Online Business

It seems that what emerged as sound email principles and etiquette apply just as well to email marketing. But its not just email marketing… it’s effective email marketing.

Where previously formal letters and faxes used to be the way to communicate with clients and potential customers, the shift to the ’softcopy’ world of the Web has meant that this same type of communication would have to happen in a format pertinent to this new venue. Email and email marketing asserted itself as the prime method of contact then. From brochures to customer support, everything can now take place through a few types on the keyboard and few clicks of the mouse.

However, there still is a protocol and a proper manner for effective email marketing:

- Be clear

Email is a shortened form of communication. There is no space for flowery and overtly ego-soothing language. Basic courtesy applies, like proper greetings and such, but on the whole, emails should be short and clear. Get to the point as soon as possible. Let your recipient know what is expected of him, what he stands to gain through this communication, and how he can gain it (for example, what he has to do, such as be within the first hundred to visit a site and thus earn a discount)

- Offer value, not information

Provide incentive for the email reader to read and click through. Add value to your communication. Attract and seduce. Don’t be surprised a boring, hum-drum email is deleted as soon as the recipient reads the first few lines. Entice, and do not provide too much information in the content. The website is there for this purpose. The email is for communication.

- Prefer text

Graphics take long to load and often emails with graphics and attachments are deleted immediately or go to a junk mail folder.

- Label your images if you use them.

Some people get only the text in an email in their browser. If you include graphics but fail to label them, the whole message may not make sense or the reader may not be enticed. Providing labels lets him know what stands at such a place in the message.

- Use a hook

You should aim to catch the attention of your reader from the first line itself. A good hook works then. Its message should be relevant and clear so that the customer can then immediately decide to read on or not. Remember that a reader is won through the first few lines itself.

- Support the hook

In the body of your email, use relevant information to support your hook and its message. However, be concise, as this isn’t an opportunity for an info dump. Your information should simply reinforce your hook.

- Be short and concise

Readers won’t read every word that is down in an email. They usually scan the thing in whole. Use the space you have succinctly to maximize the opportunity to grasp the reader.

- Provide the most important information first

Make efficient use of the top space of your email. Many readers read email through a preview pane. The top third of your email will be displayed in this pane, and based on this information, a reader may decide to read the full or delete the message already.

- Use a legible and easy to grasp format
- Arrange your text in a manner that is pleasant to the eye.
- Delineate text and paragraphs using hyphens or lines.
- Use legible font such as Georgia and Verdana in a readable size.
- Use bullets and lists to more clearly define your message so it can be grasped at first glance.

- Use the active voice

The active voice ‘involves’ the reader in the message and pushes him to react.

- Know your audience

And write accordingly with appropriate wording and information.

- Avoid URLs that are too long

Such addresses in emails can be difficult to click as they lose their link when they are ‘broken’ onto 2 or more lines.
Aim to have a URL on its own line. If needed, shrink the text for the link. Or you can offer the address without a hyperlink but as a ‘copy and paste’ option.

- Avoid caps and excessive use of punctuation marks

That’s basic email etiquette, which carries forward into your business communication.

- Offer an option to unsubscribe

Always offer a ‘way out’ for your recipients. An unsubscribe link is expected to be seen at the bottom of the email.
Providing your recipient with the option to continue receiving emails or to terminate the reception shows caring and courtesy to the reader.

Also ensure that an unsubscription is effective immediately.

- Easy to subscribe as well

Make it easy to subscribe as well. Provide links and offer a way to your guest book or how to provide comments and feedback. This shows consideration on your behalf.
It is also a good idea to let your readers know that they are free to forward the email as well.

- Make it easy to change subscription address

This way, if a client or recipient changes his address, he can make sure the email follows as well.

- Make good use of your subject line

The headline of your message should go in the subject box, as this is the first glimpse recipients will have to your email. Use it judiciously to convey information.

- Address your recipients by their name

This shows consideration and a personal touch. You definitely win over more people through a personalized message than through an impersonal mass bundling.

