The Email Wars

As a massive fan of email subscription and preference centers when it comes to email marketing I think that I stumbled on to the Holy Grail of email opt in pages. I was both amazed at the depth of this WSJ email opt in page while at the same time floored at the complexity and breadth of what they had to present. I had no idea that they published so many different versions of daily, weekly and unique emails until I stumbled upon this one. Now after scanning and trying to decide what I really wanted to get I dove deeper into all of the levels of complexity they made public facing.

My hat is off to whomever is managing all of these and my hopes is that they are using a content management system that automates the production of all of these choices. I mean for those of you that publish just one or a few emails you can imagine how many Full Time Employees it would take to pull this off.

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Do you remember back to a time when we all learned to hate the pop up ad? They became both a massive issue with users and the media and at the same time a profit center for so many ad networks and those hocking anti pop up blockers. In the end the pop up lost that round… until the invention of the light box. Yes that cool function so many of us love as it brings functionality right to the top of the screen while not killing the overall site visit is the new pop up. But is seems we like it. And even more importantly it seems to really be working in conjunction with newsletter list growth.

We are not only seeing it with content publishers but more and more we are seeing it across marketing and brand sites. And all use cases I have seen are pointing to it working and not being hated as much as the browser take over ads that make you wait 5 seconds till an ad runs or allowing you to click past it. And why is this? Well this one I found from a recent link (as no matter what you think I am not a reader of AskMen.com) was a good example of why they are working.

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Sure we all know that Twitter is a great way to increase your reach and deliver valuable content in a real time manner to those that are addicted to it like I am (I would wager many of you are as well). But are you using it in the best possible way to grow your email marketing programs? I have seen an uptick in companies using it is pre-promote the release of a newsletter telling people to opt in before the latest edition gets sent. I have seen companies feeding special versions of their newsletter out using it as well. And if they are smart they are also using it to feed individual articles from their newsletters to this channel. But recently I saw Nordstrom using it to engage with people for targeted newsletter growth.

Some time back I saw them use it to promote a men’s newsletter through a simple tweet. Smart idea. Now I am not sure if they have some way to segment based on gender (as this would be great if someone could do this from a communications tool into their follower steam) but it did catch my eye and made me want to look further as an email marketer.

I had assumed that I was going to land on a general newsletter sign up page and need to select the right lists to be on. Well I was pleasantly surprised at the fact that they took me right to a unique landing opt in page JUST for that men’s newsletter. Nice work. Now even if they did not have the ability to gender target using Twitter, they do have more of that data now by the implementation of this gender specific newsletter opt in page. Now they know that these users are male. What would have made this even better would have been if they would have either used the Twitter OAuth system to login via Twitter and capture that Twitter handle as well as an email address. By doing this they could have added this data to their user profiles in order to look for patterns and ways in the future to interact better via Twitter OR the email.

But none the less it was a great promotion and a well thought out use of targeting and landing based on gender. It opens up many ideas in my mind about the types of user data that email marketers that are giddy about social media to think about using. I would even advance the idea of similar campaigns in Facebook and employing Facebook Connect to get the 36 data fields (email is now one as well) when creating an opt in form. I have been toying with this idea for a while now since the recent addition of email as one of the marketer accessible fields in the Facebook Connect API.

Thinking about this idea, do you think that you could push your teams to try something new with implementation of social connection tools? Worth a test I think.

Yes there is a little tongue in cheek here as I wanted to share with you the opt in process from Swell, an online clothing retailer. I have followed them for a while as they are a very frequent mailer. To me it feels like they send me an email 5 days a week, it may be less but that is my perception. Now is that too much? Not really as every email I get from them is uniquely designed and they present options that are typically relevant. Now I have only purchased from them a few times since opting in so I would not think that they have much merchandising or behavioral data on me besides the fact that I always read and often click. That might be enough for them to do a good job targeting OR it might be that I am in the target demo based on lifestyle and location. Either way they are doing a better job than some of their competitors in this retail space.

