10 email strategy factors to audit your email marketing effectiveness
Update: Dec 2014. See this post for our latest guidance on benchmarking email effectiveness where you can review your email capabilities using our new chart.
Despite the growth in popularity of social media marketing, email marketing remains the best customer communications tool for most companies since:
More personally relevant emails can be delivered as subscribers are targeted by:
Demographics like age, gender, geography
Previous purchase or download categories
Time since previous interaction
Position in lifecycle - new customers are sent different messages from old
Following up on a website interaction like a search, category browse or an abandoned shopping cart - if your systems are joined up
Offers and content can be inserted dynamically into the email to target with these techniques
Cut-through and overall response is greater with response occurring over 12-48 hours rather than 1-2 hours more typical of Twitter and Facebook
Response measurable at individual level offering better…
By
04 Oct 2010
Do you have an app strategy? 5 options for reaching and engaging your audience through mobile applications
I'm currently updating my books on the latest developments and thinking through the options companies have for their mobile app strategy. This is where I've got to.
I'd be grateful for your opinions, particularly if you have experience of what works and what doesn't as a specialist consultant on mobile apps or if you are using apps within your business.
The growth in popularity of mobile apps
For me, the growth in popularity of apps for the iPhone has been amazing with Apple announcing in January 2010 that 3 billion apps had been downloaded in the 18 months following the launch of the AppStore. Growth has been maintained through 2010:
[caption id="attachment_3483" align="aligncenter" width="586"] Growth in download from Apple App Store 2010. Source: IphoneDev[/caption]
…
A whitepaper on good practice
Value: [rating=4]
Our commentary : Best practice for Enewsletters and promotional emails are discussed a lot; See, for example, our posts on Enewsletter Best Practice.
But how to make the most of emails accompany sales and service transactions are covered less often, eventhough these are important by volume and context - they probably get more attention from recipients than other types of emails (75% are opened according to the report)
This whitepaper by Sally Lowery of ESP Bronto does a fine job of summarising the issues to be reviewed.
Marketing implications : It's important to remember the main aim of transactional emails is as a service email, but there other opportunities for brand-building and increasing awareness about available product categories. It's also worth noting that from a data protection point of view service emails are classed differently.
Good…
2010 DMA National Client Email Marketing Report
Value: [rating=4]
Our commentary : I recently wrote the conclusion for the 2010 Annual Client Email report for the UK Direct Marketing Association.
Here I share what I took from the report and highlight some of the key findings through charts (click twice to read) which show the importance of email marketing and the most popular techniques. You can see that despite some of the mispronouncements that Email Marketing is Dead, Email is a key part of communications strategy for many organisations but given the competition in the inbox from rise of social media and prioritised inboxes it needs to evolve to continue to cut-through.
Marketing implications :
For me, the rate of innovation within digital marketing is one of its greatest appeals. Whether it"€™s the introduction of new technologies, marketing approaches or resulting changes in consumer behaviour, change is a constant challenge. The annual UK…
Mashable highlight 5 growing social media trends
Value: [rating=4]
Our commentary: A new breed of Q&A services are changing the way we search. Barcode scanning applications are making products social, and deal-of-the-day sites are giving us ways to save by recruiting our friends to the party. With so many studies highlighting ever-accelerating social media usage rates, the conclusion is obvious "€” social media is everywhere. This Mashable post introduces 5 big trends to consider, if you're not doing so already.
Marketing implications: Think smartphones initially - 'Social scanning' where users are able to scan barcodes for price comparison or use QR codes to enter into social experiences around current location. Building on that there's 'Mobile loyalty', where smartphones are the digital repository for loyalty data but now integrate location based services as well. My favourites are 'web-based Q&A services' for intelligent information discovery like Quora, Aardvark and Facebook Questions - and also…
9 Tips to engage your email subscribers
Value: [rating=4]
Our commentary: This 12 page whitepaper download from Selligent (registration required) advises brands on how to tackle the ongoing challenge of the best way to engage customers with email marketing.
Marketing implications: I think these guidelines are the most useful part of the report, so I'm sharing them here with my commentary.
1. Offer a choice of communications. This is a preference centre to enable customers to receive the type of emails they want.
2. Respect permission. Double opt-in is suggested. I don't agree with this in all markets, all cases. It's essential if you're selling a list, but in a customer relationship which starts with an on-site enewsletter signup or during the checkout I think it's unecessary because the relationship is already developed.
3. Analyse, automate, segment and target. I like this call to action! But these are each individually major challenges to refine your email…
Email marketers were all-a-flutter recently when Google announced the Priority Inbox feature for Gmail. And for good reason.
Not because the Priority Inbox is a big deal in itself, but because of what it represents: the era of the intelligent inbox. This intelligent (and social) inbox was one of the four trends we identified earlier this year as crucial to future email marketing, so Gmail's announcement is a timely reminder to explore that topic in more depth.
In this post I'll briefly review the implications for email marketers and then suggest three approaches to help your email marketing achieve cut-through.
(more…)…
Minimising Email marketing mistakes
Value/importance: [rating=3]
Our commentary: This post from Dela Quist at Alchemy Worx reminds us of the potential mistakes we can make with our email marketing based on the many campaigns he reviews.
Marketing implications: Review the 6 mistakes and check how good your processes and tools are for avoiding them
Recommended link: Avoiding the most common email marketing mistakes…
Last month I gave four reasons why the status quo isn't good enough for your email marketing.
One reason was growing email competition, so it seems sensible to review some of the things you can do to ensure it's your email that gets attention in the inbox.
We'll start with the in-email factors (from line, subject line, preview pane and preheader) and then address out-of-email factors (which most people forget about).
The from line
We tend to focus on the subject line, but we also know that the name of the sender is at least as important in helping recipients decide whether an email is worth attention or not.
(more…)…
Ignoring the power of LinkedIn to drive new business and build relationships is missing a big opportunity for companies small and large alike.
LinkedIn is the first place many larger businesses check out potential suppliers and new hires. Using LinkedIn makes you more visible to existing and potential clients as well as your peers. These reach and growth figures are undeniable:
LinkedIn has over 65 million members in over 200 countries.
A new member joins LinkedIn approximately every second, and about half of our members are outside the U.S.
My ten practical tips are aimed at helping you to get more out of LinkedIn.
1 - Complete your profile
Improve how people can find and connect to you by adding past places you have worked, details of your higher and further education (leave out schooling before 18), activities and professional memberships.
You have 1895 characters to create your LinkedIn profile. Do include:
BACKGROUND
HOW WE CAN HELP YOUR COMPANY
CONNECT…
