Archive: October 2011
Trick-or-treat, email marketing style
With Halloween around the corner, here are a few sweet moves to try & a few sticky situations to avoid when it comes to your emails
With Halloween just three days away, the holiday season is officially upon us, and we’re kicking things off with an email-friendly set of tricks and treats. As you prepare your fall- and winter-themed campaigns, consider implementing the three treats below — and avoiding the three tricks. Your campaigns will bewitch your subscribers (in a good way).
And, remember, if you’re looking for some design inspiration, you can request a $25 Readymade holiday design from our design team all season long.
TREAT: Birthday triggers that turn a profit
If you’re capturing your subscribers’ birth dates, consider sending birthday coupons by way of an email trigger — it’ll increase engagement and profits, especially in the months leading up to Christmas. And it may have unexpected bonuses. Take this, for example: I recently received a birthday email with a coupon for a free breakfast sandwich from Star Bagel, a bagel shop here in Nashville. It’s one of my favorite places so I was thrilled about the email. While I was busy running a few holiday errands (I’m starting early this year!), I redeemed my birthday coupon, and then I ended up purchasing more. (Nice work, Star Bagel.)
Read more from Clickz about birthday triggers bringing in the business.
TRICK: Not taking advantage of social media
Are you interacting with fans and followers on social media sites? If not, you could be missing out on an opportunity to boost customer loyalty and increase customer spending by 20%- 40%. Starting conversations on Facebook and Twitter is likely to increase the engagement of folks who may not engage with you in other ways (on the phone, for example), and as the become more engaged, they’re likelier to turn to you for your expertise. (Engaged customers also spend more. See that bit about me and the bagel shop.)
Check out a solid 12-step social media plan by MarketingProfs here. And if you need a hand getting your email and social media working together, stop by to ask us on Twitter and Facebook, or send a note to our friendly support team.
TREAT: Using video to mix things up a bit
We recently posted a video blog, and we recorded and produced the whole thing with just a laptop and iMovie. Have your own computer camera or smartphone handy? Give video a try. It’s a great way to add a human touch to your posts. And there are lots of helpful how-to’s out there. Our friend, Tom Martin, shares 8 tips over on Social Fresh for creating a video with an iPhone alone.
Read how one online floral retailer boosted response metrics and conversions just by adding video to email campaigns.
TRICK: Forgetting your images’ alt text or creating image-only campaigns
I recently got an email in my inbox with the enticing subject line “Get Dressed.” I clicked to open, and to my surprise, I landed on a blank white page. If your campaigns are filled with images, make sure to include some alt text. (If you fill out all of the fields when adding your image to an Emma layout, alt text will be automatically generated.) Alt text ensures that you’re providing some context to readers who don’t have images displayed by default. It’s much better for them to see “Click here to view our gallery of outfits,” than nothing at all.
And make sure you’re designing your campaigns to render beautifully without relying solely on images. Marketing Sherpa found that click-throughs increased over 83% when tables were used to add color and design to emails that had images blocked.
TREAT: Enable Social Sharing to grow your audience list
This might just be the easiest treat of all. With a simple click of the Add Social Sharing button atop your email campaign (in edit mode), you can add the ability for your subscribers to share your email on Twitter, Facebook and LinkedIn. Oh, and in doing so, you could be increasing your campaign’s click-through rate by 30-55%. Not too shabby.
Want a refresher on how to enable your subscribers to share the love? Grab our Social Sharing how-to here.
TRICK: Sending your campaign to your audience without testing
Giving your campaign the once over and clicking a link here or there in preview mode might seem like sufficient testing when you’re pressed for time, but it’s not enough if you want to ensure a solid delivery. Your emails will render a bit differently in the major email programs, and it’s a good idea to test all links from the inbox. Plus, getting another set of eyes on your email’s content and formatting will help you spot typos and formatting inconsistencies. Emma makes comprehensive testing easy by way of your free Test Group. Store up to 10 addresses there — try to represent a mix of different email programs — and send unlimited campaigns without affecting your monthly sending total.
If you need a hand getting your Test Group set up, visit our Help Guide.
