommend as an affiliate.
The other extreme is to be too frightened to promote anything to your list in fear that they might get angry with you for daring to sell them something. For obvious reasons this is not a good approach as you’ll not make much money. When doing email marketing you have to accept the fact that some people simply do not like being sold to, as they have very little trust in people, and they immediately get on the defensive when you try and sell them something. You just have to accept that some people will complain and be horrible no matter how much great free stuff you send them.
The best way to approach selling to your leads is to view your emails like a T.V. show. Great T.V. shows have ad breaks in them all the time, as does radio, magazines etc…. it’s just common marketing practice. So as long as you provide good content mixed in with your promotions, and you make sure your promotions are for good products, then you’re doing the most effective approach.
Tracking Your Opt In Rates
Another thing that you really should be doing is tracking the percentage of people that opt in to your list. This is not hard to do using Google Analytics. All you do is login to your Analytics account, and click the Admin tab in the top right corner. One this page you’ll see a tab ‘Goals’ (see screen shot below). Once you’re in the goal section, all you have to do is set up a new goal. What you want to do is choose a URL Destination type of goal, and then just fill in the fields.
Step 1 – Give the goal a name – Opt Ins
Step 2 – In the URL field place the URL of your thank you page that the person is taken to AFTER they successfully opt in.
Step 3 – You can place a $$ value on each lead if you like
Step 4 – SAVE
Below are a few screen shots of this:
I hope you found this post helpful, if so I would be super grateful if you’d share my content using the social links below!
Related articles
Matt,
Another great article as always.
Do you mind telling us what popover script you use?
cheers
Anton
Matt Carter Reply:
September 3rd, 2012 at 12:34 pm
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Hi Anton, sure its popup domination
Matt
A very informative post about email marketing. 🙂
To add to this post, split testing the landing page and optin places like, header, sidebar, popup and optin box below the post is very important. I have as much as doubled my conversion rates by split testing the optin boxes.
Using a ribbon kind of graphic draws more attention and always improves the optin rates.
For split testing I recommend visual website optimizer and/or optin skin.
Matt Carter Reply:
September 3rd, 2012 at 1:19 pm
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Thanks for adding these tips Deepak!
Matt
Thanks for this Matt, I have had no luck at all with email building a list I will try your suggestions
Cheers Linda
Good article. Timely for me too. I have neglected building a list partly because I had mostly Amazon sites and didn’t think it would work in my niches and partly because I get so much crap in my inbox I felt like it was being over done and didn’t want to add to the mess. But I realized I am leaving a ton of money on the table by not building a list.so I am gearing up. Thanks for the info.
Steve
Matt Carter Reply:
September 3rd, 2012 at 3:40 pm
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Hi Steve
Great to hear from you, and yeah it does leave money on the table for sure!
Matt
Matt, Thank you for the tips. I have been building my list for some time and just recently I was going through my emails and I needed some help. This post helped me a lot!
Elizabeth
Matt Carter Reply:
September 3rd, 2012 at 3:40 pm
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Hi Elizabeth
Thanks for commenting and glad you found the post helpful
Matt
One thing that has effected email marketing this year, is those spam emails going around asking for people to click links in the email etc for cheap cameras, friends photos and other stuff.
I feel it is effecting the conversion of people actually clicking the aweber link to verify their email address right at the start of the process.
Hey Matt,
How are you doing that 2 part system for your blog posts? I assumed it was two separate pages but now I see the same comments on both pages. It is a wp plugin you are using?
I myself in the past have been in the “too frighten” bracket to send stuff to my list, stuff for sale. Even when providing great content to them. But I always tell myself to think of it, as if I am emailing just one person and not tens of thousands of people.
Matt Carter Reply:
September 3rd, 2012 at 3:38 pm
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Hi Ross,
Yeah its a plugin, pagination plugin I think
Matt
John Hoff Reply:
September 4th, 2012 at 1:13 am
Awesome, I’ll check it out. I’ve been creating a table of contents by hand coding it, but it doesn’t move the comments over.
I’d like to suggest one plugin for this blog, however.
It’s the “Subscribe to Comments Reloaded” plugin. It allow us who comment to tick a box so that we are notified whenever a reply in this comment section has happened.
