Personalization is one of the most influential marketing trends. The more you cater to users, the more likely they are to turn into leads and, consequently, into customers. That’s where email marketing comes into play. It’s been effective for years, since 1978, to be precise. It all started when Gary Thuerk sent 400 emails, and the campaign resulted in $13 million in DEC machine sales. Sounds impressive, right?

With billions of emails sent daily, it’s important to stand out. Surprisingly, SEO can help you do it. Here, we’ll tell you everything about the indirect but effective connection between SEO and email marketing.

The Bridge Between SEO and Email

First, let’s recall what SEO is. Search engine optimization is a combination of actions aimed at improving a website’s ranking in search engines to gain more traffic.

Emails aren’t showcased in search results, obviously, so we can conclude that the connection between SEO and email marketing is indirect. For example, when building an email strategy, you have to find out what topics your audience is curious about. To do that, you can use keyword research, which is a part of every SEO strategy.

Knowing the most popular queries used by your target audience can help you build relevant newsletters that resonate with readers, encourage them to click on links, and offer discounts.

And when you’re using SEO to get to the highest ranking in Google and make yourself noticeable to the audience, email marketing can help you on the way. This approach lets you share content with the people who are already interested and will click on links to your blog to learn more. This should help your SEO efforts.

Useful SEO Tips to Optimize Your Email Marketing Strategy

Here are practical recommendations on using SEO for email marketing.

Use keywords in the subject line and email body

Over 100,000 Google searches are performed every second. By monitoring the process and identifying your potential buyers’ most frequent concerns, you can create excellent newsletters that give people what they want.

Precise words may create a “Wow!” effect.

Imagine you find your recent query in the subject and the body of an email. 

Continuing on the topic of keywords, how will you get people on the email list? The conversion page has to be optimized for user queries so they can see it in the search results.

The key takeaway is that you need to focus keywords in the subject and body of the emails and on the conversion page.

What keywords to use in the email subject and body

Img cr: https://instapage.com/blog/long-tail-keywords

For email marketing SEO, long-tail keywords work the best. They look conversational and can get more traffic from regular and voice searches. They are also more precise, making your emails more engaging.

For example, reading a general letter about the rules of flower care may be boring. There’s info about it everywhere online. But reading about taking care of a particular flower frequently asked about will garner more interest from a curious audience.

Such keywords also have lower competition, making it easier to rank in the SERPs if you use the same query on the conversion page.

Another recommendation is to track the search volume of the chosen keywords. When you see a volume increase, the topic is gaining popularity, and you should use it ASAP or promote content that has already been used.

Use the SE Ranking keyword search tool to monitor real-time dynamics. The tool will help you analyze any keyword and see its competitiveness, difficulty score, search volume, and other metrics. You’ll also get lists of keyword ideas to complement or replace the initial ones.

So, to properly incorporate keywords into your emails:

• Consider using long-tail keywords
• Use digital tools to look for ideas
• Follow search volume trends to find out trending topics

Optimize for mobile

SEO email strategies without mobile optimization risk losing half the traffic. Over 55% of worldwide traffic has been generated from mobile since 2020, which is rising. So, you should adjust your emails accordingly. Here’s how to do it:

• Consider single-column digests.
  Since mobile devices don’t have as much space for content as desktop screens, and their orientation is different, keeping all the info in one neatly structured column will do.
  
  Besides, such columns will look minimalistic and well-designed even if the reader opens them from a laptop or a PC, so it’s a win-win strategy.
• Watch your subject line.
  It’s easy to overdo your subject line to the point where the reader can’t understand the letter. Minimalism, a concise message, and no vague words will create a well-optimized subject line.
  
  For example, instead of “❗❗❗ONLY OPEN IF YOU WANT A 30% DISCOUNT FOR THE S/S COLLECTION, EXPIRES IN 24 HOURS❗❗❗”, which is way too long and looks like spam, opt for “❗30% discount inside”.
• Don’t use heavy images.
  Choosing smaller, lighter images will speed up the loading time of your letter.
• Leave space.
  Don’t crowd the email with text, emojis, and media. Leave space for clicks and scrolling.
• Keep CTAs in the center.
  Centralizing everything when adjusting emails for phone view is a good idea, especially when discussing CTAs. Make them a little brighter and bigger, and place them somewhere noticeable.

