Follow these steps and you’ll no longer have to fight for your place in the correct inbox again. You’ll be in the right folder and you’ll be in your customers’ line of sight!
If you use Gmail to receive your emails, the promotions tab can be useful. It helps to separate your emails into more manageable chunks and it sends sales and ad emails into a box which you might not even look at. Many Gmail users ignore their promotions or delete them without ever even reading them.
While that’s handy for receiving (or not receiving!) sales emails, it’s a nightmare for marketers.
But as noted by Keap, this can be avoided. If you want to prevent your business emails from landing in the promotions tabs of your customers’ emails, here’s how:
Don’t use too many images
If an email has more than one image in it, it looks like a promotion. Avoid mastheads and stick to a common email signature. Use plain text, as if your email is a typical office email sent from one colleague to another.
Don’t use too many links
A similar principle to the above. You should only have a maximum of two links in your email (and that includes your unsubscribe link). Opinion is divided on whether re-using the same link in the same email will make your mail find its way into an unwanted box. Test it yourself to see what’s the case for your company emails!
Don’t make it too ‘brand”
Make sure it seems like your email is personal and personable. Make it seem like your email comes from a person rather than from a marketing machine. Keep your emails light and friendly.
Avoid HTML
If your email is stuffed with HTML code, you may well end up in the promotions tab. Gmail will detect the code.
Yes, HTML looks good, and it’s helpful, but if no-one’s going to read the email, then your HTML is wasted.
Don’t use social media links
Again, you shouldn’t be using too many links – and that includes links to your social media profiles.
In any case, a link to your social media profile is largely unneeded. If you want your customers to follow the call to action in the email, why distract them with links your social media presence?
Ask your customers to whitelist you
If your customers whitelist you, you’ll always find yourself in the correct inbox!
There are many “whitelisting guides” online, but the best is Chris Lang’s whitelisting generator, which you can use for free. This creates your own personalized instructions that you can incorporate into your own website.
Don’t change your name or address
This last point is very important. If you have a bad reputation, don’t change your name or address to start afresh. If you start afresh, you go back to the very beginning – meaning that you’re more likely to end up in the wrong email box again.
Follow these steps and you’ll no longer have to fight for your place in the correct inbox again. You’ll be in the right folder and you’ll be in your customers’ line of sight!