Useful as ever Matt thanks
An easy way to set up a Opt in box is to use Shane Melaugh’s new WordPress plugin called Hybrid Connect. It is being upgraded at the moment so is not available, but should be again soon.
I would recommend it to your subscribers Matt. One to keep in mind when it is up and running again. You have to pay for it but it is pretty cheap.
BTW all – this is not an affiliate link. Just sharing good stuff.
http://hybrid-connect.com/
Hi Matt.
Thanks for another great post. You hit the nail right on the head by saying “Teach your list”, you have conditioned me so well that as soon as I spot a “Matt Carter” email I ignore all the clutter and open yours straight away.
One trend I recently found in my Spam is that some Marketers do include an unsubscribe link but the link only open a page with a screenshot of an unsubscribe confirmation image, so you are never deleted from their list. Maybe that is the reason the email landed up in the spam folder.
Matt Carter Reply:
September 3rd, 2012 at 6:32 pm
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Hi Hennie
Yeah its amazing what some people will do!
Matt
Hey Matt,
Your tip about open rate is GOLDEN. I don’t think many people really understand the significance of what you wrote.
I realized the reality of it when I noticed that I opened emails based more on who they are from than the subject line itself. I asked some other marketers I know about this and many agreed with me.
As such, I honestly believe your reputation (as a value provider) in your list’s eyes is the most important factor in determining open rates. So, when a person starts his/her “relationship” with you as a member of your list, that relationship needs to be established on the right foot.
Meaning, that opt-in incentive you offered to get people to sign up has to blow your prospects’ mind. When a person signs up to your list, you need to stand out… you need to be remembered.
Matt Carter Reply:
September 4th, 2012 at 6:20 am
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Totally agree with you Andy!
Matt
I started two years ago with my list building and I can say that this is the most successful way to built a good business online. All the other methods are built to support the opt in pages.
By the way I’m still using Rapid Rewriter and it is a fantastic tool to add content to our sites.
I’m looking forward to hear from you.
Haim
Matt Carter Reply:
September 4th, 2012 at 6:20 am
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Hi Haim
Thanks for the comment, and yeah I agree list building is key.
Matt
Matt,
I really like what you did with placing your pic inside the opt-in box! I have not seen much of that (if any) out there at all.
Just getting a list building campaign off the ground (for the first time) seems so overwhelming. With your suggestions and this post specifically, I can see some light to hopefully make this task more doable. Thanks for sharing!
Matt Carter Reply:
September 4th, 2012 at 6:17 am
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Hi Wesley
Yeah building a list does take time, but stick with it as it will pay off for you,
Regards
Matt
Hi Matt. One thing which I’d like to know is when have you found is the best time (day and time) to send out your autoresponder emails?
Any insights there?
Matt Carter Reply:
September 4th, 2012 at 6:16 am
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Hi John
To be honest with you, I no longer bother about that, I just send them when I am ready, because if you do a great job and your list likes your emails they are doing to open and read them when they get to them.
Matt
Hey Matt,
Great post as usual! Do you find it more effective to always show your popup or set the frequency? Also, I normally delay the display by 15 seconds. Do you feel there is any benefit to doing this?
Your e-mails are also the ones I make sure I read so I guess I’m trained too 🙂
Matt Carter Reply:
September 4th, 2012 at 6:15 am
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Hi Joan
Yeah I set it to load once every 24 hrs per visit and I think a 15 second delay is about right,
Thanks for your comment too!
Matt
John Hoff Reply:
September 4th, 2012 at 10:15 am
I used the Popup Domination plugin for a pop up kind of like what you have now Matt, but I noticed that my bounce rates jumped to like 90% for new visitors.
I assume you’re not experiencing that since it’s still live on your site. Have you run any tests like that?
Matt Carter Reply:
September 4th, 2012 at 3:25 pm
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I am running tests on bounce now, and I will look at this as its a good point.
Matt
Hi Matt
Another very informative post. I am not at the moment in any markets that I could really use email marketing but its nice to know how it should be done.
Your emails are always welcome because I know that they will always contain valuable information and even when you promote a product I know it will be a good product and not the usual junk that is pedalled even by some of the top names in internet marketing.
One of these top marketers was emailing me twice a day and every time promoting rubbish stuff, Needless to say but I unsubsidised from his list.
