You can waste a lot of money sending emails to the wrong people and with Christmas just around the corner, now is the time to ensure your emails create a bumper response.

Internet service providers track how well your emails engage with your contact list - the more people interact with your emails, you’re less likely you’ll be seen as putting out junk mail.

List hygiene

List hygiene describes the process of identifying those contacts who engage with your emails and those who don’t.

A good clean list means your contacts are active and interested in you. Anyone who hasn’t bothered to open your emails for a good while may not want your emails; or they are lazy; or receive your emails on the wrong day or time; or just may never open anyone’s email (about a quarter of a list can fall into this group).

So what do you do?

Re-engagement

Re-engagement campaigns address the non-openers. It aims to send a special type of email, asking them if they still want to subscribe (and it may require you being a little more pushy than you have been in the past) by making it worth their while to keep on your list. Find ways to re-energise them.

Start by dividing your list into those that have been on your list for over 6 months and not responded; and those who have not engaged within the last 6 months.

Yes, I want to stay!

Re-engagement is about sending a sequence of emails, every few days, that are highly personal (in a nice way!) and tell them you won’t keep emailing them if they don’t want you to but look what goodies they will miss out on if they don’t respond. Give them a damn good reason to say Yes, I want to stay!

The series of emails may be styled as follows:

1. Incentivisation:
This can energise even the tardiest laggards on your contact list. You can offer a coupon, an e-book, some of your time, anything you can stir their interest with - but do keep it personal. Be friendly, and don’t tell them off! Make it super-easy for them to respond.
2. Time challenged:
Make your re-engagement offer time-limited. Do this or that by a certain date to stay on the list - don’t hassle them into continuing to be emailed.
3. Last chance saloon:
Action required. Be short and to the point. If you don’t respond by a certain date then they will be deleted and will miss this basket of goodies - list some great things you’re offering.
4. Hasta la vista baby!
Let them go. Confirm they have been removed from your list but give them an opportunity, even at this late stage, to re-engage.

Nobody wants to drive away potential traffic and online people do procrastinate. However, if they haven’t responded to your re-engagement campaign then don’t keep wasting time or money on these tyre kickers.

There are plenty others prospects who may just benefit from your email marketing.

If you’d like us to help you clean up your email list, please give me a call on 08450 740068 or email me at sem@e-xanthos.co.uk

Source: Advanced Email marketing - List Cleaning Part 1 Feedblitz 08/11/2011

While social media and Apps for smartphones continue to dominate marketing minds, email remains a reliable tool for generating leads & conversions.

 If you do nothing else with your email campaigns then these 8 Golden rules which will help improve your email performance.

1. Incentives

Adding an incentive can increase open rates by 50% and while open rates aren’t the be all and end all, they do achieve one of the main objectives of all emails - enticing people to open them.  People expect incentives.They expect you to offer something your competitors aren’t and they can be a deal breaker if they see you don’t have one. So, offer an incentive in the subject line that will tempt them to open.

2. Clutter

The more “confused” your layout, the less likely you are to get people to click on your call to action. Emails often have 3 or more different type faces. Never use more than 2.

3. The Fold

Keeping the main point / offer you are making and your call to action above the fold will mean everyone will see them. You will lose 70% of your traffic if people have to scroll down. This applies to newsletters where your main event should appear right at the start.

4. 500-650 Pixels wide

If your email is wider than this then you are forcing people to scroll horizontally - and as we see in 3) above, they don’t scroll so any important messages or offers will not be seen.

5. Logo

Put your logo in the top left corner. Research into the way people track an email shows they always start top left - like beginning a book. It also gives visibility and the opportunity for brand identification.

6. Subject line

After the email address it is the most important part of any email. If your subject line isn’t gripping then why should anyone open it? A good subject line is no more than 50 characters + spaces. A good subject tells people what they can expect and whether it’s worth their while to bother with.

7. Auto-responding

People get so many emails from all manner of sources that they often forget who sent what. Auto-response messages remind people they opted-in to your database. They are an extremely useful marketing tool as you can send new “recruits” additional incentives, news or interesting information over the next days and weeks and keep you on their radar.

8. Landing pages

An email should connect with a landing page. The landing page can be a distinct page or a page on your website but whatever appears on the email should be replicated on the landing in terms of headline, copy and design. Also add tracking tools to see how email-landing page combo’s worked.

Before you mass mail your email, send a test email to a friend. Can they instantly tell you what your email is about? Is the call to action clear? Does it work for them? If not rework your email and retest.

Email is still a great marketing tool and is experiencing a renaissance with the growth in social media and mobile use.

