Ultimate Email Marketing Checklist for mistake-free emailing.

M. Usama
M. Usama

Last updated on

April 17, 2024

In the ever-increasing competitive marketing landscape, one must ensure that email marketing campaigns stand out to garner the reader's attention.

The best email marketing campaigns will help you.

  1. Stay focused on your goals.
  2. Maximize open and clickthrough rates.
  3. Give high-performing results

Considering the many variables and the factors that come into play when creating an email campaign, a simple but effective email marketing checklist can help you ensure that all your variables are in check and nothing slips through the cracks.

A comprehensive and straightforward checklist can ensure that all the processes are followed accordingly and nothing goes unnoticed.

So, if you want to learn more about creating an email marketing checklist for your business, keep reading.

What is an Email Marketing Checklist and why you should use it

Imagine you want to cook a recipe with very complex ingredients. Now if you don’t have the proper steps to create that recipe, you might end up with a big mess. The same is the case with an email marketing campaign. If the variables and factors are not compiled correctly, the campaign might not turn out how you want it to.

In this case, an email marketing checklist acts as a recipe to help you determine at what time which ingredient you should put into your campaign.

An email marketing checklist helps you keep track of all the processes that go into creating an email marketing campaign.

Let’s get cooking and create a successful email marketing campaign by employing the following factors.

The Email Marketing Checklist at a glance

Every great campaign starts with proper prep work and understanding where your campaign is heading. Start by mapping out all the essential elements of the campaign and create an email marketing checklist to help ensure that all the elements are followed at the right time.

Consider adding a few factors to your email marketing checklist.

1. Define your goal

Before starting any marketing campaign, ensure that your campaign has a set of measurable and realistic goals to help you track your campaign's success.

Email marketing campaigns can consist of various objectives, which largely hinge on the nature of the product or service being promoted.

For instance, let's consider an e-commerce platform striving to bolster its sales figures. Its central aim might be augmenting website traffic and enticing customers to purchase via targeted email initiatives. These campaigns could incorporate strategic incentives like discounts, complimentary shipping, or money-back assurances to sway potential buyers.

Conversely, a software solutions provider may prioritize lead generation to engage prospective clients through tailored content and swift responses to inquiries delivered via email.

Regardless of the specific goals you're aiming to achieve through email marketing, it's crucial to maintain clarity on your overarching objectives, which may include:

  • Amplifying sales
  • Cultivating leads
  • Sustaining customer loyalty
  • Nurturing potential prospects
  • Encouraging upselling opportunities
  • Facilitating cross-selling endeavors
  • Gathering pertinent customer data

2. Check your subject line

While judging a book by its cover might not be a good idea, in the case of an email, your subject can make or break the chances of the readers opening the email.

This is why you must master the art of creating a compelling and exciting subject line to go alongside your email.

Here are a few tips to help you create compelling subject lines and some general mistakes to avoid looking spammy.

  1. Align your subject and preheader text with the body of the email.
  2. Keep the subject lines short and sweet.
  3. Spell check
  4. Add FOMO
  5. Experiment with different ideas
  6. Avoid using all caps or adding too many emojis.

3. Select the right sender

When creating an email marketing campaign, ensure it is sent out through a platform your senders can recognize. If you have a business where people have signed up for your services, your email should be sent out through the business email so it can easily be recognized and increase the chances of your message being opened and delivered.

4. Add preheader (preview) text

A preview or preheader text is the text that appears alongside your subject line and gives the readers an idea of what they can expect from the email.

If you don’t add a preheader, the service will assign a generic one to your email. While it might still seem convincing, having a preset preheader can make your email look more professional and approachable.

5. Choose the correct list

Make sure that you choose the right sender before sending out your email. An email sent to the right person or list ensures a better open rate and clickthrough rate. On the other hand, if you mass send an email hoping it gets opened, your email might miss the read list of your senders.

While we are on the subject, we suggest looking into a great email marketing service provider like Mailmunch to help you generate better leads and contact lists for your business without running into walls.

6. Clean your target list

Keeping your target list clean is essential for a successful email marketing campaign and creating long-lasting customer relationships.

Following these tips, you can keep your contact list squeaky and clean.

  1. Remove duplicate addresses
  2. Identify the inactive users
  3. Update contact information of customers regularly
  4. Remove senders that have unsubscribed from the service
  5. Validate all the email addresses
  6. Review your automated signups
  7. Run a spam check on your emails before sending
  8. Replace invalid or misspelled email addresses
  9. When in doubt, remove the sender.

7. Exclude specific recipients

Only some campaigns are meant for all the readers. Some campaigns primarily target a specific group of people you want to reach. 

Segment your emails, ensure the right people receive them, and segment them based on when you send them to ensure your customers' inboxes aren't overloaded with emails.

8. Enable A/B testing

An A/B testing helps you determine and test everything from your subject lines to the email design and content.

If you need clarification about which subject lines to use or have multiple options, try an A/B test on them to see which resonates better with your customers.

A/B Testing allows you to send a test email to a small percentage of recipients from your contact list to test their engagement and interest in the email. It then sends the better-performing email out to the rest of your list.

