The Email Wars

I am going to need to get one of these in the next week or so for “R and D” purposes. At least that is what I am going to tell people.

Visto will let business e-mail reach the iPhone

Visto announced Thursday that its push e-mail software will support the iPhone, giving gadgetheads a round of ammunition for the upcoming battle with their IT department.

Apple isn’t pitching the iPhone as a business device, but lots of executives with money to burn on sexy gadgets might try to find a way to use their new toys for business purposes. The iPhone supports the MAP e-mail standard with SSL encryption, which means it is feasible to connect an iPhone to any mail server using IMAP. However, this isn’t the most secure way of connecting to a corporate network and is therefore likely to be met with blank stares from the IT guy when you ask to have your snazzy new iPhone set up with corporate e-mail.

But if your company is using Visto’s software to send e-mail to mobile devices, you’ll be all set, said Haniff Somani, vice president and chief architect for Visto. You won’t have to enter a username or password to access your e-mail, and the IT guys won’t have to make any changes to their policies regarding mobile devices, he said.

The problem is Visto is not that big in the U.S., where the iPhone goes on sale tomorrow. Visto has a larger customer base in Europe, but the iPhone is not expected to arrive there until later this year. Research In Motion, king of the push e-mail world, has yet to indicate if it will support the iPhone.

Read Article

This is an interesting take on the law. But it has merit. If you think about it.. if you have an image only based email and your images are suppressed, well then your image link to opt out will be as well. A little gray area here on all the ways that they could unsub, but if it is all images and suppressed, technically it could be a one way ticket to the gray bar hotel.

From Ken Magill

Marketers who send e-mails using “click here” buttons instead of text for opt-out links risk breaking federal law, said e-mail expert Jay Schwedelson during a presentation at the Direct Marketing Days New York Conference last week.
The federal Can Spam Act requires marketing e-mails to include an opt-out mechanism and a return address.

However, images are blocked by default in 59% of consumer e-mail and 69% of work e-mail. As a result, if the opt-out link is presented as a graphic, it won’t appear to many users.

“When an image comes up broken and [as a result] there’s no ability for someone to remove themselves, and there’s no physical address of the sender, the marketer is no longer in compliance with Can Spam,” said Schwedelson, corporate vice president for list firm Worldata.

Coincidentally, Magilla Marketing recently learned of a consumer who reported a marketer to the authorities over just such a mistake.

Read The Article

Some of our competitors in the email marketing space claim to be rockstars, others claim to make you a rockstar. Well we are Rockstars and one a trophy last night to prove it.

Well last night we had to perform in the First Annual Portland Advertising Federation Battle of the Bands. The theme was ButtRock. So some it may be “buttrock” but to us it is lyrical works of beauty. The team assembled an in house all eROI band and got the set list and costumes together.

1. Breaking The Law - Judas Preist
2. Big Bottom - Spinal Tap
3. Home Sweet Home - Motley Crue

We played last of 8 and brought down the house, even against Avenue A Razorfish/Microsoft ….. in a vote by the audience.

Video was shot and we are currently editing it. Should make you proud to know you read this blog today… as you hang with Winners.

See More Photos after the jump >>

(more…)

I know that we are jumping on the ReturnPath boat. It might just be the ticket of all tickets. We are going to spend some time digging into this to learn more and I suggest you do as well.

From Ken Magilla
Images and links are now on by default in Windows Live Hotmail for messages from organizations subscribing to Return Path’s Sender Score Certified service, the deliverability concern announced today.

Though images and links have been turned off by default in Windows Live Hotmail—the newest version of Microsoft’s free e-mail service—they have been turned on for Sender Score Certified mailers for several months, said George Bilbrey, general manager of Sender Score, Return Path’s delivery assurance unit.

“When they released Windows Live Hotmail, they released it with this functionality built in,” he said. “It’s just to the point where now we’ve tested enough to make sure it works all the time.

Read Ken’s Article

With so many spoofing emails out there from eBay, Amazon, National City, Amex, Hallmark, etc, what effect does domain blocking have on a brand?

I have not seen any conclusive studies or tests about this issue, but it is on my mind lately as I see so many scams out there. Even ones we get spoofing our domains. We know that they are not legitimate, but if this is happening to people you might email or that are already on your lists and they decide to block junk by the domain… it just might impact your campaigns.

Does anyone have any stats or insight on this? Or should I just not worry about it?

I had a call with an agency client last week after submitting their creative through ReturnPath Preview Pane testing. To me it shows why I want to design things so that they have the highest chance of working in any situation. Others seem to doubt the importance of designing emails so that the recipient has the highest possible chance to see what is of value to them and tell them in the first glance what you want them to do. I drink the preview pane Kool Aid.