Thank s again
Regards
Owen
Matt Carter Reply:
September 4th, 2012 at 6:14 am
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WOW thanks Owen, I appreciate the great feedback,
Thanks so much
Matt
Not only was the post an excellent post but the comments from some
of your subscribers was very good too.
I have never bought a product from you, as of this time, but I am sure
in the future I will because you are one of the very few who knows how to do this marketing correctly. Over a period of time you have
gained my trust, that you are not only interested in yourself but those of us who subscribe to a man who can really be trusted.
Paul
Matt Carter Reply:
September 4th, 2012 at 6:13 am
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Hi Paul,
Very kind words, I really appreciate that,
Matt
Hi Matt,
As an Internet rookie I have no idea how to get email list,. but I am going to start today because I’ve always value your advice. By the way , is it a plugin or a software?
Thanks
Matt:
Good point on using the email list to have people return to the site to enhance SEO. I hadn’t thought of using email lists for that purpose. That would no doubt help increase the returning visitors stat as well as help with social media sharing. Good point!
Matt,
Nice article but I’m unclear on one point you made. You wrote, “One easy way to do this is to opt in to as many other email lists in the niche already and see what they’re doing.” Could you explain more please? I’m a recruiter and my niche is product development executives in the asset management industry. Are you suggesting I sign up for my competitor’s email address or something different?
Thanks!
Matt Carter Reply:
September 5th, 2012 at 10:29 am
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Yes sign up to your competitors list
Hi Matt,
I finally got around to adding a opt-in form to my website, but the opt-in rate has been slow from the start. I’ve added it to the right column, but perhaps I need to also add a pop up as well like you haver done.
Dan
I am always pleased with Matt Carter Email.Especially because I have a lot to learn.
Thanx for that
groetjes Willem
Great article, thanks Matt! It’s only half the struggle building a list though, it can be a real chore to scrape together some messages to send out. Recently I started outsourcing my email message content – it’s paid off big time.
Hi Matt
I can see how this can work would a news letter work for this as well. I can see when you giving out free advise how folks would want to come back. Which I do here always. But how would it work best with an e commerce site
Scott
Matt Carter Reply:
September 6th, 2012 at 4:44 pm
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I do the same model for my ecommerce site and it works well. You can have a blog on your ecommerce store
Hi Matt,
Thanks for the great article. You’ve given us all some great advice.
I use Mail Chimp for my autoresponder too and http://www.istaffsource.com for my staff outsourcing, they are so much better than Odesk. Their staff are mostly Uni Graduates with years of experience at a fraction of the price.
Hey Matt,
This is a little off topic for this post, but I am interested in using youtube more often. Do you still recommend your “Video Comission Forumla Course”? Or is that outdated with all of the Penguin/Panda algorithm changes?
Thanks,
Ryan
Matt Carter Reply:
September 12th, 2012 at 7:31 am
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As far as I can tell from my videos they are not affected by Google updates.
Thank you for the article Matt, really useful info. I’m gonna have to come back later for part 2 though. I do not wanna miss any important points.
Regards
I totally agree with that point on not to be agressive with the selling to your subscribers. I myself get turned off by marketers whose emails consist of nothing but sales pitches.
Thanks Matt!
Great info. I started off a while ago with drop shipping. The biggest challenge was to find an honest dropshipper who is willing to dropship for any one outside the US.
Some of them offer you a price list and then retail the goods on a different website or on amazon and ebay. This means that you can not make any profits. So compare your price list with the products offered on the net before you work hard making an ecommerce store for any supplier.
Hi Matt,
You’re article is such a great one. It really helps a lot on those engage in business. Specially nowadays email marketing has been popular for businesses because it can build relationships, reputation and specially sales. Making an email list for me makes life of marketers easy and productive. Great.!
Very informative post.
I’ve been using email marketing for many years now, and yet, I still learnt some things from your post.
And indeed people who aren’t already using email marketing aren’t setting up a business online. They are just working on a 9 to 5 job.
So thank you for your very good post. I definitely learnt something here.
Thanks… Just by adding a call to action at the bottom of all my blogs increased my sign up rate…
I think you should sell in every email, BUT it doesn’t have to always be a hard sale. You can still add massive value and don’t be afraid to ask for the sale… you don’t ask you won’t get it and someone else will