everything you wanted to know about email marketing silverpop
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Almost Everything You Wanted to Know About Email Marketing
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You have email marketing questions. So do we.
We also have some answers. Lots of them.
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How to use this document:
1. Browse from the start; or2. Go to a specific section of interest.
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Permission
Permission is the foundation.
You are correct. The U.S. CAN-SPAM Act
does not require permission to email.
See number 1.
Permission IS required by law in the EU, Australia,
New Zealand, Korea, Canada.
The theory that relevance trumps permission is just
that – a theory.
Recipients will punish you hard with SPAM
complaints if you don’t have permission.
Recipients will still punish you with SPAM complaints
if they don’t remember giving you permission.
ISPs tell you to gain permission. They monitor/block by engagement and
complaints.
Single, Double or Confirmed
Opt-in?
Yes. Any approach will do.
Single opt-in = higher completion rate; lower
quality.
The vast majority of companies use the single
opt-in method.
Double Opt-in = An extra step, fewer opt-ins.
Use Double Opt-in when you use aggressive
acquisition methods.
Confirmed Opt-in sends an email notifying the
new subscriber they’ve opted in – and to
unsubscribe if in error.
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List Rental/Buying
Simple really. Don’t EVER buy email lists.
List rental? Work with a list broker
with a stellar reputation.
Yes, there’s a difference in the meaning of the
words “buy” and “rent.” Learn the difference.
Buy = someone sells you a list that you send.
DON’T DO IT! You are a spammer.
Rent = a third-party sends your email to people that
have given permission. You must then convince them to
opt-in to your program.
Don’t expect huge growth from list rental.
Focus on deeply qualified leads that will drive a
higher percentage of opt-ins.
Map your offering to the original reason for opt-in. Contest entrants probably
don’t buy $200K timeshares.
Never risk your primary sending IP address with
outside names.
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Welcome Emails
Use a Welcome Email. Better yet, a Welcome
Series.
Better yet – an onboarding program.
No welcome email? Then you are leaving to chance
the new subscriber experience.
Explain your value. Link to preferences. Provide
an incentive.
Welcome emails help set expectations. Can solve
problems.
Ask progressive survey questions during the
Welcome Series to build your database.
Don’t lead with a coupon. Let full-price buyers act
first!
Classify new users into active and inactive, and try incenting inactives with a small discount.
Clearly outline your return, shipping and other key policies.
Ask for the first order in your final email of the
series.
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Deliverability
Email marketing is NOT Direct Email. ISPs are NOT
the same as the Post Office.
You the marketer are responsible for your email
deliverability – not your email service provider
(ESP).
Your ESP helps you with infrastructure and
strategies – but there is no magic bat phone to the
ISPs.
Permission is the foundation to high engagement, low complaint rates.
Even the best email marketers receive spam complaints. The key is to keep the complaint rate
LOW.
Why do I receive spam or abuse complaints?
Your recipients think you send too many emails; they are irrelevant; or they don’t remember
subscribing.
Most ISPs will block/filter your emails if you receive more than 3 complaints
out of 1,000 they receive from you.
How do we reduce spam complaints then?
Don’t Hide the Unsubscribe Link. Make it
Easy to Unsubscribe.
Use a highly recognizable “from” name.
Use a consistent “from” name.
Don’t use spammy or potentially deceitful
subject lines.
Authenticate your emails. DKIM. SenderID.
Shared/Pooled or dedicated IP addresses?
Companies that send infrequently and low
volumes should probably be on a shared IP.
Like your toes in winter, your sending IP addresses
need to be ‘warmed’.
A tiny percentage of your messages will be
‘blackholed’ by ISPs.
Non-responders will slowly and silently kill
your deliverability stats. Manage them proactively.
Test deliverability statistics of each new
template using a deliverability monitoring
service.
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Opt-in Forms
Capture the data required to deliver relevant emails.
Move opt-in forms on the bottom of your home
page to the top/above the fold.
Do it now. We’ll wait. Oh, IT, Ecommerce, etc.
doesn’t want to give up that real estate?
Tell the roadblockers this: Companies that move their opt-in forms up typically see opt-in
conversions increase 50% to 500%!
Allow users to opt-in with existing social network
credentials, and capture that rich data!
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From and Subject Lines
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Yes, from or sender names matter? A lot. So
choose wisely.
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Use your most recognized and trusted brand name.
Don’t veer.
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Yes, use different sender names for different email
streams. But always incorporate your brand
name.
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Resist the urge to use a person’s name.
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But I see everybody doing that these days. Is that
your reason for doing it – everybody is?
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Do you know who John Doe is? I didn’t think so. So why use a person’s
name?
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Yes, there are exceptions. If the person’s name is
also a recognized brand in itself.
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Personal names are also okay if you're automating email streams on behalf
of a salesforce.
Subject lines can make a huge difference. But your brand/sender name is still the most important thing.
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Subject lines drive opens – AND clicks and
conversions.
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Short. Medium. Long. Any length subject line length
works.
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Research studies suggest that longer subject lines
outperform short and medium length.
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But, keep the key information within the first 40-50 characters.
“Free” Use it. It works. Look in your inbox if you
don’t believe us.
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Test subject lines all the time. It is the easiest
thing to test.
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‘From’ names are just as easy to test, but DON’T.
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Pay attention to automated SPAM scoring
tools.
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Creative
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Use personality and a real human’s voice WITHIN the
email body.
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Feature pictures of actual employees within the
emails.
