Email marketing is tied to inbound marketing: inbound brings in the leads, email nurtures them and sends them back to the website or landing page which, in turn, offers valuable content that helps convert the lead into a sale.

The #1 challenge to email marketing effectiveness is targeting your prospects and customers with highly relevant content.

Key to creating relevant content in email is to make sure your email messages:

• Provide an offer that is connected to the initial request
• Offer content that fits the needs of the recipient
• Are sent at the right time and with the right frequency

To accomplish these tactics, you need a well segmented database so that you can better target your customers and prospects with relevant email messages – content, offers, as well as timing.

Things to test include:

• Subject line
• Headlines
• Calls-to-action
• Offers
• HTML vs. Text
• Length of copy

One of the reasons relevant content is so critical is that the minute an email recipient starts to feel like your emails are no longer relevant, they’ll stop reading them. You don’t get too many second chances these days.