Testing and modifications are key to understanding whether or not an email marketing campaign will be successfully executed. Therefore, one of the easiest ways to assess effectiveness prior to actually sending a campaign to the entire list (or at least a large segment of it) is to create a seed list.
A seed list represents an effective marketing strategy that assesses things like email deliverability and design before the actual campaign is sent to ensure it gets to the right mailbox and is opened by an effective target audience. But all the testing in the world won’t matter if your emails can’t reach the inbox. That’s where Warmy.io and similar tools come into play to give marketers enhanced deliverability and sender score. Here, we explore what seed lists are, how they work, and the best practices and pitfalls of using one as a supplementary tool for your email marketing efforts.
Table of Contents
What Is a Seed List and Why Is It Important?
A seed list is a compilation of emails typically used to run an email campaign before the email campaign is sent out to the larger audience. It’s a quality assurance type of feature for the mailbox to assess engagement and effectiveness and to fix any problems before going to the general public. A seed list is typically internal (your team) and external (testers who give permission for you to use their email) with various domain/device email options. Seed lists enhance email marketing as a type of quality assurance troubleshooting the email formatting, links, accessibility, etc. in advance of potential catastrophe before the project goes live.
For example, if the email goes to a seed list, the project manager can determine if it was delivered, if it looks correct, if it’s going to the right audience or at least a specific audience so that mistakes are made that would otherwise damage brand reputation or lower engagement and effectiveness when blasted to the master distribution list. Seed lists promote quality assurance and bolster internal team trust in the deliverable and its execution.
Benefits of Using a Seed List
There are numerous benefits to using seed lists, which solidify their role in the email marketing process. For example, you can evaluate deliverability. When you send a blast to a seed list, you can determine whether you’re going to the inbox or the spam folder. This evaluates sender reputation and whether or not changes need to be made. In addition, you can evaluate formatting. When you send a blast to yourself, you can ensure that the email renders correctly across devices, browsers, and email clients. You can evaluate whether links, images, and dynamic elements function properly. Another benefit of seed lists is the opportunity for feedback. A seed list of familiar, reputable sources can allow you to determine whether your email made it to the inbox or got sent into the spam folder and what you can do to fix it in the future. This feedback is critical for developing your content, formatting, and approach.
How to Use a Seed List and How To Create Them
Seed lists are simple to create and use, but their impact can be understated without proper planning. Here’s a step-by-step guide:
Identify Key Contacts
To begin, choose email addresses for your seed list. Incorporate internal stakeholders, like team members working on the campaign, along with external testers who can offer impartial feedback. Include addresses from different email providers (Gmail, Yahoo, Outlook, etc.) among the addresses in your seed list to test deliverability across platforms.
Test for Deliverability
Send your campaign to the seed list and check from whether it gets into the inbox or is filtered into spam folders. This step is essential for detecting problems with your email content or technical setup and your sender reputation.
Test Formatting and Functionality
Preview your email on various email clients and devices. Look out for broken links, images out of line or formatting problems. And lastly, make sure your designs are both aesthetically pleasing and responsive.
Gather Feedback
Ask your seed list recipients to share their thoughts. Have them provide feedback on the email’s design, content and clarity. Use this feedback to help you refine your campaign before sending it to your entire audience.
Make Adjustments and Retest
Use your seed list testing feedback and learnings to inform your campaign. Retest with your seed list to ensure everything has been fixed and your email is set to launch.
Why an Email Warm-Up Tool Is Crucial
Even with a seed list to identify and fix formatting glitches, link breaks, and content discrepancies, there’s still no surefire way to render the email in the recipient’s inbox on a specific day. This is due to something called sender reputation, one of the leading factors that email service providers rely upon to determine whether the email should be trusted. With poor sender reputation, the most luxuriously formatted and QAed campaigns go straight to spam. So for any email campaign to succeed, an email warmup tool is not recommended; it’s required. An email warm-up tool like Warmy.io works by gradually boosting and solidifying your sender reputation.
For example, it sends a certain number of emails at certain times, nothing excessive and to certain places. So a natural reply as if they are your emails opened, replied to, flagged as important (which is good) works in your favor because these actions performed by Warmy.io on your behalf during the warm-up process impress email service providers that your domain is legitimate and that what you are sending is valuable instead of spam that gets deleted or flagged. Warmy.io is the ideal solution for after a post-seed list test. While seed lists are a great way to see if a campaign renders or has technical issues that need to be addressed ahead of time in a pre-campaign, it’s unfortunate that a seed list does not solve all deliverability issues.
But once you get past the seed list test, Warmy.io comes into play. Warmy.io fixes the sender reputation issue that exists so that sender reputation remains intact not only to clear a seed list test, but to also ensure the actual campaign is delivered to the subscriber’s inbox and not the spam folder. Warmy.io is not for the one-off campaign effort. It’s for you to maintain a real sender reputation over time so that who you are and what you do with your email marketing grows, and you can realistically scale your enterprise-level campaigns, individual drip campaigns, or even one-off transactional emails. Incorporating an email warm-up service into your package increases your email campaign success rate.
All that time and energy spent creating that perfect email copy and styling the email with proper formatting and deduplication on seed lists won’t be for nothing. With email warmy.io, you ensure you look legit to the ESPs, rendering better inbox placement for you and giving your subscribers expedited attention and results on your behalf.
Best Practices for Leveraging Seed Lists
To get the most out of your seed lists, follow these best practices:
- Regularly update your seed list to include a diverse range of email addresses and devices, ensuring comprehensive testing.
- Test all aspects of your email, including subject lines, CTAs, images, and dynamic content, to ensure a seamless user experience.
- Combine seed list testing with data analysis to identify trends and opportunities for improvement.
- Use tools like Warmy.io to address deliverability issues and maintain a strong sender reputation.
By incorporating these practices into your email marketing process, you can create campaigns that perform optimally and deliver measurable results.
Conclusion
Seed lists improve deliverability. The ability to pre-send (to check deliverability, formatting, functionality, etc.) and rectify problems before the real campaign goes out makes your future work more polished and successful. Yet there’s a caveat. Just because you have a seed list doesn’t guarantee your email will go to the inbox. Other services like Warmy.io provide better email deliverability rates and generate an even stronger opportunity for your email to get where it needs to go. Therefore, using both will allow you to have the most effective campaigns for everyone in the future. Email marketing will become effortless when you learn about seed lists. Strategic planning, frequent testing, and using the right channels will ensure your email efforts are successful, converting, and keeping your audience where they need to be.