Acxiom Digital's Eastern Region VP/GM takes a look at email through consumers' eyes to remind marketers what not to do.

Several months ago, I listed five mistakes that email marketers routinely make with their programs. If only those were all! Here are five more mistakes I regularly see companies make:

1. Too much text: get on with it!
People don't read online; they scan. If there's an overload of text in your emails, readers are likely to ignore all but the main section. Email is not a digital version of direct mail, so how you write the copy must be approached very differently.

Oftentimes, when I open an email and see an overload of text, I close it quickly rather than slog my way through it. And a lot of your customers are doing the same thing. As a good test, I suggest you cut the text on your next email campaign by half and see if you get a better response. I'll wager that you will.

2. Don't assume I read your last email
In fact, you actually know if I opened it or not. So you do have a good idea of whether I read it or not. And if you're not going to create different segments such as "opened last email" and "didn't open last email," and you have an ongoing series of emails that build upon the previous email (like a welcome stream), give me a link to the previous email so I can refer to things I might have missed by deleting it without reading.

3. I care, but not that much!
Don't abuse your relationship with me by sending me partner emails, or worse, "do us a favor" emails. In the latter category, I lump together those emails that ask me to vote for your company in some poll or contest, or those that ask me to sign a petition to support you in one issue or another.

I opted in to do business with you, but I don't care about your partners or your own corporate agendas. We've seen it time and again that these kinds of emails generate ill will, as well as huge unsubscribe and spam complaint rates.

4. Stop emailing me at my wife's address
I always know when a company with which I do business has done an email append and attempted to match my known physical address with an email address. How? Because it ends up in my wife's mailbox.

Given that any physical address is likely to have as many email addresses as it does occupants, an email append can be tricky. While it is a great way to grow your opt-in list, be sure you're using a top-tier vendor, that you give the recipient the chance to change the email address you used, and that you give the recipient the chance to opt out of further emails (or ask him to opt in for further emails, though this will significantly reduce the number of names you add).

5. Don't send me customer service emails that say "Do Not Reply To This Email"
This really gets me worked up! "No Reply" email addresses in confirmation emails generated by order-processing software have been traditionally used to prevent customer service email addresses from being flooded due to bounce backs and other system-generated auto replies. It has been argued that forcing people to copy the customer service address instead of hitting the reply button will ensure that customer service only receives genuine requests from humans. Another challenge is that older legacy systems cannot be easily modified to have a different "reply to" address than the "from address."

However, an SMTP redirect can easily be set up to transform incoming messages from an order-processing system and have the "reply to" address switched to customer service. A well designed inbound mail handler can be easily configured to differentiate system-generated responses from actual customer service feedback and inquiries, ensuring that the customer has a pleasant experience and the customer service department is not overwhelmed with unwanted messages.

Like I said in the original article, if you are involved in your company's email marketing efforts, at this point you should be asking yourself, "How many of these things am I doing to my email recipients?" If your answer is "more than one," then once again you're in a good position to make changes to your tactics that will build your business faster, and better. Good luck!

Chris Marriott is vice president and GM, Eastern Region, Acxiom Digital. Read full bio.