Digital Relevance

In a meeting today I was asked, what is the single most important part of email marketing? A nice simple question, not, and just what you need to test you in front of three decision makers looking for a new email service provider My answer went along the lines of…

If I had to state my number one it would be a cultural one, and that is simply that the best and most effective email marketing is done when the focus of all activity is customer/subscriber based. We all have sales and marketing strategies but with email marketing you achieve your objectives by looking at it by stepping into our target audience’s shoes (my favourite book is ‘to kill a mockingbird’) before we do anything. What information will our current subscribers and target future subscribers find relevant to their information wants and needs? Only by understanding this and delivering the relevant match of information can we hope to develop engagement with and ultimately loyalty to our brand. Website visitors and email newsletter subscribers are in total control of where they choose to go for information and losing sight of this simple fact dilutes the effectiveness of our online marketing.

This initial reply was accepted but I was then pressed on the question from a tactical point of view.

I don’t believe you can say that any one tactical element of email marketing is the single most important as without a good data capture strategy for example you won’t have many subscribers to talk with. Also without a well designed email template reflecting the brand of the campaign owner, however relevant and well written the copy, the delivery envelope will not do the message justice. So pretty much impossible I feel to name one element of email marketing as the single most important. Any readers of this blog that feel they can I would love to read your view.

I did though set out what I thought the key fundamentals of email marketing are in order of data capture, campaign activity, campaign measurement, relevance of content and segmentation. The list of elements to consider in developing a truly effective subscriber focused email marketing campaign warrant far more time than I have right now on a Thursday evening, when it’s time to be getting ready for a pretty hectic Friday. So I would more than welcome a top 10 ‘ELEMENTS OF eMAIL MARKETING’ post from visitors to this email marketing blog who feel they can set the agenda.

After sending a campaign, our customers always ask for reports of activity. Now this is fairly straight forward; “You sent 1000 emails, 100 people clicked on these 10 links.” Not really enough information for most people and certainly not enough to be of any use from a positioning point of view.

Google Analytics (on the website)

By installing Google Analytics on the website you are directing people to, you will have a wealth of information available to you about your web visitors. This includes things like “Average time on site”, “Bounce rate”, “Search Engine keywords” to mention a few.

Email Marketing & Google Analytics

By including a little “code” to the end of every link in an Email Marketing Campaign, we can see how many people click on an email and what happened when they get to the website. This can be broken down by Campaign and is fully integrated into Google Analytics.

This allows us to go from the statement at the top of this post to “You had 100 people visit your website and the average time on the website was 5 minutes for the New Product A Campaign”.

Google Goals

And lastly, if you setup Goals in Google Analytics you can specify activities that you are particularly interested in – this could be from Event Registration to Ordering Online.

This allows use to arrive at “You had 100 people visit your website and the average time on the website was 5 minutes for the New Product A Campaign. The 100 bought a total to £300.00 worth of products and registered for 5 Events.”

Open rate basics … How are open rates measured?

To start with, only HTML emails can be tracked as opened, plain text emails can only be recognised as opened if the recipient clicks on a link. Plain text emails are not trackable since they do not contain HTML image capabilities.
An HTML email is tracked as opened when an image within the email is opened and viewed. Many email ‘clients/readers’ have a security setting that hides the images in emails sent from email addresses not saved as a ‘contact’, or on the recipient’s safe senders list. Once your subscriber chooses to view the images, then that email can be tracked and considered opened. A subscriber could receive an email, read the text but not click to view the images, so your open rate can be higher than what can be tracked.

Since many email readers hide images automatically it is important to remind users to add your ‘From’ email address to their ‘Safe Senders List’ as displayed in your accounts header and footer. Once the ‘From’ email address is added as a ‘contact’ in your subscribers contact or safe senders list, then images will automatically be displayed for each sequential mailing.  Always try to use a combination of text and images in your email communications to give your subscribers something to view, the right image can work very effectively if well placed.

What’s the average open rate?
This is misleading in my view generally as unless you are comparing like with like it is difficult to get any valid comparison. For example, if your business is providing accountancy services to small to medium size businesses, uses local press and direct marketing as well as email and SEO, employs eleven staff and is based in Bracknell targeting the east Berkshire area, whose email open rates are relevant to compare with? The average benchmark also leads to potential complacency…Lets say your average benchmark is 29%, if you achieve this is that job done? Let’s hope not.

