10 Email Marketing Mistakes to Avoid at All Costs

Anyone who has ever worked in email marketing knows the value of getting your emails delivered into the inbox. You probably also know just how difficult this can actually be. The hardest part is knowing that your business objectives – open rates, click rates, revenue – all can be affected by poor delivery and for which you have no idea why.

In the internet space today, Yahoo, Gmail, Hotmail/MSN and AOL dominate the free email account market in the United States. That being said, it’s probably a good idea to familiarize yourself with each of these ISP’s rules so that you can ‘play nice’ and comply with each one. Each ISP has its own rules of what email messages they consider spam and what they don’t. They also are constantly changing their email filters to protect their customers, so where your email lands is a day-to-day task to tackle.

Probably one of the simplest ways to help with your inbox delivery is to make sure that your sending IPs are set up properly. This includes having both the Sender Policy Framework (SPF) and DomainKeys Identified Mail (DKIM) records available for all of your IP addresses and domains. Basically, these records are checked by the ISPs to ensure that they mail they are about to deliver is actually from you. Spoofers and spammers set up IPs quickly and don’t usually bother with the SPF or DKIM records, so if either (or both) of these two verifications is missing or broken, it’s likely that your email will not be delivered. Practically every ISP relies heavily on these records for email sender verification, so remember to check them frequently.

Some ISPs are willing and able to work with marketers to get email delivered to the customers who actually want it. This comes in the form of whitelists and feedback loops. Whitelists are available only with a few ISPs – Yahoo, AOL, Verizon, to name a few – but can give you preferential inbox treatment. While whitelisting doesn’t guarantee that your email will always make it to the inbox, it shows that you are willing to comply with the ISP’s policies. Putting forth this effort to send reputable email to the customers in your email list resonates well with ISPs, so this is definitely an email best practice worth acting on.

Feedback loops are another relationship you can create with an ISP to help with your delivery. This process allows you to be notified by the ISP when a customer makes a complaint or reports your email as spam. You can then build services to automatically remove these customers from your email list. This shows the ISPs will see that you are complying with your customers’ wishes and only mailing those that want to receive email from you. In turn, you are likely to have better inbox delivery of your emails. Still, inbox is not guaranteed, but any extra help you can get is beneficial. Again, there are only a limited number of ISPs that offer feedback loops – Comcast, Yahoo, Hotmail/MSN, to name a few – but definitely worth the time spent to set these up.

Another – albeit expensive – option to help you achieve inbox delivery is to pay for email certification. By using this service, you pay a per-message fee and agree to comply with very strict spam complaint regulations in exchange for guaranteed inbox delivery. As simple as this sounds, you can never predict how the customers in your email list will respond to your messages, and your IP addresses can go in and out of certification with a single mailing. So essentially, the ISPs are leaving your certification status up to their customers. To ensure that you comply with the complaint rate standards, optimize your email stream so that the customers that receive your emails are, in fact, the ones that want to.

In addition to implementing all of the above options, you will constantly need to monitor your inbox delivery. If you don’t have the time or resources available, there are a few 3rd party options available to help. Companies such as Return Path and Pivotal Veracity offer several tools that can help you keep your email in the inbox. On a day-to-day basis, you can send emails to their test or seed lists that will determine what percentage of your email list received their emails in the inbox. While these are not actual statistics, they are a solid indicator of how your mail is delivered overall.

These companies usually offer other tools to assist with your email delivery such as screening your email content through spam filter checks, IP reputation monitors, delivery statistics alerts, benchmarking standards, among many others. As an added plus, these companies can help with the whitelisting, feedback loop and certification processes. It’s likely that they may also have established relationships with several ISPs. This can be incredibly beneficial when troubleshooting IP and delivery issues that are not resolved by usual means.

A last – and sometimes obvious – method for battling the inbox war is to simply comply with email best practices. However old school they may seem, they are consistent with what the ISPs want to see from bulk mailings. And as the customers in your email list get more and more advanced, it’s always a good idea to stick with the standards and play it safe.

1. Text-to-Image Ratio – In your email templates, be sure to use a combination of both images and text. Even though it is easy to use all images and allows for better branding, ISPs do take this ratio into account. Simple text additions such as promo codes, product descriptions, personalization, expiration dates and fine print can all help with your email delivery.

2. Reinforcing the Email Relationship – It is usually a good idea to remind the customers on your email list how they got there. A small line of copy in the footer of your email that includes their email address and the site they signed up on is usually sufficient.

3. Links and Images – Make sure that the links and images you use in your email have matching domain names to your own. While using external links isn’t wrong, it can be picked up by some ISP’s filters and can seem like spam. If you must use external links, try masking them by sending them through a tracking server.

4. Check for Spam Words – There are still a number of words, phrases and syntax that indicate spam to ISPs. Such things as the words ‘free’ and ‘guarantee,’ typing words in all capital letters and dollar signs can all get your messages caught in the spam filters, so avoid using them where applicable. Remember both the subject line and email content are ‘read, ’ so apply the best practices to all of your email copy.