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I hope these treats and tricks have sparked a few ideas of your own. Please share your tips with our community in the comments here. And if you’d like to show off your holiday-themed campaign, share the link, too. We’re ready to see the spooky and the spectacular. We may just feature yours in an upcoming post!
Liven up your email with animated GIFs
The '90s web animation staple isn't just for dancing babies - it’s perfect for spicing up your email campaigns
There's nothing stopping you from featuring this jaunty fellow in your email campaigns. Click on the image to view the animation.
If you ever want to get a little perspective on how far web design has come since the ’90s, pay a visit to Internet Archive’s Wayback Machine and pull up Best Buy’s home page from December of 1996. Yikes, right? Was there really a time when a well-heeled electronics megastore used an animation of a turtleneck-wearing, gift-giving pig on its homepage during the holiday season?
The Wayback Machine doesn’t lie; back when the Internet was undergoing its awkward adolescence and everyone was infatuated with moving pictures, the animated GIF was king. It was a time of dancing babies, twinkling lights and bouncing smiley faces, all playing on endless loops. Not coincidentally, it was also a time of web-induced headaches. As the technology and language of Internet styling evolved, the bulky, simplistic animated GIF gave way to more sophisticated Flash- and Shockwave-based animations. Like the 8-track and the VHS tape, the once-revolutionary animated GIF became the butt of jokes (like this one, sneakily tucked away on our site).
Still, every format has its champions. Just as some filmmakers find inspiration in VHS camcorders and some diehard music geeks still make mixtapes, there are artists and designers who welcome the challenge presented by the animated GIF’s endless animation loop, limited color palette and potentially restrictive file size. When the stunning GIF-based artwork of collaborators Jamie Beck and Kevin Burg caught my eye earlier this year, I began to wonder if the email marketing world was due for a GIF animation revolution. If it is, it’s hard to imagine a better medium.
The Internet has evolved a great deal since the age of the four-frame animated firework. However, as our own Taylor Schena outlined in an earlier blog post, the countless display variations between email clients has kept email design frozen in a time before Javascript, Flash or CSS. Fortunately, animated GIFs’ early web prominence means that, unlike Flash and most other animation styles, they’re almost universally recognized (and correctly rendered) in the inbox.
If you’ve been wondering how to jolt a little life into your email campaigns, a moving element may be just the thing. But before you lay your newest email campaign on the slab for re-animation, there are a few things you should be aware of.
Not everyone will see your animations. When I say that GIFs are almost universally recognized, I mean that they’re recognized by every major email client except for Outlook 2007. Holding true to its reputation as the bane of every HTML designer’s existence, Outlook 2007 will only display the first frame of an animated GIF. While this is hardly a deal breaker, it does mean that the first frame of your animation should communicate your intended message clearly for Outlook users. So if you were planning a fancy reveal in the animation’s final frames, you may want to think through your animation carefully to make sure the takeaway isn’t lost on Outlook users.
Your animated GIF should be more Popeye than Pixar. Since every frame in an animated GIF can introduce a new or altered image, these files can get very large, very fast. If your image file size is too large, it could affect both your email’s deliverability and the quality of the display, especially on mobile devices (only a couple of Beck and Burg’s designs would be truly email-friendly). Limit your color palette and stick to basic movements with a limited frame rate, and your GIF will travel and present itself well.
Be bold, but don’t go crazy. Hipster clothier Urban Outfitters has a long history of incorporating animated GIFs into their campaigns in a way that’s both sophisticated and, sometimes, charmingly retro. When the design comes together well, like this spring campaign spotlighted by Email Marketing Voodoo, it makes for a fun, eye-catching email, and it’s an excellent use of the format’s limitations. When it goes too far, as many think this divisive psychedelic campaign did back in 2009, readers’ first reaction may be to get away from it any way that they can.
Make your animated GIF updates before you upload your files to Emma. Emma email campaigns will treat your animated GIFs like any other image file, with one exception: you’ll need to have your GIF file ready exactly as you’d like it to appear before you upload it to your account. Once it’s in your Emma account, you won’t be able to resize the image or rename the file.
