three hats marketing email marketing workshop

Email Marketing WorkshopFebruary 24, 2010

8:45 - 9:00 - Introductions9:00 - 9:30 - Components of a good email marketing program9:30 - 9:45 - Break9:45 - 10:45 - In-depth example

- setting our goals- creating our distribution list- setting up our account in the email system- creating email template- creating landing pages- writing copy (subject lines, spam filters, testing)- sending email (best days / times)- reporting / list segmentation- follow up- calculating return on investment

10:45 - 11:00 - Questions & Answers

What we will be covering...

•In 2009, email marketing generated an average return on investment of $43.62 for every $1 spent. Direct Marketing Association (Oct. 2009)

•Email and e-newsletter marketing is considered second most effective tool in generating sales, just behind SEO Forbes Media

(Mar. 2009)

Why should we care about email marketing?

• It allows targeting

• It is data driven

• It drives direct sales

• It builds relationships, loyalty and trust

• It supports sales through other channels

What are the benefits of email marketing?

•Using web analytics to target email campaigns can produce nine times the revenues and eighteen times the profits of broadcast mailings. Jupiter Research

•46% of small businesses used email marketing in 2009, 36% plan to start using in 2010.

Hurwitz & Associates Survey (Nov. 2009)

Why must we learn the right way to do email marketing?

• Great plan

• Great design

• Great copy

• Great distribution list

• Great frequency

• Great follow up

• Great measurement

What are the components of great email marketing?

• It’s set goals for your overall investment

• It’s sets goals for each individual email

• It shows how you will measure your results

What is a great email marketing plan?

• It uses every email as a great brand touchpoint

• It makes your emails flexible to your needs

• It takes on the same look and feel each time

• It works with images or without

What is a great email marketing design?

Let’s critique:

Let’s critique:

Let’s critique:

• It engages the reader

•It includes just enough to peak their interest in wanting to know more

•It incites action in the reader

•It pays attention to details like subject lines, subheadings and hyperlinks

What is great email marketing copy?

•It starts with people who want your email

•It’s actively growing with everyone you come in contact with

•It is segmented based upon details, demographics and analytics

What is a great email marketing list?

•It’s based on how often your audience wants to hear from you, not how often you want to speak to them

•It recognizes when the best time to reach your audience is

What is great email marketing frequency?

•It is based upon their actions, not yours

•It is timely and appropriate

What is great email marketing follow up?

What is great email marketing measurement?

• It pays attention to opens, clicks, forwards, unsubscribes

•It renders a conclusion and action based on their action (or lack of)

•It is consistent

•It is “measurable”

Break

• Setting our goals• Setting up our account in the email system• Creating our distribution list• Creating email template• Creating landing pages• Writing copy (subject lines, spam filters, testing)• Sending email (best days / times)• Reporting / list segmentation• Follow up• Calculating return on investment

In-depth Example

• Example 1: Develop a long-term relationship with readers

1. Increase open rates by 10% and click-throughs by 25% in three months.

2. Reduce unsubscribe rates by 50% over six months. Increase instances of "send-to-a-friend" by 5 per email.

Step #1: Setting our Goals

• Example 2: Increase sales through up-sell and cross-selling

1. Push email-driven sales up 5% in the next email.

2. Move 3 readers along to the next stage in your sales cycle.

Step #1: Setting our Goals

• Example 3: Increase event participation

1. Increase event attendance at your next event by 50 people.

Step #1: Setting our Goals

• Helpful Tip -

Write your goals down and include them in each performance report

Step #1: Setting our Goals

• What tool should I use?

Step #2: Setting up our account

•Create a subscribe form for your website

Step #2: Setting up our account

• The technical talk – do you speak geek? • Domain keys and Sender Ids

Step #2: Setting up our account

Step #3: Creating our distribution list

• You can use all those business cards, right?

Step #3: Creating our distribution list

• Let’s understand what Spam is first

Spam: any email you send to someone who hasn't given you their direct permission to contact them on the topic of the email.

Step #3: Creating our distribution list

• You can use all those business cards, right?

• You need more than just a business card!

