The Email Wars

I am not going to go on a rant on adding a share this, follow me, digg this, or another technology to your email programs in order to drive cross channel adoption of your email strategy. What I want to do is show you how others are using email as the delivery vehicle to drive adoption.

We are “jumping the shark” on things used as more clutter in email to try to move email past the inbox. Now I am not against these other mediums, heck I use them all as well, but what I am against is the Nascar like efforts to add more things to do in email.

Instead of rushing to add the next new thing to your email marketing programs, take a step back. Look at your audience and see if adding these things are valuable to your subscribers. Are you trying to just add a feature for the sake of staying up with the comp? You need to make sure that they will work for you before you go system wide with implementation.

Look at taking small groups of people from your lists and test some ideas. I have actually looked at taking these people and looking across social media and community systems to see if they actually exist with profiles or accounts in these locations. You are not going to be the driver of new technology adoption, you are going to be the one to leverage existing places that they might “live”.

Let’s move away form the Nascar badging stategey of more and more and think clearly about the How and Why. You will find that your subscribers will thank you and your efforts will work better. You need to have a goal and just adding “social” features will not be an means to the end.