How to Deal with Gmail's Tabbed Inbox & Make Sure Your Messages Get Read
Unless you've taken an email vacation, you've surely heard that Google has changed their Gmail Inbox, creating three default tabs that are Primary, Social and Promotional. These are pretty self-explanatory, but the resulting uproar from marketers crying, “The sky is falling” was heard from virtual coast to virtual coast. Never mind that Google obviously thinks they're able to manage your inbox better than you can. What's critical here for online marketers is discovering ways to work around this change and ensure your emails are seen by those on your list with Google Gmail accounts.
So what can you do about Gmail?
As a reader, your options are to go along with Google's divvying up of your email, adjust your tabs to your preference, or return to the old inbox. However, what we're really focused on here is getting the marketing emails you're mailing past Google's filters and into the primary inbox of your list. A lot of people won't take the time to rescue your email from the others that fall into into the Promotions tab, and thus your emails will likely go unnoticed. In the short time since this has been around, we already have reports of far lower open rates resulting from this. What's more, Google has chosen to create email-like ads that appear at the head of your promotions emails, which makes it even harder for your emails to be found. Many marketers are fearful that this trend could spread to other email providers, rendering it more and more difficult to use email marketing. We'll see. For the time being, we must learn how to use our email so that we stand the very best chance possible to skirt Google's promotions tab into the primary inbox.
Four tips to help get your emails read in Gmail
- Create Serialized emails – keep them returning for more, no matter what inbox it ends up in.
- Avoid hypey words in your subject lines. This only helps Google identify it as promotional.
- Let people know that if they don't see your emails, check in their promotional tab and move them for easier access.
- Make them anxious to view your next email by supplying terrific content!