A quality contact list is an essential part of any successful campaign and as your list matures makes sure you start to understand their preferences. This allows segmentation which seriously improves open and click through rates.

The bottom line is that email is works. It can be relatively low cost but carries a long reach. You can keep your list aware of what is going on in your world and build authority and relevance leading to stronger brand identification and more sales.

If you’d like to review your email marketing strategy then we can help you. Just email us at: sem@e-xanthos.co.uk or call me on 0845 0740068.

Source: Pamela Vaughan email Best Practices, Hubspot. 1st September 2011

We keep telling people email marketing works! Countless surveys show that business considers email the most effective way to convert online prospects into customers.

Here are some hints for your email campaigns:

The email envelope

Email has an envelope which contains a letter, and just like direct mailing, the letter inside is irrelevant if the outside doesn’t get opened.

And your envelope won’t be opened unless your “To” line is correct; Your “From” line is recognised; Your “Subject” line grabs their interest; and the day and time of day of receipt are convenient.

Where email differs from a traditional letter (other than being digital) is that you get a peek at the contents through the “Preview” page.

Most people don’t read passed the first two lines. So expend more of your creative juices, offers, etc, on the heading and the first two lines of your first paragraph.

Who are you after?

The people you most want on your contact list are those whose needs best fit your ultimate goal.

You can’t really craft effective copy until you know how to “speak to them in their own language” and they won’t engage with you until you do.

One page, one action

Your email has one goal only. To get people to take the action you want whether it is signing up for a subscription or buying from your storefront.

Unless every word, every element on the page enhances and moves prospects to your call to action then your email is failing you.

More email essentials

• Your subject line must grasp their interest instantly! Don’t give them time to ponder it
• Their reward for taking your call to action must be crystal clear and risk free
• Get their details by encouraging them to opt-in for future email posts
• Build momentum and trust through testimonials, reviews, mentions, etc
• Incentivising them is a smart tactic, offering freebies that deliver instant gratification
• Tell them what’s coming next in future email posts to create a following
• Your email should be just long enough to give your prime audience exactly what they need
• Ask for as little personal detail as possible first time - e.g.just email address and name
• Measure how well your email campaigns are running using analytics

Takeaway

Avoid emailing to the wrong audience just because they are on your list. Go through your list and break it down into different areas of interest then tailor your offers and email content to each group.

Remember, your online audience is smart. You won’t develop any meaningful relationships until you put their interests first, and don't waste their time.

Test, test , test. Different headlines, button colours, placement and measure what works best.

If you’d like to find out more about successful emailing have a look at the email page on our website.

Source: Brian Clark, 7 Steps to an Email Opt-in Page That Works, Copyblogger, 23/06/11

Can you remember the first time you used a chat-up line? Struggling to impress, saying something that would bowl them over and get them focused solely on you? Probably like most of us, after a few spectacular failures you eventually figured out what worked!

Now think about how you address your email audience. Have your open rates improved over time or are they still languishing at the edges of the online dance floor?

The objective of your email is pure and simple - to generate a click. Whether this click is through to your website, or signing up for your newsletter or buying one of your products there and then, unless you convince your recipients to do something you are wasting their precious time and they’ll go elsewhere.

Just like on any dance floor, there’s usually plenty of choice and while you want to sweep them off their feet, your recipient’s primary objective will be to filter out anyone who doesn’t immediately impress (in terms of your email that’s deleting anything that doesn’t instantly hit the mark - which also helps them clear their inbox). So, unless your Subject line clearly shows your intentions and value, and is designed to impress, then you won’t be hitting it off with anyone.

Your contact list may contain hundreds of names and each one you send out goes to an individual. For your Subject line to have widespread appeal it must have relevance and potential to elicit a positive response with each person - and it must make the connection in milliseconds.

If you have a larger list then you have a choice between using a Subject line that has a broad appeal to the whole list (with reduced relevance to all) or using specific Subject lines to specific segments of your list to increase relevance and appeal to each person - but also means a lot more work!.

It is now recognised that relevance beats brevity every time and on the internet, one chat-up line rarely fits all.

So, your Subject line should not be short either, but long enough to show recipients how relevant  and useful the accompanying content will be, with an incentive to encourage them take an interest. The quicker you can generate a positive and ongoing interaction the more likely will your emails work.

The subject line: chat up line analogy is a good one because email is a conversation and the more you can make it like a real conversation the better it will work. Conversations that are vague and unfocused will put your listener off, so it pays to test and try out different Subject lines until you get in a groove and know exactly what to say.

The Arctic Monkeys knew what they were about when they sang “I bet (your subject line) looks good on the dance floor”.