All in all, ISPs are willing and able to deliver your email to the inbox if they determine that it is what their customers want. If there is any indication that you are sending spam – even if you believe you really aren’t – they will err on the side of caution and send your emails to the junk folder. It is definitely in your best interest to ensure that you have done all you can to comply with each ISP’s standards and take any action that they require. This is probably the best way to get your email delivered to the inbox, which will certainly have an effect on the statistics of the email since all of the intended recipients in the email list actually received it.

In the mid to late 90’s, if you didn’t have an e-mail address, people generally looked at you as if you were from the wrong planet. Now, nearly 20 years later, we have a generation wondering what exactly email is good for in an age of Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn and other social media outlets, not to mention texting, which is probably the ultimate form of instant written communication.

It leads business owners to wonder if they aren’t beating the proverbial dead horse to a veritable pulp by going to the trouble of assembling and maintaining an email marketing list. Even this author has been guilty of neglecting my hard fought and won email list in favor of the more instantaneous social media avenues.

It’s not hard to see why. Social media paints a much more vivid picture of a given market as a whole. Just be spending time on Facebook, you can get instant feedback from a large number of people on a given topic, product, or service, as well as literally watch the market landscape change, ebb, and flow.

The smartest marketers out there will find a way to have the best of both worlds, integrating the tried and true (email) with the newest and more innovative forms of communication. How, you ask? Well, consider the following:

Make Your Social Presence Known. If you have an online presence for your company with say, Facebook, then start including a link to that page when you send out an e-mail blast. Invite your clients to come and join you on Facebook (or Twitter, or whatever the hot spot of choice is). Providing multiple avenues of conversation can only become a benefit, and may actually increase your online visibility. And the key word there is “conversation”… these channels should be a two way street between you and your customers, not just a pulpit from which you endlessly extol the many virtues of your company brand name.

Listen. God gave us two ears and one mouth for a reason…..to listen twice as much as we talk. Not sure what to craft for your next marketing blitz? Spend some time perusing your social media accounts. See what your customers are talking about (or arguing about, or complaining about). You have a perfect opportunity to remain relevant and engaged by addressing these factors in your next communication. Your customers will certainly appreciate the fact that you are responding to their concerns

Try Some Variety. Okay, so you have multiple channels of communication available to you. So now, instead of just sending out a mass e-mail to your list, you take the e-mail message ad repost it on Facebook, tweet it to all your Twitter followers……that’s effective, right? Well, not really. Who wants to get an e-mail about your lawn care company offering a new fertilizer service, and then log onto Facebook to read the exact same message again? It’s an old rule… avoid duplicate content. Make each of your channels, e-mail, direct mail, Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn… make them all different and unique, addressing a different aspect or angle of your business. Variety is the spice of life (to borrow a tired but true cliché’), and you can rest assured that it will keep your clients coming back and engaging. We all like to be where things are happening, and if it appears that your company has multiple balls in the air on a number of different fronts, it will generate interest.

If Something Works, Do It Again. You’ve spent a lot of time learning what works and what doesn’t as it applies to your email list. For example, subject lines. You need a line that is brief, catchy, and interesting… something to make people click on your message and read it. Facebook has the same thing, called a status update. I am constantly amazed at what people put out for the entire world to read (i.e. nobody cares if you had Froot Loops for breakfast this morning). All too often, the status update is the social media equivalent of watching somebody else’s home movies. You want to be different, eye catching, intriguing. You have a momentary opportunity to grab attention, particularly with people like me who peruse status updates rapidly and are very discriminating about what they will and will not click on. Adopt the same method that has served you well with subject lines, and you’ll see more visitors to your page.

Make Customers Work For You. I’m a firm believer that the best marketing you can ever hope for comes from your customers talking to each other, and they are no more likely to ever do this than they are through social media. If you own a pet supply store and have a corresponding Facebook page, then it’s a pretty good bet that at least a sizeable majority of the folks who “like” your site have, oh I don’t know, a pet! They have a common interest. You make a post about a new product and you will no doubt receive scores of comments from folks about that product, both pro and con. Don’t be afraid to share them through other venues. You can use a FB comment as a part of your next email blast, or in your next tweet, to tout the benefits of a given product. People will pay far more attention to their fellow customers than they will to you. Trust me on this one; I made a living through word of mouth for over twenty years.

Email is not becoming extinct. It is merely another step in the evolution of online marketing. There is no reason why it cannot be successfully integrated into newer forms of communication. We still use the phone don’t we? But it is a markedly different animal than it was when Mr. Bell made that first static filled connection.

Commit yourself to riding the crest of the wave in 2012!

Happy New Year! And welcome to 2012! Of course you are going to want to keep your business moving forward in the coming year, and part of that process will include staying on the cutting edge of marketing techniques, especially as they relate to your email lists. The last thing you want to do is fall off the crest of the wave and end up in the backwash of outdated or ineffective email marketing techniques.

Sixty five million years ago, the dinosaurs looked up and no doubt wondered about that big rock hurtling their way, and businesses that fail to stay abreast of current email marketing trends are destined for a similar extinction. Technology is advancing at a rapid pace, and the phrase “that’s so 20 minutes ago” while often made in jest, actually carries with it a great deal of truth.

So, equip yourself for the coming year by exploring some of the latest and most effective options for enhancing your marketing efforts.