If you’re ready to experiment with animation in your email, but aren’t quite sure where to start, Style Campaign has a terrific guide to creating animated GIFs in Photoshop.
Have you had any interesting adventures (or misadventures) with animation in the inbox? Share your story in the comments section.
It’s Emma 25 time, folks
We're giving away 25 Emma accounts to small, local nonprofits. Encourage your favorite cause to apply today!
Fall is in the air, and that means it’s finally socially acceptable to eat candy corn and dress like Snooki, which is not really something you can pull off in, say, April unless you’re actually Snooki.
More importantly, fall marks the launch of our annual Emma 25 initiative. For seven years and counting, we’ve been awarding a lifetime of free Emma service to small, deserving nonprofits and hoping that our email marketing tools help these causes do even more good work in their communities.
Here’s how it works. Nonprofits can apply at myemma.com/emma25 from today through Monday, November 21. We welcome any 501c3 nonprofit with 10 or fewer employees, including current Emma customers. Emma staffers pore over the applications to select 25 (it’s unbelievably tough), and we announce the honorees in early December.
Of course, we rely on you to spread the word. Encourage the nonprofits in your community to apply, whether it’s a group you support, volunteer with or that’s made a difference in your life. And share the news and application page with your social networks, too, if you’re so inclined.
And thanks for teaming up with us to do some good!
Write or die: Find the time to write or your business will fall behind
Tips for developing your writing & making proposals a thing of the past
We like Blair Enns' unconventional headshot. He looks a little bit like Clark Kent.
Now, when we want to find the answer to a question, we just type or speak it into the various Google apps on our numerous devices and, voilà, answers! We do the same thing when we want to find a subject matter expert. The power of organic search has made content marketing the number one lead generation strategy for not just creative firms, but businesses of all types. In this manner, Google is also driving the increased pace of the specialization of knowledge-based businesses across the globe. With so many people writing content on so many subjects, to be seen as an expert these days requires one to write prolifically or to pick a subject area that’s not already crowded. In this Darwinian manner, Google is forcing the world into specialized niches and is single-handedly increasing global productivity as a result.
It’s clear to me that those who cannot write are going to find business development increasingly difficult. This is a relatively new phenomenon, but it’s very real. Writing, I believe, is now more important to the success of a design practice than designing. But what if you are among the many who possess the ability to write but just struggle to find the time to do so? Are you destined to the same fate as those who lack the ability? Perhaps I can help you find the time.
In fact, you’re probably still spending between 25% and 50% of your time writing. You’re just writing the wrong things.
So I’ll offer you this pact: I’ll free up ten hours a month of wasted writing time for you, and, in return, you re-allocate that time to writing thought leadership. Deal?
Before we get to the source of the misplaced writing, let’s cover some basic principles on your new thought leadership writing commitment.
- Go over 1,000 words. Most people can fake anything for 400 or 500 words. One of the hidden benefits of writing to a meaningful length, however, is that it forces you to get smarter. You can blog every day for less than 400 words at a time and still not be meaningfully smarter a year later, but once your word count gets up there (1,200 words seems to be the threshold where I can no longer fake it), you cannot help but be smarter afterward. Set a target of one piece of thought leadership per month and try to go over 1,000 words each time. I promise you that one year later you will be twice as smart as you were when you started.
- Go narrow and deep. Once you identify your subject — but before you start writing — do a quick search to see what already exists on the topic. Resist the urge to retread tired, old ground (this will eliminate pretty much anything to do with the topics of branding, transparency or authenticity), and go deep into the crevices of your knowledge base. You’ll sacrifice reach, but the value of those who find relevance in the topic will be worth the tradeoff.
- Use a strong voice. Zillions of pages of new content are created every day, and so much of it is not worth reading. If you don’t experience a meaningful amount of fear before you publish, then you’ve probably played it too safe. Tackle the conventions and the sacred cows in your writing; just remember to be hard on the issues and soft on people.
- Predict the future. You don’t need to be right in your predictions to be seen as an expert; you just need to be thinking ahead. You’re not an expert if you’re not predicting the future.
