In the world of email marketing, two big factors often come up when determining success: email deliverability and email content. But which one truly matters more? You might have the best content ever written, but if no one sees it, what’s the point? On the flip side, perfect deliverability won’t matter if your content doesn’t engage your audience.
In this post, we’ll dive into both aspects and see how each contributes to the effectiveness of your email campaigns—and ultimately, which one holds more weight.
What is Email Deliverability? And Why Does It Matter?
Let’s start with email deliverability. This term refers to how successfully your emails land in your subscribers’ inboxes, not their spam folders or promotional tabs. You might be thinking, “As long as I hit send, my job is done, right?” But it’s not that simple. Various factors affect whether or not your emails actually get to your audience.
Here’s what impacts your email deliverability:
- Sender Reputation: Your email address and domain develop a reputation over time based on how your recipients engage with your emails. Frequent bounces, spam complaints, or low open rates can negatively impact your reputation.
- Authentication: Implementing email authentication protocols like SPF, DKIM, and DMARC signals to ISPs (Internet Service Providers) that your emails are legitimate, improving deliverability.
- Subscriber Engagement: ISPs track whether your emails are opened and interacted with. High engagement signals that your emails are valuable, boosting deliverability.
- List Hygiene: A clean, up-to-date email list is key. Regularly removing inactive or invalid emails ensures that your campaigns are targeting an engaged audience and not hurting your reputation.
Bottom Line: No matter how great your content is, it won’t matter if it’s stuck in spam or unseen. Deliverability is essential because it ensures that your message has a chance to be read in the first place.
The Role of Email Content: Capturing Attention and Driving Action
Now, let’s talk about email content. This includes your subject lines, the body of your email, any images or links, and most importantly, your overall messaging. It’s what your recipients engage with once your email has made it into their inbox.
Great content does more than just deliver information—it captivates attention and persuades the reader to act.
Here’s what makes email content effective:
- Compelling Subject Lines: The subject line is the gatekeeper. It’s the first thing your recipients see, so it needs to be intriguing enough to prompt an open, while also avoiding spam triggers like excessive use of “FREE” or all-caps.
- Personalization: People respond better to emails that feel personalized. Using the recipient’s name or referencing their past purchases or preferences can significantly boost engagement.
- Value-Driven Copy: Readers need to know “what’s in it for me?” Whether you’re offering a solution to a problem, a limited-time discount, or valuable content, your emails should deliver on their promise and provide clear value.
- Call to Action (CTA): Every email should have a clear goal, whether it’s getting the recipient to click a link, sign up for a webinar, or make a purchase. Without a well-defined CTA, your email’s effectiveness drops.
Bottom Line: Once your email reaches the inbox, it’s the content that drives your audience to engage. Without engaging, well-crafted content, your email is just another piece of digital clutter.
Email Deliverability vs. Content: Which One is More Important?
So, which one should you prioritize—getting the email delivered or making sure the content is irresistible? The truth is, they’re equally important, but they play different roles in the email marketing process.
Here’s how to think about it:
- Deliverability is the Foundation: If deliverability is poor, even the best email content in the world won’t make an impact because it simply won’t be seen. So, deliverability comes first—you must ensure your emails are landing in the inbox. Think of it as setting the stage for success.
- Content is the Game-Changer: Once your email reaches the inbox, content is what hooks your audience and drives them to take action. Without engaging content, even a perfectly delivered email can fail to convert. Your content needs to resonate with your audience, solve their problems, or inspire them to click through.
In other words, deliverability ensures your emails are seen, and content ensures they are acted on. If you’re aiming for long-term success, you can’t focus on just one. Both need to work together for the best results.
Tips to Improve Both Deliverability and Content
To get the most out of your email campaigns, you need to optimize both your deliverability practices and your content. Here’s how:
How to Improve Deliverability:
- Authenticate Your Emails: Ensure you have SPF, DKIM, and DMARC records set up to prove your emails are legitimate.
- Clean Your Email List Regularly: Remove inactive and bounced emails to keep your engagement rates high.
- Encourage Engagement: Ask your subscribers to whitelist your emails and make it easy for them to interact (like replying or clicking).
- Monitor Your Sender Reputation: Use tools that allow you to keep an eye on your domain’s reputation.
How to Improve Email Content:
- Write Attention-Grabbing Subject Lines: Keep them short, personalized, and relevant without being spammy.
- Personalize Your Content: Use segmentation and dynamic content to tailor your emails to specific groups of subscribers based on their behavior or preferences.
- Deliver Value: Every email should provide something your audience finds valuable—whether it’s advice, a discount, or access to exclusive content.
- Test and Optimize: A/B test different elements like subject lines, design, and CTAs to see what resonates best with your audience.
Conclusion: A Successful Email Strategy Needs Both
In the debate between email deliverability and email content, there’s no clear winner because both are essential. Think of deliverability as the engine that gets your emails in front of your audience, and content as the driver that takes them where you want them to go—whether that’s making a purchase, reading a blog post, or signing up for an event.
Prioritize both, and you’ll have a powerful email marketing strategy that not only reaches your audience but also inspires them to take action.
