Emarketing news: October 2007

Wednesday, October 31, 2007

Complacency - Is It Killing Your Business?

I was talking to a woman about her business the other day. We were focusing on a particular service that she knew would be a nice thing for her customers to have and wouldn't take a ton of work to...

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[Source: VerticalResponse Email Marketing Blog]

Friday, October 26, 2007

RSS The Email Marketing Killer

Derek Harding, clickz.com, released a new article, RSS: The E-mail Marketing Killer?. Derek explains how he is skeptical that RSS is an alternative to email for mass marketing.

I agree with him that RSS has not matured enough for mass marketing. But I definitely see that RSS can be used for niche marketing in its current form.

Derek also states, Its not useful or effective to take a quarterly newsletter or monthly promotional e-mail and publish it via RSS for the mass market.

By no means would you want to stop emailing and only offer a RSS feed. You want to compliment your email marketing by putting RSS into your marketing mix. By publishing your newsletter via RSS you provide your users/customers another marketing channel to access your content.

eINFO a collection of articles and case studies about email marketing.

Technorati Tags: RSS, email marketing, eINFO

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[Source: Email Marketing Blog - eINFO]

Email Experience Council Releases Preliminary Survey Results

The Email Experience Council ( EEC ) released some preliminary results from their recent Deliverability Roundtable survey. The ECC is going to use this data to set some standards in the areas of bounce management and more. Here are some of those results:

20% of respondents are using a combination of internal email systems and ESPs with limited, to no coordination between the two platforms.
65% of respondents are not tracking whether their email is being delivered to the inbox or spam folder.
10% of respondents admit that they are not removing bouncebacks (hard or soft) from their list.

They hope to have the final results out in a few weeks.

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[Source: Email Marketing Blog - eINFO]

Stats: Email Usage 2003-2010

eMarketer released some interesting email usage stats for the United States. Are 3 year olds actually sending email??

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Technorati: email marketing

eINFO - a collection of articles and case studies about email marketing.

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[Source: Email Marketing Blog - eINFO]

5 Missed Opportunities Email Marketers Make

Chris Marriott, Acxiom Digital, released a new articled, "Bad Email is Bad Business". In the article Chris points out five mistakes that he often sess from email marketers.

No welcome message.
Not using the data gained from the questions asked about the recipient's preferences.
Treating everyone on your list the same.
Letting everyone in your organization mail to the customer.
Sending plain text transaction emails without any cross promotion or up-sells.

Here are some tips and best practices on some of the mistakes that Chris points out.
How To Maximizing Email Welcome Message
Six Tips For Your Welcome Message Email
Preference Prove Profitable for Email Marketers
What is a Transactional Message?
Key Guidelines for Integrating Promotional Content into Transactional Email

Technorati tags: Welcome Message, email best practices, email, email marketing, einfo

Here Come the Holidays! 7 Tips to Get You Ready Now

If your business is anything like ours here at VerticalResponse, you're pretty hectic from now until the end of the year. We've jotted down some ideas to get you thinking and acting now. By the way, some of this post...

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[Source: VerticalResponse Email Marketing Blog]

Webinar: The State of Email Deliverability

Goodmail Systems and JupiterKagan's David Daniels are hosting a webinar, "The State of Email Delievrability". The webinar will be held on November 29th at 2 p.m. EST. The webinar will cover new research on:

Average delivery rates
Which delivery improvement techniques are commonly used today
How does blocked links and images affect email results
Paying for assured delivery of email
Case study on how two leading Internet marketers improved email revenue and business results using Goodmail's CertifedEmail

Sender Reputation Biggest Factor In Email Deliverability

ReturnPath released a new research brief that found Sender Reputation drives email blocking and filtering. Here is a break down on the causes of email deliverability that ReturnPath found.

77% - Sending IP's Repuation
17% - Email Content
6% - Domains in the email content

The take away here is that the biggest factor regarding deliverability is how ISPs look at the IP address that is sending the email. They are taking into consideration such factors as email volume, whether the server is authenticated, list quality, complaint rates, spam trap hits and listings on public blacklists and whitelists.

Direct Mail Postcards Gone Good and Gone Bad

I get a ton of mail, I'm sure you do too. Today I want to focus on a good example of a direct mail postcard with a fun offer and I want to show you a creative example that in...

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[Source: VerticalResponse Email Marketing Blog]

Webinar: Habeas - Drive Holiday Sales Through Email

Habeas along with Forrester Researchs Sucharita Mulpuru will be hosting a webinar on best practices to help boost your email program for the upcoming holiday season. The webinar will be held on Tuesday, August 15 at 2pm EST. You can register at http://habeas.com/en-US/reg/reg.php?s=ecommerce.

eINFO a collection of articles and case studies about email marketing.

