Email marketing is a one of the fastest, easiest and most successful ways to market or advertise your product or service. It is in fact the most preferred means of marketing for almost all kinds of businesses, from real estate to home repair. Because many people rely on email marketing to get the word out about their business, it can be difficult to reach your targeted audience. But it can be done as long as you consider the following factors when you’re planning and executing your HTML email or newsletter campaigns.

Most email marketing campaigns end up in the bulk mail file of the target customer. Why? Because the sender hasn‘t shone that they know the customer at all, let alone their name. Even though you may be sending thousands of emails to thousands of recipients, keep in mind that the best email marketing services allow you to personalize each one with your customer‘s name. If you do this, you’re showing email service providers that your customer is definitely yours and not just an email address from a bought email list.

Once you‘ve personalized your emails, your next step is to get your recipient to open them. Remember that in email marketing it‘s just as important to have your customers read your emails as open them. When you create your headline, keep things straightforward and to the point. If you’re offering 50 percent off on a product, by all means say so. Writing cryptic headlines that take time to understand will turn the customer off immediately. Use those few seconds you have of your customer’s attention to get your point across and entice them into reading further.

When you write your email campaign copy, stick with simple, easy to understand words. Remember that you want to reach the broadest possible audience. By using simple, straightforward language and an easily understood vocabulary, you can reach out to every single customer, from the high-school dropout to the MENSA member.

Using complicated graphics and jarring colors in your email marketing layouts are a mistake. Why? Because the more complicated your graphics are, the more time it takes to download. On the same token, the more jarring the colors, the more distracting they become, which ultimately takes the attention away from your message. Remember that your body copy should use a font in the same family as your headline. Using too many fonts is also a big error, and will make your layout look thrown together and unprofessional. If you’re not sure how to create a pleasing layout or email template, by all means hire a professional email designer to design one for you.

When a customer takes the time to answer your email, make absolutely certain that you respond in less than 24 hours. If you can, respond immediately. If you answer emails quickly, you’ll show that you’re a professional business that cares about their customers. If not, someone else will get your sale, guaranteed.