Finding the time to write
Alright, now let’s free up some content writing time. The culprit is proposals. Do a rough estimate on the number of hours you spend writing proposals every month (far, far more than 10 is my guess) and ask yourself, how much of that is wasted?
Ahh, but I’m not merely proposing that you somehow eliminate the proposals that don’t get accepted; I’m proposing that you consider the idea that the written proposal does not need to exist and you eliminate all of them.
Intrigued? Want to learn more? Visit Win Without Pitching for tips on finding time to write in lieu of writing proposals.
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Blair Enns is a business development advisor to creative firms worldwide and the author of The Win Without Pitching Manifesto, published by Rock Bench. Contact him at winwithoutpitching.com.
Join Blair and ReCourses’ David C. Baker at the Emma-sponsored ReCourses New Business Summit in Nashville January 25-27, 2012. Learn more here.
Design showcase: Let’s hear it for holiday spirit
Get a jumpstart on your end-of-year marketing goals with our new Readymade holiday designs
This time of year, it seems that my to-do list grows faster than I can check things off. From holiday shopping to travel plans, crafting parties to gift wrap, there’s always something to make, plan or do. Of course, the holidays are particularly busy for Emma’s design team, as our customers need top-notch design work for their year-end campaigns. It’s a high-volume season, and we know how important it is to rise above the inbox noise.
And so, for the first time, our designers have created dozens of beautiful, handcrafted designs that are ready to go in no time. And each $25 design comes in two formats so you’re covered no matter what kind of mailing you’d like to send.
Best yet, the Readymade designs will be available in your account within 3-4 business hours of submitting your request, so even a professional, handmade design can keep up with your holiday to-do list.
Let’s take a look at a just a few of our Readymade designs …
Design: Fall Leaves
Designer: Lee Floyd
Design level: Readymade holiday design
Lee may be one of our newer designers here at Emma, but he has already wowed us with his great eye for textures and type, which you can see here in “Fall Leaves” and also on the fancy new holiday page he made. This is one of the few Readymade options with a vertically-oriented postcard, which works beautifully for this particular design because the dimensions give more breathing room to all its rich, varied textures.
Both the postcard and stationery maintain the same design concept, and you’ll get both versions with each Readymade you choose. Postcards are designed at a fixed size; they’re best suited for quick well wishes, short holiday greetings or brief messages of thanks. Newsletters, surveys and longer marketing pieces, on the other hand, will work best framed by the stationery version, which integrates with Emma layouts and expands vertically to accommodate more content.
Design: Christmas Swirls
Designer: Stef Atkinson
Design level: Readymade holiday design
This beautiful, more traditional Christmas design comes from another of our new designers, Stef, and is a great marriage of delicate, graceful lines and bold pops of red. The end result is certainly formal but still dynamic; the stationery version even has a hand-designed custom frame around the content area for added visual interest.
The postcard version takes up much less vertical space than many of the other postcard designs so your own message gets seen sooner. Like all the Readymade postcards, it includes an editable text box and image box for a personal greeting and branding just below the design. Here, we have a simple year-end message (“From all of us to all of you … Wishing you good times, good cheer and a Happy New Year!”) and a sample logo to illustrate how you can add your own touch to the card.
Design: Season’s Greetings
Designer: Taylor Schena
Design level: Readymade holiday design
Taylor, one of our senior designers, really wanted to convey the joy of the season with fun gift wrap and interesting textures, but without the traditional red-green color scheme. The content area’s cream background adds another complementary but unexpected twist, and it definitely allows the red bow to pop all the more off the screen.
The cream-colored area in the postcard version is textured, and the message is in a specialty font because it’s all image-based. The stationery, however, requires websafe fonts and a flat-color background, since textures would have required a background image — and that sort of thing behind live content doesn’t work reliably in email. (Websafe fonts are automatically available for selection when you are working on a campaign in Emma in edit mode.)
Design: Shiny New Year
Designer: Stef Atkinson
Design level: Readymade holiday design
Stef’s design for New Year’s beautifully reflects her signature style; you can tell she has a wonderful sense of color and a photographer’s eye for composition. In this design, the light spots and sparkles with hints of bright gold and copper balance well with the simple outer shapes and the classic folded ribbon in a flatter, muted color scheme.
