Email Marketing Best Practices: Getting Permission to Email

Here’s a quick expansion on Point 1 of our Email Marketing Best Practices.

1) Always get permission to email (either before or after)

There are a few scenarios. This seems to make the most sense.

• If you have a prior business relationship with the email recipient (already your customer)
• If they have asked to be contacted or to be included in your list (brandy bowl for namecards in store)
• If they belong to a special group that must use your services (eg cleanroom engineers need specialised goggles and prescription lenses)
• They belong to the same association as you (once again, you must ask their permission.)
• If you met them in person before and have their contact or business card
• If you are a customer of theirs (they could become a customer of yours)

It’s okay to email in the above circumstances, but what if you have an old list of customers or someone with whom you have not already asked his or her permission to contact? Then do this.

• We have a newsletter which I will be sending to you shortly. If you do not wish to receive the newsletter, you can click on the unsubscribe link to be removed from our lists.
  <<unsubscribe link here>>
• You are being contacted as you have been referred to us by {Their Friend’s Name}. While we would like to ask your permission to contact you again and to share with you our Newsletter Weekly. Please make your selection now.
  Yes, please send me your regular newsletter and email updates.
  Yes, please send me email updates only (no newsletter).
  No, please do not send me any more emails or newsletters. [This is an Unsubscribe Link]
• We will be sending you our regular newsletter as a way of keeping in touch with our best customers. We have lots of valuable tips and interesting articles to share with you. You can unsubscribe anytime from our newsletters by following the unsubscribe link.

Simply follow this and get ready to manage a few unsubscribes. Unless you run a particular awfully produced newsletter with no news and lots of ads, it is unlikely you will see more than a 5 to 10% unsubscribe rate.

What ever base you are left with should be better in quality than a totally “cold” list and you can develop a new relationship with these new subscribers via email.

You will soon realise that getting permission helps you develop a more responsive and a higher quality list. You will be making more money with a 1,000 strong list with 50% open rate than a 5,000 strong list with a 1 percent open rate. It’s more than a numbers game if eventually, you want a list which values your relationship with them.

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