Text Marketing: Texting is the logical evolution of email, providing an even more instantaneous connection. Some of the newer programs send automated text messages to customers in their database, offering a gift card for a given amount in exchange for answering a question such as “What kind of car wash products do you use?” The answer given allows the company to even more accurately target the customer with specific deals or products.

Mobile Optimization: With the advent of the Smartphone and tablet devices in recent years, fewer people are spending their time retrieving emails by sitting in front of a computer screen. Mobile commerce is expected to increase significantly in the coming year, following a threefold increase in 2011. More and more retailers are optimizing their sites for mobile transactions, and more complex marketing efforts such as up selling, cross selling, and other promotions are being generated across mobile channels

Product Subscriptions: This technique allows customers to subscribe to receive a given product or service at regular intervals for a prearranged price. This allows the merchant to forecast revenues, establish recurring sales, and provide more effective inventory management (since they know approximately how much of a given product will be going out every month).

Triggered Emails: It sounds like we’ve wandered away from the e-mail field, but we haven’t gone very far. Triggered e-mails are messages sent to coincide with an event or announcement or product release, and were a very successful marketing tool during 2011. Triggered e-mails are sent based upon customer behavior or interaction, or lack thereof. Say a customer shops on a given site, fills his shopping cart with say, golf equipment, and then abandons the online cart without checking out. An email offering special discounts or other incentives may be sent to the customer to encourage him to return and complete his transactions. Triggered e-mails may also go out a week or so after a purchase has been made, offering special deals on related products.

Video Content: Online videos have been a part of email marketing campaigns for the last several years, but the medium still has not reached its full potential. The average internet user watches more than 20 hours of video content per month, so any company not utilizing video in their presentations is missing a rather large piece of the marketing puzzle.

Video is one of the best ways to present a product or service, and is generally accepted favorably by the majority of consumers. It offers easily acceptable and understandable product information, and is easily shared across various platforms such as Google+ or Facebook. This of course brings us to….

Social Media: In today’s society, if you don’t have a Facebook page, you’re almost looked at like a leper. With such an across the board acceptance of social media platforms, it is almost equally mind boggling that merchants would fail to take proper advantage of such an effective communication avenue. Emails should be properly marked with Facebook or Twitter icons, along with an invitation for your customers to “like” or “follow” your company. Of course any social media page should provide prominent opt ins for customers to submit their contact information as they wish. Done correctly, exposure through social media can spread your brand name almost exponentially, reaching far more people with a minimum outlay of time and effort.

The Good Old Fashioned Inbox: This may be a misnomer, as the e-mail inbox is a rapidly evolving tool, one that is becoming ever more effective at catching and filtering out spam. You will also find yourself competing with other companies who are utilizing the same approach. This is one area where you cannot ignore the power of quality, relevant content, as that is what will guarantee that your message will actually be read. Engage your clients and you will go much further than flashy slogans or over the top promises.

The New Year always brings with it the promise of a fresh start. Make sure your company takes the next step forward in its e-mail marketing strategies and enjoy a prosperous and successful 2012!

One important – and frequently overlooked – aspect of email marketing is the copy, or message that you are trying to get across to your email list. Whatever the message may be email is a quick and easy way to relay it to your customers. There are many opportunities to convey a message in email, so it is important to coordinate all components so that the entire email has a cohesive message.

The first touch points an email has with a customer is the subject line and from name. It is a best practice to keep a consistent from name on all of your email campaigns so that customers instantly recognize the message is from you. A proper subject line should be brief and prepare the subscriber for what is contained in your email body. The recommended length for a subject line is 52 characters, but this can vary according to your brand’s preferences. Just keep in mind that the longer your subject line is, the greater the chance that it gets cut off in the ISP and some of your message can be lost.

Another touch point outside of the email is the super subject line or eyebrow. This is a line of copy you place just inside the body of your email’s HTML. This copy will display in some ISPs immediately after the subject line. Many email marketers do not realize that this copy will show to the subscriber and in most cases you just see the email header copy. Instead, if you use a super subject line, you have the opportunity to provide more information about the email’s contents before the user opens the email.

Once the customer is inside your email, but before they have downloaded the images, the alt tags provide another opportunity for you to convey your message. The alt tags are the text back up to images and will display in the ISP before the customer turns the images on. Here, you should use this text to give additional details as to what the email contains, or explain what content is displayed in the images. Remember that any text in the email will also display, so make sure you are not repeating what is already there.

So now that you have intrigued your customer enough that they want to open the email, make sure that the body appropriately matches the subject line. Tricking your customers into opening will only increase unsubscribes and complaints, so try not to be misleading. If you plan to use mostly images in your email, design it so there is a large headline that is short and to the point. Remember, the intention of an email is to direct traffic back to your website. With this in mind, be sure to write the copy that is both vague and intriguing so that they want to click on the email to learn more.

Inside the body, you should include additional copy that supports your email message. Since emails are usually only around 600 pixels wide, long sentences and paragraphs can translate into many, many lines of copy. Instead of really long copy blocks, use sub headlines and bullet points to get your message across. You can always use images to portray your content as well, so use them to supplement your message.