9. Verify your unsubscribe link works

An unsubscribe link is a legal requirement according to the CAN-SPAM Act of 2003, so make sure you include a working unsubscribe link to your emails to ensure that customers who don’t want to receive further emails from your business can opt-out at the right time.

10. Polish your email copy

Writing a stellar email copy can be a daunting task for many marketers. However, creating a small checklist to see what to include in your email copy can be helpful. Here are a few factors to help you polish your email copy.

  1. Craft a clear CTA
  2. Use persuasive language
  3. Provide valuable content to your audience
  4. Personalize email content
  5. Make your email conversational
  6. Focus on the pain points and avoid industry jargon
  7. Keep things simple and sweet
  8. Break your text into smaller, more digestible chunks
  9. Make sure your content is relevant

11. Get a second opinion on the design

Having another set of eyes go through your email after you finish is a good idea; it can help you identify things you may have overlooked during your checks. 

You will also get additional feedback from another reader, which can help create a better email experience for your customers.

12. Use integrated email testing

Integrated testing allows you to test your emails across different inboxes, senders, and devices straight from your email editor without even sending the email out. At the same time, manual testing might seem like a good idea to save on costs, but letting automation handle it can save you a lot of time.

You can quickly test your emails by utilizing Mailmunch’s platform to help you test subject lines, email design, content, and more to send the perfect email to your customers.

Get started with Mailmunch today.

13. See how emails are rendered in every inbox

Since more than 81% of users prefer opening emails on their mobile devices, ensuring your email performs well on those devices is good. 

Here are a few practices to help ensure your emails are rendered on most devices and across different service providers.

  • Validate your email design across various email clients and web browsers.
  • Ensure that all text remains clear and readable when viewed on mobile devices.
  • Employ a single-column layout with stacked sections for optimal mobile compatibility in design.
  • Employ CSS media queries to adjust content based on the screen size dynamically.
  • Implement responsive font sizes and line heights, aiming for at least 13- or 14-point font for body text and 20-point for headings.
  • Establish maximum widths to prevent images from exceeding their designated containers.
  • Optimize images specifically for smaller screen dimensions.
  • Incorporate alt text for images to provide context if they fail to load in specific email clients.
  • Maintain ample white space around elements to enhance overall readability.
  • Refrain from clustering multiple hyperlinks together; instead, utilize prominent, easily tappable buttons.

14. Bump up your spam score

Subject lines and email content that seems too spammy rarely make it to the inboxes of readers, so before you send out your email, test your email on spam filter software to ensure that it is not one of those many emails that land in the spam folders.

15. Check every URL

Just like a spell check is crucial, so is checking all the elements included in your email. Especially concerning the URL, you must ensure that all the URLs lead to the specified areas to ensure your readers don’t get lost and can easily navigate your website.

16. Review accessibility elements

Email marketers sometimes overlook the importance of ensuring their emails are accessible to everyone, which is a missed opportunity. Why? Because if you don't carefully design and test your emails, people with specific disabilities may not be able to read them.

Here are a few essential tips to keep in mind when creating emails to ensure they are more accessible to a broader audience:

  • Use heading elements (like H1, H2, and table) instead of just making text bigger or bold.
  • Make sure there's enough contrast between background colors and text. You can check how colors appear to people with color blindness using Color Oracle.
  • Use descriptive link text. Instead of saying, "Click here," try something like "Visit our product page to see women's shoes."
  • Always include alt text for your images.

17. Verify the send time

Remember that you cannot just send an email at any time. Most marketers don’t send emails. They schedule them according to the timings that align with the read times of the customers to ensure that emails are opened and read by the audience. 

18. Send a test email 

Send a test email out to a member of your team to see how the email performs on their screen and test whether everything is up to code. 

Sending a test email also helps you see how the email will render on different devices and see if any content or design issues need to be fixed through the eyes of a new person.

19. Press send 

The most crucial step is ensuring everything is up to code and in its optimum state. Now, it is finally the time to send your campaign out to the people.

20. Monitor metrics

A good marketer doesn’t just stop after sending the campaign out; they track the campaign's performance and gain insights from the current campaign to build an even better campaign.

21. Write down learnings and takeaways

Once you have checked out all the metrics and now all your most successful and unsuccessful factors, you can create a list of takeaways to ensure that you don’t repeat the shortfalls and work on perfecting the success of your campaigns.

22. Repeat

You are not ending things with just one excellent email campaign, are you? Nope. Now that you have your comprehensive email marketing checklist, you can easily customize it to fit your goals and always have a checklist handy.

You have most of the factors in mind, so there is no need to worry about what to include in an email marketing checklist. Just customize it, and you will be ready to go.

Long story short

Using email to promote your business can be helpful, but you've got to do it right.

Hopefully, this simple email marketing checklist we reviewed has some good advice on creating emails and email campaigns that your customers will like and engage with.

Just stick to these steps, and your emails will be a hit with your audience every time.

Author Bio

M. Usama

M. Usama is an SEO Growth Specialist and Content Marketer at Mailmunch. He is passionate about crafting engaging and informative content on email marketing and lead generation.

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