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“It’s easy to bore your customers to death with email,” writes Karen Talavera in an article at MarketingProfs. “Just send them the same type of message repeatedly, and you’ll succeed.”
Many companies, for instance, fall into the easy rhythm of sending e-newsletter after e-newsletter, never adding anything else to the mix. While there’s nothing wrong with an e-newsletter, your campaigns start to feel stale if you don’t offer a variety of message types. Here are three that can work well for you:
Announcements, alerts and reminders. Whether you’re hosting an event, launching a new product or promoting an offer, Talavera recommends a three-message series that: “(a) gives your audience a heads-up as to when your initiative will ‘go live,’ (b) tells them when it’s official, and (c) reminds them before it’s over or expires.” It sounds like a lot of email, but she downplays frequency concerns by noting most marketers don’t send enough messages like these.
Helpful, educational content. You’ll increase customer loyalty and engagement if you intersperse sales-oriented messages with information that explicitly benefits subscribers: articles, blog posts, white papers, videos, webinars and podcasts.
Triggered up-sell and down-sell offers. Encourage existing customers to make another purchase with automated messages that suggest complementary products or services. “For those who don’t convert on the up-sell offer,” Talavera advises, “especially after a free trial, proceed to a down-sell offer (usually a lower-priced, lower commitment than the up-sell or original purchase).”
Don’t be a bore. If you want to hold subscriber interest, you’ll need to create a diverse, engaging mix of email campaigns.
Source: MarketingProfs.
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“Before I started my career in email delivery,” writes Art Quanstrom at the Emma blog, “I imagined sending emails looked like some sort of Rube Goldberg Machine: a bowling ball rolling down a track, opening a door that pushes a knife into a string, releasing a mouse that takes the cheese off of a scale, which then unweights and causes a small explosion … to propel said email to the other side of the Internet.”
We might chuckle at the low-tech visual, but Quanstrom says it’s not a bad way to envision the actual complicated process of sending your offer or newsletter to a subscriber. He maps out the typical route:
- First, your email service provider (ESP) formats your message and sends it to a mailer (MTA). The MTA adds header information about the sender (RSVP address), the ESP (IP address) and the recipient (email address).
- Next, the MTA connects with the MX record for the DNS of the domain (e.g., gmail, or companyname) to which you’re sending. “A domain’s DNS is a one-stop location that other machines use to communicate with the domain’s various servers, and the MX record is there to process any incoming mail,” he notes.
- If no connection can be made, it might indicate a permanent issue (e.g., the domain doesn’t exist) or a temporary issue (e.g., a bad connection).
- A successful connection triggers the four-step Simple Mail Transfer Protocol (SMTP) process: 1) Identifying the sending and receiving servers; 2) Identifying your RSVP address; 3) Identifying the recipient’s email address; and 4) Transferring the data.
Now, that’s a strong argument for keeping your email lists clean.
Consider the long and winding road. Sending a marketing message from Point A to Point B might take only a few seconds—but its journey is anything but simple.
Source: Emma.
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The debate between opt-in and opt-out email marketing strategies isn’t simply about one choice or another. The reason? Any two marketers might have strikingly different definitions of opt-in. “[N]ot all opt-ins are created equal,” writes Maria Pergolino at Marketo. “In fact, it’s quite the opposite.” What one marketer considers strong opt-in permission might be, from another marketer’s perspective, barely up to CAN-SPAM standards.
Get on the same page by determining which opt-in category you’re discussing:
Unconfirmed opt-in. This is as close to opt-out as opt-in gets because visitors don’t actively subscribe to your newsletters or offers. Instead, their addresses are added to your list when they register at your website for other reasons—like downloading white papers. “You may be in keeping with the law but you’re not getting high marks for credibility,” Pergolino notes.
Single-confirmation opt-in. With this much better option, you add visitors’ addresses to your list only when they actively subscribe by checking—or not un-checking—a box. “To make that opt-in easier,” she advises, “have the permission box pre-checked and be sure to highlight all the reasons they will benefit from continuing a dialogue with you.”
Double-confirmation opt-in. Pergolino considers this the best of all—a policy that removes any doubt about new subscribers’ intentions. They’re only added to your list after they confirm their subscription by clicking on a link in a follow-up email.
It should be up to them. You won’t sell anything to a list of people who can’t figure out why you’re sending them newsletters, so focus on building a list of engaged customers who actually want to receive your relevant information.
Source: Marketo.
Crumbs from the Scone
“Email marketing is thriving—especially for businesses who can adapt it to the changing world,” writes Veronica Maria Jarski at the Daily Fix blog. In her post, she gives a sneak-peek at material presented by Silverpop’s Loren McDonald in MarketingProfs’ Email Marketing Essentials online course.
Here are a few of Jarski’s takeaways from the course—tips on keeping email relevant to the times:
Promote following and sharing within all your email communications. You need to go where your customers go, and—like it or not—they spend their time at social networks. “Branch beyond the newsletter by letting people ‘like’ the content on Facebook, forward it to a friend, post it to Facebook, or tweet it,” says Jarski. “And don’t forget to use social media to grow your email database. For example, on Facebook, provide email opt-ins for existing customers (and potential new ones).”
Design your email marketing for people on the go. “Don’t just picture people reading your email marketing pieces in front of their office desk,” she says. “Imagine them waiting in traffic, grabbing a spare moment or two at their children’s swim meets, traveling on trains.” In other words, picture them everywhere.
Make sure all your emails are relevant to the reader. Your subscribers have inboxes filled with vibrant content. “That’s because, thanks to smart filters, consumers now avoid spam altogether—and have their inbox prioritize their mail according to their reading habits,” she explains. “If a consumer reads your stuff, your emails will start gaining a higher priority in a person’s inbox. (And if they don’t, your emails will start being pushed to the bottom of the list.)”
Keep adapting. If you don’t evolve your email programs with the times, the times may well leave you behind.
Source: Daily Fix.
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Many marketers can’t resist a shiny toy. Whether pay-per-click in the mid 1990s, Web 2.0 in the early 2000s or mobile marketing in the late 2000s, we want it—and we want it now. “But at what price?” asks Laura Patterson at MarketingProfs. “I’d suggest at the price of our credibility and the opportunity to be perceived as a strategic player.”
“When our enthusiasm (or that of our colleagues) convinces an organization to experiment with the next shiny toy without understanding the strategic implications,” she continues, “as marketers we are doing a disservice to the organizations we support and we’re presenting marketing as a primarily tactical function.”
To ensure a shiny toy also makes strategic sense, be sure to ask questions like these:
- Has our target audience adopted this new channel, or will we get there before they do? “Being first on the block may be irrelevant if the markets you serve or want to serve aren’t ready,” explains Patterson.
- Does our company have the wherewithal to exploit the new channel? “If a successful implementation requires complex new skills, and if it is too time-consuming or costly to acquire that level of competence, it may be too soon for your organization to tackle the new channel.”
- Will we see a return on our investment? “The adoption of a new channel may require configuring systems, upgrading technology, or even adding new systems and training employees,” she notes. In other words, you need to be reasonably sure that it’s worth it.
A shiny toy can quickly lose its luster if it fails to boost your bottom line—so refrain from what amount to impulse buys.
Source: MarketingProfs
“It’s easy to bore your customers to death with email,” writes Karen Talavera in an article at MarketingProfs. “Just send them the same type of message repeatedly, and you’ll succeed.”