Additionally, pay close attention to the copy you use in your links. Be sure that the Call to Action (CTA) is strong and tells the user what you want them to do. In the case of hyperlinks, link the appropriate words in the copy so that the customer will know what website they are going to if they click on it. By default, hyperlinks will be underlined and will turn a royal blue color. If you wish to stylize your hyperlinks, make sure that they look clickable – keep the underline, make them a different color than the rest of the copy, italicize, etc. If your message is more of a newsletter style with lead-in copy, try cutting off the copy in the middle of a sentence and have the customers click a link to read more.

For graphical button links, use short, action words that lead customers to the next logical step. Also make sure that these images look clickable. Use shadows, underlines and arrows to make it easy for readers to know that they are supposed to take action.

Remember the entire process of ‘reading’ an email takes only about five seconds. Since this is such a limited amount of time to engage your subscribers, be sure to use all of these text areas to get your message across as directly as you can. Optimize your text and images so that they all coordinate into an email that is cohesive and can be easily engaged with.

If you’ve been in the business of email marketing for a while, it’s likely that you have collected quite a large number of email addresses. You probably have a group that are [hopefully] engaged with you and open and click your emails frequently. Then there is the rest of your list…one group that is unengaged and hasn’t interacted with your emails in quite some time. These might be marked as unmailable due to hard and soft bounces and unsubscribes. Since the inactives and unmailables are probably a majority of your email list, take some steps to clean them up or remove them from your mailing stream. In the end, you may experience an increase in email metrics along with better inbox delivery.

First, take a look at some of your email metrics to determine how customers are reacting to your email campaigns. The failure rate is an important number to watch because it shows how many emails never made it to the customers in your email list. Failures can include hard bounces, soft bounces, connection errors and other technical issues that made your email undeliverable. You should be sure to take action and remove any hard bounces from your email list, since the address is no longer valid and can only further harm your deliverability.

Some other important email campaign statistics are the unsubscribe and complaint rates. These rates indicate how your customers are responding to your email. If subscribers don’t see value in receiving your emails, they are going to take an action of either unsubscribing or complaining (marking your email as spam). While neither of these actions are desirable, it is better to have customers unsubscribe since this action goes under the radar of ISPs. A complaint will notify the ISP that a subscriber believes your message is spam. If too many people complain about your email, it’s likely that all of your incoming mail will be blocked or immediately sent to the spam folder. If you have feedback loops in place, you will be notified of which subscribers are complaining and you can immediately remove them from your email list. According to CAN-SPAM regulations, you legally have 10 days to remove an email address from your database. However, it’s in your best interest to remove any addresses that unsubscribe or complain immediately to avoid any extra harmful behavior.

The churn rate is another metric you should be monitoring. Depending on how often you mail, you might report on this metric differently, but calculate it by month to see how you trend throughout the year. You simply need to add the total number of unsubscribes, complaints and unmailable addresses and divide by how many total email addresses you have at a certain point in time. This will give you a percentage that indicates how many email addresses you lose each month. If you have email acquisition efforts running, this number is important since you pay for every email address you acquire and should have an idea of how many you will lose due to churn.

Next, take a look at the composition of engaged and unengaged users in your email list. Instead of continually emailing to everyone in your list, find those that are most engaged and target them for your campaigns. To find these customers, run counts of users in your list that have recently taken an action on your email. Depending on how often you send email campaigns, try running counts of those that have opened or clicked on an email in the past three, six, nine or twelve months. And depending how quickly you acquire new subscribers to your email list, run counts of users who have recently been added to your list in the past week, month or quarter.

Then you will need to put together a testing strategy where you mail these groups separately and track how each responds to your email campaign. From here you can create separate lists of the most engaged users that will optimize your email campaigns. Not only will you experience better email statistics – ex. open and click rates – but you are likely to have lower unsubscribe rates and fewer delivery issues. If you do experience deliverability issues, it might be a good idea to separate your database into separate engagement lists. First deploy your email campaigns to actively engaged users, then roll it out to the moderately engaged (and possibly then unengaged). This strategy will allow your email to be immediately opened and clicked and will indicate to the ISPs that it is a message of value and should be delivered to the remainder of users.

For those in your email list that are dormant engagers or completely unengaged, you may choose to either mail them less often or not at all. Put together a separate email strategy for these users that gives them the opportunity to re-engage with your brand or to opt out of receiving emails. Since these subscribers haven’t engaged with you recently (or ever), it’s likely that they won’t respond and you’ll have to decide what action to take for them. If this is the case, your best bet would be to put them on the back burner and email them quarterly with the options above.

If you have a large email list, you’ve probably collected a very large amount of invalid email addresses. This group could hold a trove of valuable customers, but for some reason, they are not able to get your email due to typos, fat-fingering, their mailbox was full, etc. Whatever the reason is that they were marked as invalid, there are some options available for recovering these email addresses. There are several third party companies in the market that can help with your recovery efforts. Many will provide free or reduced-fee trials to help you decide which of their services will best hygiene your list.

One service that is offered is an email syntax check. They will take your entire list of invalid email addresses and check each one for common mistakes and errors that would cause your email to be unmailable. Such things as misspelling a Yahoo address as ‘@yahho’ or missing the shift button and typing a 2 instead of an @ sign could cause an otherwise correct email to bounce. You would then be returned a list of corrected email addresses that you can now try to re-mail. Be careful when mailing these recovered email addresses though. Remember they have probably never gotten an email from you and it may have been awhile since they signed up for your email list, so the first message you send them should be some form of welcome email.