Over the years I have spoken at many conference and seminar events and the one question I always hated to field was…What’s the average this that or the other? It struck me that the question was always asked by average marketers. Forget average and strive to raise your bar.

So just how can open rates be improved?

• Develop an effective ‘from’ field.

The ‘from’ field is the first thing your subscriber’s will see when receiving your email, so make sure it clearly shows who the email on coming from. An easy way to test whether your ‘from’ field is friendly is to ask yourself, ‘will the recipient recognise the ‘from name’ and/or ‘from email’? Think about who your subscribers are most familiar with, if your subscribers have a personal relationship with say their regional sales manager use that contact, split your database into regional segments and personalise the campaign accordingly. Just remember, the ‘from’ field may be the only name they see in their inbox. Once you have decided on the ‘from’ field, keep it consistent. As you develop email relationships over time, the ‘from name’ and ‘from email’ will become recognisable.

• Writing your subject line

You should try to experiment with your subject line. Try different subject lines and see what works best for your subscribers. Some marketers suggest spending as much time writing the subject line as you do the copy of your email, this is not really practical but underlines the importance of the subject line. While there are many tips and best practices on how to write great subject lines, here are some of my favourites …

Create interest in the first few words – Conveying simple values in a newsletter in the first few words is key, especially when it communicates features, advantages and benefits (FAB’s) for the subscribers. Personalisation can really help here too, like most tips, simple and easy steps to develop small gains are realistic and achievable.

Keep it short - Definitely try and keep the subject line to less than 35 characters. Longer subject lines run the risk of getting cut off in the email reader and with it does your opportunity to engage subscribers. As with most elements of email marketing you only have a few moments to catch subscriber’s attention so keep it simple.

Never hard sell – email marketing is all about subscriber engagement with your brand. Use FAB’s and grab attention with well written headlines, present a good succinct summary of the message and link to the full story. It never fails to amaze me how many still use far too much copy in emails and bore subscribers into unsubscribing.

• The timing of your campaign

Timing definitely influences your open rate, but once again beware of average/best stats, your brand is unique and so will your best time to send be. There are definite basics here such as avoid late evenings, early am (before 9am) and Friday afternoons. That said I can cite a successful campaign for all of the previously mentioned. caterersearch.com every Friday late afternoon send a campaign called ‘The Friday Wrap’, which I know works effectively for them. Testing and establishing better days/times for your own activity will deliver results. Once again, simple and easy steps to develop small gains are realistic and achievable.

I have tried to cover some of the basics here but as with most email marketing topics much more is available. A good email marketing newsletter that will cover this topic frequently is www.clickz.com/experts/em_mkt

If readers have any tips/hints they would like to share with visitors please leave a comment.

Thinking about the post I made ‘ Defining Business Culture? ‘I remembered an email marketing campaign sent from FHM, the lad’s brand, back in 2002. During the world cup 2002 in Japan and Korea, where Ronaldo buried the ghosts of 98 by scoring the goals that gave Brazil their FIFTH World Cup title, FHM made their own claim to fame. The company I worked with at the time was e2 Communications, a real pioneer of email marketing. The campaign in question was sent out early one morning informing their seven figure email marketing database that, as England prepared to face Argentina FHM were doing their bit for their country. The campaign simply informed all subscribers that the FHM team were going down the pub for the day to support the lions and that the brand was CLOSED.

Absolutely 100% brand culture reflected in the simplest of messages, you would expect nothing less !!

In their second World Cup 2002 game, England beat Argentina 1-0 on Friday 7th June in Sapporo, Japan, and doubtless the FHM team celebrated. I have been in email marketing for a few months short of 10 years now and that simple message is still the best I have ever seen. CULTURE PERSONIFIED.

For anyone unfamiliar with FHM I have great pleasure in using the image below, which is truly worth a thousand words.

I had a meeting late this afternoon with a senior manager who has a significant marketing role with a well known company. We had been invited in as well as a short list of other email service providers to present what we felt we could do to improve the effectiveness of their activity. Part of my review of their activity and recommendation for future tactics/strategy was to reflect their company culture more in their copy. This opened an interesting debate on defining exactly what the company’s culture is. The idea of integrating company culture into their activity delivered and before I left learned that we had been short listed for the last two. Part of my leaving gambit was to promise that I would post a very brief summary of the meeting and ask for readers of this blog to define what ‘company culture’ meant to them. I hope that we get some challenging comments as this is a subject I am passionate about and through this post I hope to grasp a better understanding of what company culture means to more people. So please, please, please take 5 minutes and let me have your view. If I use your ideas I will let you know and happy to donate £50 to the charity of choice from the best comments reply received.

