Category: Email

So, you are communicating with your best customers using email. And, your strategic business objective is to append more of your customer file with email addresses, and increase the number of opt-in addresses you email. Because, of course, email is much cheaper than marketing using other channels, it presents opportunities to better target, and personalize, and improve relevancy.

But do your customers see it the way you do? Do your customers sense the value you have for their business as a result of your email communications?

Arguably, email does not enhance the emotional connections you want your best customers to have with your brand. Email doesn’t say “thank you” or “we appreciate your business” or “you’re special” very well. Certainly email allows you to cost-effectively increase the frequency of contact with your customers. But your customers know how cheap email is to send: that’s why they get so much of it!

Consider an Information Week report that came out today, regarding a study from Symantec. Spam is on the rise, and as of July, 2010, spam comprises 92% of all e-mail messages. This is the context of your best customer email marketing communications: a sea of spam.

Think about the most meaningful messages you’ve received from companies. Remember the hand-written postcard from the Nordstrom sales associate after your big purchase? Remember how the head chef in a fine restaurant you frequent came out to the table to greet you (and your friends), thank you, and buy that bottle of wine? Remember when your Zappos order came, including ’surprise’ free overnight shipping? Remember your stay at the Ritz-Carlton and how the Ritz-Carlton motto — “We are ladies and gentlemen serving ladies and gentlemen” – was put into action in the most basic and yet surprising ways? Remember the birthday card from a store you like, and the special thank you gift inside? Remember the genuine and highly personal contacts you have experienced that actually do engender loyalty, and repeat purchasing? Most of these experiences that stand out occur in the offline world, the real world.

Yes, email is part of the marketing mix, and an excellent channel and effective means of communicating with customers. Yes, you have objectives to retain customers, up-sell and cross-sell other products and services, increase the lifetime value of your customers, and generate more sales – and email helps you get there.

But, your best customers are your greatest asset. The 80/20 rule probably applies in your business, suggesting that 20% of your customers (your best customers) drive 80% of the revenue, and likely, most of your profit.

Customers want to know their business is valued. With so much competition, and commoditization, it’s easier and easier for customers to go elsewhere to buy product X or service Y. In a world of homogenized email, faceless companies, and other options just a click away, it’s more important than ever to stand out, deliver quality experiences for your best customers, be truly personal, and add meaning to the transaction.

People don’t want to be numbers, or treated like everybody else. People want recognition, and “surprise and delight” experiences that reinforce their brand choice. For your best customers, spend more, deploy direct and highly personal initiatives that go way beyond email, and let them know you care.

Email remains one of the most effective and inexpensive ways to engage, educate, and compel customers to act. Today, getting results means staying on top of the latest industry trends and building on what you know about your customers. We have it down to a science.

Timing is everything
Customer relationships are a lot like dating. Once you’re introduced, you need to strike that careful balance of staying in touch without coming on too strong. Here are three rules of thumb to progressively get more involved in your customers’ lives: 

• Start out friendly. Send a welcome email within minutes of registration. To optimize delivery rates, be sure the email asks customers to add you to their address books. Offer incentives to first-time buyers.
• Be responsive but not needy. Use event-triggered emails to confirm an activity and upsell products or services.
• Stay top-of-mind. Maintain regular touchpoints that correspond to your promotional calendar. Some suggest weekly and others, bimonthly. Map out specific drive periods, develop the messaging plan (and offers), and tie back, if you can, to the appropriate customer group.

Out with the old
Thanks to iPhone and other mobile devices, customers have less time for your message, and less space in which to see it. Your design needs to render well regardless of where and how it’s viewed: images on or off, preview pane or full screen, cell phone or desktop. And you need to work harder to grab the customer’s attention while they’re on the go. The new rules:
 
• Remember 50 character subject lines? Today it’s better to bring them down to 45 or less. Be sure to make your first three words count.
• Put your most important message top left for immediate viewing in most preview panes. Provide a clear, simple, and compelling call-to-action right at the top.
• Image-based emails are fabulous for conveying a premium brand image. But unless you’re selling luxury products or vacations, it’s better to use HTML text and colors for your layout. Most email applications disable images by default, and if your text is embedded in an image, your customers may not see it at all.
• We used to think using ALT text behind images was enough. While it’s still a best practice, you can’t count on it to deliver your message. Some browsers will display only 20 characters or less of ALT text, and others won’t display it at all.
• Be where your customers are online, and ask them to connect with you. Highlight forums, social networks, blogs, and mobile apps to maximize brand engagement.