Another service offered by third party hygiene companies is a validation tool. This software is designed to catch syntax and spelling errors up front, and ensure that the hard bounce never happens. This service happens at the time when the user enters their email address. Once they hit submit, the service will verify that the email address is both properly formatted, as well as checking it for common errors and typos. If it detects an issue, it will provide several options of what it ‘thought’ the user was trying to enter and force the user to choose the correct address. Although pricey, this service can do wonders in preventing bad email addresses from entering your database.

In all, there are many different ways to hygiene your database. It is important to constantly keep a clean mailing stream as ISPs get stricter and stricter with delivery standards. Whatever budget and resources you have available, it can only benefit you and your bottom line to ensure that you are only mailing those in your email list that want to be mailed.

I used to manage my e-mail list meticulously, even down to going through it name by name and eliminating people that my gut told me probably wouldn’t qualify as long term subscribers. I included opt outs, and usually made mention in the body of the message that folks should feel free to let me know if they no longer wished to be on the list. I was also diligent and removed those folks who wanted to be removed for fear I would obtain a spammer reputation.

But despite my best efforts, I would still occasionally get those angry e-mails from people who thought I had gone too far, worn out my welcome, crossed the line, and for all I knew, probably beat on my own mother just for kicks. It really was quite amazing how intensely people responded when they got the impression that they were being spammed, and even more disappointing for me to think that I was being perceived as such.

Today’s lesson… sometimes you just can’t help it, and no matter what you do, you get the label of spammer hung around your neck like a three ton boulder, leaving mental images of you kissing your collective career goodbye. Is there any level of damage control that will work when you’ve been branded with the dreaded “S” word?

Whether the accusation is true or not, it should not be ignored. Enough complaints to your ISP will result in your internet service being shut down, your website yanked, or all of the above. Once the damage is inflicted, it is awfully hard to undo. Can you possibly take the necessary steps to prevent this from happening? And if not, how do you combat the false accusations when they do occur.

One thing to remember is that a lot of people sign up for e-mail lists and then forget about it. Six months later they are wondering why they are getting e-mails from a given outfit. I’m guilty of this myself, and I like to think I’m pretty thorough when it comes to e-mail issues. Moral: it happens to the best of us.

Also, forwarding is a big thing nowadays. Almost every morning I find myself cleaning out forwarded messages of all kinds from my inbox. Occasionally, the forward may look like it is coming from the company itself as opposed to a well meaning friend. Something like this could easily tick off the wrong person, they lodge a complaint, and then you’ve got problems.

About all you can do when you get these responses is to be proactive in responding to them. Promptly remove the person from your e-mail list, and send them a polite personal message, apologizing for the inconvenience and assuring them that you have heard their request and will honor it.

Of course there are methods by which you can be better prepared with regard to your e-mail database:

Don’t buy e-mail lists from companies. It takes longer, but suck it up and take the time to build your list on your own, one step at a time. Building any business endeavor takes time, but the end result is worth it and you will find your list to be more substantive and ultimately more productive for you, your product, and your business.

Make it at least a little difficult to get on your list. Have your webpage set up with an opt out button; basically making it a decisive action for the person to add their name and information to your database. Informed decisions go a long way towards cutting down on the number of irate folks that you will be hearing from (unless of course you go off the deep end and inundate them with useless info or otherwise wear out your welcome, but that’s another story…).

Give them every chance to back out. When you get an e-mail subscriber, if at all possible, send them a thank you message in return. The personal touch is always appreciated and makes people want to maintain the connection.

Don’t be a stranger. If you let a long time go by between mailings, you run the very real risk of people forgetting about you. Then, when they finally do hear from you, it comes off as unexpected and you end up looking like a garden variety spammer. If your product or service warrants it, then touch base with your clients every month or so. If you can send a birthday wish or Christmas e-card, do it. If you establish a relationship with your clients, then the business relationship runs so much smoother.

Whenever you do a mailing, include the URL where they initially signed up. This may serve as a reminder if they are scratching their heads trying to remember who you are. Place the URL near the “unsubscribe” feature to make things easier.

If it walks like a duck, quacks like a duck, well, you get the rest. Don’t engage in activity that makes you look like a spammer. Avoid the cheesy, unrealistic subject lines, include a functional return address, as well as a real header. If your messages look professionally composed, with a personal touch, and coming from a reputable source, then you stand far less chance of your presence being rejected.

Even the best internet marketers may be occasionally tempted to go the email spam route. It doesn’t matter how well you’re doing or how spectacular the results, it only takes a lull or drop in business to trigger the desperation response and make otherwise lucid and intelligent individuals begin debating the merits of the cyber equivalent of a shotgun blast.

It’s only natural, I mean, more is better, right? The more names you get your brand in front of, the more lucrative the result, right? Can email spamming always be wrong? Or would it be okay to try, just this once? Before you load up and press send, read on. Hopefully it will change your mind.

For starters, none of us like email spam. We have to wade through enough of it on our own, and we know firsthand that it doesn’t get read and is nothing more than fodder for the delete button. So keep that in mind when you start thinking about inflicting it on others. But if you require an itemized list of reasons:

The Inevitable Response. Some people get down to their basic instincts pretty quick when it comes to spam, and the response they send you can be ambivalent at best and frightening at worst. In short, you’ll make a lot of enemies with this approach. Count on it.