New Years eve I joined a group of friends with our children (those young enough not to go out themselves) at a local Pizza Express. I found myself sitting next to a guy that I only knew as an acquaintance and had a very enjoyable conversation. It started with ‘what do you do for a living’ and gradually we established that we were both in business and that we faced many similar challenges . When asked the question I replied ‘we drive relevant traffic to customers websites’, an answer that normally leads to twenty more questions. In this instance however the guy I was speaking with was extremely literate in online marketing as he carried it out for his own business, great we speak the same language! As the conversation developed I learned that this guys business was quite substantial employing around seventy people. As the business owner and manager I was curious however how he made time to look after quite a considerable marketing function as a non marketer, his background is sales and senior management roles. It seemed incredible to me that running a business of that size that a full time experienced marketer or an agency had not been appointed. A few Peroni’s had been consumed by us both so a fairly uninhibited debate followed. The upshot is a meeting later this month to see if outsourcing with Digital Relevance would work for us both.

It has struck me since how often I have had similar encounters but in customer or potential customer meetings. Maybe as well as tea, coffee and water in such meetings Peroni’s should be available, as frank discussions can lead to more open thinking. Joking apart, I frequently have meetings with business owners/managers about potentially working with them, and all too often their micro managing of their business holds back decision making. Digital Relevance work with/outsource to a number of partners and we do this to focus our own efforts on what we do best and this has helped us accelerate growth that on our own we simply could not have realised.

Opinions welcomed on either side, especially strong ones

The company I work with recently held a marketing seminar and the editor of Marketing Week presented an incredibly powerful talk on the subject ‘Brands without Frontiers’. No holds barred straight talking, if you like marketing with passion take a look…

www.ismedia.co.uk/digitalrelevance/markchoueke2.html

Despite mountains of research to the contrary too many business leaders do not recognise marketing as a fundamental element of a successful business. The problem I feel lies in seeing marketing as something less than a basic fundamental of business and the key to this lack of vision is in lack of measurement of marketing.

Marketing is the lifeblood of sales and sales is the lifeblood of any business, bringing in the revenue to pay salaries, rent, utilities and all other business costs. Bad marketing produces little or no results and lazy marketers do not want bad marketing measured. But just like having a bad receptionist or finance director they do not make their job function any less key to the successful operation of the business. Too few business owners and managers have not seen a truly effective marketing function creating the right level and quality of lead generation for their sales colleagues. Yet good marketing stares us all in the face every day from brands that have been created and are sustained by effective marketing.

So why do we ignore or miss the lesson that seems so obvious?

Relevance!!

The marketing message sent by effective marketers is relevant and as such is welcomed even if subliminally.

For example, a restaurant owner realising they will need to replace their crockery, glassware and cutlery soon starts searching for offers from potential suppliers. The search is conducted through the internet via Google and the smart marketers pay to have their ads appear alongside these ‘relevant’ searches. The restaurant owner sees the ‘relevant’ ad and clicks to take a look. The smart marketer does not send them to the home page to navigate/find where to go for further information themselves. They also do not pre judge if glassware, cutlery or crockery is the visitors priority, and take a gamble on a specific landing page, they want to engage with them over the long term. They take them to a page that positions their business, a page that sets out their range of product groups and product lines succinctly, with links to relevant specific pages for more information. The focus of this landing page is not just the here and now however it’s the future. The page reads…’ABC Restaurant Supplies regularly have special offers available to our email newsletter subscribers. Simply enter your email address below and we will send you our offers email newsletter a day before we make the offer public’.

This gives the visitor the opportunity to very simply and very easily receive information ‘relevant’ to their original search and reason for clicking on the ad. The ABC Restaurant Supplies marketing message has now engaged with the potential buyer. A simple process and one that is truly effective. ABC Restaurant Supplies sees sales through this activity as they monitor and track their sales and marketing activity, and this fuels further justified marketing.

I have seen good marketing executed by big, small and medium sized businesses, just as I have seen bad by all three groups also. The simple difference is in the level of priority recognised in marketing by the business leaders running their company.