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Ask and You Shall Succeed
Using online surveys to improve your email communications
You've probably heard the saying, "beauty is in the eye of the beholder." When applied to email marketing, a more appropriate variation might be, "relevancy is in the eye of the reader." You know that your email communications need to be relevant to the interests of your readers. But how can you discover what information they consider relevant? Open and click-through rates give you some idea, but that's only part of the story. There's only one way to get the specific feedback you need from your readers-ask them.
Asking your readers for their feedback on your email communications will give you valuable insights that help you achieve better results including more sales, additional website visitors, and higher open and click-through rates. You will also show your contacts that you are interested in what they think-that you understand your email communications are about them (not you).
The simplest way to get detailed feedback that is easy to evaluate is to send a brief online survey. You can use a number of services to conduct online surveys, including Constant Contact.
When you prepare your survey, think about what aspects of your email communications you want feedback on. Then, think about the questions you need to ask to get the insights that can help you make improvements. Here are some key areas to focus on:
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Overall satisfaction - Before you get into the details of your email communications, start out with a general question that gets a "gut" reaction from your contacts. Here's an example:
On a scale of 1 to 5, with 5 being excellent, how do you rate our newsletter?
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Most valued sections - Understanding what your readers value most in your current emails will help you focus your energy and effort. If there is a section of your emails that your readers don't find helpful, you may want to remove that section. If there is an area you find they really enjoy, you can explore ways to expand it and make it even better.
Here's an example of a question that a human resources consultant could ask her readers:
Please rate the following segments of my newsletter:
(Ratings: Extremely Valuable, Valuable, Somewhat Valuable, Not Valuable)- Articles
- Industry statistics
- Question and answer section
- Customer profiles
- Job listings
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What you're doing right-and what you can improve- This is perhaps the most important information you can gain from your online survey. Ask your contacts how the newsletter helps them, what they appreciate most about receiving it-and why. In a different question, ask them what you could do to improve your newsletter. When these types of questions are open ended, your contacts have the opportunity to share their valuable thoughts with you, in their own words.
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Day and time of day to send - Ask your contacts for their preference on when they want to receive your emails. You may find that there is a better day and better time for you to send your communications.
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Frequency - How often do your contacts want to hear from you? Maybe you are sending too many email communications or not enough. Considering your readers opinions in this area can lead to better open rates and less unsubscribes.
- Reader information - While the main objective of your survey is to get feedback on your email communications, you can close out with a few questions that find out more about who your audience is. Stick to one or two questions that reveal demographic information that is important to your business or organization. You can also use the responses to segment your contact list.
You can create an online survey that addresses these topics and questions in just minutes. And the responses will start to roll in right away (online survey responses usually come in within 24 to 48 hours of when the survey is sent). Once you get your responses, spend some time looking them over and reading the comments. Here are a few questions to ask yourself.
- What do people like about my newsletter?
- What are areas that need improvement?
- What did I learn?
- What are three things that I will do differently as a result of the feedback I received?
Answer these questions and you'll have the valuable insights you need to take your email communications (and your business or organization) to the next level. By asking the people on your list for their feedback, and understanding what matters to them, you will create email communications that are relevant and successful.
