We have put together a list of email mistakes that almost everyone makes and what you can do to avoid it. Like all marketing, some are common-sense, while others will cause your marketing department to pause and reconsider its strategies.

1. Blatant lack of permission
Carelessly sending enewsletters to email addresses that haven't duly shown permission in your registration process will only end up hurting your open and click through rates and significantly damage your reputation among receivers.

You can avoid this may ensuring that individuals have been told that they will be added to a mailing list. They have the choice of being included or they can opt out. Allow your database to decide what kinds of offers they would like to receive and how often they would like to receive emails from you. For example, once a week, monthly or once a quarter. These timing options may actually help improve your response rate and decrease the number of unsubscribes and messages being sent to the junk box. 

2. Relevant content
Content relevancy is the number one issue for the email marketer. Without segmentation, you have no real relevancy.

Avoid this mistake by asking what interests/hobbies your customers enjoy. You can also segment your database by age, gender, purchasing style, geographic location etc.

3. Lame ‘Welcome’ messages
We still receive far too many lame welcome messages. What a wasted marketing opportunity. Use this space to include a snippet of an outstanding offer. If you can engage the customer from the very start, the more likely it is that this pattern of engagement will continue throughout their account lifetime with you.

4. How often do you send out your newsletter?
How did you determine how often your e-newsletter gets sent out? Is it based on how often readers want to hear from you or did you just choose it by default? Or did you pick it based on your workload and your ability to get an issue written and sent?

The frequency of a newsletter is one of the toughest strategic decisions you will make that will affect the success of your e-newsletter. Sent to frequently and you risk annoying subscribers, but sent too sporadically, and you risk losing a customer as you are not at the top of their mind.

To avoid this mistake, the first thing you should do is to run a test. Conduct an A/B split on your newsletter signup page. Let half of your subscribers pick the option of how frequent they would like to receive your emails, while the rest see your current signup options.

Email tracking has also become more sophisticated, which means you can also adjust your email schedule to reflect consumer interest and seasonality. For example, you can send out more emails just before the holiday season to remind customers to get in quick to avoid disappointment. Some only email on Tuesdays/Wednesdays as these are the best days for open rates.

And here's a no-brainer - only send email when there is content of genuine value to your readers.

5. No personalisation
All too often, email newsletters read like they have been written by a large institution. Keep the emails personalised, and this means having the basics right, such as including the first name in the welcome message, sign off the newsletter by an individual, add your contact details, or a headshot and don't use too much corporate-speak or sound too robotic - you want to make it look like a human wrote it!

6. No real interactivity
Interactivity is not only for social media. Email was once the relationship building medium, and it still can be. For example, if the recipient hit the reply button in their email, would their message reach a human that would get back to them with their enquiry? Does your 'from' email address include a personal name? Ask your readers to provide their comments or feedback about your products, services or articles directly to you.

7. Deliverability
One of the reasons why your emails is being stopped by filters is because you could have formatted it incorrectly in HTML. Or, it could be that your reputation with an ISP or two is bad.

To ensure deliverability of your emails to the inbox, check that you are using a dedicated IP address to send e-newsletters. Use a third party email system, not your Outlook Express to send bulk emails. These email service providers can help you get through to major ISPs with volume controls, strict list hygiene and reputation. If you send bulk e-newsletters from your inbox, you may find that your email will become blacklisted as spam.

If you send the newsletter in HTML, make sure it is coded properly. For example, a great deal of email design is done by web designers who don't realise email requires super-clean code. Plus, as original email templates are altered and adjusted over the years, the code can get messy.

8. Images that appear as red Xs
Getting HTML images to appear for those who have images turned off still requires that they turn the images on. It’s the text vs. HTML debate.

To avoid this mistake, ensure a balance between your copy and images and employ ALT-text tags.

9. Disregarding your BlackBerry and Mobile readers
The number of mobile readers has exploded since 2008. Thank you iPhone and Android. That's why it's so important to make your email mobile reader friendly. The easiest solution is to offer text-only messages for mobile users to be able to read your emails on the go.

10. Repeating Ad types
Banner blindness in email newsletters is more prevalent than ever. This means that attention to the same banner ads in the same spot drop steadily each time the readers view them.

Yes, you can avoid this by changing things up, but even if you change the ad position or format, it can help to jumpstart attention. You can mix up your ad spots on your newsletter without losing its consistent feel. Use different ad types, from graphical ads to text lists. Even slight variations can help bring attention back to your newsletters. If you have an email template that lets you rotate articles and images around, this will help keep your e-newsletter looking fresh.

11. Relying just on email
Whether it's talking about combining email with TV and radio advertising, or email with your social media networks, website and banner advertising, email marketing is just one part of communicating with existing and new customers. For example, if you have an offer on your website, follow up with a email flyer to your database, post it on Facebook and Twitter and send out a flyer to the surrounding area.