Subject lines are the first, and sometimes only, impression an email makes on a customer. Mastering this magical one-liner is not easy. The key here is to diversify your email subject line. Any one of the ideas below, if used too frequently, will lose its efficacy.

1. Compound Topics: I’ve seen this used regularly by Karmaloop. They cram about as many topics, brands, or product names into the subject line as possible, in hopes that something will grab the users attention. In order for this strategy to work, it’s important to still keep the subject line scan able by breaking up the topics. I personally like using the “+” symbol. (”New Nike + Reebok + Addidas Shoes!” vs. “New Nike, Reebok, and Addidas Shoes”)
2. Short and Simple: If you can communicate the topic email in 2 words rather than 6, you’ll stand apart from the rest of the inbox clutter.
3. Use Special Characters: I like using special characters in order to communicate ideas and create eye magnets. Below are a couple of suggestions:
   • New Widgets = Great Gifts
   • Huge $avings on Widgets
   • { New Widgets, In-Stock Now }
   • New Widgets @ YourURL.com!
4. Question Marks and Exclamation Points: Creative use of Question marks and exclamation points within subject lines can stress urgency or create curiosity in the mind of the subscriber. I like combining the 2 and creating something like “50% Off All Widgets?!”

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Tags: email marketing Internet Marketing Transactional Email Marketing Web Marketing

Email deliverability is a headache. We used to worry about the content of an email blast, and avoid spammy words like free or using ALL CAPS. But with the shift in the last few years towards repuation based SPAM filtering, email deliverability tactics have changed drastically. Now, instead of one isolated email getting stuck in the bulk folder, you risk damaging your long term sender reputation if you’re not using best practices. Below, I’ve gathered some tips for ensuring your email makes it successfully to the inbox.

1. Join Feedback Loops: Feedback loops allow you to see who is marking your email as spam (so you can remove them). Some ISPs, like AOL, provide an easy way to join the feedback loop. For other ISPs, you may need to contact your email service provider to see if they can provide you with this information.
2. Remove Inactive Subscribers: Inactive subscribers are most likely to mark your email as junk. Sure, nobody wants to willfully shrink the size of their opt in list, but you have to think long term.
3. Consistent Timing: ISPs love it when you consistently send email on the same day at near the same time. Since spammers don’t care, consistency is the mark of a responsible email marketer.
4. Use Consistent From Information: Be sure to always use the same from name and address. Changing the from email will require your subscribers to add each address to their address book in order to ensure deliverability. In addition, a consistent from name helps readers recognize your brand.

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Tags: email marketing Internet Marketing Transactional Email Marketing Web Marketing

I suppose I can title this post “25 Email Marketing Mistakes I’ve Made.” But rather than focus on the negative, below I’ve outlined the best practices I’ve come to adopt over the years. Hope you find something here useful.

1. Diversify your Content: If your entire email focuses on one product, service, or topic, you risk alienating all but the few people who will be interested. Unless you have segmented your database based on previous behavior, do not send an email on only 1 topic. I consistently find that the click through rate increases in proportion with varied content.
2. Don’t Stress about Spam Words: Many experts will tell you to avoid words like “free” or “sale”. In my opinion, ISPs tend to be moving away from content based spam filtering in favor of reputation based filtering. In other words, your sending IP address and from email are more important than whether or not your email contains certain words. Personally, I’ve used words like “free” in the subject line without any affect on delivery rates.
3. Make it Readable with Images Disabled: Always take into account the appearance of your email with images disabled. For email clients such as Outlook, this is now the default feature. Even popular web mails like Hotmail now disable images unless the sender is in the address book of the recipient. The best tactic to create readable emails with images block is use an alt description.
4. Create an Online Version: Always provide an online version of your email for users having trouble viewing images. I’ve calculated from emails I’ve sent in the past that around 5% of users will use this feature.

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Tags: 25 Ways Series best practices E commerce e mail marketing ecommerce email marketing Internet Marketing Transactional Email Marketing Web Marketing

As marketers, we all like to think we know all the answers for our clients. Unfortunately we don’t, which is why we need testing. Especially in regards to email marketing, testing campaigns can be the difference between a moderately successful program and a breakout success. Let me share some variables I’ve tested with my clients in order to determine the best paths to success.

Text vs. Image: Should emails be text or image heavy? In my experience with one particular client, a text heavy email received a slightly better delivery rate than an image heavy email. However, both received an almost equal amount of clicks and conversions.

Subject Lines: Should they be short or long? Is ALL CAPS ok? What about using words like “Free?” In my experience, the subject line doesn’t matter as much as it used to since ISPs seems to be leaning towards reputation based spam filtering. While I still avoid using all caps, I have been able to use the word free and acheive good delivery rates.

Calls to Action: What works better, “click here” or “learn more?” Depending on your type of business, and what point of the buying process your customer is at, the answer to this will vary greatly. The best you can do is try different CTA’s and measure the results.

