Email Traits That Get Art Offers Ignored
Email is a powerful sales tool that helps art professionals connect with clients on a personal level. Let’s discuss how to avoid sending emails that get ignored.
It’s no secret that how we communicate through email significantly impacts your art gallery’s success. In fact, email is one of the most common forms of communication in the workplace. And as with all types of communication, there are right and wrong ways to do it.
In our previous blog post, we considered characteristics that can make your emails more compelling. Now, we’ll analyze some common traits of ineffective one-to-one emails and how they can hurt your outreach efforts. We’ll also provide some tips for avoiding these mistakes and improving your email communications.
A Mediocre Example Teaches Us a Lot
Most people don’t send terrible emails, merely unoptimized ones. This difference can make spotting errors more difficult. The following example is a recreation of emails we’ve received to help identify three common mistakes.
1. The Sweetest Sound Is Your Own Name
First off, we can see that the email doesn’t use the recipient’s name, making it feel like something from a mailing list, not a personal email. This fact alone may be enough to send it straight to spam. If you don’t know or can’t find the recipient’s name, it may be a good sign that they’re not ready for personal emails.
Tip: Avoid phrases like “to whom it may concern,” “dear reader,” “dear friend,” or worse yet, leaving the name blank.
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2. Bad Images Are Worse Than No Images
Another problem is the images. The image of the sculpture is obviously rendered incorrectly and is cut in half, making the examples presented much less compelling. Another consideration is where the clickable image leads to. A link that leads to a Dropbox or Google Drive folder can seem offputting and a potential virus.
Tip: Ensure images will render correctly by sending a test to your personal email. Use a software tool like ARTERNAL to link users to a branded gallery page that lets them browse works in the exhibition while maintaining your professional image.
3. Unpersonalized Email Is Not Engaging
The email example above lacks personalization and fails to highlight why it’s relevant to the reader. Even a simple sentence associating the exhibitions mentioned in the email with the reader’s previous interactions with the gallery may be enough to make the appeal clear.
Tip: The introduction should focus on the reader first and then connect their interest with your offering. For example, try working in relevant details from their previous interactions, such as if they’ve inquired about or acquired similar works in the past.
4. Generic sales email addresses are off putting
Have you ever received an email from a sales@ or info@ address and immediately sent it to spam? Generic email addresses like these are not personable. They give users the impression they are receiving bulk emails, which are much more likely to be ignored. Additionally, many mail clients flag addresses like these as spam by default.
Tip: If you want to improve your sales team’s efficacy use email addresses with real names. As a bonus, giving your sales team separate accounts will help them keep contacts organized and improve follow-up communications.
Poor emails can hurt your professional image by lowering your response rates and sending emails straight to spam. Highly personalized emails start in your CRM. There, you can track client activity and data, segment them into relevant groups, and only send emails to collectors that fit your target audience.
Send Personalized Emails Faster
In this article, we’ve seen the dangers of not personalizing your emails and the subtle differences that take your email from mediocre to great. However, busy art dealers may struggle to balance personalization with efficiency. ARTERNAL’s Smart Mail solution provides email customization tools that help art sales professionals personalize emails in a fraction of the time.
Leverage Smart Mail to help your team nurture meaningful conversations more efficiently and increase your chances of getting a positive response from your recipients. Schedule a demo today.
