Effective email marketing can be profitable for any business, no matter what kind of product or service you offer. Email best practice attracts new customers, keeps and builds relationships with existing ones and up-sells or cross-sells your products and services. But what is best practice for email marketing?

Over 65% of marketers say that effective email marketing is core to their business. Billions of emails are sent every hour, so it's important to master the art of getting your email seen in a crowded inbox. Consistent and relevant communication is vital for effective email marketing. If you get someone to sign up to your list and you neglect them for too long, they'll forget who you are. The next time you email them, they'll also forget they gave you permission to email them and they'll click the spam button. Too many of these and you'll get labelled a spammer and your email account can get shut down.

So, you've got your autoresponder all set up and your opt-in forms ready and live on your website. Let's have a look at how to do email marketing once people have to signed up to your list and the email marketing best practices to ensure that you don't get deleted or reported as spam when your email lands in an inbox.

1. Send an email to say welcome.

Effective email marketing starts with sending a warm welcome email when somebody opts into your list. You want to thank the person for signing up. If you promised a free download, make sure they don't have to jump through hoops to get it and give them the download link right in the first email.

2. Send follow up emails that are relevant.

A scheduled set of email follow ups are effective because it your target audience will look out for the next email. For instance, if you promise to show them how to repair their relationship in 7 short steps, send them one step per email over 7 days. Don't send all 7 steps in one go. This is where you can use your autoresponder to its full potential and pre-program your email series.

3. Do not trick your readers to open the email.

One of the key elements of email marketing best practices is to ensure that your message fulfills the promise of the subject line. Your email has to have a compelling subject line so that it will be opened, but do not trick people to open your message by promising something that you cannot deliver. There can be a fine line between being clever and being deceitful so make sure you don't cross it.

4. Let people to unsubscribe.

If somebody wants to unsubscribe from your list, let them. If you make it difficult, they may label you as spam. You will not have any success with your email marketing if you worry over someone unsubscribing to your emails. If a recipient has no interest in even getting or reading your emails, it is very unlikely that they will ever become a customer anyway.

5. Build a relationship.

Thought provoking messages are always great for creating a successful email campaign as they drive traffic back to your blog and get people to comment on what you just said. Inquisitive email follow ups are those where you're specifically asking for your reader's input. Everyone loves to be asked for his or her opinion. You might even poll your audience about an upcoming product or service you have.

6. Constantly provide value.

Email marketing best practices are about providing value. Sprinkle your regular follow up emails with some special perk emails. This could be a free report on a relevant subject or access to an exclusive webinar. These are ways you can thank the reader for subscribing and letting you communicate with them on a regular basis via email. Don't just constantly send out out sales messages.

7. Know your audience.

It should go without having to say that email marketing best practices also mean knowing your audience. If you send emails to people who do not want them or did not ask for them, that is spamming. Spread your follow up emails out in a way that your audience will best respond to. Some people like daily emails. Some might respond to once every three or four days, or every other week. You'll have to evaluate your audience and see what works best for you and them.