The Technological Fallout. In this age of the internet, some people respond to spam in a more substantial way, namely the shutting down of your e-mail, your server, and quite possibly your ISP. You may also see issues with your phone and fax lines. Abuse is one thing, but the disruption of your ability to even conduct business is a whole new level.

Big Brother Is Watching. Most ISPs have policies against spamming. Get caught and don’t be surprised if they shut you down in short order. You’ll lose your internet access and quite possible access to your web site. It only takes once or twice before your business is irrevocably damaged.

Ethical Compromise. Email Spam is universally recognized as the lowest common denominator when it comes to e-mail marketing. It has a blanket negative connotation, and with very few exceptions, it is not going to be received positively. Granted, it is more expensive to utilize direct mail, radio or TV ads, magazines, newspapers, telemarketing, etc, but they are legitimate, straight up methods of marketing, and well worth the investment. Spam is a classic example of trying to get something for nothing, and of course we all know how well that normally turns out.

Legal Eagles. Some states have anti-spam policies. Is hitting the “send” button really worth ending up in a court of law or having to pay out enormous fines for pole vaulting over that legal line? ISPs have historically been able to make really good, solid cases against spammers, and the judgments passed have been, shall we say, considerable.

Your Professional Reputation. At the end of the day, a company’s success is by and large built on their reputation and good standing within the community and their industry. Garnering a reputation as a spammer drives every possible nail into the coffin of your good name. All you have to do is look at any major company such as Google, Facebook, GM, Delta, Wells Fargo, AT&T, etc, and see how many spam e-mail marketing campaigns they send out. Think on that for a minute.

Not Knowing Your Enemy. Companies that provide email lists for spamming purposes aren’t exactly the top of the food chain themselves. You may purchase a “targeted list” but in fact you may never know if the e-mails were ever even sent. Trying to hold the company accountable turns into an exercise in futility, with your phone calls going unanswered and no way to track down the people in charge who can tell you where your list went.

Guilt By Association. Much the way unscrupulous car salesmen forever tarnished the reputation of the automotive sales industry, so have spammer left a sizeable black mark on the marketing industry. It’s said that if you aren’t a part of the solution, then you are part of the problem. Participating in email spam guarantees that you are nothing more than part of the problem.

Profit Margin. I don’t care how many people take part, have you ever met anyone, from any company, that can show you some demonstrable success from a spam marketing campaign? I’ll make it easy for you, you won’t find it. True, the spam providers that make these e-mail lists available may be making money hand over fist, but for those of us trying to promote our products or service, there are no winners.

Make no mistake e-mail is a fantastic tool, one that can be used to great success in getting your message across to the masses. However, it also comes with a great deal of responsibility, taking care to make proper use of it and use it within acceptable parameters. Making sure your messages are properly targeted to the appropriate groups, and including luxuries such as “opt out” buttons are highly recommended. It may take a little longer, and there is still no guarantee of a major return on investment, however, your clients will see it as an example of your willingness to operate above board and by the rules.

Now that you’ve gone through the Request For Proposal (RFP) process with a few different Email Service Providers (ESP), you should have lots of information regarding the features of each. The next step is to examine the features of each and determine which one most meets your business needs. Each will obviously have its own strengths and weaknesses, so perform due diligence to find the one that caters your email marketing goals. Below are just a few of the features you will want to research with any ESP.

Dynamic Content

Since email marketing is growing more and more difficult, one popular trend is to personalize the email through dynamic content. If you plan to incorporate dynamic content into your email marketing stream, it is very important to have an Email Service Provider that can easily handle it. Be sure that you are comfortable with the process of uploading, implementing and reporting on any email campaigns you plan on sending.

Segmentation

Another common functionality that you will likely use on a daily basis segmentation. Since targeting emails by specific audience is another popular trend in email marketing, you should be sure that your ESP could easily segment your email list by any criteria you deem necessary. The process of segmenting your email list via the Email Service Provider should be user-friendly and able to be completed quickly.

Randomization

Anyone who uses segmentation in their email marketing strategy understands that there is a strong need to have control groups of customers. If this is the case for you, it would be worth your while to see if your new Email Service Provider has the ability to create random segments from the subscribers in your email list. If so, this feature can greatly reduce the amount of work you require from your database team, as well as improve your overall testing functionality.

Permissions

If you work in a business where there are multiple brands under a single organization, you might need your ESP to provide a way to separate each one. It’s also possible that you will have different team members working on different parts of your email marketing stream, so you’ll need a system that can handle a number of logins for separate users.

Reporting

The need for instant and accurate reports is crucial to email marketing. Since some testing decisions are made on the fly, you should research each ESP’s ability to timely report email statistics. Also take a look at the pre-fabrication reports available in the system. Most reports will include total and unique counts of sent, delivered, failed, opens and clicks as well as the corresponding rates. You might also find trending reports, email statistics by ISP or other engagement reports. If you are in need of something other than what is offered out-of-the-box, make sure you negotiate any custom report creation into the contract.

