Personalize it.
Rather than starting on an impersonal note with Dear Customer, make it more personalized by using their first names. As for the rest of your email newsletter, remember to directly address your customer. Using their first names once in a while would also be a nice touch.

Also, make sure to configure your email newsletter software to send birthday greetings to your subscribers. Although it’s a programmed action, subscribers will still appreciate the thought behind it.

Be careful about making assumptions.
Misassumptions can make you end up addressing your customers incorrectly. If you are introducing a new product in your next newsletter, should you write in with the assumption that they’d be automatically receptive to your new product? Would they have prior knowledge about it already? Exert time and effort in researching about your subscribers to be able to address them properly.

Know your target market.
Be sure about your target markets demographics. If you thought your products appeal best to adults and wrote your newsletter accordingly, what would happen if your subscribers turn out to be teenagers? You would have lost them right away once they see the formal tone of your letter or the topics you’ve discussed and which they can’t relate to.

Always use a respectful and courteous tone.
It doesn’t matter what kind of target market you’re addressing. It never hurts to be respectful and courteous. This doesn’t mean you’ll have to address them by Sir or Madam all the time but opening your letter with pleasant salutations could be a nice touch. Issue your call to action with courtesy rather than stating it as a command.

Take care with how you write.
Capitalization helps in providing emphasis, but they can also be interpreted as shouting or talking down to someone so make sure you use it appropriately. Be just as careful with punctuation marks and underlining.

Get feedback.
Lastly, is there any better way to know how to properly address your customers than asking them yourself? You can do this by conducting polls, surveys, or behind-the-scenes research. Be careful though. People can be pretty tough when it comes to giving feedback so don’t take it personally. Use it instead to further improve your public relation skills. After all, what the customer wants, you try your best to provide!

And one of the best strategies to employ in all of your email campaigns is the first name basis tactic. Whenever you write somebody about your product, you should not treat that somebody as just an email address. Keep in mind that you are actually talking to people. And these people have names. You always try to get your prospect names and use it in the greeting of the email and more preferably, in the body of your letter as well.

It is not a hidden fact that email campaigns are sent massively. This means that one single email message is sent to several thousand internet users at the same time. These letters are not unique. And your recipient knows that. But if and when they see their names especially integrated into the whole email, they’ll feel that the email is actually for them and them alone. That’s also when they start reading.

Don’t worry about the task ahead because you don’t really have to individually type the names of your recipient in each and every one of your emails before sending them. It’s a good thing that there are email managers and software that can do all of these for you. All you have to do is to construct an effective sales letter and specifically leave spaces for the names of your prospect for the program to fill. Your only job is to make a database of email addresses and the names of the people that own them.

If you use the first name of your clients in your letter, the power of your email ads are doubled. You will capture the interest of your reader right off. And your letter would seem unique and not created for the whole world to read.

But more importantly, using the first name of your prospects creates a certain level of connection between the two of you. And that’s the start of trust. You need to exude trust in order to gain sales. And the first name basis strategy is a good start.

8 Suggested Items to Include in Your Email Marketing Checklist

Goal List
List down the specific goals you wish to achieve with your email. Once you’re done creating your email, use the checklist to verify whether all goals have been accomplished or not.

Outline and Format
It never hurts to have a draft and outline to work with. The details in your outline must then be included in your checklist. Reviewing them will allow you to determine if all key points have been properly addressed by your email. Secondly, make sure that your preferred format is included in your email marketing checklist. In most cases, your email marketing format would usually include but isn’t limited to subject header, introductory paragraph, body, conclusions, closing paragraph, call to action, and miscellaneous details.

Email Address Validation
There’s no point sending out an email if there’s no one to read it. Hence, take out your opt-in list and consider sending a confirmation email to verify whether all email addresses in your list are still active.

Testing Procedures
Try to think of the various tests your email must be subjected to for quality control.

Monitoring Results
Include in your checklist a periodic assessment period for your emails. Compute the conversion rate, click-through rate, referral rate, and any other applicable statistics for your email marketing campaign.

Previous Mistakes and Concerns
Include in your checklist a list of things you did wrong or overlooked in the past email. This will prevent history from repeating itself with your current email. Next, if there are any issues or concerns which you had promised your customers to address on your next email, include them in your checklist as well. It will remind you to address them as promised when you are in the process of formulating your latest email.

Email Versions
Some of your customers may prefer a text-only email while others may prefer graphic-heavy emails. If you are creating more than one version of your email, all versions with the appropriate reminders should also be included in your checklist.

Link Checking
Finally, remember to double-check all links pasted in your email to ascertain that they are clickable and that they do redirect your readers to the appropriate and functioning pages.

Make sure you have your email marketing checklist with you all the time. Remember to use this for monitoring and evaluating every email you send.

However, even if you have painstakingly created a targeted email list, your emails are still susceptible to bouncing problems. An email will bounce if and when the intended recipient refuses or can’t receive the email at all. In cases like this, the message will go back to the sender with an error text signifying the reason the message can’t be sent.

But you can solve the problem of bouncing emails in just a few steps. However, this solution will only work for created email lists and not for bought email lists.

1. Put a proper sender’s name on your emails.
Email spam filters are always checking where the email came from before it can be cleared. If it can’t find the valid sender’s name in the proper fields, then it will be considered as spam. And as such, it will never find its way in the recipient’s inbox. It would stay forever in the spam folder until the come across it and take it out of there. And that scenario is not very likely.

2. Request your email subscribers to add your address in their contacts list.
If your name and email address are added to the contacts list, then the email filters that could bounce your message back would be avoided. It’s like giving your emails an exclusive entry pass to the inbox without having to go through scrutiny.

3. Double check the spelling and format of the email address you have on your list.
In the digital world, the worse mistake you can make is a human error. Make sure that you ask your prospects to retype their emails on the fields provided on the opt-in pages to be sure of an accurate address every time.

4. Provide for a confirmation link for subscriptions.
In order to make sure a real person had subscribed to your emails and not a robot, have your users check their emails and click the confirmation link provided therein. This way, you also protect your own interest. With an email confirmation process in place, you won’t be accused of sending unsolicited mails to your prospects.

Use an auto-responder system.
An auto-responder is a program you can use to ensure that everyone who emails you back will receive an immediate reply. You’ll have to configure it, however, to ensure that the people who email you will receive the appropriate response.

Make effective use of your email signature.
Your email signature is another way to market your business. The degree to which you can modify and design your email signature will depend greatly on your email service provider. Most, however, will accept text and images. HTML may be accepted by other providers.

Your email signature must contain above all else contact details of your business. Starting with your business name, you should also provide your store or company location, landline, mobile and facsimile number, email address, and website. If you have any email group, blog, or forum, these should be included in your email signature, too.

Last but not least, include either a tagline or a general but catchy call to action in your email signature.

Complete your profile for your email account.
Most email accounts also offer their members a chance to create their own profile pages. Use this to your disadvantage as well. If you have any qualifications you can use as your competitive advantage, this is the place to display them.

Use sophisticated designs for special emails.
Emails detailing about special events and occasions for your company should be designed accordingly. Rather than relying on the usual text and graphic combination, try going for a little bit of flair by using either Java or Flash to spice up your email.

Timing is essential.
In the old days, timing in your vocabulary usually meant sending emails either on a daily, weekly, or monthly basis. But now, you have to be more specific than that. You should research about your target markets daily routine and try to find out what time of the day they’re most likely to read their emails. Use the information you obtain to improve how your email ad is designed.

For more advance email marketing techniques, consider enrolling in an Internet marketing course and joining Internet marketing workshops.