Time Sent: Every email list has a sweet spot in the week when subscribers are most apt to open and engage your email. The only way you can find this sweet spot is to test different timeframes. Traditionally, Tuesday seems to be the favorite day to send emails.

There are an endless number of variables you can test. While many of the lower cost email service provider do not provide a built in a/b test functionality, I’ve found that you can simply split your list in two and create two different versions of an email. As long as your provider offers basic analytics, you can then track open rates, clickthroughs, and conversions.

In my experience, you can’t trust the delivery rates shown by your ESP’s report admin. Recently I tested an email delivery monitoring service by Delivery Monitor for one of my clients.  The service allows you to see which ISP’s (most of the major one’s except gmail) are sending your emails to junk or not delivering them at all. I’ve this service is extremely helpful with a/b testing content.
Happy testing…

E-commerce has one glaring problem. Because you can’t interact with your customers face to face, you often don’t know what the greatest barriers are that prevent purchases. The savvy e-commerce marketer will do everything in his power to make up for this by interacting with their customer base in other ways. In my experience, the difference between a customer centered company and a self centered company is how they deal with and encourage customer feedback. Below, I’ll share some benefits of surveying your customers.

1. Measure Customer Satisfaction: I encourage my customers to move beyond simple “how would you rate your experience” questions. Delve into specifics. Ask them about checkout. Ask them about the shopping cart. What about customer service? The returns process? If you questions are vague, then your results will be less than impressive.
2. Determine Future Improvments: One of my favorite things to do in a survey is to ask customers about potential ways of improving the website. When your tech team is wavoring between two or more improvement projects, a survey is a great way to find out which would benefit customers more.
3. Capture Customer Demographics: Have you ever wondered what the average age or your customer is? What about the percentage of male/female? Customer surveys are a great way to learn more about your client base.

Anytime you ask something of your customers, it’s a good idea to provide an incentive. If you site uses coupon codes, you might want to offer a $5 discount for those who fill out the survey.

If the idea of creating a system to create and track survey responses sounds intimidating, there are companies such as Constant Contact and KeySurvey that offer services that simplify creating and analyzing customer surveys.

Be sure to let me know your experience in this area.

It’s not often that you are blown away by the customer service of an online retailer. After all, how much of an impression can a company make when the only contact points are usually email or a help page?

Recently, I purchased a cream for the Eczema problem I have on my skin from DermaTechRX. Immediately following the purchase, I received the typical order confirmation receipt. Not long later, I received another email from a name I didn’t recognize, in the form of a reply. The subject line however, made it clear it was regarding my order from DermaTechRX.

Opening the email, I found personalized letter. Below is an excerpt from this impressive piece of correspondence.

“I have been assigned as your “Personal” Customer Service Representative and my primary role is to help guide you through the process of getting rid of your Eczema symptoms quickly, so If you have any questions or need further assistance, please do not hesitate to call me.”

The Letter went on to discuss several of the products they offer for treating Eczema. The letter concluded with…

“PS - Please let me know how our products are working for you. We try very hard to give support and advice to our customers.”

As I said, I was blown away. I had been contacted by someone in the company who actually cares about helping my skin problem. Sure, it was probably automatically generated. And sure, they probably send out hundreds of these a day. Regardless, how many companies assign you a “personal Customer service representative?” Most likely, I will not need to use the help of this person, however it’s nice to know where to go if I need assistance.

It’s nice to see how smaller e-commerce companies continue to innovate by creating programs such as this. I am definately going to recommend doing something similiar to this to all my e-commerce clients.

Transactional and trigger based emails are becoming more effective as generic, mass email blasts are becoming more irrelevant. Why? For one, an transactional email is usually in response to a request or an action a customer takes, therefore it is more inline with a pull marketing strategy rather than push. Below I’ve listed 4 ways I’ve successfully used transactional emails with my clients. Keep in mind many of these strategies won’t work for all business types, and most of them are geared towards an e-commerce, physical product site. 

1. Low-stock Emails: Allow your customers to be notified when a product they are interested in is almost sold out. Many people have a tendency to wait until the last minute before they act, so this serves as a great last minute reminder. Out of all the transactional emails I’ve ever used, this type seems to get the best conversion rate since there is a strong focus on urgency.
2. In-Stock Emails: Many times customers end up on the product detail page for an item that is out of stock. Rather than simply tell them, “Sorry, too late!” why not allow them to be emailed when the product becomes available again? In my experience, people are blown away by this, and often times purchase the item immediately.
3. New Product Alerts: Most businesses have trained their customers to know that their product newsletters are one size fits all. For this reason, the industry as a whole is seeing a decrease in open, click-through, and conversation rates. Rather than taking this approach, why not allow your customers to be emailed every time a product from their favorite categories is added to the site? Implementing a system such as this, you can expect to at least double your open rate due to the increased relevance.
4. Abandoned Shopping Cart Emails: These are becoming more common. When you visitor starts an order but doesn’t finish it, it’s a good idea to check up on them. Customers are usually shocked at this level of customer service, and many respond by completing the order. This sytem will also allow you to determine what barriers exist in your current checkout process.

