Email Marketing – Some Big DON’TS

I subscribe to MediaPost’s Email Insider newsletter and every day I receive some valuable little nugget of information.  This post by Loren McDonald, vice president of industry relations for Silverpop, details some generally accepted best practices for email marketing.  It’s so great I simply had to pass it along to our readers.  I’ve condensed the info to highlight Loren’s important DON’Ts of a successful email marketing campaign.  You can read the post in its entirety by subscribing to MediaPost’s Email Insider blog.

DON’T

1. Make it difficult to unsubscribe.  When you camouflage your unsubscribe link, recipients will click the spam button so frequently that ISPs block your emails. Make it easy to unsubscribe, but also make it easy to give your subscribers alternatives to do what they really want, like changing format, frequency, email address or interests.

2. Forget to include a “Welcome” message and/or wait weeks to send the first message.

3. Overmail. This is typically the number one or two reason people hit the spam-complaint button or unsubscribe.

4. Use a large single image as the core of your email.  Not only does this create a problem with recipients who use preview panes, have images blocked, it can also get your email blocked or filtered to junk folders by ISPs such as Hotmail. 

5. Overlook the use of alt tags.  An alt tag is the HMTL code that describes an image and displays when the email client/ISP blocks the image. Have your email designer and copywriter create descriptive tags for each image.

6. Rely on graphical links.  If recipients can’t see the image-based link, then they won’t click on it.  Use text links, especially for navigation and key calls to action, and create HTML buttons that render even when the email client blocks the corresponding image buttons.

7. Omit a preference center.  Make it easy for subscribers to change their email address, frequency, format and profile/preferences

8. Forget to design your email for the preview pane.  More than a quarter of consumer users and half of all business users read email in a preview pane.

9. Use a person’s name in the “from” line. Tell the recipient the email is from “Company A”. 

10. Hide email registration.  Sell potential subscribers at every possible turn, with an invitation that highlights your email benefits, on every page of your Web site.

Study Shows Email is the Most Effective Form of Direct Response Among Large US Companies

According to a new survey conducted by Direct Partners, New York, Email Marketing is the most effective form of direct response among large US corporations.

The surveys were sent to 30,000 US companies with 2007 revenues exceeding $100 million.

28% of the senior executives who responded to the April survey said that email works most effectively for them, while 24% reported that direct mail worked the best.

This study shows that large companies are gaining acceptance of Email Marketing, however, in our daily dealings with our clients, and prospective clients, we find that Email Marketing has captured the interest of companies of all sizes, from the Mom-and-Pop Shops to the larger corporations.  Why?  The benefits are obvious.  It’s

• Quick to distribute
• Inexpensive versus other media and, if done properly,
• The response is rapid

Does size really matter?

And now that I’ve got your attention, let me rephrase that!  Does the length of your email subject line increase your open rates?  

I found this MediaPost Publications article written by David Goetzl to be pretty interesting.  

To summarize, what he’s saying is open rates for marketing emails increase when the subject lines are in the 50-80 characters range.  

Research was gathered from 250 million messages sent over a two year period with over 600 different subject lines.  It is theorized that the longer the subject line, the better chance a marketer has to present different concepts that may be appealing to different consumers, thus elevating the email’s open rates.   

Check out the article, in its entirety, below.  

 

Email Analytics Reveal Sweet Spots In Subject-Line Length

by David Goetzl, Tuesday, May 27, 2008 7:00 AM ET

CAPTIVA ISLAND, Fla. — Email marketing analytics have led Dela Quist, CEO of London shop Alchemy Worx, to discover a sweet spot for how long subject lines should be.

He says open rates climb when the subject lines are in the 50-character range or 80-character range. But, perhaps counterintuitively, they fall in the middle when the length is 60 or 70.

The magnetic Quist gave the keynote address Saturday at MediaPost’s Email Insiders Summit conference: “Emailing People Not Lists: Using Customer Based Metrics to Drive Performance Improvement.”

Research culled from 250 million messages sent over the past two years, with 660 different subject lines, has led him to believe that a 50-character subject line touting a “powerful” offer is appealing (30% off Spring Getaway flights to Florida on Delta).

And a longer 80-character-plus line describing a newsletter in enticing fashion works (Find out Secrets to Spice up your Barbecue this weekend and all Summer Long and enter to win a New Weber Grill.)

Somehow, in the 60- to-70-character middle, he says, the subject line is either too long or not long enough.

Quist has various theories, but one is that the longer the subject line, the better chance a marketer has of presenting different concepts that may appeal to different consumers and boosting open rates. So in the above example, some may be interested in the ways to improve their grilling, while others would seek the new grill, leading to higher open rates.

Quist’s research–his clients include PayPal and Intercontinental Hotels in the U.S.–showing that “long subject lines work better” goes against conventional wisdom, he said.

“Our experience tended towards the belief that long subject lines work better,” he said. (The longer the better goes against conventional wisdom.) A more descriptive subject line can also build goodwill with consumers, since it can provide enough info to easily either turn them on or turn them off.

 

The original article can be found at:http://publications.mediapost.com/index.cfm?fuseaction=Articles.showArticleHomePage&art_aid=83385

Plan For E-mail Marketing Success

Have you noticed how e-mail has propelled itself into the marketing scene? What makes it such an effective sales tool? What should be considered to produce the best results? How do you deliver the proper message to the right person at the right time? Reflect on these areas when developing your e-mail marketing strategy:

• Goals – What is the specific event or sale your campaign will promote?  How will you measure success? 
• Budget – Determine your total budget for this initiative.  Is this a one time effort or will regular e-mail blasts run concurrently?  The more campaigns you run, the more money you should plan to spend. 
• Target Market – Who are my customers?  Are they individual consumers, small businesses or larger corporations?  Determining this will assist in reaching your target audience.
• Frequency – How often does my customer buy my product?  Is the purchase made on impulse or is it a contemplated purchase? 
• Place of Sale – Will the customer order online, by phone, mail or visit the store? This information will influence whether your call to action is “Click Here” or “Come to our Store today” within the e-mail.  

Once you have a strategy and plan in place, consider these points to encourage e-mail readership :         

• Keep it short – with Internet users having short attention spans, get their attention quickly!
• Personalize the message – address the person or business by name.
•  HTML – this is the Web’s language and it can be utilized in e-mails to create graphically rich, interactive and engaging offers to captivate your customers. 

To obtain more information, visit our website at www.wmgagency.com/email.html