- Avoid in holiday periods

This time is often holiday from emails too, so keep email marketing communications to the minimum too.
You could however send out a message with the holiday’s greetings and best wishes.

- Consistency with corporate design

Having the same kind of layout and formatting as your website and other business communication supports ensures that someone recognizes your email at first glance too.

Once you have found the right template/format, use it every time.

- An email address that says who you are

People are more apt to trust a message with a From line containing information about who you are and where you’re from. This will also prevent your email from being listed as spam and from ending in the junk email folder.

- The landing page should fit the email and the offer

Make sure you are leading your reader to the right destination through the links provided in the message.

People hate wasting their time, and if this happens even once, you stand the risk of losing credibility.

By tailoring your landing page for links, you also make better use of your website to further engage the customer’s interest.

- Motivate newsletter sign up with a freebie or bonus
Offer something in return as an incentive. This could win you a lot of new subscriptions.

- Have good multimedia if you are using it

If you are using audio or video, make sure they are of good quality and can be accessed easily.

- Reply to requests within 24 hours

This is basically common courtesy but it pays to be recalled. Ensuring prompt replies show you care and value your customers.

- Email should be service oriented, not marketing oriented as with paper

Your aim through email marketing is to inform and provide an ‘easy’ access to your company.

- Customize so it doesn’t look like spam

Make sure your message is unique in its content and format so it isn’t brushed off as spam.

- Offer user control if possible

Wherever possible, give your reader the opportunity to tailor your communications to him. People are most apt to listen to the information they have asked for.

- Provide contact information for you

Always provide a way of contacting you. The signature in emails is one of your greatest effective email marketing assets.

By making use of these email marketing tips, you should be able to create a successful and effective email marketing campaign.

Tags: Campaign, Effective, Email, Marketing, Running, Tips

Email marketing is becoming extremely popular but this does not mean all business owners know how to run an effective email marketing campaign. However, those who are well versed in the subject of email marketing and have experiencing using popular strategies effectively are likely to gain a huge advantage over their competitors who do not have these skills. This article will provide useful information for business owners who are hoping to improve their sales or website traffic through effective email marketing. There are four strategies we will discuss here:

1. If you do not have a great deal of information about email marketing and do not deeply understand the principles involved one of the best ways to orchestrate a truly effective email marketing campaign is to hire a consulting firm with a proven track record in promoting business through email marketing to assist you in your endeavor. Similarly to traditional marketing using medias such as radio, television and print media, the popular strategies governing email marketing are changing constantly. As a business owner you likely already have enough to deal with trying to stay up to date on business practices that you do not have the time, energy or finances to also stay up to date on the latest changes in email marketing.

2. For this reason it is certainly worthwhile to hire a professional in the email marketing industry who can devote himself full time to keeping up to date with the most effective email marketing strategies and designing an email marketing campaign for our business to help you achieve your business related goals. However, selecting a consultant from the many options available can be downright overwhelming. In general you should look for a consultant who has a great deal of experience, a proven track record, listens to your questions carefully, explains concepts simply and makes your project a priority.

3. Another popular strategy for email marketing is to offer an email correspondence course on a subject closely related to your website or the products or services you offer. These correspondence courses should include a number of short segments, provide useful information, be of interest to your intended audience and should also help to promote your business in some way. The simplest way to promote your business without having your correspondence course deemed to be spam is to use a soft sell approach to subtly urge readers to make a purchase or visit your website for more information.

4. Publishing and distributing period e-newsletters is another example of an email marketing strategy which can be highly effective. An e-newsletter is very similar to a newsletter which is printed and distributed by conventional methods such as mail delivery. The bulk of an e-newsletter should be quality content in the form of featured articles, short articles containing useful tips or product reviews. The e-newsletter may also contain graphical elements. These elements may simply be graphic designs or they may be graphics which also serve as links. The links may direct traffic to your website or to other websites. Finally, your e-newsletters should contain some type of soft sell sales approach. It is important to not make the sales pitch blatant as this may result in the e-newsletter being considered spam. Finally, the e-newsletter should contain a call to action urging the readers to either make a purchase or visit your website for more information.