Technorati Tags: Habeas, Forrester, email best practices, holiday email, email marketing, eINFO

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[Source: Email Marketing Blog - eINFO]

Advertise on My Email Marketing Blog

I have just passed 3000 unique visitors to my email marketing blog. I have decided to place AdSense ads on my site. You now have an opportunity through AdWords to advertise on this site. I typically have about 30 visits a day with an average visit length of 2 minutes 11 seconds. Talk about the "Long Tail". Since this blog is on such a niche topic there is a highly qualified audience to target. Thanks to all the readers!

eINFO - a collection of articles and case studies about email marketing.

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[Source: Email Marketing Blog - eINFO]

eINFO: Blog Posts Now Available Via Email

I have added the ability for you to receive my feed via email courtesy of Feedburner. Go ahead and sign up on my homepage under the "Subscription" section. Enjoy!

eINFO - a collection of articles and case studies about email marketing.

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[Source: Email Marketing Blog - eINFO]

US Mobile Consumption of Email on the Rise

M:Metrics released their latest data on U.S. mobile subscriber monthly consumption of content and applications. The report saw an increase of 5% in the mobile activity of viewing personal email. The report also noted an increase of 6.4% in the mobile activity of viewing work emails.

eINFO - a collection of articles and case studies about email marketing.

Technorati: Mobile, Email Marketing, eINFO

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[Source: Email Marketing Blog - eINFO]

Canadian Q3 Email Trends

Canadian firm, Card Communications, released their 3Q Email Trend Report. Here are some pf their findings:

Smaller lists achieve higher deliverability, open and click through rates
Non-profit organizations and associations enjoy the best results industry wide
event planning achieved high open and click throug rates but lagged in deliverability

Take a Stroll Through My Junk Folder

I thought it might be fun to peruse my junk folder and point out why some of the emails wind up there...ready? Let's begin! From: Neiman Marcus Subject: FREE SHIPPING + What's the hottest CHRISTIAN LOUBOUTIN style for fall? Problems:...

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[Source: VerticalResponse Email Marketing Blog]

ReturnPath receives Patent on ECOA Service

Looks like ReturnPath has received a patent for their Email Change of Address (ECOA) service. So if you are looking for those lost customers you may want to consider ECOA. At my previous job we tested ECOA on a list of non-delivered email and received about a 10% match rate. S

Straight from the markteting machine:
Thought that you would be interested in the news about Return Path's receipt of a patent for its Email Change of Address (ECOA) service. Launched in 2000, Return Path's ECOA service provides a fully permission-based way for businesses to find customers' new e-mail addresses and allows consumers to search for friends' and families' new e-mail addresses for free.

To date, it has been used by more than 400 companies and more than 31 million consumers have registered with the service. On average, 15,000 people register daily with Return Path's ECOA service. The patent awarded to Return Path from The U.S. Patent and Trademark Office, number 7,080,122, applies to both the system and process for updating electronic messaging accounts.

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[Source: Email Marketing Blog - eINFO]

Microsoft Windows Live Email Offers a Universal Unsubscribe Button

DirectMag released an article, E-mailers Call For AOL, Yahoo! to Follow Microsofts Lead. The article notes that some users are noticing a universal unsubscribe link in their Windows Live Email.

Currently Yahoo! and AOL do not have any plans to follow Microsoft. I think this will be a wait and see how it works and then jump aboard. I think for all email marketers that this is definitely a step in the right direction to combat the Report this is Spam button.

Bill Nussey - Unsubscribe Button May Become a Reality

Mark Brownlow - You need another line in your header

eINFO a collection of articles and case studies about email marketing

Technorati Tags: Windows Live, Unsubscribe Button, Microsoft, email optimization, email marketing, eINFO

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[Source: Email Marketing Blog - eINFO]

9 things to put in your list welcome messages

Mark Brownlow, Email Marketing Reports, released a new article, 9 things to put in your list welcome message.

I would probably add one more item to Marks list.

10. Place some copy to instruct the recipient how valuable it is to whitelist your From address. If your email program allows dynamic content, generate the whitelisting instructions based on the recipients email domain.

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Technorati tag: email marketing, welcome email, whitelist

eINFO - a collection of articles and case studies about email marketing.

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[Source: Email Marketing Blog - eINFO]

Webinar: Designing Effective HTMl Emails

EmailLabs, Stefan Pollard, will be hosting a free webinar, "Designing Effective HTML Emails" on November 27th at 1 p.m. EST and November 28th at 10 a.m. EST. The webinar will cover:

HTML design and coding for optimal inbox delivery
Reducing Spam Signatures
Combining Text and Images to improve readability
Stylesheets and Tables
Layout Tips for Preview Panes

Leveraging Behavioral Targeting for Your Email Marketing

Jeff Daniels, JupiterResearch, released a new report called, "The Connected Click-Through". The report looked at how email marketers are using their web analytics program to imporve their behavioral targeting. The report found:

15% actively use Web sile click stream behavior as an audience segmentation attribute
21% of marketers are planning to implement this kind of behavioral targeting in the next 12 months

The report also notes that there are some obstacles in implementing behavioral study into email marketing.

