The first marketing email was sent in the 1970's, resulted in around $13 million in sales, and kicked off what has become one of the most highly used marketing channels even to this day. Given its early beginnings, email isn’t as shiny and new as some of the most recently available channels like messaging and social media, but it remains one of the most effective way to build an audience for your business.

But what is email marketing? Email marketing is the process of targeting your audience through email communication. It helps boost conversion rates and revenue by providing your customers with valuable information they want and need. This is just a quick summary but if you'd like to learn more about email marketing and the benefits before you see the answers to 6 commonly asked questions regarding the strategy, click HERE.

So let's get back to what this blog is all about. After we conducted a quick survey on all things email marketing in business, we decided to answer the top six questions you all commonly asked. So keep reading to get your most burning email marketing questions answered.

How can I grow my emailing list organically?

One of the most basic ways to grow your list is to create an offer and ask for people to give you their email address to access it. This is just one way to grow your list, but it demonstrates the basic principle behind organic contact database growth - provide value and receive their email address in return. For other ways to build you emailing list, click HERE.

Should I buy a mailing list?

NOOOOO! You should never be buying lists - even if people opted in to those purchasable lists, they didn't opt in to hear from you. This means when they get an email from you, they'll not just be less likely to open it because they don't know you but they could mark you as spam because they don't recognise your business. This could negatively affect the deliverability score you receive, which in turn negatively impacts the success of your email marketing long term.

How often should I be sending emails?

In short, send emails as often as people want to hear from you. Test and measure what your audience respond to, what they like to receive and when they want to be informed about the goings on you have. It can be daily, weekly, bi-weekly, monthly and so on. Often or not, most opt for either weekly or monthly - however it all depends on your industry and your audience. See for us here at Avanty, we currently email our mailing list weekly. Why? Well we provide a constant flow of valuable content, for FREE, and we want to make sure it reaches as many people as possible. We also host new offers and even competitions from time to time so email marketing works perfectly for things like that.

What does open rate mean?

It's what it says on the tin, an open rate is the percentage of people who opened your email from the total that received it. So the higher the percentage, the better. A higher percentage means your audience are interested in your email and are opening to read more. The exact outcome you want.

What is a click-through rate?

This differs from what an open rate is, and it's important you know the difference. A click-through rate is the percentage of people who clicked on a link in your email from the total number of people that opened it. Again, the higher the percentage the better. You want people opening your email as well as interacting with the content. Add relevant links where possible and keep an eye of the click-through rate.

How do I avoid landing in my customers' spam folders?

Most of us have received random marketing emails from companies that have landed in the spam folder. You definitely don't want this to happen to your emails, so what can you do to avoid this? The biggest thing you can do to stay out of the spam folder is to work off an opt-in email list that you built yourself (remember NO BUYING LISTS). You should also follow these basic email practices to avoid the spam folder like the plague: identify who you are in the sender name, make unsubscription easy for everyone receiving an email, cleanse your mailing lists regularly to make sure all emails are relevant and valid still. Additionally, it's important to segment your lists into categories and tailor your content to those segments.