But to get back on track I wanted to share their opt in and welcome email as I thought it was well done. The opt in does a good job of presenting 3 variations of the emails I would receive by opting in. I am always thankful when I get to see some examples located around the opt in process. I feel that it is a good way to condition people to what to expect. Almost in a way of setting up the experience of when I see them in the inbox for the first time. Adding the birthdate to the form must be a legal requirement for them or even one that helps them to look at age data in targeting. Heck we will see in about a month if they have a birthday campaign as well.

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It was great not only to see one of our clients doing a whiz-bang job on their welcome messages but also on the feedback that the subscriber sent in. When was the last time that you were delighting people with your welcome messaging in a way that made them take the time to write a response? I think you should make this a goal to achieve this year.

Over and over I tell people about the importance of Welcome and Thank You messages when people opt in to a newsletter, make an information request, sign up for a webinar or any other first touch point. It really does set the tone, make an impact and build a path for your email marketing. Take a moment to review your own emails and see if there are things you can do to uplevel your programs. And if you are still missing a Welcome or Thank You email I would work hard to get one in place. First impressions are hard to make twice.

Example of this email after the jump

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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.

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Any good relationship needs a foundation that can be built upon. Here are some elements that will help you build a strong email program.

Trust
What will you do with the information you collect from me? Will you protect it and make sure that it will only be used how I have asked it to be used? Will you make sure to honor it even when you think that a “blast” is ordered down from the C-Level? Your job is to take an oath to make sure that the information shared is clearly identified from opt in and presented in a clear manner that builds trust.

Clarity
What am I giving you my information for? Is it a contest? Newsletter? Purchase? What will you send me in the future? What can I expect from you in my inbox? A good program will clearly present the uses of contact, communication and the premise of the relationship. It is your job to honor that and keep your word.
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When it comes to relationships, is your goal to continually hunt for new ones, or to make the ones you have into long term commitments?

Most marketers are caught in the eternal struggle to gain more opt in records, having no plan on how what happens next aside from “let’s email them.” Marketing, not just email marketing, needs to have a plan for how to grow relationships once they have started. If you can think about next week / next month / next year, you can nurture healthy relationships and get out of the grow-my-list game.

One of the challenges I continue to see is most interactive marketers not beginning the thought process around where their relationships are going. They live in the now and rarely think about one month, let alone one year, from now. The better you are at listening, reviewing and making plans, the better health your relationships will be in the long term.

Prospects enter into new relationships online with the hope that they will get, clearly communicated to them, something valuable and beneficial. We can use a real life relationship metaphor to talk about this, as it sometimes places it into an easier to understand flow for most.

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Why would you want to build a contact management preference center for your website? You already have lead capture in place. You are getting 2-5 data points besides email address for every prospect. For your newsletter opt-in forms, you are getting the necessary subscriber email address. This is all good right? You have what you need to start communicating with people, according to your marketing plan. When someone above you says drop another email on the list and drive some sales, you are all ready to lock and load. Your messages simply drop the payload on everyone on your list in hopes that a good percentage of them are interested in something you have to say or sell. “Spray and Pray.” Perfect plan, right?… you have done your job.

Or have you?

If you are the one in charge of email marketing efforts for your company and this is how you approach email marketing, then maybe it is time you start thinking about how you are going to start getting tactical for the holiday season and beyond.

Why a preference center?

Besides simply their email address that you already have in your database, what information would be more important for you to know about someone in order to have a relevant discussion?

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Being a subscriber to the Daily Beast – fun daily email if you have not seen it – I noticed some odd things on the home page of the site that I wanted to take a few minutes to share. These things were multiple opt in forms to sign up for the newsletter on the home page. Now at first glance I had a hard time finding them, yet notice I had not scrolled down yet, but once I saw them another thing popped into view. Two different types of newsletter opt in form. One being the long – give me everything about you – and the second being the just the email please. It got me wondering if this was a test of the form length on the page or just a tactic as the daily email is a primary driver of traffic to sites like this where daily news is the driver of opt in.