Here are some stats from www.emailstatcenter.com/Creative.html

26.6% of online customers use preview panes (instead of look at your whole email). - MarketingSherpa (2007)

64% of people who are offered preview panes start using them as their default. - MarketingSherpa (2007)

69% of at-work email users usually view emails in their preview panes. -
MarketingSherpa (2007)

80% of at-work users in the US rely on Outlook, which offers preview panes. - MarketingSherpa (2007)

38% of online consumers now use preview pane ‘capable’ email clients. -
MarketingSherpa (2007)

Now do stats like these tell you not to care? I don’t think so. So if you aren’t using ReturnPath testing like we do for all of our creative for client projects, you need to at least set up multiple email accounts to do this before you send. But then again, do you have the time to do this? I know I don’t. Chalk up another reason I heart ReturnPath for giving me back a few hours a week of my life.

We were very excited to work with HBO/Cinemax on a new project for Sin City Diaries that started it’s inaugural run this month. Our partner KickApps brought us to the table to execute a campaign for this new series with just a few weeks to go. We delivered on time and I think, with a stellar social media site.

We have set it up to be it’s own niche social media and contest site and traffic is already climbing daily. We hope to draw some more visibility and viewers into this new series.

Have a look if you need a little Sin today.

Well we are very excited to end up 15th in the top 100 companies in the State of Oregon for Fastest Growing. I can only say thank you to all of the companies and people that have believed in us and honored us by allowing us to be their emarketing partners.

And of course a big hats off to the whole eROI team for the amount of work, drive and love they bring to the table each and every day (and many late nights).

View Large Image

Ending the week on a high note and excited to crack the Top 10 next year for this award category. Who know what else might be on the horizon for us and our clients.

Thanks to everyone and come to the party July 20th at the eROI offices if you are in Portland, Oregon. We can celebrate together then. Until then… back to great ideas, great work, great partners/clients and the best team.

View Large Image

I just about made the front desk receptionist drop her coffee and the guy 6 stories up welding re-bar across the street fall when this landed in my inbox this AM. I mean this might be the best and worst study I have ever read.

Let’s start with the article title: DM Mail More Likely to be Opened Than Unsolicited EMail, no #$%^$. And guys.. check the EEC but last I saw Email was email all one word and lowercase. Not TWO capital letters. Can you honestly tell me that it is okay to spam my home, real world mail box and I MIGHT open it as compared to my email inbox.

Hell, are you kidding me with this article? You are telling me ” HEY send the hell out of the junk mail to someones house, cut down a few more swaths of trees, add to the landfills, add to the footprint it takes on the environment to produce this stuff that odds have it won’t get opened. But if we send enough misleading on jacket prints there is a chance….”

And then this quote made me not only gag, but think about forwarding ALL my print junk to Pitney Bowles (Bowels). “The research… shows that consumers still prefer mail over e-mail… we continue to find that mail is the most effective marketing tool businesses can use when communicating with their customers.”

Are they just trying to prop up their industry with this study? I believe in DM with EM as a winning combination but I find this study to be crap. (I feel a little like Bill McCloskey right now… sorry Bill)

A recent survey by International Communications Research, commissioned by Pitney Bowes found that 73 percent of consumers prefer mail for receiving new product announcements or offers from companies they do business with, as compared to 18 percent for e-mail. Mail was also preferred by 70 percent of respondents for receiving unsolicited information on products and services from companies with which they are not currently doing business.

Read more of this garbage

Ken Magill reports on the new legislation passed in NJ. I wonder if we will see more state centric laws this year. I know from the others that have been passed they have not been as powerful as Can Spam to date. I love the idea, but I think all it does it give a better legal right to sue and not combat the issues.

The New Jersey Senate yesterday approved a bill its sponsors claim expands the federal Can-Spam Act.

Dubbed the New Jersey Can Spam Act, or S-1129, the bill would establish criminal and civil penalties for activities typically involved in spamming.

The bill would prohibit using a computer located in New Jersey to relay or transmit multiple commercial spam messages to mislead recipients or service providers about their origin. It would also ban registering for multiple e-mail addresses or domain names with false information to transmit spam and accessing another computer without authorization and using it to transmit multiple spam e-mails.

Read More

One of our clients we have worked with for about 4 years has just launched the Men’s Only version of daily candy. The site went up a few days ago and the first editions per city should be rolling out soon.

Similar in the idea of Daily Candy, Ideal Bite and some others in the space. We have even seen local markets like ours start Portland Picks, which is geared towards women. I also had a conversation with a start up out of Colorado this week which is looking to start up a daily (5 days a week) health and fitness email with tips, ideas and more.

Many of these sites/blogs/dailies reach subscriber numbers from 15K to over 500K from what I have personally seen.

