Your Team Could Be Making These Email Marketing Mistakes – And Here’s How to Tackle Them

Email marketing mistakes are frequent, especially in B2B businesses where marketing is an afterthought. When emails don’t work, it’s easy to point to the tools or the audience that has been provided to you.

 However, most of the time, it is how the emails are crafted and sent that creates the problem. If your team is running the marketing on the side like a part-time job, the likelihood is that they are making the same mistakes over and over and missing opportunities.

This article outlines the most common email marketing mistakes we notice with technical B2B companies, the reasons behind them, and what actions can be taken for solutions. Whether it is product alerts, campaign sequences, or sales follow-ups, strategic alterations will make a robust difference.

Email Marketing Mistake 1: Emails That Are Overly Long And Vague

One of the blunders under the umbrella of email marketing is sending long and vague emails that lack a specific call to action. It is understandable that self-explanation has become a requirement in today’s complex and tricky world. However, specializing brought about this tendency to focus on features or specification.

The email turns into a chunk of text that does not lend itself to guiding the reader. The subject line may raise expectations, but the value proposition is not provided within the copy, and the action is absent or overlooked.

As an example, we’ve witnessed niche software businesses inundate clients with multipart 500-word explanatory emails detailing what their platforms claim to offer. These messages fail to increase sales, leaving readers in a state of bewilderment.

Keep emails short and direct. Each email should focus on a single issue, preferably one that the recipient is dealing with. Use headings or bullets to make it easy for recipients to find the information they need at first glance. And remember to always add, “See how it works” or “Book a quick walkthrough” as a call to action.

Email Marketing Mistake 2: No Clear CTA (Call to Action)

One of the frequent email marketing mistakes is not providing the readers the instruction after which they have the freedom to choose what to do next. It’s especially common for teams, like junior marketers, to get so caught up with the design and the content of the email that they fail to identify what crucial action is required.

Technical teams tend to default to “here’s some information” with most emails sent out, completely sidelining anything after that. The outcome is a disengaged email that is utterly passive.

Each email should have only one CTA. The CTA can be a hyperlink to a landing page, a downloadable file, a calendar event, or even a question that invites direct responses from readers. Along with specific wording,

CTAs should be clearly defined. Moreover, CTAs should also be placed in the middle of the email where they are easy to find. If the email is being skimmed and if it is being skimmed, links and buttons must be accessible without scrolling.

Most of these email marketing mistakes arise not from carelessness, but rather from lack of attention given to team structures. Work processes that are undertaken are often the result of underlying team dynamics. These underlying administrative processes are most likely overlooked as a byproduct. Marketing is one of the more common areas of business that suffers from this.

More often than not, the individual responsible for drafting the emails doesn’t have performance metrics at hand. Lacking knowledge about their prior successes or how many people engaged with the content means they are not able to present an accurate picture. Provided is no real training, instead guidance to keep the list warm causing them to “send something out.”

While working with our clients in SmallCog, we are often astonished by how overworked some employees are. One customer was managing the social media pages, sending out email campaigns, and updating the website… on top of handling customer calls and product demos.

We all know that the best strategies go to waste without proper guidance and design. In fact, good strategies can quickly become detrimental to businesses.

Clutch Case Studies with Technical B2B Clients

A client from the industrial automation sector reached out to us so we could assist them in optimizing their processes. Their practices were a classic example of what not to do. They were regularly sending monotone product update emails – monthly, long, complex, and laden with engineering jargon. Surprise, surprise, no one engaged with the content.

After offering the client guidance, we managed to improve their processes. They adjusted their email marketing strategy and changed the subject and titles of their emails to be more engaging.

Each email contained one feature, had a headline in “plain English,” a quick explanation of the featured item’s added value, and a single call to action that encouraged them to “See It in Action.” Two months after implementing these changes, open rates surged by 35 percent while click-throughs doubled.

In a different scenario, a logistics platform was providing newsletters without any kind of structure. There was no consistent format, nor any call to action. We introduced a generally repeatable structure including: a brief problem-solution tip (that’s what we call it), a customer story, and a “Want to know more?” link.

It was easy enough for their team to create it month after month — and suddenly internal team issues started by forwarding the emails to their teammates.

Effective Coaching And Corrections

You don’t need to reconstruct your entire strategy in order to fix these email marketing mistakes. All you need is clarity, consistency, and a looped feedback system. This reason alone is why having a coaching model, like the one from our Junior Marketer Coaching plan, is invaluable.

From strategy sessions, we go through previous emails and find areas that have weak spots or could use some polishing. From there, your internal marketer is offered practical changes that they can implement right away, including everything from subject line rewrites to formatting changes to the CTA’s simpler wording.

The plan is not for your junior marketer to immediately start becoming a high-performing junior marketer immediately. It’s rather to create a set of habits that push them towards improving better and over time.

When these team members are provided with the SmallCog Marketing email marketing correction tips pamphlets, they are not left to wonder; rather, they are following a prooven methodology designed specifically for B2B technical communication and marketing.

Such tips are geared towards real teams that have struggles with time management. They focus more on progression, structure, and clarity, rather than trying to achieve perfection.

Closing Comments

Effort should never be a problem when it comes to email marketing. Instead, focus should be the main priority. One problem involving internal team issues is If the rest of the marketing work is being handled by the internal team, there always has to be instruction alongside the work.

Be it streamlining the wording of your message, enhancing your call to action, or creating a uniform structure that your team can use, all of these contribute to a larger goal. They can be done independently, but with proper guidance, it becomes easier.

That is precisely what we offer using the SmallCog Marketing email marketing correction tips. We do not just provide assistance with the issues at hand; instead we prepare your team to help themselves with the correct training.

Looking for some assistance with your digital marketing needs?

Email us at lynn.whitney@smallcogmarketing.com and we can help you transform your email database into one of your sales team’s most powerful tools.