Lack of staff expertise
Lack of resources
Web analytics vendors do not provide integration for easy use and movement of data between applications

Email & Word-of-Mouth

eMarketer has released a new report, "E-mail & Word-of-Mouth: Connect with Your Best Customers". The report looks at whether using email in your word-of-mouth marketing strategy. If the offer is enticing enough the email becomes viral. But tread lightly, email messages that "were once welcomed can easily be seen as spam if the marketers press too hard, are too obvious or imagine that word-of-mouth can be direct-marketed".

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Technorati: word of mouth, email marketing

eINFO - a collection of articles and studies about email marketing.

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[Source: Email Marketing Blog - eINFO]

Inbox 2.0 - Long Live Email

I just read Scott Dorsey's debate with Robert Scoble in the Business Week Debate Room. The title of the debate was: E-mail Faces Deletion: Web 2.0 applications such as Twitter will unseat simple electronic mail as the No. 1 business...

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[Source: Chris Baggott's Email Marketing Best Practices]

Webinar: Holiday Email Optimization with Eyetracking

ReturnPath is sponsoring a webinar, How to Earn Higher Email Response This Holiday Season on August 17th at 1pm EST. ReturnPath and Eyetools Research are providing an opportunity to publicly critique your email templates.

Eyetools Research: Email Optimization Webinar (and a chance to get your email template heatmapped for Free)

ReturnPath: FREE Webinar: How to Earn Higher Email Response This Holiday Season

eINFO a collection of articles and case studies about email marketing

Technorati Tags: ReturnPath, Eyetools, email heatmap, email optimization, email marketing, eINFO

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[Source: Email Marketing Blog - eINFO]

Someone Tried to Put One Over on VR? I don't think so...

Every week I use an online tool from Andiamo Systems that helps me track what people are saying about VerticalResponse online real-time (plug: my husband's rockin' technology, try it). I came across a cryptic post and asked Richard, our Manager...

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[Source: VerticalResponse Email Marketing Blog]

Gmail Sees 93% Increase in Users

Charlene Li, Forrester, has a blog post talking about Google being a one-trick-pony. In the post she looked at some user data from Neilsen//NetRatings on Google services. The data noted that Gmails unique users have increased from 4.3MM to 8.3MM in the last 12 months.

eINFO - a collection of articles and case studies about email marketing.

Technorati: Gmail, Email Marketing, eINFO

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[Source: Email Marketing Blog - eINFO]

Refer A Friend ( RAF ) Study

Chad White, RetailEmailReports, has released a new study that takes a look at the effectiveness of Refer A Friend viral marketing among some large online retailers. The study has some interesting information to ponder.

It looks like Chad publishes a new report every month since he started his blog (August 2006). This one blog that you will want to add to your blogroll.

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[Source: Email Marketing Blog - eINFO]

5 Things to Know About Using Images In Your Email

We've recently been asked a bunch of questions about using images in email so I thought this would be a good time to talk about 5 quickies to help you out. Beware of a good image to text ratio -...

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[Source: VerticalResponse Email Marketing Blog]

Using Flash in Email Newsletters

In ChiefMarketers latest newsletter, E-Centric, they have a new article, Tips for Dealing with Tough E-Zine Challenges. The article had a good list of email marketing basics, until I got to the end. The last bullet point was:

Only Outlook can accept a Flash e-mail, so do not use it across all e-mail clients.

This bullet point peaked my interest because I just had a co-worker ask me about embedding Flash into an email. I did a little research on using Flash in email newsletters. I found a great resource at Campaign Monitor blog. They did a thorough test on the major PC, Mac and web-based email environments.

Campaign Monitor found that support for Flash was only found in Mac Mail. One blog comment noted that the ActiveX control needs to be enabled for Flash to work in Outlook and Outlook Express.

Bottom lineDo not use Flash in your email newsletter.

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Technorati tags: email marketing, flash email, email design

eINFO a collection of articles and case studies about email marketing.

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[Source: Email Marketing Blog - eINFO]

Our Own 300 Millionth Baby

I have been away for a bit due to my wife having our baby (who we consider the 300 millionth baby born in the U.S.). Andrew Brennan was born 10/17/2006. We are so excited and tired! Consider this our virutal baby announcement.

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[Source: Email Marketing Blog - eINFO]

Add Opt-In to PPC Landing Page

EmailLabs posted an short article, "Add Opt-In to PPC Landing Pages to Boost ROI". They suggest to include an email opt-in invitation on each PPC landing page to capture your most motivate shoppers and browsers. They propose that you sell your opt-in with 10 words or less so not to distract the visitor from the landing page offer.

- Search Engine Marketing Demystified

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[Source: Email Marketing Blog - eINFO]

comScore Top Five Web Email Clients

The Email Wars blog posted a comScore chart that provides the top five web email clients.

Yahoo! Mail
AOL E-mail
MSN Hotmail
Google Gmail
Comcast.net Webmail

eINFO a collection of articles and case studies about email marketing.

Technorati Tags: top web email client, email marketing, eINFO

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