I have seen many of these grow fast and actually charge close to 5K for a daily ad in the email and up to 18K for a stand alone focused email just around their product. Interesting ideas and so many opportunities. I just wonder what the opt in vs opt out rate is on these as personally I have removed myself from dailies and gone to weeklies with my inbox already so full.

Give Daily Scotch a taste.

iMediaConnection had a good article written by Clint Smith of MyEmma today on Blackberry and mobile device rules. Some good best practices in the article, but the number one thing is GIVE YOUR TEXT VERSION SOME LOVE.

So often I see people just go with the auto generated Text version of an email and they do not take time to review and reformat the text version. Yeah I do, but this is my job. I detest getting an email on my blackberry that is HTML garbage or has more space from the top down that you have to scroll 2-3 times to get to the meat. Give me the content and make it work.

Four tips for designing handheld-friendly emails that deliver their message on any screen or device.

So you’ve pretty much got this email newsletter thing down. Design looks great. Copy is crisp. Flow is, well, flowing. Inboxes everywhere are going to love what you’re about to send their way. And your finger is hovering over the send button until someone — probably that pimply intern Nick you never liked in the first place — chimes in with, “So, how’s this gonna look on my BlackBerry?”

And there it is, the question most senders hope doesn’t get asked. But the mobile device crowd, while still a fairly small slice of the overall email viewing audience, is growing. Use of BlackBerrys and similar devices continues to rise, and research by the NPD Group shows that as of last September, 6 percent of people viewed their email on mobile phones, up from 3 percent just six months earlier.

So while there’s no need to rework your entire email strategy around mobiles, it is time to make sure you include them in your design and testing mix. And a few small adjustments will probably do the trick. Here are a few ideas to get you started:

Keep Reading at iMedia Connection –>

If you are in the Portland area July 19th, you should make a point of registering for the Internet Strategy Forum. We have been working with them since the start and the line up of speakers is amazing this year. Robert Scoble just confirmed this week I learned and with this line up it is going to be the event of the year for e-marketers in the Pacific Northwest.

The Internet Strategy Forum’s Executive Summit conference returns on July 19th (with an optional symposium on July 20th) and is open to all. We have confirmed a great line-up of presenters and panelists:

Cammie Dunaway, Chief Marketing Officer, Yahoo!, Inc.
Tim Kopp, Chief Marketing Officer, WebTrends
Mark Colombo, VP Electronic Channels and Strategic Marketing, FedEx
Rey Ramsey, CEO, One Economy Corp.
Erik Kokkonen, VP, Global Publishing Services, CNET
Mike Moran, Distinguished Engineer, IBM, author of “Search Engine Marketing, Inc.”
Bryan Rhoads, Sr. Internet Strategist, Social Media, Intel
Mark Erickson, Sr. Computer Scientist, Adobe
Mary Alice Colvin, Senior Marketing Consultant, Allyis

There are less than 100 spots left, so don’t delay and get registered.

I wanted to take a moment to plug an upcoming show of the Portland Advertising Federation, which is actually in the new building we are currently building out and should be in towards November 2007. (June 26, 2007 / 7:00 PM / at Someday Lounge ) This type of event has been big in other cities and we are excited to hold one here in Portland for all the ad agencies to participate in. Not only will it ROCK but eROI is fielding a band of employees. They are hard at work selecting just the right set of Butt Rock to blast out and will be taking some extra hours to get it right. It helps that we already have a Fridays at 4 event each week in the sales area where some tunes are selected and then hacked up into little irrelevant bits based on employees life stories.

View Large Image

Here is my favorite part. The Band had to have a name. e.R.O.I. aka Evil Rock Overlords Inc. If you can imagine it in a 1980s gothic font on the front of my stained t-shirt then there you go. I will be posting video from the show.

So if you are in the Portland area around this time, come and let us rock you. June 26, 2007 / 7:00 PM / at Someday Lounge

Now I can’t tell you when I opted in for email newsletter from MySpace, as this is the first one I have ever seen, but it must have been from some campaign profile pages we built for some clients a long time back.

I hate MySpace, not for the idea of it, but for how ugly the whole damn site is. It reminds me in a scary way of my teenage bedroom where I had covered every wall and spec of ceiling with any scrap of magazine or random thing I found. (I understand now why mom was so happy for me to leave and head to college so she could reclaim that part of her house for the Queen.)

View Large Image

But this email is solid. It is well designed, built and rendered. I had a hard time saying no to it when it arrived today. This is how email should be done when you have so much information to communicate. So hats off to you MySpace for getting it right.

The color blocks were clean and called me into the spaces with just enough text to let me know what it was about and why I would want to learn more. The width was dead on and all the actions drove my eye through the email in the path I would love to emulate.

Look for emails in your inbox that inspire you and if you have not opted in for about everything under the sun online, you might just miss a great campaign.