One size does NOT fit all
Content is king now more than ever. If you come across as a bore, you’ll kill your open rates, so use your data to get to know what appeals to different segments of your customer base. Then use those insights to tailor compelling, actionable creative offers and messages to each audience.  Consider developing unique email streams that are based on specific customer segments. Your offers and tone should be different for new users, loyal customers, and those who haven’t engaged with you in more than 90 days.

Aggressively target and profile
Continually gather data throughout the customer lifetime to keep content relevant and fresh. For example, look at purchases and behavioral data. One of the best ways to find out what your customers want is to simply ask:

• Collect data during registration. Make it simple, and ask questions that will help you understand what types of messages the customer prefers and how often they’d like to hear from you.
• Direct customers to preference centers for progressive profiling.
• Periodically conduct surveys and short polls.

Always look at the big picture, and refine your touches. By striking a balance with your content and number of emails delivered, you’ll keep customers from getting overwhelmed by email and effectively build long-term loyalty.

There’s a saying in golf: “Drive for show, putt for dough.” Booming drives might wow the crowds, but they account for only a fraction of your total strokes. It’s the humble putt that actually determines whether you win or lose.

This sentiment transfers to the world of online marketing, with social media, banners, and the like as the “drives” and email as the “putts”. A study from Shop.org (the digital division of the National Retail Federation) found that email has become the consistent winner for online marketing programs. From Ad Age:

The study shows that 30% of retailers are spending less than originally planned on their web business overall while 24% are spending more. Of those spending less, more than half said search spending is being affected, while about a quarter said affiliate marketing and social marketing are taking a hit. By contrast, only 4% of retailers said budget cuts would affect email marketing. Of those increasing investments, email marketing will be the beneficiary at 65% of retailers.

The study also revealed that email was the retailers’ most successful marketing tactic in terms of ROI, which should get the CMOs out there salivating.

Email is just about as quick and nimble as it comes, and your program should reflect that. If you (responsibly) use past purchases and other trackable behaviors to segment your file and customize your content, your emails will turn from a pest into a welcomed guest. Oh, and don’t forget about those subject lines. Important stuff.

One of the amazing things about working at an agency is the sheer number of emails, IMs, and voicemails you receive per day. We’ve been talking on the blog a lot recently about communication tools, staying productive, and combating interruptions. All great tools and strategies. I’m here to suggest that another answer to confusion, ineffectiveness, and inefficiencies is remembering that how you say something is just as important as what you say. Try putting just a few of the tips below into practice and see what it does to make your communication more effective.

1. Know your subject.

Does your message recipient work well on IM but go dark on email? Do they reply via email to voicemails but never pick up the phone? Know the communication style of the people you’re working with. Don’t assume everyone is tethered to their Blackberry and checking email after hours or on the weekend. Send a message, but if it’s mission-critical, make sure you also give a phone call.

2. Increase click-through.

Create a subject line that means something. My team and I have so many messages floating around with subjects like “Database needed” and “QA progress.” Even adding something as simple as the project name helps the recipient start to understand what brainwave they should be tuning themselves to before even reading the message itself. The subject line “Wells Fargo draft schedule – please review” says much more than “schedule.” And guess what: if you’re replying to or forwarding a message, you have the power to rename the subject. It’s all for the greater good.

3. Say their name, say their name.

Messages should be addressed to a real person. It’s easy and perhaps even socially-acceptable to launch into the body of your message before so much as saying “Dear John.” But people like the sound (sight) of their name. It’s not even vanity. When multiple people are on a message, it’s especially important to clarify to whom the message is directed. If it’s directed the entire team, address it to “All,” before launching into the message. But if there are specific bits of information addressed to individuals within the message, be sure to call out their names.

4. Delete the chatter.

Often in a long string of email, too much unnecessary narrative gets sent around the thread, making it difficult to see the core issues at play and what needs to be done. Feel free to condense the message so that only the pertinent information remains. I often delete extraneous information and include ellipses […] to show that I’ve taken parts out. This helps people focus on the key points. Better yet, follow Tim Ross’s advice and use another means of communication altogether. If you’re discussing options, use an online poll. If you’re compiling documentation, create a wiki. If you’re choosing images, create a lightboard or photo album.