The first in the top right hand corner of the site asks for 9 fields, some check boxes and some opt in frequencies. It also allows you the ability to create a user ID and password for the site. I was not sure exactly why I needed a U/P but maybe it is to comment and interact. Odd for a news site to require this instead of just using comment forms. The other strange thing to me was that ALL fields were required to sign up for the newsletter in this form (in small type at the top) yet there were not any required indicators next to the fields. Little bit of a disconnect to me if someone misses it and I am requiring it for opt in.

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In light of all the dialogue that is going around the web, email blogs, twitter, and the broadcast news (video here) about the use of email marketing to promote the healthcare agenda I wanted to share some of my thoughts with you on it. Now this is not a post pro or con against the bill but simply one to open up a dialogue about is the use of email marketing RIGHT for the president to use (or the guise of this email the committee Organizing for America) to advance this agenda?

Now I have opted into the Barack campaign emails. I have not unsubscribed, so I do expect to get messages from his list. I want to make sure that is clear. But what is not clear to me is who this is really from? It is coming from the President’s opt in list (or is it the candidates list), it is from Mitch Stewart but from a Barack Obama email address, it references the Barack web site, uses his image, and yet it cites that it is coming in the footer from some other entity. Truly confusing to me.

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I was caught the other day by a banner ad, yes a banner ad, that had me wanting to click deeper into it to learn more. Why? Well first I love all of the cast in this new movie, and second they promised footage that I could not see anywhere else.

So of course they had me as many banner ads do not.

When I hit the landing page I saw a lead capture form, but was it? Well kind of. It asked for first name, last name, zip code and date of birth. I assume all of this was done for reasons of verifying age and identity as we saw some time back with the SuperBad movie site. But what was missing? The email address was not asked for. This caught me a bit by surprise, as if they would have asked I would have provided it just for a chance to see Jeremy Priven and Will Ferrel in action for a quick afternoon laugh. But nope, they never did.

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I spent the past Spring on the road with the OMS city tour talking about 3 of the most often missed steps in an email marketing program that I believe are vital to a proper on boarding of new subscribers into your programs. These are the Thank you page, the Welcome email and the First Touch.

I wanted to share this example of a well done Thank you page as I stumbled on it while signing up for a great new wireframing tool called Hot Gloo.

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I am starting to wonder if the BETA sign up for notifications is becoming the ultimate social media junkies phishing scam. After all, about 100 new things surface a day on the web and they are all about the sign up now to be in the BETA when we launch. When we launch? Is it really worth waiting an indefinite amount of time to get into the inner circle? DO you need to yell “FIRSTS” to your friends, co-workers, etc? Is the new tech elite class driving this rush to beta?

This strategy IS effective and has worked for years when hotmail, gmail and many others started using it. But now it is the standard way to pre-launch. So what happens now with the BETA give us your email address and we will alert you when it is ready idea? It is losing its value (or perceived value) to me.

Give me access now.

I think that it is hard to expect to have someone give you their email address until you have proven what you are doing to be compelling enough to warrant me just not checking in later.

What can you do to run a good BETA campaign?

1. Show Value. Now this is not just a cool screen shot, some body copy and a splashing reflective font and a BETA or beta badge, but truly be able to SHOW why I am going to want to know about this.

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We have just wrapped up a 8 city tour with the Online Marketing Summit that took us across the country sharing with marketers from all market segments about the importance of the email welcome process. In each city we had the opportunity to refine our presentation based on three simple things:

1. The Opt In

2. Thank You Page/Thank You Email

3. The First Touch/Welcome Email

Now how do these tie into what your Mother taught you? Well let me try to make this simple. Not knowing how your own mother might have raised you, but knowing how all of ours did at eROI we know the importance of being clear, being hospitable, saying thank you, and making you feel heard and welcome into our home (of your website).

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