And of course, the beauty of any “Happy New Year” design is that you can send it both before *and* after the holiday itself, such as for New Year’s sales that extend through the holiday and into mid-January.
For more tips on seasonal campaigns, be sure to check out Molly’s guide to wrangling your own holiday email marketing plan.
Here’s to the end of the year, and to stylish, affordable design — we hope this season brings you lots of joy and a schedule full of good work and good times!
Hugs and holiday toasts,
The Emma Design Team
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Ready to create your own holiday campaign? Request one (or more!) of our Readymade designs for $25 each, or take an even more customized approach.
What prompts people to subscribe or unsubscribe from your emails?
Tips for increasing subscription numbers and keeping opt-outs low
We love interacting with our customers and fans on Twitter and Facebook because it gives us the ability to spark a discussion easily — and to learn from a pretty big range of opinions. In a quick poll on Twitter this summer, we asked, What’s the most common reason you unsubscribe from an email? Later in the week, we followed up with the question, What’s the best incentive for subscribing to a newsletter?
Both topics resonated pretty strongly with our followers — in fact, many of you also asked about these very things in our recent holiday survey — and the answers coincided with a few email best practices that we’d encourage you to implement.
Ready to grab new subscribers and hold on to the ones you already have? Here are five tips:
1. Cater to audience preferences, especially when it comes to frequency.
Not sure if you’re sending too much or too little? Asking readers to manage their preferences is a great way to find out how often they’re hoping to hear from you.
+ What our followers said about unsubscribing:
- @ylbesos: I get too many! A biweekly newsletter is quite enough! Everything is NOT a special announcement. >1 a week and it gets nixed
+ Further reading: Marketing Profs lists frequency as the number one reason for opt-outs.
2. Keep content relevant and concise.
With inbox clutter on the rise — especially during the upcoming holiday season — it’s as important as ever to say what you mean clearly and quickly.
+ What our followers said about unsubscribing:
- @kylekutter: I don’t find the email’s content is relevant to my needs sometimes because there is so much to filter through.
- @sandies2382: [I unsubscribe if there's] too much content in one email. Keep it simple.
+ What our followers said about signing up:
- @DolphinTeacher1: [I'm likely to subscribe for] interesting info or tidbits – can’t be too long.
+ Further reading: MarketingSherpa shares eight tactics for developing content that’s relevant to your readers.
3. Add an element of surprise to your emails and keep the content fresh.
Diversifying your content gives your readers a reason to open — and to be pleasantly surprised with what they find.
+ What our followers said about unsubscribing:
- @TTCEVENTS: [I opt out] when I realize that the last 5 articles are simply remixes of the first.
+ What our followers said about signing up:
- @billyadams: [I sign up for] content that makes an impact on me. Not just a re-listing of what’s on your site.
+ Further reading: Consider using video as a successful way to re-imagine content that holds your audience’s attention. It’s better to re-imagine than simply repeat.
4. Set expectations for what your audience will receive, and consider offering some exclusive content or goodies.
Offering rewards is a great way to attract new subscribers. Plus, it’s an easy way for you to have fun and infuse your personality in what you do.
+ What our followers said about signing up:
- @ThreeLakesWI: The best incentive is great content, always.
+ Further reading: One case study shows that offering exclusive content increased email opt-ins by 2,000%.
5. Make signing up quick and simple to do (and never send to folks who didn’t subscribe).
Post your signup form where it’s easy to find and only collect information that you plan to use later. If you’re going to send birthday emails, collect birthdates. If not, leave that field off your form.
+ What our followers said about unsubscribing:
- @AugustaGolfGirl: #1 [reason to unsubscribe]: Because I never subscribed in the 1st place.
+ Further reading: ClickZ attributes a successful email program to starting with an easy, obvious signup process and goes on to recommend considering a double opt-in to establish a positive relationship with your readers.
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Now it’s your turn to weigh in. What prompts you to sign up for new emails, and what has you kicking current ones to the curb?
Contribute to the conversation and follow us on Twitter at @emmaemail.
