The Email Wars

As a loyal FedEx shipper, I am always happy to see when they associate a personal win with a campaign and attach a brand that has equal (if not more) brand weight. As a business shipper you are going to continue to use them for your company, but when a time based and personal gain (like the Starbucks gift card) makes you think… what can I ship between now and then? I would be interested to know if they used different values for certain shipper types. The $7 offer stood out because it was a unique value offer instead of what I would consider in 5 or 10 dollar variations.

When using a promotion to increase your own sales goals, you need to consider the value of the offer, if it is an offer for your product or service or if you bundle it with a strong or stronger brand, and does that margin of cost (think about the personal fulfullment time of the card and shipping) keep your margins intact.

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We believe in the strong co-existence of email and RSS. It is not one or the other, but giving people choices can help to get your campaigns integrated into other places that your subscribers might visit on non campaign days. We built in RSS into the emailROI system about 2 years ago and have seen the increased interaction with the messags on a daily basis. These interactions are pull interactions when we might not be targeting the subscriber on any given campagin.

Marriot added the RSS to the top right of their emails a little while ago anc they continue to leverage that spot in the weekly emails. It shows a commitment to the idea and how they work together. If you have not tested this yourself, you might look at this in 2007 planning.

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If you are not using any email client rendering software or services (like ReturnPath) it is often hard to know how the creative is going to present itself once it reaches the inbox. What I always appreciate about the JCrew emails is that they are simple (maninly text to promote an event) and the entire creative is driven with one large link to the appropriate page. Saves me from needing to find out if there is more hidden at the bottom of my preview window where I might miss it. Now you might not be in a postion to drive each email to only one place, but they do a great job with understanding if it is a business goal, give them the offer right where you can act on it and drive them to the right page. The past thing I ever want is to get to a site and then need to dig in further to find the offer.

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As a subscriber to many print magazines (yes print is not dead, just changing) I found these two examples of how I was being targeted. I found the Esquire creative to be well done and actually targeted to my preferences. The Details one was off the mark 100% as it was targeting smokers. You would think that if you were going to use a list for 3rd party emails, you might want to know preferences like, Do You Smoke? Not that it is a horrible use of email, but not on target and some people that deplore smoking might have a negative brand experience. Just thoughts for how you should know the audience before you send out irrelevant offers to your list that might not be a good reflection on your brand.

Details 3rd party:

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Esquire Invite:

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I found that I was subscribed to a list I was unsure of since it was using an email address I used 4 plus years ago. I saw little value in it, so removed myself from the list. After an easy one click action, I found the below screen. What I liked about it was that it was selling the value of this service even after the opt out. Instead of just a simple Thanks screen, they positioned the value of people that use it with a little solver tool below the message. Nice touch, did not save me this time, but I liked it.

It is a good example of creating value even when someone is leaving. Like “Thanks, and we will be here for you when you need us to be of value.”

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So I am a shopper. People at the office will tell you that if you ask, but what compelled me to blog this was that the emails I get from Buy.com have always facinated me. They switch up Text and HTML often in emails to me, even when they have preferences for me set as HTML. Are they testing me? I have bought before, but I KNOW that it was from an HTML email and not a TEXT one.

The point of this, the thought direction I began in at least, was they they seem to email me with an odd frequency and I have lately become uninterested (too bad as the holidays are coming up). So I decided to opt out of this email. When I took the action, using the unsub link of course, I got the below page allowing me to change my frequency. That saved me as a subssriber of thiers. I was actually happy that they provided me a chance to stay on and control my frequency. Use this as a lesson for your own campaigns. Give people a choice (maybe not as many as they did) and you might just keep a valuable subscriber. Cheers Buy.com.

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Now I can tell you of all the emails I get each day, one of the top I look forward to is MarketingVox. It is clean, simple, timely and well designed to allow me to scan, act and move on. There is something daily that drives me to WANT it. You should too if you want to stay up on events.

But the other AM I saw the first OOPS. I was okay with it, as we all see challenges from time to time with our campaigns. But I had to cover it. Sorry guys. I am only doing it to illustrate a mistake and how to be careful before you drop. I am not sure what caused it, but after it was corrected I got another mistake and then the edition 2 more times. All within an hours time. I wonder if anyone unsubscribed due to this, or everyone gave them the slack we all deserve?

Here is what I got.

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Then this one a little while later

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I have had an MSN Account since 1995. Eleven years now and it is amazing to see that the new version is really quite an improvement. I have yet to see ads served along side the emails, but I am waiting for that day as they try to catch up with Yahoo and Google with Ads served based on content. What has been striking me as a good move on MS lately is the use of conditioning the user to ads, even if they are for internal education and products. Of course I installed MSN Mobile, GMail and Yahoo Mobile on my blackberry the AM they came out, but I really have yet to be blown away by many of them. They work, but they render totally different than we are used to in the inbox on desktop clients.

In the end, hats off to MSN for using the space to educate and not slam with more contextual based ads… for now.

