Improving Healthcare Email Marketing Open Rates (9 Proven Tips)

The “open rate” in healthcare email marketing refers to the percentage of recipients who actually open an email. This number will likely fluctuate over time, and marketers use the open rate to help determine whether their strategy is working. Marketing studies suggest most email campaigns achieve an open rate between 11% and 50%, and anything above 30% is considered a top-tier score for healthcare services.

But how can you increase this key metric? In this article, we look at a series of actionable tips that will improve the open rate in a healthcare email marketing campaign.

Let's begin.

9 Tips To Improve the Open Rate in Healthcare Email Marketing

You have a variety of means of improving the open rate of emails you are sending to current or prospective patients, customers, and users. These are tried and true ways to increase the open rate.

     1. Build a Clean Email List of High-Quality Leads

It's not a good idea to amass a bucket-load of email addresses and hope these large quantities produce more conversions than a curated list. The open rate will suffer greatly in such cases because the quality of leads is lower, and recipients are less likely to be interested in what you have to say or offer.

This is why you need to build an email list with high-quality leads only and take steps to clean this list over time. Cleaning an email list involves removing fake addresses or inactive email subscribers, and most digital marketing agencies use a marketing tool that takes care of this process. Either way, a clean email list full of high-quality leads will improve your open rate in healthcare email marketing.

     2. Avoid Sending Emails From the Company Name

Emails from real people are opened more often, suggesting you should avoid using the company name. Marketing statistics show that aside from whether or not they have time to read an email, recognizing the sender is the most critical factor people consider before deciding to open an email.

This is because email recipients see emails from a company as spam or advertising, while the name of an actual person is deemed more personal, which might at least prompt the recipient to click through.

     3. Create Subject Lines That Inspire Curiosity and Interest

Creating a subject line that demands attention is everything. It's the first thing recipients see and the only way to stand out in a crowded inbox. There are many ways to gain traction in this respect. Marketers will often use a compelling question in the subject line to incite curiosity or evoke interest by informing recipients of the value they can expect when they open the email.

This is also an example of how personalization can improve the open rate. However, it's a good idea to avoid using words like free, deal, or special offer, as email filters will often send these emails directly to the spam folder.

     4. Personalize To Create a Sense of Familiarity

Research shows that personalization is one of the most effective strategies for healthcare email marketing. It's so important to be personal to engage recipients' interest and to imply this email is especially for them.

While marketers always try to personalize the subject line to increase open rates, this also applies to the content of the email, because recipients are more likely to open future emails when they believe the content to be consistently interesting or applicable to them.

     5. Focus on Delivering Quality and Exclusive Content

If people consistently find interesting and useful content inside your emails, you should see a sharp rise in the open rate. The opposite happens when quality is low, especially if this content is not exclusive and can be found elsewhere online.

You should also keep this content as concise as possible and try to avoid combining spam with your best sales copy. Create copy that truly addresses your readers’ issues, pain points, concerns.

     6. Segment the Email List for Higher Conversions

Segmentation is another of the most effective strategies to improve open rates and involves dividing an email list into segments of similar types of recipients. This process helps personalize the message and ensure content is as relevant as possible for the recipients.

SEO agencies will often use the interests, location, and preferences of recipients to create such groups and then send them highly targeted emails, which are likely to have a higher conversion rate. The more personal and effectively targeted, the more likely your emails are to be opened.

     7. Ensure the Email Content Is Mobile-friendly

Emails should always consider mobile and recognize that most people use a smartphone to check their emails. It's also true that content doesn't always translate to mobile very well, and with this in mind, you need to ensure the emails display well on smart devices.

In short, if the content is not mobile-friendly, the open rate of a healthcare email marketing plan will suffer greatly. Make sure your content is mobile-friendly.

     8. Identify the Best Time To Engage With Recipients

Timing is crucial in healthcare email marketing and is a key factor that directly impacts the open rate. You need to ensure you are sending emails at a time when most recipients are likely to be available, and trial and error is often the only way to determine the best time.

Surveys by Hubspot suggest that 9 am to 3 pm on Monday is a popular time for checking emails, but the truth is, you will need to test and test to find the optimum time for your recipients. You might find several different times that rank highly as the right times to send emails.

     9. Split Test To Understand What Recipients Want/Need

Split testing (A/B testing) is a great way to track and improve the open rate in healthcare email marketing. This testing applies to many factors that will dictate the open rate.

For example, you should always try testing multiple subject lines instead of using the same one each time. It's also a good idea to try changing the length of newsletters etc., and use different types of content to ascertain precisely what encourages recipients to open the emails.

Final Thoughts

Email marketing is still one of the most engaging strategies, especially when time is taken to refine the factors – like those above – that can lead to success. However, many healthcare services destroy their open rates by sending out substandard emails or bombarding recipients with spam, essentially defeating the purpose of an email marketing campaign.

It also takes time, experience, and marketing tools to master the process, which is why most healthcare services employ an SEO agency to get the job done right. And maybe this is the kind of help you need right now.

Get in touch with our team at Digital Authority Partners to get started.