The New Year is fast approaching, and everyone knows what that means — it’s time to start making your resolutions! But as you reflect on the past 12 months and promise yourself to exercise more or learn a new language, why not take the opportunity to also set a few email marketing resolutions for your business?

Whether you’ve seen a decline in engagement and want to get things back on track, or you want to take a successful strategy to the next level, the beginning of a new year is the perfect time to whip your email marketing program into shape. To help give your campaigns a boost in 2017, here are three simple and effective resolutions you might consider for your email marketing — plus tips that will make sticking to them a cinch.

1. Win ’em back

After the ball has dropped and folks get back into their post holiday routines, it’s a great time to send out a winback campaign. A winback is typically used to get people who purchased or considered purchasing from you a while ago to come back and give your product or service another try. But you need to be thoughtful about how you go after them. Many people may have post-holiday shopping burnout or have resolved not to buy for a while in the New Year. Try to anticipate their needs and appeal to those. For instance, many people resolve to get more organized, lose weight, or be more efficient. How can your products or services meet those needs?

Or, if you’re in sales, you can reach out to folks who may have considered using your service in the past, but perhaps chose a different provider. See if their needs are being met, and remind them of any changes, improvements, or upgrades that have been made that may influence their decision.

2. Remind them of your value

During the holiday season and just thereafter, many people go on an unsubscribe bender in which they unsubscribe from any email lists they think aren’t providing value. This often happens because people get inundated with so much email during the holidays. In 2015, email deliveries increased by 25 percent compared to the 2014 holiday season.

So what can you do to stay in your subscribers’ good graces? Remind them of the value your emails provide. What’s in it for them? Do you offer exclusive content, deals, or promotions? Do you send specific content based on their preferences? This email from Yelp, for example demonstrates the benefits of receiving messages from the company. Namely, the content is personalized and helpful, featuring local restaurant recommendations. Take a page from Yelp’s playbook and remind your subscribers why they signed up in the first place and all the good value you provide:

3. Polish up your lists

To enable the best possible delivery rates and engagement, it’s a good best practice to keep your email lists clean and tidy. We recommend creating some subsets of your list (called segments) so you can create more targeted content based on your subscribers’ preferences or engagement. For instance, you can create a list of your most engaged subscribers by looking at everyone who opened or clicked your last 4 emails. These folks could make up a segment you call “Engaged.” You can also segment your list based on people who have made a purchase and those who haven’t to better target offers and promotions.

As you prepare your business for 2017, let these three resolutions guide your email marketing, and you’re bound to see real results in the New Year and beyond.

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Editor’s note: This blog post was originally published in January 2014 and has been revamped and updated for accuracy and relevance.

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