Preliminary Checklist as an Aspect of Quality Assurance to Avoid Email Spam
A robust email marketing campaign includes several stages. It’s important to comprehend that a campaign is not confined to sending out messages. It also requires a preparatory phase which includes numerous processes. One of which is considered to be pre-send email checking. Before setting up an email marketing campaign marketers must consider and check on some points of the checklist which will be mentioned in this article.
Email Spam Test as an Inevitable Part of Pre-Send Email Checklist
Launching an email campaign takes a lot of time and effort. Marketers may experience “send button anxiety” before sending out messages as they assume responsibility for the quality and delivery of the mailing. Unclear text, misleading links, inappropriate language and other issues may cause loss of profit for companies and even loss of a position for a person who is in charge of the marketing campaign.
The only thing which may bail out is to have a pre-send check of messages done. Such a check is conducted in several phases as it includes auditing various aspects. For instance, having an email spam test done helps to ensure that your messages reach the inbox and your efforts have not been in vain. The purpose of an email spam test is to test email deliverability and determine a spam score.
It’s better to take advantage of a pre-send checklist to make certain all the necessary work has been done. People with different jobs, like pilots or doctors, have a tendency to use checklists, so it’s a good idea to double-check everything which is important.
If you are willing to find out how to provide email quality assurance, you are welcome to read the article and get insight into the procedure and peculiarities of conducting a pre-send check.
The Necessity of Email Deliverability Test in the Context of Pre-Send Email Check
Before getting insight into a pre-send email check, it’s important to highlight the necessity of checking email deliverability. As the purpose of an email campaign is to make a recipient read an email, it’s essential to carry it to a recipient. The ability of messages to land in the inbox is regarded as email deliverability which needs checking. You can make use of an email spam check to prevent your messages from getting into the junk folder and email checker to determine valid email addresses which won’t cause hard bounces. Care about your sender reputation to increase your deliverability rate.
Stages of Email Check Before Sending Out Messages
Screen Your Inbox Display
The way your messages look like in the inbox of other users prior to opening is called an inbox display. It is considered to be a great opportunity to encourage the subscriber to open the email and therefore to look through it. It contains the sender name, subject line and preview text. Bear in mind that first impression matters.
When you are at this stage, it’s crucial to:
- Clarify who the sender is not to be marked as spam.
- Tell a little bit about what is inside. Make the most of a subject line and a preheader to appeal to your subscribers and motivate them to click it.
- Implement personalization wherever possible. It makes your emails stand out in the inbox.
By verifying that all your data in the inbox display is valid and attractive, you are streamlining for more openings. Make use of a spam checker to detect spam trigger words in your messages. A remarkable inbox display may boost open rates, users’ engagement and, consequently, ROI.
Check On Accessibility
When you write and send an email, you expect it to be read. It’s difficult to meet the target if the recipients can’t access your email to read. Try to provide access to your messages to people with visual disabilities. Make certain that your messages may be read with a screen reader. Here are some tips which need to be followed to enhance your email accessibility:
- Provide structure to your messages with headers. It allows your recipients to navigate easily through your content to find the sections of relevance
- Ensure that your fonts and formats are accessible. If you apply an inaccessible font, it will make hard work of reading it. For instance, to alter an unreadable font, a user needs to copy and paste your email content into a word document. It is time-consuming and not everybody wants to do it. Moreover, pick a font which is recognized by most devices. Be mindful of the size of your text. It should be large enough to be read without difficulty. Don’t overuse capital letters, italics or underlines.
- Provide adequate color contrast between the foreground text and the background color to enhance the readability.
- Provide descriptive alt text to the images you offer. People, who can’t see images and utilize assistive technology, will get to know the alt text instead of seeing the image.
Monitor URL and Image Validation
If you want to direct users to another HTML page on the internet, you utilize an URL. Adding a valid URL to your email is your area of responsibility. There is no point in adding broken links as they won’t lead to the target page. You can check all of your links on your own. However, there exist specific tools which aim at verifying your links and simplify your work.
Sometimes images are displayed in the different way you have intended, especially if we talk about Outlook. It’s necessary to pay attention to the following aspects:
- Detect whether the image is missing a border or width.
- Optimize your image for speed and message size. No one wants to wait for your images to load a great deal of time. Care about its size to maximize the speed. It’s possible to compress an image.
- Make sense of which frame Outlook uses as the thumbnail or static image.
Check the relevance of your images and URL to prove to be a trustworthy sender. It increases your chances of getting a higher rate according to the email delivery test.
Benefit from Spell Checks
When sending a message, make certain it doesn’t contain any spelling mistakes. Typos may make a bad impression on your subscribers. Don’t neglect email spam checks which are supposed to determine spam trigger words in your content. Skip some warnings like branded words which aren’t recognized by dictionaries. Of course, you can rely on authors and copywriters, but it’s better to double check everything.
Be mindful of Domain Blacklists
Keep an eye on all domains that your message deals with. If one of them is blacklisted, it may affect email deliverability. You can make use of an email checker to check email addresses of your recipients to save your efforts. Moreover, avoid adding links which direct users to malicious websites.
Test Your Email Deliverability
One of the essential stages of pre-send check is to make sure your email doesn’t drop into the spam folder. Running an email delivery test helps to determine the percentage of messages which are likely to be received by your subscribers’ inbox providers. Make sure that both your delivery and deliverability rates are high enough to provide the possibility of your emails to be read. Verify addresses on your marketing list with an email checker to increase your deliverability rate.
Preview Your Message as a User
When you have completed all the previous checks, it’s preferable to assess your email as a whole. Looking at screenshots of your messages is a crucial point of your pre-send checklist. This should be the last step as you will be able to notice all the changes which have been done and see an email which will be displayed on your subscriber’s device.
Outcome
Following a pre-send checklist is a crucial aspect of QA. It’s necessary not to omit its steps to make the best of your marketing campaign. Bear in mind that testing email deliverability provides proper landing of your messages and increases the chances of being read and improving user’s engagement.