Regardless of the method of email marketing you opt to utilize, one of the most important strategies is to evaluate the effectiveness of your email marketing on a regular basis. This is critical because elements of your email marketing campaign which are not working should be weeded out. Likewise elements of your marketing campaign which are enjoying a high degree of success should be utilized more often. For example if you notice there is a spike in sales or website traffic each time you issue an e-newsletter, it might be worthwhile to begin issuing e-newsletters more often. This type of evaluation and feedback can turn a moderate success into a huge success.

Tags: Effective, Email, Improve, Marketing, Sales, Strategies, Traffic

Introduction

Many organizations are utilizing email marketing as part of their internet marketing strategy.  There are numerous email marketing services provided that support all types of businesses such as: Emma, ConstantContact, Aweber, etc.  In today’s environment, businesses are sending emails to promote products & services, cross-sell additional services, inform customers, and provide discount coupons.  The question is: Are businesses leveraging email marketing to support multi-tactical internet marketing campaigns?

In most cases, businesses are not leveraging email marketing to drive successful campaigns.  Marketers continue to see email marketing as a single tactic that has a limited impact on the goals of their campaigns.  The biggest example of this is the lack of integration between databases, website, and email marketing campaigns.   A local business owner has a limited amount of hours in a day and a limited amount of resources.  However, most of them do not streamline the lead acquisition process to work together.  If the systems were integrated, a similar scenario can be applied to large corporations that employ or utilize 3 different employees to do the job of a single email marketing professional. Simply put, the website form does populate to the database, and neither of these automatically feed to the email marketing system.  In general, this is a manual process that costs businesses time, resource, and money. 

How can effective Email Marketing Help Your Business and Drive Results?

How you ask?  Well, let’s start with efficiency.  The ability to integrate your website with your business’s database, website forms, and email marketing services tools may cost additional money upfront; however, in the long-run you will not need to use manual processes that require more resources.  At DaBrian Marketing Group, we provide businesses will the tools to connect website forms to an email marketing system and eliminate the database itself.  In our client’s case, the email marketing system or email marketing service is the database.  In addition, you can use event or email triggers to confirm opt-in email addresses after receiving a contact submission form.  In less than 30 seconds, you have populated your form into a specific list with the email marketing tool, confirmed an opt-in email, and responded to a prospect with relevant content.

 Email triggers can be a useful and impactful tool for customer acquisition & lead generation.  We live in a society of instant gratification so being able to deliver relevant information or set the expectation to receive a response to a question is critical.  This can help to separate your business from the competition.

The ability to reduce the resources used for an email marketing campaign will reduce the campaign cost.  If implemented effectively, email marketing can position your business to be on your customers’ minds and reduce your overall acquisition cost. The bottom-line is Return-on-Investment. 

 Testing to Drive Results & Revenue?

Once you have become proficient with your automated process, it is time to start testing your email campaigns.  There are a number of different tests you can do with a single email campaign.  These tests include A/B, A/B/C, and multivariate testing of headers, subject lines, layouts, landing pages or calls-to-action.  The more successful your business is at getting customers to open emails, the greater the probability that the customer will respond to your call-to-action. Usually, better open rates and click through rates translate to better ROI. 

Conclusion

The truth is that just about every business uses email marketing to communicate with customers.  Unfortunately, not every business takes the time to evaluate opportunities to integrate technologies, test, or measure their results.  These are simple fundamental businesses practices that should be gone.  The ability to establish internal processes and best practices are critical to every business’s success. 

 The fact that you have an email marketing tool does not mean that what you are communicating is relevant to customers, or even driving results.   It is our recommendation that businesses start to take a holistic approach to all internet marketing strategies & tactics.  Continue to push the envelope for maximum results that will lead to maximum returns.      

Tags: Business, Effective, Email, Integrated, Marketing, Measuring, Success, Technology