Use the best SEO practices

Email SEO has a list of practices that can be applied to ensure your newsletter and the website it leads to getting plenty of attention:

• Optimize the HTML template.
  Use H1 and H2 tags, titles, subject lines, and the body of the message. Ensure there are no errors and the template looks neat and relates to your brand style.
• Use keywords.
  As we mentioned earlier, seeing your exact question in the title and the body of a newsletter builds a special connection between the brand and its readers. So, don’t forget to optimize your titles and body content.
• Use proper anchors.
  Research keywords for the anchors to the links in your newsletter.
• Link to the most relevant pages. The newsletter should contain the most relevant, useful, and engaging content from the website.

It may not be perfect on the first try. Some emails will work like a charm and some will flop, and it’s important to understand that that’s OK, even good. You get to find out what your audience cares about.

Create an email newsletter archive

Search engines can’t crawl emails. But you can post them as an archive and attain more email marketing SEO benefits. This works as a database of content optimized for specific keywords, plus expands your email list by highlighting that the emails are exclusive.

People don’t like missing something, so this will remind them to submit their email addresses to join that exclusive club. Besides, not everyone is ready to sign up for a newsletter if they don’t know what articles they will receive.

An increased mailing list means more leads, brand awareness, and revenue. Plus, it will help you rank higher for more keywords, another benefit of email marketing in SEO.

To make sure this strategy works:

• Research keywords for every newsletter
• Optimize titles and content to those keywords
• Create a master archive by adding links to every newsletter on the website

Add a website search bar to the newsletter

Adding a website search bar to the newsletter will lead more people to your pages. It is very convenient since the readers can find everything they need from their email platform.

Moreover, people who like your content can find more articles and information on your products and services.

This can also be very beneficial from a branding standpoint, helping build trust and authority. For instance, let’s say that you host a podcast with hundreds of episodes that your audience probably hasn’t heard.  

Adding a search bar allows your audience to discover the content directly within the email. This lowers the barrier to entry and allows them to learn more from you quickly and conveniently. 

How to add a search bar to an email?

There’s a relatively easy code piece you can use in the template.

<form action=”https://website” method=”get”>

<input type=”text” name=”s”/>

<input type=”submit” value=”search” />

</form>

Img cr: https://seoforgrowth.com/email-marketing-seo/

You can add more code to adjust the design of the basic search bar, change its color, and build it to match the newsletters you send.

Incorporate video content

Both search engines and Internet users love video content. It’s an easy way to perceive information because it’s exciting and entertaining. Incorporating such content in your emails is another great way to make them more creative.

Of course, it only makes sense if you can create a gorgeous picture and upload it in high quality. 

Engaging, aesthetically pleasing videos will keep people on the website and encourage them to want to find other video and text content you have posted. Optimal bounce rate, longer session time, and other metrics will help you rank higher in Google.

This, in turn, will bring more traffic to your pages and, potentially, more people to your mailing list.

Here are some recommendations for making video content that will engage viewers:

• If you’re trying to make a point, add evidence. This could be a picture, a video, or a link in the description.
• Use titles and thumbnails to make people curious about the clip’s contents.
• Try using popular culture elements like memes and GIFs to make the videos more entertaining.
• Make sure the first 3 seconds of the video are entertaining so that people don’t bounce.
• Make sure the content is valuable and causes emotion.

Summary

The bridge between SEO and email marketing seems more obvious now, right?

Search engine optimization will help you create a newsletter archive, connect with people using the same queries, and choose the most appealing content for the campaign.

Email marketing will help you get the right information to the right people, personalize user experience, and encourage people to become loyal buyers and brand advocates.

The two approaches complement one another and boost brand awareness, increase leads, and make your site rank higher, bringing more traffic every day.