Leave a comment if you experience success with any of the ideas above or have any ideas of your own.

 5 years ago, I would have told you the most important tactic for email marketing was building your list. Today, that would probably be the last tactic I would recommend. Email marketing has evolved from a shot-gun approach to highly targeted sharp shooting. In this post, I’ll list some of the best ways to derail the effectiveness of your email marketing machine. Remember, these are ways to ruin your program, not improve it.

 1) Not Removing In-Active Subscribers: Inactive subscribers are the most likely to mark your email as spam, which can severely damage your reputation. Remember, if as little as 1% of your list flags you as junk, this can prevent the other 99% from getting your mail. Play it safe and automatically remove people who haven’t opened or click after a certain timeframe.

2) Not Using Double Opt-in: Double opt-in is a great way to (a) reduce the amount of invalid emails on your list and (b) ensure that those signing up really do want to be subscribers. Many ISPs, such as Hotmail, require double opt-in order to obtain whitelist status.

3) Increase the Frequency of Your Emails: Recently, I took a survey of customers receiving one of my clients email newsletters. We found that the average subscriber preferred receiving 3.1 emails per month. Unfortunately, my client was sending around 6 per month. Most email marketers send too many emails rather than too few. Don’t send an email unless you have something good to say, otherwise you will be like the boy who cried wolf.

4) Offer Incentives to Get Emails: Many websites offer incentives such as freebies or a sweepstakes entry in exchange for an email address. This might be a bad idea. Users who signup with incentives like this likely just wanted the freebie, and they won’t necessarily become an active subscriber. They might not even remember you, and mark your email as spam.

5) Automatically Enroll Subscribers: At checkout, many e-commerce sites don’t give customers the ability to opt-out of their emails. Always, always, always let people opt-out any time you collect contact information. An opt-out is much better than having them later click the “junk” button to complain.

Many of these suggestions may be very counter intuitive or even controversial. Please leave a comment if you agree, disagree, or have anything to add.

In the past, SPAM filters have relied heavily on a content based filtering system. Recently however, it seems that ISPs are moving towards a reputation based filtering system. Instead of focusing too much on the content of the email, they seem to care more about the reputation of the sending IP address or domain name.

So how much does content matter? Recently, I performed an A/B test with one of my customers in an attempt to answer this question. We split the subscriber list down the middle, and mailed half of the list with an image heavy email, and the other half with an html heavy email. Much to my surprise, each email received nearly an identical delivery and open rates. Website sales tracked back to each email was also very similar.

We also performed other tests such as using the word “Free” in the subject line. Again, I was surprised to find that it didn’t really affect the open or delivery rates. So does this mean content doesn’t matter any more? Not exactly. I would strongly argue that content plays a much smaller role in determining whether your email will be delivered. However, it’s important to keep in mind that it’s not possible to accurately track effects of client side email filters such as Outlook’s junk filter. Certainly, filters such as these still rely heavily on content.

In addition, certain other practices will certainly send off red flags for the ISPs. Never use IP addresses in links (a common phising technique), forms, or javascript in your emails.

I’d love to hear some feedback from anyone else’s experiences with content vs. reputation based spam filtering. Be sure to drop a comment.

Years ago, when email marketing was still in it’s infancy, it was quickly and thoughtlessly adopted by many companies seeking an inexpensive alternative to traditional print media. “Why not email our customers and save thousands in mailing costs?” many executives thought. “Email marketing is cheap, effective, and easy.” Or so they thought.

 I’m going to venture to say that email marketing is as expensive, if not more expensive, than traditional print mailings. Why? Consider these hidden costs of mass email blasts:

1) Unsubscribes: It’s extremely easy for someone to opt-out of your email list. If you overmail, you give your customers no other choice. A once interested subscriber can quickly become jaded by irrelevant or frequent emails.

2) Spam reports: If your emails get reported as spam frequently, it can severely damage your reputation. Depending on the size of your list, spam reports from as little as .5% of your list can affect the deliverability to the other 99.5%. Considering that the “Junk” button in Hotmail is now easier to find than the delete button, it’s not very hard to quickly reach a dangerous spam complaint threshold.

3) Reputation Affecting other Business Areas: One customer I worked with had so damaged their sender reputation the even the customer service department ability to get an email to a customer was compromise. Once a domain or IP address has acquired a bad rep, it can takes months to clean things up.

4) The Crying Wolf Effect: Email marketers can learn an important lesson from the Boy Who Cried Wolf. Suppose you send an email to your customers twice a week. These emails don’t necessarily contain important or relevant content, they’re simply sent as a matter habit. Eventually, your email list will languish due to overmailing, and your unsubscribes will go up as your open and click-through rates go down. Now, what happens when you actually have something important to announce like a new product or a huge sale event? Your customers think you’re just crying “wolf!”

What’s the moral of this post? Don’t overmail and be relevant! Effective email marketing now requires a conversation rather than simply shouting generalized messages at customers.