5. Cut the string.

Likewise, if the message is being bounced around, sometimes it means that people aren’t understanding the issue. Resist the urge to punt the message yet again and just pick up the phone or schedule a meeting to work out the issue. Then (and only then) follow up with a message summarizing the resolution.

6. Avoid CC surprise.

Never copy your team member on something that comes as a total surprise to them, especially if it is addressed to a client. Take a moment to get your team member’s opinion or brief them so that they know the news before the client does. CC surprise is the perfect way for your team members to feel blind-sighted and stressed. Avoid it at all costs.

7. Get active.

It might sound like a grammar lesson, but at pain of death, you should avoid the use of passive voice in your communication. What’s passive voice? It’s when the subject receives the action expressed in the verb. Examples include “It was decided,” or “It came to my attention.” You’ve probably seen these in messages in the past and thus know that this technique is pretty effective in obscuring the details and avoiding the background story! It is unclear who did what and more importantly, what needs to be done about it as a result.

In active voice, the subject performs the action expressed in the verb; the subject acts. Usually this makes language more straight-forward and clear. Consider the vagueness of the following passive voice example: “It was decided to go with option B.” But look what happens when you switch to active voice and say who decided to use option B and what that means: “The client decided that they liked the stripes, so please prep option B for production.” Passive voice leaves a lot open to interpretation. Again consider the difference between “The deployment was approved for 5 p.m.” and “Please deploy the website at 5 p.m.” Decide for yourself which method is better-suited for getting the message across.

8. Have an opinion.

Every day we work with people who have great ideas. But when we move from ideas to action, it’s important to no longer hypothesize. Sometimes clients will say “It would be great if. . . [fill in the blank]” when what they really mean is “This thing is broken, or cumbersome, or not what I expected.” Far better to say, “This thing is broken; please scope it.” Saying, “It would be great if the sky was pink,” often leads the recipient to say, “Yeah, that’d be something, wouldn’t it?” But if you say, “I’d like the sky to be pink,” then it’s easier to know to reply, “Well, that would involve these resources and impact the schedule this much.” If multiple options are available, outline them all, but say which one you think is best.

9. Give solution, then details.

Start off your message with the answer so that time-pressed executives can get to the crux of the matter quickly. Then if background details are needed, add them after the outcome. It’s really painful to read a message that gives all gory details of a problem gone awry only to get to the very end of it and read “But it’s fixed now.” Start the message with “We were able to fix the shopping cart issue that we discussed at Monday’s review.” Then if the details are pertinent, add them in after that.

10. Recap.

By the same token, when you give a solution or assign a task in a message (then give the details), be sure to recap what needs to happen. A bulleted list of action items is useful, each having an owner and deadline. Remember the basic composition outline you learned in school: intro, body, summary? Saying it twice helps hit the message home.

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There are plenty of other good communication tips out there, including this list of email dos and don’ts, written by TechSoup. The fundamental truth is that clear communication can make everyone’s day go more smoothly, help you look good in front of the client, and help your team to be more effective.

If subject lines are the gatekeepers of email, yours need to be more Saint Peter and less troll under the bridge. Approachable. Honest. Inviting. Not making subscribers run in fear.

We could talk about the link between subject line length and open rates or which day is best to send emails, but those have been debated over and over. And frankly, we think they’re small potatoes in the large scheme of things.

So without further ado, here are three simple subject line rules that will improve your results:

Be provocative. You either grab their attention, or you’re in the trash. So tempt the reader. Make them laugh. Make them wonder. Make them click.

Be truthful. While open rates are the ultimate measure of subject line success, the ends don’t justify the means if the content fails to meet reader expectations.

Be smart. You should want to learn and improve, not guess and hope. So test. And test. And test again. Follow a simple scientific method and take some chances. The market will tell you the rest.

If you tap your email subscriber base on the shoulder too often, you’re bound to be ignored…or worse, unsubscribed

Lauren McDonald over at Silver Pop wrote a fine article for MarketingProfs that addresses email frequency and why a strict regimen is sure to fail. A little taste:

When you send email based on your customers’ actions or their place in the product or program lifecycle, your messages arrive at logical times. As a result, your messages are not only more relevant but also more easily automated in many cases, which reduces the amount of time spent on creating, testing, and tracking messages.

Email is just about as quick and nimble as it comes, and your program should reflect that. If your house file has birthday information, send a special offer (or even just a friendly “Happy Birthday”—think about that).

If you (responsibly) use past purchases and other trackable behaviors to segment your file and customize your content, your emails will turn from a pest into a welcomed guest.

