Should you ever bring up the topic of e-mail marketing, you will certainly hear people complain about the hundreds of e-mails they receive on a daily basis. They will tell you sob stories about the endless “junk” they receive and how they try to opt-out from all of that “spam” — all to no avail! They might even give you a strange look (after all, you did bring up e-mail marketing at a party) and start asking you if you are “one of those people” who sends huge volumes of e-mail.

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With increased postage rates and the desire to reach your prospect when they are attentive, e-mail has increasingly been the solution. The most recent challenge has become: with so many businesses sending messages, how should you stand out in the crowd? How can you ensure that yourmessage actually gets noticed?

Now more than ever it is essential to have an edge with e-mail marketing when you want to reach new prospects for your business. To cut through the spam filters and be sure that your message is one that someone truly wants to read, consider the following:

The Success You Will Enjoy with E-mail Starts with Your Offer

When business owners want to improve their success with e-mail marketing, they immediately look at what they are sending. Whether your database holds 200 e-mails or it holds a million e-mails, look at how people have come to find out about your company or product before looking at the content of your e-mails.

Did recipients originally sign up for a newsletter? Did your prospects sign up for information on a specific product line? Did they sign up for a white paper to learn more about a particular offering or service? Far too often the same e-mail messages are sent to every prospect in a database. The person who signed up for the newsletter is looking for something entirely different than the person who signed up for a white paper.

Look carefully at what prospects sign up for and you will start to uncover the issues with your response rates. Look even deeper into your offerings to ensure that they provide enough value that you are actually providing prospects with “real” e-mail. The better you make your offers, the more responsive your prospects will be through e-mail.

An Interest-Piquing Subject Line Can Save the Day

Most business owners take the time to carefully review their marketing pieces before they go out. They might work with a designer on color details for their website or change the layout of a brochure multiple times before it lands in the hands of a potential customer — but what about the time they spend looking at the subject line of an e-mail?

Open your e-mail right now and take a look at the volume of messages. How quickly do you scan the list to determine if you should delete the message, save it for later, or actually read it? Five seconds? Ten seconds? You have just a few seconds to grab a prospect’s attention, which means taking the time to craft a powerful subject line is worth the investment.

Try challenging your original thought as you look to craft engaging e-mail subject lines by asking yourself these questions:

• Interest-Piquing: Is there an element of curiosity to the subject line that would make want to find out more?
• Pain: Does the e-mail subject alleviate pain or pound on a bruise that is bothering prospects?
• Benefit: Will your prospect experience a benefit of time, money or well-being if they read on?

Take time to craft your e-mail subjects and watch as your response rates increase.

Not Just Any E-mail Will Do, Each Touch Must Add Value

While the goal of e-mail is certainly to bring more customers into your store, encourage more prospects to call for assistance, and push potential customers to purchase more of your products online, that can’t be what your e-mails are all about. Sending e-mails that are only about sales, new products, or services is a sure-fire way to ensure that your messages are quickly deleted. Look at the content of your e-mails and ask yourself a very simple question: If I were opening this e-mail as a total stranger, does it add any value to my day?

For most e-mails received, the answer is that the message adds no value at all. It’s merely an advertisement delivered digitally. Regardless of your industry, it is crucial to create e-mails that add real value. For example, if you sell clothing you could share fashion tips. If you sell exercise equipment you could share fitness tips. Don’t try to disguise helpful tips as sales letters; add real value and your e-mails will be eagerly anticipated by your prospects — and that’s a win for everybody.

How Many E-mails are You Sending?

Even with a database that has a few million records, sending a big “blast” e-mail is not likely to help you achieve your goals. Instead of periodically blasting your database of prospects with offers, consider developing an e-mail follow-up sequence that will keep prospects engaged until the moment they are ready to take action.

A good e-mail follow-up sequence will appear personal, add value, and can allow you to stay in touch with a prospect for a number of years. In the best cases you will have a different e-mail follow-up sequence for those that have purchased a product or service versus the ones that have not yet purchased anything.

The more time you invest in your e-mail marketing, from crafting subject lines to offering quality content, the more success you will enjoy with your from your efforts.