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We spent a years time evaluating different Email Deliverability Service Providers and in the end decided to go with Return Path. What really set them apart in our book was the level and detail to service that we need from a partner. The Tools, by the way, blow my mind. I am in there every day multiple times using the rendering, ISP IP testing, Deliverability testing and more. It is going to take me a few weeks to be excellent with it, but the entire company at eROI has access and LOVES it. It has helped us test new client campaigns, evaluate new clients for issues they might have as well as ones that they might pose to our email marketing reputation.

Our clients have thus far been in awe of it as well. We have used it to solve internal deliverability issues at major and minor corporations that before took days, now in hours or less.

I am excited to see the new tools that they are releasing in the coming months. Great product, and great team.

If you are a current or future emailROI or eROI customer, make sure to request from the team an email delivery audit from us. You will love the results and it will help you shape your campaigns for 2007.

A REPORT by anti-junk mail outfit Spamhaus reveals that 80 per cent of the garbage we get in our inboxes comes from just 10 people.

It seems they’re based all over the shop - in Ukraine, Russia, the USA, Israel, Hong Kong and Canada.

What I want to know is, if it’s known who they are, why can’t the CIA or Mossad just kill them? And no, I’m not joking. These guys are killing the reputation and experience of the legitimate email markters. Everything I read lately is talking about the huge increase in the inbox to everyone. I personally wake to 100s in my inbox and really need to see something done.

See the Top 10 List and also take a look at the Top 10 ISPs

I have been watching my Gmail Inbox on my Blackberry since my last post to try to find things that are “A-HA!” moments. Here are a few early finds:

Images: Forget about them. You better have a text version of your email and be sending as mulitpart or you will end up sending a completely blank message.

Links hidden as words: If you are creating links with words over the top (hyperlinks) the links will not display. I have sent few tests on this and you actually need to have the full URL set to display. (like www.eroi.com)

Column formated emails will not render and parts will go missing: If you have a two or three column email layout, only the main body will display. Any other segmented areas will not resolve in the phone client. So make sure you focus on the body for your actions and links.

There is a SPAM button: At least on my Blackberry when you use the scroll wheel to select or delete messages, you get another link called Report Spam. So mobile users can make a spam complaint. Which I would expect, BUT what if I you mistakenly hit it? I have not had any to report but I am curious to see how this works.

More to come soon: Like Where are My Folders? Where is the JUNK mail? Where are the ads (you know that they are coming if you heard Google’s CEO announce that cell phones should be free and ad supported)

And I thought it all went to TV and Radio this year. It felt like it to me as I cannot remember getting more than 10 total emails on the 2006 elections this season. Maybe they lost hope in me last time around. I don’t blame them. Did you get some that you saved or stood out? Share them with us.

A report by research firm PQ Media on political media spending claims that email accounts for 80 percent of the $40 million spent online by political advertisers leading up to this year’s midterm elections, ClickZ reports. The shift can be explained by a need for candidates to focus more on geotargeting during the midterm, whereas during a national election advertisers can move more toward mainstream political websites.

Read the Article on MarketingVOX

I came across this blog post from OpenSourceCU and found it very interesting how this process went. Basically they had unsubscribed and in turn the message was such a negative brand experience that it drove frustration. Think carefully how you approach this and think more about how you can postion it to come back when they are ready OR thank them for being a subscriber OR best yet, give them options to adjust their email preferences or subscribe by RSS.

Earlier this week, I got an email from CU Times. (I didn’t even remember what was being sold until I dug through my trash to grab this screenshot. But I didn’t forget the sender’s identity.)

So I clicked on the unsubscribe link as soon as I got the piece of spam, thinking I could spare my inbox from similar sales attempts. Instead I was led through a process I understood as: either you continue to receive spam or you can’t subscribe to our online publication at all. (If only all decisions were this easy!)

Here’s part of the confirmation email I received:

Goodbye from our Newsletter, sorry to see you go.

You have been unsubscribed from our newsletters.

This is the last email you will receive from us. We have added you to our “blacklist”, which means that our newsletter system will refuse to send you any other email, without manual intervention by our administrator.

Blacklisted? Since you left us once, don’t come back again?

I came across a book, yes I read print just as much as I read the web. Try it sometime if it has been a while. It makes for a nice change or your mind glowing instead of the screen glowing. The book is called Strategic Database Marketing. Now how could I pass that one up on the Borders bookshelf? It was straight to the point and could not have been made any clearer. Well this book (more like my new email marketing bible) is one worth the read. It is not an inexpensive book by any means, but it is thick enough to cover everything in detail and if need be stop your car from rolling down a hill when placed behind the rear wheel.

I suggest you take a peak at it the next time you pass a store, walk in and flip through. Or learn more about it here.

RetailEmail Blog has released a new study about the send to a friend (STAF) practices of major retailers. Some of the key findings include that only 44% of retailers use STAF in their regular emails, and that many of those that do use STAF are using practices that diminish its effectiveness, such as requiring too much information and not paying enough lip service to privacy on both ends of the process. We also found that many retailers squandered the opportunity that STAF gives them to sign up the recipient of the forward, with only 44% of retailers including a newsletter subscribe link at the top of the forwarded email.

Read the Study