Behind the scenes of the Atlanta Falcons’ interactive marketing team
We talk email marketing, social media strategy and staying focused during the holidays with Dan Levak, Director of New Media for the NFL's Falcons
Meet the Atlanta Falcons' New Media Group. Dan's on the left.
Read on for a glimpse at the Falcons’ fine-tuned approach — you’ll be as impressed as I was.
How do you use Emma to reach your fans, and how often do you send emails?
We understand that people have more email than they know what to do with so we try to be very disciplined about limiting and consolidating our messaging. We send a weekly e-report that’s a digest of significant events, stories and news. We also send a “pre-game” season ticket holder email filled with useful game-specific information relevant to folks attending the game — such as when the tailgate lots open that week, pre-game entertainment options around the Georgia Dome, etc. We also send various one-off emails to fans that opt in for various value propositions: ticket specials, third-party offers, etc. Again, because of the avalanche of email people face today, we are very selective of these third-party offers — there has to be true value to Falcons fans, or we won’t send it. On occasion our senior leadership team needs to directly address our fan base, and we use Emma’s platform to send out “Letter From…” emails crafted to look like they’re on Falcons letterhead. And we also utilize Emma for what we call operational purposes: season ticket renewal information, reminders for deadlines, applications for season-long parking passes, etc. It sounds like a lot – and in the aggregate, it is — but we are very conscious of timing and frequency of our mailings.
Who works on the Falcons’ email marketing strategy, and how do you set priorities as a marketing team?
We work under an empowerment philosophy. That’s one of the main reasons we’re with Emma — the ease of use of the platform. I’ve used several large enterprise email marketing platforms throughout my time with the Falcons, and many of them require two-day training sessions just to understand how to deploy a single campaign.
Emma’s platform was clearly designed with an emphasis on user interface — it’s so easy to learn and use. We’ve been able to empower various departments throughout the organization to deploy their own email campaigns. Our Ticket Office is a prime example. Folks generally aren’t experts using HTML or CSS, but we set up very flexible templates that allow them to enter their own content & graphics, schedule their emails, manage their own lists and even monitor their own analytics. It’s taken much of the burden off of our digital media group, and it allows them to be much more spontaneous when spur of the moment campaign needs arise.
What’s your most popular content, and how do you continue to come up with fresh topics?
We continuously ask the question: “If I were a fan, and I didn’t have access to our players, coaches and front office, what would I want to know right now?” It’s actually easy when you simply turn it around and always look through the fan prism.
You also use Twitter, Facebook and LinkedIn to reach fans. What’s your social media strategy?
The $64,000 question. :) There’s so much focus on “social strategy,” and yes, we have a very specific one with very tangible strategic goals layered with discreet tactical measures geared toward achieving them.
Without going into too much detail, our social media strategy is centered around two things: be consistent in our interaction and be authentic. We are all bombarded by so much information in our lives. Social media platforms –- especially Facebook & Twitter –- along with the mainstream penetration of smartphones and tablets has created shorter and shorter attention spans among consumers. The mediums are so much more efficient, but this has paradoxically made it more difficult to get your message across. So when someone takes the time out of their busy lives to reach out to us –- via an email, a message board post, a comment on our Facebook page, an at-reply on Twitter –- then we OWE that fan a response. Even a simple acknowledgement that “yes, we heard you” goes a long way. Rewarding someone who invests their valuable and increasingly scarce time with our brand is one of the most important things we do.
A recent Atlanta Falcons Weekly E-report
Finally, we look at these social mediums as an extension of our online presence, and we’re not focused on our dot-com site’s major metrics the way we used to be. Uniques, page views, time-on-site is important, to be sure, but their significance is wrapped in the context of the overall universe — including social. I think making sense of social analytics and being able to derive truly actionable business intelligence from them is a major market opportunity.
This season, you’ll play New Orleans the day after Christmas and Tampa Bay on New Year’s Day. Any special tricks for maintaining focus around the holidays?
