The Email Wars

I know I have said it a million times in speeches, articles and in person but telling someone thanks is one of the best things that you can ever do for your email campaigns. Now I don’t mean just at the sign up, like “Thanks for signing up for OUR email newsletter” but really saying thank you and giving them something use, do or enjoy.

I wanted to point out a few recent favorite examples to give you a better idea of a retailer that is excelling at not only saying thank you but showing it as well.

Urban Outfitters not only gives you a straight forward and dead simple way to opt in, but they also make sure to ask more information about you after the opt in. Smart. Less road blocks more happy subscribers and list growth. Also while you are thanking them for signing up you are also more likely to get the next bits of info from them that are relevant while they are engaged. Knowing that mobile and TEXT is very important to their marketing mix as well as what their target demo uses frequently and is open too, asking for a mobile is a great idea here. Other great features they include is asking about your social network affiliation (who knows what’s next here) as well as your online Vs offline shopping.

But it does not end there. Really you ask. Well as a best practice it should not. It is where so many people fall down. The next steps are crucial to increasing engagement and driving revenue as well. They send out an immediate welcome and thanks email.

I want to call out 7 key things I noticed in this email.

1. The from line is NOT a donotreply OR norely@ email address. That is a fail. If you do it fix it. Email comes from people and should be able to be responded to, not from machines.

2. Mobile friendly and View in Browser is there, which is good, but the lack of real text preheaders is something to improve on.

3. BIG use of the primary messaging and font size to echo Thanks.

4. Immediate reward/awarding of content that they already have on the site of free downloads of music. BIG plus as it carries goodwill way past the first few weeks and into the ipod/car/work place/ parties and sharing with others.

5. Featuring the storytelling asset of the brand with driving them to engage with the blog and not the merchandise. Get them into the fold with a better feeling for the relationship and company and the sales will follow with increased understanding and exposure.

6. Presenting the locations of where they have commitment in social media is important. Giving options and providing paths to interaction in the ways that people want outside of the email channel gives you more touch points as well as helps if you lose people to unsubscribe behaviors. Keeping them in the social loop can gain you some ground when you lose it.

7. Telling them how to update their profile. It should ALWAYS be presented in a very clear way not only during the first few interactions but everytime you email. Early on you have an increased chance in gathering the information you need to shape better one to one communications. Make sure you don’t miss the opportunity.

THE UO Bonus.

So they got me in the door, gave me places to interact, thanked me, welcomed me and after my first purchase actually rewarded me and thanked me again. Almost immediately after my purchase they sent me this Thanks (love the messaging) and presented me with a discount. If this is not Pavlovian conditioning at it’s best than I don’t know what is.

Now not matter if you are selling services, software, consulting, news, songs, sweaters or sneakers you can model this type of program. Giving and saying thank you builds a relationship and while doing so the conditioning drives the behaviors. As a parent I might hammer on my kids to do the same in real life, but saying thank you and show appreciation goes miles.

Thanks for reading my post and as a way to say thanks here are 3 1 hour holiday party tracks that a 2 DJs on the eROI team put together that stand the test of time.