15 Email Marketing Best Practices for 2026
You send the campaign. A few people open it, fewer click, and you are left guessing which part failed.
These 15 email marketing best practices for 2026 are the fixes worth making first, whether you are a small business owner sending the campaign yourself or briefing someone to send it for you. Every figure below carries a link to its source, and two of the most-quoted numbers in email marketing say something narrower at source than the headline suggests.
Is the email marketing ROI ratio everyone quotes real?
Not in the form it usually travels. The figure traces to the UK Data & Marketing Association, whose Marketer Email Tracker 2019 reported email marketing ROI standing at just over £42 for every pound spent. That is pounds sterling, in 2019, from marketers who were asked to estimate their own returns.
A later DMA edition put it lower. The Marketer Email Tracker 2021 recorded marketers estimating email’s return at £38.33 for every £1 spent, up from £29.64 in 2016.
So read any headline ratio as a survey answer from one market in one year, not as a forecast for your business. What email returns for you depends on your list, your margins and your offer. Our guide to how to measure email marketing ROI walks through the calculation on your own numbers.
What does the email ROI figure actually measure?
Before you quote any ROI figure, including this one, check what sits behind it.
| Check | The DMA’s 2019 figure |
|---|---|
| Amount | Just over £42 for every £1 spent (2019) |
| Currency | Pounds sterling |
| Year measured | 2019 |
| Who was asked | Marketers surveyed by the UK Data & Marketing Association |
| How it was produced | Marketers’ own estimates of their returns, not measured results |
| What the same body published later | £38.33 for every £1 spent, in its 2021 edition |
Run those six checks on any ROI figure before you plan around it.
What percentage of emails are opened on mobile?
Nobody can tell you accurately any more, and that is the more useful answer. Litmus’s email client market share report states that opens from subscribers who opted into Apple’s Mail Privacy Protection do not pass along the email client version and platform, and that Gmail’s image caching likewise hides the client version and platform. The device behind a large share of email opens cannot be identified.
That is why a confident mobile-open percentage is worth distrusting. It is also why the practical answer has not changed: design for the small screen by default, because you have no way to confirm anyone is on a big one.
For context, mobile devices accounted for 51.71% of web page views in Ghana in July 2026, ahead of desktop on 47.29%, according to StatCounter Global Stats. That measures web browsing rather than email opens, and in Ghana the split is close to even. Read it as a reason to check your email on a desktop screen too, not as a count of how anyone opens their mail.
The 15 email marketing best practices for 2026
The audience is there. DataReportal’s Digital 2026: Ghana report put the number of internet users in Ghana at 26.3 million in October 2025, an internet penetration rate of 74.6% of the total population. What follows is how to earn a share of their attention.
1. Personalise beyond the first name
Personalisation works when the email reflects what someone did, not just what they are called. Use what you already hold: what they bought, what they browsed, what they abandoned in the cart. Then change the offer, not only the greeting.
One subscriber gets “Ama, your cart misses you, here’s 20% off.” Another gets “Kwame, your usual order is back in stock — shall we send it this week?” Same campaign, two different reasons to click.
If you write the copy yourself, these AI prompts for writing email give you a first draft to edit rather than a blank page.
2. Segment your list before you write
Segmentation is what lets one campaign feel relevant to everyone who receives it. Split the list into groups that need different things:
- New subscribers who need a welcome series
- Frequent buyers who expect loyalty perks
- Cart abandoners who need a reminder with a reason
- Quiet subscribers who need a re-engagement message
Start with one split rather than four. Take the subscribers who bought in the last three months, send them something the rest of the list does not get, and compare the click rate. That single comparison tells you whether segmentation is worth the effort on your list, and it takes one campaign to find out.
Our email list segmentation guide covers how to build those groups, and there is a companion guide on how to build a list worth sending to in the first place.
3. Design for the phone first
Assume every email opens on a phone, because you cannot verify otherwise. That single assumption settles most design arguments.
One column. One clear button. Text large enough to read without pinching. Tap targets big enough for a thumb. Images that resize instead of forcing a sideways scroll.
Then send yourself a test and open it on your own phone before the campaign goes out, and once on a laptop — you cannot tell which one any given subscriber will use.
4. Write subject lines that survive a lock screen
Front-load the words carrying the offer, because a lock screen cuts the line off partway and your reader decides from what is left. A subject line whose point arrives in the final three words never gets read.
Curiosity, urgency and exclusivity all work: “Your weekend just got better: 30% off inside.” Or “Akosua, your loyalty reward is waiting.”
5. Let people act inside the inbox
Interactive elements such as polls, surveys, image carousels and clickable GIFs let a reader respond without leaving the email. Fewer steps between the message and the action is the whole point.
Whether it lifts your click rate is a question for your own list rather than for a benchmark. Run one against a single segment, compare it with your usual campaign, and keep it if your subscribers respond.
6. Test your send times instead of guessing
Send time is testable, which makes guessing at it a waste. Split one segment in two, send the same email at two different times, and let the click rate decide which window you use next.