Data Tables & Your Email List

In addition to analyzing all of the features of your new Email Service Provider, you will have to decide how to handle the transfer of your data. As with any business, the information contained in your email list is sensitive and confidential. So it is important to make sure that your new ESP is compliant with your policies and can has the proper systems to handle your data.

You may choose from a number of different methods of making your data available to an Email Service Provider for mailing. Some ESPs can create a database of your information in their own system while others can simply dial in and connect to an external data source. Look into your unique business needs and determine which option(s) are most suitable to you. Be sure to consider such things as system speeds, internal resources and around-the-clock support. If you are not sure how to set up your data tables, you should be able to manually import data lists into the system.

Depending on your business type, it is also likely that you have numerous rows of data, with many fields of data available for every row, so it is important to make sure that your ESP is able to accommodate data tables of any size. They should have functionality available to quickly and easily query these tables and return data sets that may be used in your mailing campaigns. In addition, you should be sure that the processing time for mailings is not affected by the size of your email campaign. Multiple fields of data, dynamic content and segmentation in a mailing can significantly increase processing time, so choose an Email Service Provider that has systems and resources available to handle them.

Switching to a New IP(s)

If you switch your email marketing to a new Email Service Provider, you will most likely need to start using a new set of IP addresses. This can be a major interruption in your email marketing stream if are currently using an ESP since usually they are ‘rented’ from the ESP and are not owned by you. This means you cannot take them with you to the new ESP and will have to start fresh. The good news is that you now have the opportunity to set up your new email stream with as many IP addresses as your business needs.

It is normal to have several different mailing IPs to service your different email streams. Since different types of messages have different goals and delivery rates, set up as many as you need to get your most important messages delivered properly.

Welcome/Sign Up Message

– It is recommended to put your Welcome email on its own IP address since it is usually the first email received by your customers. This IP is likely to not have poor delivery rates because it receives all of the hard bounces from new customers inputting their email addresses incorrectly.

Transactional Messages

– It is very important to have all transactional messages such as order confirmations and shipping notices delivered to your customers. Since the number of this type of email sent is fewer than most of your other email streams, it can be helpful to create a separate IP for them. The delivery rates should remain high since you will experience very few or no bounces or complaints from these emails.

Marketing Messages

– These emails should also be sent from their own IP. Depending on your email marketing practices, you could generate lots of complaints that could affect how your emails are delivered.

When switching to new mailing IPs, another process to take into account is the warm up period. To ensure you have good delivery of your emails, you must make sure that your IP addresses have a reputation to send the amount of email you intend through them. This means that you will have to warm up your IP addresses and prove to the different Internet Service Providers (ISPs) that you are not spammers.

During the warm up period, you should plan to send emails that aren’t necessarily important to your email stream. They should be fairly generic and not marketing in nature, since it is likely that your initial email sends will not have high delivery rates. Examples could be surveys, change of address emails and general communications. You’ll first start off sending emails in smaller quantities, then gradually increasing them until your IP is warmed up enough to send your usual volume of emails.

By the time you’ve completed all of these steps, you should have a new Email Service Provider that is fully prepared to send your email. Hopefully you’ve chosen wisely and now have a new partner that is dynamic, advanced and able to move your email marketing to the next level.

Well, it’s the week of Thanksgiving, which means that most stores have had their Christmas decorations up some time since the middle of August. It seems to come earlier every year, and of course no business wants to risk missing out on the extra bump in numbers that always seems to occur around the Yuletide season.

It’s a fact, more and more companies are marketing for Christmas earlier in the season, and consumers seem to go right along with it. Studies show that more than two thirds of consumers are already holiday shopping, well before the national event known as Black Friday that has traditionally signaled the start of the shopping season.

So how to make the best use of this rush of Christmas retail cheer through your email marketing efforts? There are a number of ways, but the clock is ticking, so the time to begin is now.

Be Creative: Let’s face it, a lot of people disregard email promotions, but Christmas is THE hot buying season and folks are more prone to give you a shot at earning their business. So take advantage of it and punch up your email promotion with some eye catching graphics or fonts. Don’t worry about going overboard….nobody ever got ahead by playing it safe.

Countdown To The Day: Maybe one e-mail blast isn’t enough. If you don’t think you’ll wear out your welcome with your customers, opt for a series of email blasts every day or every other day leading up to Christmas. Take the opportunity to highlight special sales, incentives, or campaigns. If in doubt, “The
Twelve Days Of Christmas” is an ideal platform from which to launch your marketing efforts.

Catch Their Attention: Obviously the subject line is your single best shot for getting folks’ attention, so as always make it something that makes them want to open it and read further. Words like “sale”, “discount”, and especially “free” tend to work wonders.

Suggest A Gift: We all go through that whole “what to buy for the person who has everything” dilemma, so make some suggestions. You can also provide reviews for the products you are pushing in order to create value. Basically, do whatever it takes to spark an idea in the minds of your clients, ideally one that makes them think “that’s just perfect!”

Come Bearing Gifts: Suggestions are one thing, but offering a discount seals the deal. Either a special sale price, discounting shipping, or something free for every order over a given amount. You can also offer gift cards, which are easily emailed and can often be the perfect gift for those grouches that you can never seem to win with.