Step #3: Creating our distribution list

• You need permission• They opted in via your web site

• They completed an offline form and indicated they wanted to be emailed

• They gave you their business card and you explained you would be sending them commercial email

• They purchased something off you in the last 2 years

Step #3: Creating our distribution list

• What isn’t permission?• You obtained the email addresses from a third

party

• You have access to this list as a member of an organization or club

• You scraped or "copy and pasted" the addresses from the Internet

• You haven't emailed that address for more than 2 years

Step #3: Creating our distribution list

• Why should you be concerned• Spammers can be subject to penalties of up to

$16,000 for each separate incident

• Spamming will leave a negative mark on your brand

Step #3: Creating our distribution list

• So how do we build our list?• Ask your contacts/clients for permission

• Create registration forms on your website

• Add “Forward to a Friend” capabilities to your emails

• Your Brand / Identity

• The Audience

• Types of Content

Technical Aspects

• How the email renders on different email applications

• Use of images & alt tags

• Mobile phones and the need for text based emails

Step #4: Creating our template

• Be aware of the technical aspects. Do you know code?Technical Aspects

• How the email renders on different email applications

• Nearly 50% of people don’t have the “display images” setting enabled

• Most mobile phones only display text based emails

Step #4: Creating our template

• The Good

• The Bad

• And the Ugly

Step #4: Creating our template

• The Good

• The Bad

• And the Ugly

Step #4: Creating our template

• The Good

• The Bad

• And the Ugly

• over 50% of email clients have

images blocked

Step #4: Creating our template

• The Good

• The Bad

• And the Ugly

• over 50% of email clients have

images blocked

Step #4: Creating our template

• What is a Landing Page?The page your visitors see first when they click on an ad link or email promotion is crucial to the success of that ad or promotion.

Step #5: Creating our landing pages

• Why are Landing Pages important?You have 8 seconds to capture someone’s attention

•The confusion of arriving at a web page that doesn’t match the look and tone of the email can lead visitors to abandon the site

• To reinforce the call-to-action that generated the email recipient to click a link in the first place

Step #5: Creating our landing pages

Step #5: Creating our landing pages

• Conversion, conversion, conversion

• Tips on creating successful landing pages• Make the pages in-line with your overall Website design• Put a Signup Form on every page or Include a shopping cart• Don't skimp on graphics• Make sure your pages link to other pages on your main site

Step #5: Creating our landing pages

• Subject Lines• Subject lines have a huge impact on open rates

• Emails with subject lines shorter than 35 characters are opened more than emails with subject lines longer than 35 characters.

• Key words or special characters in the subject line can cause your email to be flagged as spam

Step #6: Creating our copy

• Headings• headings help guide the readers eye and segment the email

• think of a heading in a newspaper – attention grabbing

Step #6: Creating our copy

• Calls to Action• you sent them the email, make sure they know why

• give them a reason to click

Step #6: Creating our copy

• Dates & Times

• Open Rates & Click Rates

• Opens Rates = total emails opened as a percentage of the total sent

• Click Rates = total amount of recipients that clicked on a link as a percentage of the total sent

Step #7: Sending our email

• Dates & Times

• Open Rates

Varies by industry

•Ranges from 7.2% to 25%.

•Average is 12.52%

Step #7: Sending our email

• Dates & Times

• Open Rates• Impacted by date and time

Best Days to Send

• Sunday & Monday

Best Times to Send

• Varies based on audience. Test, test, test

• B2B usually 8am - 10am or 1pm – 3pm

• B2C usually morning or evening

Step #7: Sending our email

• Reporting and AnalyticsThe moment your campaign is sent you have access to a range of reports that show you exactly how your subscribers are interacting with it.

Step #8: Reporting & segmenting our list

• Reporting and Analytics• Use reports to understand how the recipient is interacting with your email.

• Measure clicks, opens, forwards, unsubscribes, bounces, spam.

• Us this information to better your future emails.

Step #8: Reporting & segmenting our list

• List SegmentationA segment is a subset of one of your existing subscriber lists. Simply speaking, it’s a group that can be defined by you, based on criteria such as: • If the subscriber clicked a link in a previous campaign• If the subscriber joined your list prior or a specific date• A match with any of your custom fields (eg. Subscriber lives in Berkeley)

Step #8: Reporting & segmenting our list

• List SegmentationAdditional reasons to segment: • Sending introductory offers to, or asking for feedback from

new subscribers• Re-awakening subscribers that have not responded to your

last few campaigns• Limiting your subscriber list when sending a campaign to

subscribers who responded to a previous campaign• Testing a new subject line or call-to-action on subscribers

who did not respond to a previous campaign• Sending nice notes to subscribers on their birthday

Step #8: Reporting & segmenting our list

•In 2009, email marketing generated an average return on investment of $43.62 for every $1 spent. Direct Marketing Association (Oct. 2009)

Step #9: Calculating our return on investment

• So…how do you calculate your ROI?Key Performance Indicators to Consider

•# of responders

•# of buyers

•revenue generated from email buyers

•profit generate from email buyers

•cost per responder

•cost per email buyer

Step #9: Calculating our return on investment

Thanks for attending.

Contact Three Hats Marketing to learn how we can help you with email marketing. www.3HatsMarketing.com