Businesses want to target ideal benchmarks in email marketing, including high open rates and click-through rates (CTR). These measurements can help you determine how well your campaigns are performing. What defines a good benchmark will depend on your business and industry.  

For instance, the average optimal open rate is around 20.94%. Meanwhile, a good open rate for the electronics industry is approximately 19%, and an excellent open rate for the education industry is 25%. However, once you've defined your benchmarks, you may be uncertain about how to improve them. 

If you're disappointed with your email's open and CTR rates, there are several solutions to improve these metrics and increase both leads and sales. 

A/B Test Your Subject Lines 

To increase open rates, determine which subject lines get users to open them. As you pinpoint the ideal subject line that drives results, test and learn what your audience finds interesting. Try out different words and phrases that inspire people to click, whether you discover that a specific offer or a simple invitation to learn more performs best.  

Based on your research throughout this process, you can create subject lines that genuinely work. You may be surprised to find that you only need to change a few words to improve results. On the other hand, you may also discover that some subject lines are worth dropping entirely to yield a better open rate. 

Segment Your Email Lists 

Keep in mind that not everyone in your audience will find every email appealing. Different portions of your audience will have different interests worth targeting. This is why you need to segment your audience into different groups based on interests or other factors. You can then send only certain emails they'll be more likely to open. 

With well-segmented audiences, you'll be less likely to annoy recipients who get emails they don't care to open. Conversely, targeting emails to segmented audiences means that people are more likely to open emails that pique their interest. Send each segment-specific offerings, which can help boost sales in addition to open rates. 

Improve Your Email Content 

Good content will get more people reading. Users are far more tempted to click links if they believe the content will be of value to them, making high-quality content integral in email marketing for small businesses.  

To attract more clicks and drive traffic through your email campaigns, add links to reach your website, social media, and other channels. In addition, you can add certain interactive content that users love, such as videos and animated GIFs. Using valuable and engaging content, you'll entice more people to explore well beyond your emails. 

Create a Sense of Urgency 

To further encourage more people to open your emails and click through various links, you may create a sense of urgency with certain emails. For example, you can put a specific time limit on offers, with subject lines including phrases such as "Limited Time Offer" or "You Only Have a Few Days Left to..."  

With an increased sense of urgency, you're likely to see increased CTR. Offers can also be tailored to each segment of your audience, with offers unique to them based on their interests. Including a strong call-to-action will also lead more people to click through to your website or other platforms. 

Clean Up Your Email Lists 

Email open rates will determine whether your emails wind up in people's spam folders. To improve the efficiency of your campaigns, get rid of email addresses that never open your emails. If you have dozens of addresses that never seem to open your emails, it's best to exclude them to avoid wasting time and effort.   

Cleaning up your email lists will increase CTR because your emails will only go to those who want them. This can reduce the number of emails that get lost in spam folders or ignored in inboxes. Businesses often neglect to clean out email lists, but doing so can significantly increase the efficacy of your campaigns. 

Use Email Marketing to Your Advantage 

If you want to know how to use email marketing effectively, taking all of these email marketing tips into consideration can significantly help. Email marketing remains one of the best ways to connect with audiences. 

With the help of a good email marketing strategy, you'll be able to grow your business, generating more leads and sales. By testing your subject lines, segmenting and cleaning up your email lists, creating high-value content, and creating a sense of urgency, you'll drive results. Ultimately, a well-developed email marketing campaign can complement the rest of your marketing efforts. In turn, you'll increase the ROI of your campaigns and see satisfying benchmarks.