I was recently informed by a client that they needed to step up their social media presence because “email is on the way out”. That was a shock to me as most of my clients (this one included) see a nice return on their email marketing investment. In fact, industry wide email marketing boasts a leading ROI among online marketing
Read moreLike websites, there’s a temptation to look at the positive metrics rather than improving negative ones. Bounces from email is a great indicator of list health. An email campaign that has a low bounce rate (under 10%) is often a well built list that is regularly maintained. The benefit of this is that it usually reflects audience engagement. Poorly built
Read moreIt’s hard to find all inclusive tools. Some times the features in one system do a certain task well while another technology is better suited for something else. This is often true in email marketing, especially for small and medium companies. There’s no inherent problem with using multiple database or list platforms. However a lack of planning and organization can
Read moreIt’s not uncommon for people to want to infuse their email list with a batch of new people. The stock answer from email marketers (myself included) is to gradually and methodically build a list. Use your network of contacts and regular business interactions to build up a legitimate opt-in email marketing list. However, some people are in a hurry or
Read moreUsing generic metrics for gauging success is very common in email marketing. Specifically the most common gauges are: Open rate Click rate Don’t misunderstand, these metrics are important but for most email campaigns they should not be the defining factor in measuring success. Success depends on the intent of the email. Here’s an example, an email campaign that consists of
Read moreIt’s common for people to use general metric standards as a guideline for success when analyzing online marketing data. This can lead to real problems with their campaigns because it doesn’t take into account individualized goals. Each webpage, email communication, or social media post needs to have a clearly defined metric for success rather than being analyzed on general metrics.
Read moreHTML based emails with sophisticated layouts and images are great. Generally speaking HTML layouts also improve conversion. However, email marketers always need to pay attention to images and how they are rendered. Recent studies have shown that only 33% of email users have images on by default. That means two of the three people you send emails to are not
Read moreJakob Nielson wrote a great article on email usability. There is a lot of good points but I wanted to focus on his section about subject lines. As a rule of thumb, if you have doubts on what the subject line should be . . . be direct. There is a great example in the article of a subject line
Read moreAs a broad guideline, at least 50% of your email communications should have a clear benefit for your recipients. A higher percentage is fine, a lower percentage will often result in list fatigue and opt outs. This seems like a simple equation but it gets complicated when email marketers confuse what benefits them and what is a benefit to the
Read moreIn a previous post, I said that email testing didn’t have to be a monumental task for smaller lists. While that is true, the statement shouldn’t be taken to mean it is easy. Detailed analysis is necessary to get a true picture of how your campaigns are running. An integrated set of reports that takes all of your online initiatives
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