"64% of respondents cite the "From" line as the most important factor motivating them to open permission-based email." Source: DoubleClick

1. Include Your Brand in your From Line
For better sender recognition, make sure you use a From Name and Address that includes your name, company, product or service name - whichever the recipient will know best. This best practice has never been more important. Your brand in the From line assures the recipient that the email is coming from a reliable and trusted source and builds familiarity and credibility - especially when repeated over time. For 8 more important From line tips, go to "Your From line: benefit or barrier?"

2. Include Your Brand in The Subject Line
You may also want to incorporate your brand into the Subject line of your email, especially if the From line does not contain your brand.

Here's an example: Debbie Weil's award-winning B2B (business to business) newsletter, WordBiz Report, looks like this in my inbox:

From Line: Debbie Weil [dweil@wordbiz.com]
Subject Line: [WordBiz] and the title of the issue

A newsletter publisher and B2B online marketing, email and content strategist, Debbie uses her name in the From line because her widely recognized name is her brand. She then places her newsletter brand, WordBiz, in the subject line.

For 9 more important Subject line tips, go to "Your Subject line: fabulous or filtered?"

"Likeliness to respond to permission-based email was most increased by content based on specified interests (72%), while 68% cited relevance. Recipients clearly desire to state their preferences." Source: DoubleClick

Naturally, when an email is targeted, relevant and timely the recipient is more likely to open, read and act on it. The ideal content and frequency of email marketing communications will be different for every business and every audience.

How do you determine what is right in your case? Just ask!

Make the "ask" as formal or informal as you wish. Your customers and prospects will be eager to share their opinions and preferences, and they will appreciate being solicited. Most importantly, you can use the information to establish the email content and frequency that is right for your audience. And that equates to more readers and better response rates.

3. Customer interests
Gather customer interests on your website sign up form - and use them! It may be tempting to send an all-purpose email to your entire audience regardless of their stated preferences, but established best practices and the DoubleClick study strongly indicate that, from the recipient's viewpoint (the only one that really matters), irrelevancy can easily turn a good permission-based email into spam.

Take the time to learn more about content, relevance and frequency by enabling your visitors, clients, customers or members to choose what kind of information they want to receive from you.

When someone signs up to be on your email list, allow him to select his areas of interest.

For example, allow subscribers to select by:

• Product or service categories
• Job function or self-description
• Desired communication type or content (e.g. newsletters, event or sale notifications, new product or service announcements etc.).

Also, specify what the customer will receive and when he will receive it. For example: "Sign up for our Email Marketing Hints & Tips Newsletter, sent every three weeks on Friday, and become an expert email marketer!"

4. Ask at every opportunity

• Office or store visit
• Sales calls, meetings or account reviews
• Customer/client service, and support calls
• Comment cards or feedback forms
• Etc.

5. Send an email survey
Email surveys compliment your email marketing efforts by allowing you to gather important feedback and opinions from your customers in a more formal, efficient and organized way. Email survey tools, like Zoomerang™,are both easy-to-use, affordable and offer great customer support and value for small and mid-sized businesses. As a matter of fact, my company Constant Contact, liked Zoomerang so much that we partnered with them, so Constant Contact users can include a Zoomerang survey link in any Constant Contact email campaign. Find out how.

6. Use your reports
If you are using an email marketing service, you can review your reports to monitor your subscriber feedback on a regular basis (e.g. opens, click throughs, email replies, unsubscribes and spam complaints).