28 point pre-email send checklist
We are sure that you will already know many of these email marketing best practices, so let's collectively build it up to 40!
We shouldn't give our emails that six or 12 month car service, or cut corners as we send out emails all of the time. Email Monks, email marketing designers, have saved us some time writing that important check list before we 'press the send button' , breaking it into four sections - client compatiblity, email delivery setup, inbox preview and html open preview.
So let's avoid those simple email blunders that can be avoidable by reading their tips and it would be great to build this up!
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9 ways to improve your mobile customer experience
As mobile shopping sites and apps increase in popularity, and overall experiences improve, customer expectations are rising at the same time, so there is an imperative for customers to act to improve their mobile experience and how it joins up with the overall brand experience.
Research by IBM has highlighted the extent to which customers are intolerant of any faults, with 16% of respondents reporting that they would be more likely to buy from a competitor if they encountered a problem, and 13% admitting they would abandon the transaction altogether and try a competitor’s website or app instead.
'Some of the bigger leading brands have really upped their game, and the ones that are keeping pace have strategically invested in a platform that is able to service both traditional online channels and also…
Perhaps it’s customer engagement
There’s a huge irony in marketing now - I feel - one that ignores understood, proven mantras of direct, or one-to-one, marketing stretching back decades.
“Your future prospects resemble your best customers, and that’s the place you should start.”
Holger Schulze, vice president of eG Innovations
Put existing customers (consumers) first in marketing planning
It doesn’t matter how advanced modern marketing gets, how intelligent our advertising, our targeting and re-targeting, our key-phrase strategies in search and our use of social and mobile advertising. Marketing success and commercial growth rely on strategic thinking and most importantly begin with customer retention and loyalty before acquisition. Yet how much marketing spend do we see launched into cold reach and acquisition compared to the spend volumes in how we add value to our customers and leads? Is it possible then that we’re over-spending on acquisition and underspending on the sustainable opportunities in customer engagement and…
An interview with Retail email specialist Dan Jak
There is a LOT written about best practices for email marketing, especially around creative and copy. Mark Brownlow has contributed many great posts to Smart Insights covering subject lines, email pre-headers and Email CTAs to name but 3. But there is far less written specifically about best practices for email marketing in retail ecommerce. The obvious exception is Chad White's Retail Email blog although Chad has diversified into more general email marketing advice with his new Email Marketing Rules book - we have a competition to win 3 copies running at the moment.
So, when I got chatting to Dan Jak in our LinkedIn group and discovered his experience on Email marketing I was keen to learn and share more. So in this interview we look at some retail-specific email marketing challenges, many of which apply more…
Responsive Web Design is expected by consumers and backed by Google
With the continued rise in mobile usage, and 'with 25% of internet users only using mobile devices', companies are adopting responsive design. Responsive design is typically more cost effective than maintaining different versions of our websites for various devices - even Google are recommending this as best practice from an SEO and experience POV. That's why we use it at Smart Insights!
Note though that the thinking "mobile responsive design is always the best option" may be oversimplistic. Yes it may be for smaller businesses, but for larger businesses who want to maximise conversion and experience adaptive design may be best. Our recent research on managing customer journeys shows that although responsive designs dominate adaptive is a valid alternative.
Still we felt that this infographic from Verve does a great job of raising awareness…
An interview with the VP of Aviasales.ru - a case study of mobile app lead generation
In today’s mobile market, app developers concentrate primarily on making money from in-app purchases. However, there are many other ways to make a profit with an app. At AppInTop mobile app marketing podcast (English, Russian), we talked to Ivan Kozlov, Vice President of Mobile Products at Aviasales.ru about how to leverage a mobile app as a lead generation tool.
A lead gen case study - an airline ticket search app
Airline tickets are a very complicated product, and this is a low-margin business. But that doesn’t mean that you can’t make money in this niche. It’s perfectly realistic to create a successful product in this area, but to do so you…
A review of the latest digital marketing approaches for charities and not-for-profits
Digital marketing is now a core communications method for Charities and Not-for-Profit organisations (NfPs). Charity websites give a great platform as a vital communications channel to inspire and engage people, raise funds, provoke discussion and explain the benefits and use of services provided through fundraising.
Trends in digital marketing for charities?
The future direction of Digital Marketing for charities was discussed by Dave Chaffey of Smart Insights at a recent keynote delivered to the Comms Rewired conference organized by The Scottish Council for Voluntary Organisations (SCVO) - the membership organisation for Scotland’s charities, voluntary organisations and social enterprises.
[slideshare id=39786189&doc=digital-marketing-trends-for-nfp-davechaffey-scvo-141002024327-phpapp01]
You can see in the Slideshare that Dave reviewed examples of how charities are using digital communications across the Smart Insights RACE planning framework. Dave recommended that content marketing should be a the heart of charity marketing. As our Inbound marketing blueprint suggests, this requires these 6 key actions Dave…
A simple explanation of the Robots.txt file for marketers
The robots.txt file, also known as the Robots Exclusions Protocol, is an essential part of your website. It provides instructions to the search engine robots that crawl your site. Get it wrong, and you could damage or even destroy your search engine visibility.
In this tutorial on robots.txt I'll explain the what, why and how of robots.txt for non SEO specialists so you can ask the right questions or have the right discussions about it with your specialists.
What is robots.txt?
Any webmaster worth their salt will know how important the robots.txt file is. Essentially a list of instructions for search engine robots (or web crawlers), it indicates any areas of your website you do not wish to crawled (and potentially indexed) by search engines. Getting it wrong could lead to your website disappearing…
Chrome triumphs on desktop, but Safari on mobile
If you're a marketer or designer you'll be aware of the dramatic change in browser use since Google introduced Chrome. This compilation from the US from Adobe Digital Index's report clearly shows the change across the most popular browsers, across desktop and mobile. Is it no surprise that in 2014 we have seen a crossover so that Google Chrome commands the highest share, as us consumers are spending more time in the 'google ecosystem' through our Gmail accounts, Google hangouts, and Chrome and Android browsers default to google search - we can't escape it!
However, Internet Explorer and Safari are still at similar market share, so as Craig Sullivan points out in his post on 17 ways to F**k-up your AB Testing - many sales can be lost because designers ignore older versions…
Should you switch your site from http to https?
In September Google announced that websites would receive a minor ranking boost by using Secure Socket Layer (SSL) technology and switching from HTTP to HTTPS. Now that the 'dust has settled' a little, this post looks at the 'Pros' and 'Cons' of making the switch.
Google has stated that it would be a 'very lightweight signal' within the overall ranking algorithm and carried 'less weight than other signals such as high-quality content; Google webmaster trends analysts Zineb Ait Bahajji and Gary Illyes went on to say that Google
'would like to encourage all website owners to switch from HTTP to HTTPS to keep everyone safe on the web.'
As a result, the search marketing community went into overdrive, blogging, tweeting and commenting on the reports. Many webmasters and business owners were soon requesting information and guidance on moving to SSL and companies were producing…