We never have issues maintaining focus. We’re all so passionate about our careers and pro football in general — this is what we love to do. What is difficult at times is not being able to spend traditional holidays with your family because the NFL schedule requires you to either play a game or be traveling to a game on major holidays like Thanksgiving and Christmas Day. Everyone in this business understands that taking a few vacation days or a full week off around the holidays isn’t realistic. It’s what we signed up for, and it’s one small con in an industry that’s filled (literally and figuratively!) with pros.
Do the Falcons have any holiday traditions as a team?
Hopefully we’ll look back 10 or 15 years from now and say our holiday tradition each season was getting ready for the playoffs. :) Our owner provides a unique opportunity for all the business units that make up the Blank Family of Businesses to come to Falcons headquarters on a weekday for a mid-December holiday luncheon. It’s a great opportunity to meet and visit with folks who share your culture, but not necessarily your day-to-day experience.
We also partner with Children’s Healthcare of Atlanta for an annual holiday ornament drive. Each year we design a unique ornament, and each one has the number of one of our roster players on it. We manufacture several hundred of each roster number, then the players get together and sign all of the ornaments with their number. Fans can then purchase the autographed ornaments (they’re tax-deductible). Because of demand for our highest-profile players, fans don’t specify which player’s ornament they receive — they’re randomly sent out, and it’s the luck of the draw. It’s a fantastic program that benefits one of the best nonprofit children’s hospitals in the nation.
The Falcons' ticket office sends game day emails to season ticket holders.
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Connect with the Atlanta Falcons:
+ Sign up for their email newsletter
+ Follow the Falcons’ main Twitter feed or any number of staff members, players and cheerleaders, including Dan Levak at @FalconsDLevak
+ Like them on Facebook
+ Check out the team schedule
Emma City Guide: Denver, CO
Tour Denver and get to know some of Emma's mile-high customers
This crisp fall weather is signaling me to spend some time in the great outdoors. And what better place to enjoy autumn’s offerings than Denver, Colorado? Home to one of Emma’s satellite offices, the mile high city is a fine place to spend a day shopping, eating and soaking up some of its downtown culture, and it’s the perfect setting for our next Emma City Guide.
I’m actually headed to Denver next month, so I’m putting together my short list of must-visit local attractions, and I found some noteworthy Emma customers along the way. Here’s my rundown of a perfect day in Denver, Emma-style.
The Denver Museum of Nature and Science uses Emma to promote exhibits and special programs and to stay in touch with museum members.
Denver Museum of Nature and Science
2001 Colorado Blvd
For me, exploring a new city means visiting a museum or two. It’s a chance to feed my brain in a unique setting, chat with a docent and find a proper souvenir in the gift shop. I’ll begin my day in Denver with a visit to the Denver Museum of Nature and Science. This museum has been a city fixture since 1900 and provides the community with exhibitions and programs that teach visitors about the history of Colorado and beyond. I’ll hit up the permanent exhibit of Egyptian mummies first, then wander through the lifelike wildlife dioramas. Oh, and I can’t forget the planetarium. There’s so much to see, I’m planning on making a morning out of it. And when I get a little peckish, I’ll grab a sandwich from the snack bar and head outside for a leisurely lunch in City Park. It’s just outside the museum door.
+ See a recent campaign
+ Visit their website
Fleur de Lis uses Emma to let customers know about upcoming sales and to notify them of changes to their website and blog.
Fleur de Lis
8000 E Belleview Ave, Ste B40
Greenwood Village
After a picnic lunch, I’ll scout out a couple local shops. Fleur de Lis (a paperie) will make a delightful first stop, just south of the downtown Denver Tech Center. It’s a luxury paper boutique, the kind of place that instantly inspires you to dedicate more time to old fashioned correspondence. But they also stock beautiful gifts and accessories, like picture frames, portfolios, pens and personalized stamps. If you’re planning a wedding or special event, this is a one-stop shop for custom save-the-dates, invitations and gifts for the wedding party or guests of honor. Treat yourself to something nice, too.
+ See a recent campaign
+ Visit their website and blog
CLP Jewelry uses Emma to showcase products and announce trunk shoe events to retail partners and fans.
