Email marketing common mistakes: the 40/40/20 rule reinvented

The late direct marketing dean Ed Mayer first thought of the 40-40-20 rule. He originally said that the success of your direct marketing effort is 40% target audience, 40% offer/message and 20% creativity. For email marketing that is the case as well. But most marketers tend to overemphasize the creativity part.

For successful email marketing campaigns I would like to divide the 20% into two: namely creativity and deliverability. The latter actually covers a number of issues relating to the more technical aspects of email marketing. While it is not difficult to go from poor deliverability rates to high email marketing deliverability rates, it does require some work and – most importantly – focus.

So in summary, I think the effort you put into your next email marketing campaign or newsletter should be distributed as follows:

• 40% target audience (whom are you trying to reach, what are their interests, what have they purchased previously etc.)
• 40% offer/message (delivering compelling and interesting content to your target audience – don’t forget to pay extra attention to your copy)
• 10% deliverability (how to get your message successfully delivered to your target audience, avoiding spam filters, establishing trust etc.)
• 10% creativity (the look-and-feel of the email message itself, subject line would be part of offer/message)

If you want to learn more about email marketing and what you can do to increase your email marketing results, check these:

• The Email Marketing Masterclass might be coming to a city near you soon
• Check Michael Leander Company’s services for email marketing

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