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Related: Avoid cheesy stock photos of perfect people, shaking hands, lightbulbs, globes, etc.
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Use “alt” tags to provide context when images
don’t automatically load.
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Use “bulletproof buttons” – HTML text and tables behind you CTA image.
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Keep key customer actions in the same
location across templates.
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Show more than you tell.
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Designing Emails for Mobile
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Take a “mobile first” approach. Go ahead,
Google what that means…
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OK, so design your emails and landing pages to be
friendly for mobile devices. Period.
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Smartphones are everywhere, and people
have email in their pocket.
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The finger is the new mouse, just 40 pixels
wider.
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Don’t make a user side scroll or zoom to read
your content.
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How Do We Measure Success?
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Think in terms of “process” or
“operational” and “output” or “success”
metrics.
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Output/Success: Measures against goals
and objectives, i.e., conversion, revenue,
retention, cost savings.
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Process/Operational: Measures email tactics ,
i.e., opens, clicks, unsubscribes, spam
complaints.
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Except perhaps if you are a publisher.
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Open rates DON’T matter
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Are you crazy? People have to open their emails to click and take action.
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You are correct. But just because recipients open an email, doesn’t mean
they’ll take action.
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Opens and clicks are irrelevant, conversion
matters.
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Did more people buy or sign up for your event?
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Focus your email metrics on those that support
achieving key company objectives.
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Ever met someone that got a raise for increasing
open rates?
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I didn’t think so. Focus on: conversion; revenue;
engagement; cost savings. These things
matter.
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Metrics Benchmarks
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There are no average open rates. Industry
matters.
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Still want to know? OK. How does 23% sound?
Happy now?
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Go ahead, tell your boss you are “average.”
We’ll wait.
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Thought so. How’s that raise looking
again?
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There’s average, lower quartile and upper
quartile in each industry. Higher is better.
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Oh yeah, we have a benchmark report. You should grade yourself.
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The real metric: interaction.
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Frequency
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The best frequency is the one that delivers the best combination of revenue,
LCV and acceptable churn.
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The more behavior-based the content, the less you
need to worry about frequency.
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Ignore frequency controls for your most behavior-
driven emails.
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Manage frequency across ALL campaigns from your
brand. See it from the customer’s viewpoint.
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Test frequency. This is your only answer.
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Re-test frequency every 90 days to keep your
approach fresh.
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When to Send
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The best day to send email? Monday. Tuesday. Wednesday. Thursday.
Friday. Saturday. Sunday.
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Everybody has their own opinion…
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Send based on historical recipient open and click
times.
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Consider multiple time zones within a list.
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Weekends rock for some brands. Give it a try…
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Inactives / Reactivation
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Inactives are a HUGE problem for almost every
company.
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The average company can expect that between 30%-
50% of their email database is inactive.
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So how do you define an inactive subscriber?
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Inactives combine timeframe + email
activity + purchase/offline behavior.
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For example, no email opens and clicks or
purchases for 6 months.
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But every company must develop a definition that
makes sense for their business.
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Determine who your Inactives are. Then target
them differently.
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ISP algorithms are watching whether your recipients are opening
and clicking.
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Sending “we want you back” emails to inactives typically only activates up
a few percent.
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Proactively re-engage or purge inactives while adding new records to
maintain audience.
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Wanna drive your metrics through the roof? Kill inactives mercilessly.
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Reactivate via a 2-3 step program with escalating
offers. No action = purged record or, reduced
frequency.
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Tell the user you're taking them off the list, and give them a way to prevent it.
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Reactivation programs are not the answer. But
do them anyway.
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Preference Centers
Implement a world-class preference center.
Seriously. Implement a world-class preference
center.
Ask for what you need to segment, provide relevant
content.
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Empower new subscribers through choice.
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Step 1) Capture birth date. Step 2) Send Happy
Birthday emails.Step 3) Print Money.
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What’s the right number of form fields?
8
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Just kidding. Use common sense. Test It. Balance data needs with lower form completion rates.
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Be radical. Consider a database keyed on
something other than email.
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Use existing social credentials during sign
up.
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Let users control which communications they
receive and each one’s frequency.
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Support recipient choice, and know that some will opt-out of everything if
you act shady.
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Don’t force a full opt-out. Offer subscribers the
option to pause communications?
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Testing
Test. Test Again.Test everything.Test, test, test.
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But why? Because testing is the only real answer to all your darn questions.
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Where should I start?
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Most email marketers start with subject lines because of the ease of
testing.
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When testing, use your ultimate goal (revenue
and other conversions) to determine winners.
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What else can we test: pre-header text, layout, copy, personalization,
offers, buttons, timing – pretty much everything.
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Only conduct true A/B tests – random splits in
parallel.
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Test 10% of your list with each variant, then send the winner to the other
80%.
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Use A/B testing to prove or disprove pre-defined
assumptions.
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Don’t go crazy testing ‘from’ names. In that
case, consistency wins.
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Misc./Resources/Final Notes
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Stop saying (and thinking in terms of) ‘e-blast’.
ESPs are different. Find the one that is right for
YOU.
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Balance existing need with future plans, and
pick a vendor who works for both.
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Pay attention to 4-5 KPIs send-over-send, week-
over-week and year-over-year.
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Spend less time modifying lists in Excel, and more time building rules-driven programs.
There are no short cuts.
Don’t agree with these Slides?
Then Yes, it depends and test it.
Thank you!
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