One of the biggest mistakes for companies just getting started or, for that matter any company spending time with email marketing, is treating their email marketing like direct mail marketing. I also believe it is a big reason why those same companies get turned off of email marketing. The stats for email marketing do not reflect better results because so many companies are doing it wrong. It does not take much to make a huge difference in your results. Here are a few steps you can take to improve your results immediately.
1. NEVER Send Email to Purchased or Rented Lists: Big mistake… I know there are good list companies out there and sometimes it works for some companies. However, this is the fastest way to a bad reputation a company can take. If you are a direct marketer, the first thing you are looking for is the right list to purchase for your message. If you have the same mentality with email marketing, you are going to fail. Email marketing is all about the subscriber. Instead of finding the right list for your message, find the right message for your list.
There are so many ways to build your list (in fact that will be my next post) there is no reason for you to purchase a list for email marketing. The risk of having a high rate of SPAM is too great to go down this path. If the recipient of your message is not opted-in to receive the message, then they should not be getting an email. This is best practices 101…
2. Maintain a Clean List: If you have been emailing at all, you probably know people tend to use the “Report Spam” buttons more than clicking on the link you provide (especially true in the B2C world). If you are using an email marketing service worth anything, the recipient who clicks this button is automatically removed from your list. This helps you with keeping your list clean, but your reputation still took a small hit. Get enough of those “hits,” and you start to build a bad reputation.
Why not take care of the issue before it causes a problem for your reputation? Review your list every month and remove recipients who have been inactive over the last six months. Now, I know this is not what a direct marketer would do, but this is not direct marketing. You certainly can create a new segment with this group of recipients and market to them differently. There are several strategies for getting inactive recipients reengaged which can be discussed in another post. However, the take away from this is… big lists don’t mean big results. The focus needs to be on clean data with active recipients even if that means sending to a much smaller list. If they are not engaging in your campaigns, why would you waist time with them?
3. Personalize: This does not just mean sending the exact same email to your entire list with the only difference in the email being the fact that you added the recipient’s first name in the beginning of the email. What I am referring to is a more focused, personalized approach to your messaging. Data is the key. Learn as much as you can about your recipients and use that to create a message that speaks directly to that specific person’s interests.
A basic example of this approach is to create an email with dynamic content that is delivered differently based on the gender of the recipient. Instead of a shoe store sending a generic offer email out that offers 30% off of all shoes, the store could send an email out with the same offer, but with a different image for a male as opposed to a female. Take that even further… if the recipient has shopped there before and the store knows what type of shoe they bought, the image changes to that type of shoe and the message changes to “30% off of your favorite shoes!”
The more personal your message can be the powerful the message to the customer. The more the customer is going to feel like your company knows/understands them. This will affect your results immediately for the positive. Communicate directly… Interact, relate with your customer on a personal level. Don’t just blast them with another generic email that might or might not be relevant to them.
As a very general rule, if you have been in the direct marketing world for a long time, email marketing is a different beast. If you want to be successful with your email marketing campaigns, use an old trick I learned from George Costansa… Do the exact opposite of what you would do normally. Success will follow.
As always, your comments are welcome and I hope this post gave you some good ideas on how to polish up your email campaigns.
Friday, March 20, 2009
Thursday, March 5, 2009
I cannot say it enough... Always, always be in test mode.
I am often asked questions like… “What is the best day to send my emails?” “What is the best time?” “What should my subject line say?” I could go on and on with the questions, but my answer to most all of these is going to be the same… “Let’s find out.” Statistics are great to look at and use as a starting point, but all lists are not created equal and therefore do not respond the same. The only way you are going to know if what you are doing is working the best is to test another idea. Find out what works and then try to improve it.
No matter how much you think you know about your customer base, chances are sometimes they will surprise you… hence the reason for testing. Testing is one of the foundations of email marketing. I believe that if you are going to do email marketing well, you need to always be in a test mode. Don't become complacent with your email marketing. Just because something worked, does not mean that it cannot be improved.
It is your job as a marketer to learn as much as you can about your customers and use that data to become more effective. When it comes to email marketing, the old saying, "if it ain't broke, don't fix it" is not true. Always try and break the mold. There is always room for improvement.
Testing starts with a plan. Not just an idea of what you are going to test today, but a long term strategy for testing. What are your goals when it comes to testing? What do you hope to achieve? You must have a good understanding of the theory behind each of your testing ideas. Know what action you are going to take based on the results of your tests. What are you going to do next to improve your results?
Now, what are you going to test and more importantly, how are you going to perform your tests?
The most common form of testing is the A/B Split method. Most email marketers have used some form of this method. An example of this method is with a subject line test. Send 10% of your list one subject line. Send another subject line to another 10%. Wait a day and send the remaining 80% of your list the subject line that performed the best. Simple. It is easy to administer and it is very easy to determine the results. It is an effective form of testing in most areas.
Another and less common form of testing is multivariable testing. As its name suggests, this method allows you to test many changes simultaneously. However, the more variables you are testing, the larger your list will need to be in order to create a statistically significant result. Once the results are in, you can determine which change had the largest effect on the conversion rate of the email. This is a more complex testing method but it does lead to faster learning about your lists and more creative ideas.
When it comes to what to test, there are so many things that can be tested. Subject lines, layout, segmentation, and landing pages just to name a few. I am interested to know what everyone is testing. What have been the most successful for you and what other methods of testing have you deployed…?
I hope this, at the very least, got you thinking. If testing is not a part of your email marketing effort right now, then your emails are not getting the polish they need to shine.
No matter how much you think you know about your customer base, chances are sometimes they will surprise you… hence the reason for testing. Testing is one of the foundations of email marketing. I believe that if you are going to do email marketing well, you need to always be in a test mode. Don't become complacent with your email marketing. Just because something worked, does not mean that it cannot be improved.
It is your job as a marketer to learn as much as you can about your customers and use that data to become more effective. When it comes to email marketing, the old saying, "if it ain't broke, don't fix it" is not true. Always try and break the mold. There is always room for improvement.
Testing starts with a plan. Not just an idea of what you are going to test today, but a long term strategy for testing. What are your goals when it comes to testing? What do you hope to achieve? You must have a good understanding of the theory behind each of your testing ideas. Know what action you are going to take based on the results of your tests. What are you going to do next to improve your results?
Now, what are you going to test and more importantly, how are you going to perform your tests?
The most common form of testing is the A/B Split method. Most email marketers have used some form of this method. An example of this method is with a subject line test. Send 10% of your list one subject line. Send another subject line to another 10%. Wait a day and send the remaining 80% of your list the subject line that performed the best. Simple. It is easy to administer and it is very easy to determine the results. It is an effective form of testing in most areas.
Another and less common form of testing is multivariable testing. As its name suggests, this method allows you to test many changes simultaneously. However, the more variables you are testing, the larger your list will need to be in order to create a statistically significant result. Once the results are in, you can determine which change had the largest effect on the conversion rate of the email. This is a more complex testing method but it does lead to faster learning about your lists and more creative ideas.
When it comes to what to test, there are so many things that can be tested. Subject lines, layout, segmentation, and landing pages just to name a few. I am interested to know what everyone is testing. What have been the most successful for you and what other methods of testing have you deployed…?
I hope this, at the very least, got you thinking. If testing is not a part of your email marketing effort right now, then your emails are not getting the polish they need to shine.
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