A study conducted by the interactive agency eROI found that just 25% of emailers test their subject lines on a regular basis. That’s like smearing makeup on your face without a mirror and just hoping that you got it right. And subject line indifference is just the tip of the iceberg.

Ken Magill wrote an article on Multichannel Merchant loaded with tips on how to avoid email marketing design pitfalls. A sample:

Enter commercial email, the only channel in direct marketing history in which the designers must make choices based on the knowledge that a significant percentage of their messages will be mangled beyond recognition by the time they reach recipients.

With images and links turned off by default as the rule rather than the exception at most inbox providers — such as Yahoo, Gmail, AOL and Microsoft Outlook — commercial email designers now face the task of simply getting their copy points to appear.

And even when email graphics do appear — or render, as e-mailers prefer to say — they do so differently from account to account.

Are you a dedicated tester of subject lines? What do you think the most critical aspect of email programs? Seen anything exciting pop up in your inbox that you wish you created?

Don’t miss our other email-centric posts, including making emails jive with smartphones, how to make your email stand out in the holiday blitz, and an homage to the great work of the Email Experience Council.

As more and more snore-inducing cellphones get traded in for bombastic iPhones, Blackberries, and other smartphones, marketers must consider what people see when opening up their email on the go. Emails that look great on laptops may be a disaster on smartphones.

So how can you design and write emails that work in both channels? Loren McDonald of Silverpop recently wrote a terrific article on MarketingProfs about 11 tips for making your email marketing smartphone compatible. From the source:

“Design for the preview pane and initial mobile screen. Use your most valuable real estate, the top 2-3 inches of your message, for your most important content.

Alt text. Use descriptive alt text (HTML text that displays when images do not render) with all images, as the text will show in some email environments when images are blocked.

Use fixed-width tables. This ensures that your email won’t expand when images are blocked. Also, make sure you specify image height and width.

Keep emails to less than 600 pixels wide. This eliminates the need for users to scroll and ensures that your email won’t have ads overlaid on your content from email services such as Gmail.

Use text links, not image links. Image-based links will create a mess in most mobile environments and will not render when images are blocked in a PC environment.”

For those out there rocking smartphones, have you seen emails come through that worked well with your screen? Any that didn’t work?

Ponce de Leon searched for the Fountain of Youth. Dr. Richard Kimble searched for the one-armed man. And we have been searching for a dependable source of email marketing expertise.

Found it.

The Email Experience Council is erupting with the latest and greatest from the industry, written in a fashion very untypical of stodgy professional organizations. The EEC maintains a pair of blogs (Email Experience Blog and The Retail Email Blog) that will keep interested readers, well, interested. Here is a sampling of their fine work:

• Email takes on the economy

• Double Dog Dare: Start your email program over from scratch

• CTAs get some action

• Know the lingo—Email anatomy from head to footer

The current drop in consumer spending coupled with dismal holiday shopping projections has created an environment ripe for email marketing campaigns. As we get deeper and deeper into Q4, expect inboxes to pile up with aggressive offers from retailers like never before.

From a recent Associated Press article on the state of email marketing:

“Kurt Peters, editor-in-chief of trade publication Internet Retailer, noted that stores can easily react to a sharp sales slowdown in a matter of hours by sending out email blasts, which is faster and more cost-effective than redoing a mailer to consumers. Julie M. Katz, another Forrester analyst, estimates that it costs about $2 for every thousand emails sent. The Direct Marketers Association estimates that marketers reap $45.06 in return on investment for every dollar they spend on email campaigns. That compares with $7.28 for catalogs and $15.55 for direct mail pieces”

The article provides further detail on the increasing number of retailers using this quick, nimble, and cost-effective medium:

“Internet Retailer’s recent survey of 174 Web retailers, including those that operate stores, found that nearly half have increased the number of monthly emails they send compared to a year ago. Chad White, director of retail insights for the Email Experience Council, the email marketing arm of the DMA, reports an 8 percent increase in the number of emails stores have sent for the week ended Oct. 17, compared to the same week a year earlier.”

So how are your campaigns supposed to stand out in this holiday blitz? By delivering the right content at the right time, you can shift your email from an interruption to a welcomed message. Marketers that pay attention to individual’s transactional data and communicate back products and promotions understand the value of behavioral targeting and will be rightfully rewarded.

For more on email coupon trends, check out our post Coupon clipper drops scissors, runs to computer.