Our guide to the best days and times to send emails gives you sensible starting windows to test against.
7. Ask for consent and make leaving easy
Every email needs a visible unsubscribe link and an honest description of what you collect and why. Honour opt-outs the moment they arrive, and never send to a list you bought.
Data-protection rules differ depending on where your subscribers live, so confirm which ones cover your list before you send. The trust you keep is worth more than the addresses you lose.
8. Write for skimming
People scan an email before they read it, so put the offer in the first line rather than the third paragraph. Short paragraphs. Bold on the words that carry meaning. Bullets for anything with more than two parts. A button instead of a link buried mid-sentence.
9. Automate the emails you send every time
Any email triggered by something a customer does belongs in an automation flow rather than on your to-do list. Welcome series for new subscribers. Post-purchase follow-ups asking for a review. Birthday or anniversary offers. Re-engagement for subscribers who have gone quiet.
Build each one once, and it runs while you work on something else.
The welcome series is the one to build first, because it reaches people at the only moment you can be certain they want to hear from you. Three emails is enough: what you sell and who you are, the thing your customers most often ask before buying, and an offer with a deadline on it.
Segmentation, automation and A/B testing are the three practices that need a platform rather than discipline. Arkesel Email Marketing covers all three, alongside transactional email for receipts and confirmations.
10. Keep yourself out of the spam folder
Filters read your words, your sending history and your list hygiene together. Phrases like “FREE!!!”, “Act Now” and “100% Guaranteed” work against you, while “Enjoy a complimentary gift with your order” says the same thing without the flags.
Our guide on how to keep your emails out of spam covers the technical side, including authentication and list cleaning.
11. Use dynamic content where your platform and your readers support it
Some email formats let a reader complete an action inside the message rather than on a web page. AMP for Email is one such format.
Support differs between inboxes and between sending platforms, so confirm both before you design a campaign around it, and always include a plain version for readers whose inbox does not render the interactive one.
12. A/B test one thing at a time
Testing earns its keep only when you change one variable and hold everything else still. Subject line, sender name, button text or layout: pick one, split a segment, and let the result choose for you.
Send version A with “Shop Now” and version B with “Grab Yours Today”, then send the winner to the rest of the list. Repeat it every campaign and the gains compound.
Two cautions worth knowing. A test on a very small segment tells you about those few people rather than about your list, so run tests on a group big enough that a handful of clicks either way does not decide the result. And test the subject line before anything else, since nothing inside the email matters to someone who never opened it.
13. Pair email with SMS and WhatsApp
Email carries the detail; a text carries the nudge. Send the launch email, follow it with a short SMS pointing back to the inbox, and keep the message consistent across both.
Our guide on how to combine email with SMS and WhatsApp covers sequencing the channels without repeating yourself.
14. Measure clicks and conversions, not just opens
Open rate is now the least dependable number on your dashboard. Litmus does not treat opens from Mail Privacy Protection subscribers as reliable opens, and that applies to a share of your list you cannot identify. If your goal is to improve email open rates, treat that number as a rough signal rather than a scoreboard, and judge the campaign on what happened after the open.
Track the numbers that record a decision instead:
- Click-through rate, to see whether the offer landed
- Conversion rate, to see whether it was worth making
- Bounce rate, to find dead addresses before they cost you
- Unsubscribe rate, to catch a message going wrong early
15. Tell the truth about your business
Customers respond to specifics. Name the customer, name the problem they had, name what changed. One short story about a real order beats a paragraph of claims about your service.
That is the difference between an email people delete and an email people remember receiving.
What is changing in email marketing in 2026
Measurement is getting narrower, not wider. Inbox privacy features hide more of what marketers used to see, so first-party signals like clicks, replies and purchases carry the weight that opens once did.
Zero-party data is replacing guesswork. Ask subscribers directly what they want to hear about, store the answer, and send against it.
Emails are getting lighter. Fewer heavy images and more plain text load faster on a phone and clear filters more easily.
Automation is doing more of the sending. The flows you build once outperform the campaigns you remember to send.
Example email CTAs that work
The button you use depends on what the campaign is for:
- Limited-time offer: “Unlock 24-Hour Access”
- Cart recovery: “Complete Your Purchase”
- Feedback request: “Share Your Opinion”
- Product launch: “Be the First to Try”
Give each email one job and one button. A second competing button gives the reader a decision to make instead of an action to take.
Where to start this week
Pick one segment and one automated flow, and build them before you touch anything else. A welcome series sent to new subscribers will teach you more about your list in a fortnight than a month of general campaigns.
Then add one practice per campaign rather than all fifteen at once. Rewrite the subject line this week, split the list next week, cut the images the week after. Each change is small enough to attribute a result to, which is what turns a checklist into something you actually learn from.
If you are still deciding which emails to send at all, start with the types of emails every business needs.
When you are ready to build it, create your Arkesel account and set up your first automated flow, or see current plans first.
Related Articles
- Best practices for managing your email list
- The best time to send your emails
- How to measure email marketing ROI
- Email list segmentation best practices
- Email marketing for coaches: the sequences that book calls
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