Checklist: Planning your email marketing campaign

The following checklist outlines some of the most important factors to consider when planning an email marketing campaign, and should help you avoid some of the common pitfalls that companies fall into.

You will need to consider the following questions carefully before sending out your first message:

• Who is the message for?
  • What are the particular characteristics of this group and how are you going to interest them?
  • Where are you going to get their email addresses from? Bought list or home grown? Does your list comply with current legislation? Is your list up to date?
• What is the aim of the message?
  • Do you want people to click through to your website / phone your call centre? Do you want to create customer loyalty?
• What is the content of your message?
  • What title will you give the email to ensure as many people as possible open it?
  • How are you going to word the message to ensure that the most important parts get read?
  • How are you going to attract your recipients to click through to your website / phone your call centre etc?
• How should your message look?
  • Are you going to create an HTML message, text only or both? How should you decide?
  • How can you make your message visually attractive to your target audience?
• How are you going to measure the success of your message?
  • What are your targets in terms of clickthroughs / opened messages etc?
  • What information will you need in order to determine how successful you have been and where are you going to get this information?
• How often are you going to mail out to your list?
  • Are you going to send out a regular newsletter and if so, how often?
  • Are you going to send ad hoc updates, and if so, what kind of information will you send?
• How will you ensure that you learn from experience?

By considering questions such of these you should be able to avoid many of the common pitfalls that email marketers often encounter.

If you need any help or advice on planning your campaign, Ascendancy Internet Marketing can help. Call 01952 288314 for more information or email info@ascendancyinternetmarketing.com.