There’s a lot of great articles and infographics about testing different variables for your email marketing campaigns – most pervasive are time and day of the week. Same goes for subject lines (and to a lesser extent, the first sentence in your email, called the “pre header text”).

But did you know that the factor that influences the most whether or not an email gets opened is who the email is from?

So if you pursue an email marketing strategy

Make sure you’re recognizable

Include both the name of the person who’s sending the email as well as the name of the company, and even better: send using your own domain.

The three rules for email marketing sender etiquette

1) You should have a relationship with the people you’re sending to.

They’ve purchased from you, been to your brick and mortar place of business, visited your website or your Facebook page and, when they did, you specifically asked them for permission to send them newsletters, promotions or other electronic messages.

2) You never, ever buy, rent, borrow, beg for or otherwise steal a list.

Ever.

3) Don’t change your sender address without warning!

The address you send from is your identity – if you change it, make sure you give ample warning and tell your contacts who they will be receiving emails from going forward.

The cold, hard numbers

64% of small businesses execs said they decide whether or not to open the (email) newsletter based on who it’s from. – Bredin Business Information (2007)

80 percent [of respondents] decide whether to click on the “Report Spam” or “Junk” button without opening the actual
message; 73% [of them] base the decision on [who the email is] “FROM” – The Email Sender and Provider Coalition (2007)

Additional Resources

• Building the right kind of list
• More about Permission Marketing
• Deliverability Basics
• Changing your from address