Know Your Audience: There are two types of Christmas shoppers, the efficient and the not so efficient. The efficient begin their holiday shopping on Dec 26 of the previous year. The not so efficient start putting their list together after work on Christmas Eve. Send messages addressing both types of shoppers. Early bird discounts are always in style, and for those of us who scramble last minute, knowing you still have a decent selection even at the eleventh hour is most appreciated.

Never Assume: Namely, never assume that the public stops buying at a given time around Christmas. There is a reason stores stay open on Christmas Eve, and some people even make purchases online on Christmas Day! Perhaps a series of triggered messages letting your customers know that you are, in a sense, even open on Christmas would go a long way toward putting a few more dollars in the bank.

Mine The Results: Look at what worked and what didn’t. What did people respond the strongest to? Were there certain links that generated more response across the board than others? Maybe a campaign for a given item worked well, or a gift suggestion guide increased sales across a number of fronts. Or maybe you noticed an uptick in business from a given demographic, say females 35 – 45. Whichever one(s) worked for you, make note of it for future use. Chances are you can get quite a bit of mileage out of it before the public buying habits change yet again.

Maximize Your Success: After Christmas, be sure to thank your customers with some additional goodies, such as special incentives or a New Year’s sale. If you picked up new subscribers, do something to make them feel welcome, such as a coupon good for a substantial discount on a popular item or service.

Don’t Bank On Christmas Alone: You have 364 other days in the year that you want to stay in business. You will no doubt pick up quite a few new customers from your holiday marketing efforts. Make sure that they know they are valued and welcome all year round. Go the extra mile to analyze and determine their needs for future email marketing campaigns.

Merry Christmas!

In every written communication there is always the one line where you want to make your strongest impression, and the world of email marketing is no different. Is it your opening statement? Closing remark? Something in the middle that seals the deal? Nope. In fact, your most important line isn’t found in the body of the message at all. It is your subject line, the only line that your recipients are guaranteed to see once they open their inbox.

With that one short line, you can spur their interest or bore them to tears. The choice is up to you. Mishandled, you will disappear into a yawn and promptly be relegated to the trash (or recycle bin or whatever they’re calling it these days). Properly composed and articulately expressed, you can have a substantial return on a very limited investment. It’s your move.

In order to help you along, here are a few tips for getting the most out of that one solitary line:

Nothing Is Certain: At the risk of starting off on a dour note, there is no surefire formula for subject line success. Just too many variables involved, not the least of which is a constantly changing court of public opinion, whims, and tastes. What may work one time will bomb the very next. A meticulously assembled and well written blurb may generate no reaction at all, while one composed as an afterthought pays off handsomely. That being said:

Support The B Line: If the subject line is the most important element, then the “from” line is a close runner up. Many readers check the “from” line before the subject line. People want to know that the message they are getting is from a reputable source, so when they check that secondary source, make sure it is from a genuine domain name, one that can be responded to. This is an excellent way of branding your email in another location and giving the message some added credibility.

Maximize The Space: Some email programs allow more space in the subject line than others, but most allow for about 50 characters. Sit down and determine how you can best describe the product of service being offered in 50 characters or less. It may sound like a small thing, but a subject line that runs off the edge (and into apparent infinity) is much less likely to be opened than one that is short, concise, and informative.

Personalize: This works wonders. Just having someone’s name on something automatically ups the chances of it being opened and read. Find a program that will allow you to personalize your email marketing efforts. Face it; do you open snail mail addressed to “occupant” or the one with your name on the front? Email is no different. Establishing a personal connection gets you one step closer to the sale.

A Sense Of Urgency: Many purchases are impulse, especially in scenarios where you can see and lay hands on a product. You can’t do that through email, so you have to find other ways of spurring folks to action. Instilling a sense of urgency is the cure here. Setting deadlines like “midnight tonight” or “last day to ensure Christmas delivery” are good. You may even want to utilize a series of emails, starting with “4 Days Left…” and ending with “24 Hours Remaining”. Nobody wants to miss a good deal, and an urgent reminder will often spur folks to take action.

Use Four Letter Words: “Free” is always a good one. It’s not a crime and it’s not false advertising, provided you are actually offering something of value to sweeten the deal, such as free shipping. Just don’t go overboard with exclamation points or all caps (both of which may trigger spam filters), but find a way to add something to make the product that much more appealing.

Ask A Question: Subject lines that pose a question, such as “Are you in debt up to your eyeballs?” or “Looking for the perfect anniversary gift?” are always good because in many cases, we’ve all been there and we want to know the answer. They will open your e-mail to get that answer. As always, make sure your message is relevant to the question asked. If people are asked about refinancing home loans and the message is promoting your home renovation business, you can count on being reported as spam.

Don’t Over Promise: One of my favorite ads was from a car dealership advertising “buy one car, get one free”, a claim that was so over the top that nobody in their right mind bought it, and the whole promotion laid a major egg. Same thing with email. Be honest in your subject line. Flashy come ons and unrealistic expectations will do nothing to grow your business; more likely it will back fire and you will spend months or even years recovering from the fallout. Make sure your subject line accurately reflects the content of the message.

To quote a tired cliché’, you have one chance to make a good first impression. The subject line is that first impression. Take your time. Think on it. And come up with something that will wow your customers and make them want to check you out.