CLP Jewelry
Carried by multiple retailers
While meandering back to downtown Denver, I’ll likely embrace my inner cowgirl and pick up some locally crafted jewelry from Emma customer CLP Jewelry. Christy Lea Payne’s designs are decidedly western, made with soft worn leather and natural stones and metals, and they reflect Christy’s signature rustic style.
Her pieces are carried in a number of local Denver boutiques, but she does wholesale business with shops all over the country. You can visit the CLP Jewelry website to find a retail location. Yeehaw.
+ See a recent campaign
+ Visit their website
The Denver Philharmonic Orchestra uses Emma to share its season schedule and promote ticket sales.
Denver Philharmonic Orchestra
KPOF Hall, 1340 Sherman St
Time to take in the local music scene. I’m going to skip the bars and rock venues and class things up a bit by attending a concert by the Denver Philharmonic Orchestra. The Denver Philharmonic is one of the longest standing — and best — community orchestras in the western United States. Now in its 64th season, the DPO is led by conductor Adam Flatt and calls KPOF Hall its home. The DPO’s repertoire proves to be a mix of familiar and new-to-my-ears pieces, and the concert will cap off a lovely day in the Front Range.
+ See a recent campaign
+ Visit their website
And there you have Denver in a day. I hope your fall promises a travel adventure or two. Don’t forget to check our our previous city guides for Austin and Portland, and happy trails!
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Blank page, begone
Part two of our content strategy series gives you a head start on writing key email campaigns
We like to share email strategies that work, so we’ve written quite a lot about welcome triggers, surveys, and all kinds of other ways to showcase who you are as an organization. We’re pretty sure you already know how effective these communication tactics can be, and we know how it feels when you know you really should be doing something that just never makes its way to the top of the to-do list. Sometimes having to stare at a blank page is enough to keep that “send brilliant email to subscribers” item permanently low on your list, actually, so we have two solutions to help you fill up the page.
Solution 1: Call the professionals
We’ve been talking to a new company called Scripted that employs writers who, well, write stuff. We like them because they’re smart and they’re nice, but also because they like telling stories. Many of their writers have a screenwriting background, which is a pretty interesting way of looking at email marketing since those campaigns you send are all about telling your company story in just the right way, every time you show up in someone’s inbox. Their writers are developing a specialty in email writing, and Scripted likes to pair their freelancers with clients by matching up subject-level expertise, too.
We’re launching a test program with them, and we’re going to cover the writing fee for the first 15 current Emma customers who post a comment below and want to participate. What you’ll get out of the deal: an email campaign written by a professional writer (one rewrite is included if necessary, too). What we’ll ask of you: to complete the campaign and send us feedback within 30 days.
Solution 2: Get a head start with our pre-written emails
Our in-house experts created templates you can use for three important ways of communicating with your readers. We highly recommend each of these strategies — we’re always astounded by their tendency to engage audiences. (We’re also astounded by the cuteness of baby bears playing in the middle of a road, but we’re not covering that in-depth here.) Getting started with these email tactics is as simple as downloading our templates and then personalizing them.
We’ve got content templates for …
+ Setting up a welcome trigger. Sending a welcome email is an ideal way to start your relationship with that special someone who just joined your list. Even just saying “hi” and mentioning how to stay in touch with you on Twitter and Facebook is great. For a gold star, offer a discount to further endear yourself to them. I can’t promise you’ll receive an actual gold star, but go ahead and imagine one for yourself every time new person signs up and then gets that automatic welcome. See more welcome email trigger examples and analysis.
+ Sending a survey. If someone’s on your list, you’ve succeeded in establishing a relationship with them. That’s a big deal, when you think about it. So honor that connection by finding out more about them. You can send a survey to ask what they’d like to hear from you or to find out a few of their preferences so you can personalize your content. And since they’re taking time to share with you, consider offering them some kind of prize or other thank-you for the effort. See our previous posts about surveys to read more about how to create effective ones.
+ Getting the right list in place. Marketers are increasingly realizing that it’s better to have a smaller list of folks who are actively reading and clicking on email campaigns than a bigger list that’s full of people who never bother. As Mary on our community relations team wrote in a post about list hygiene earlier this year, “Members who have never opened a mailing are telling you that they’ve all but officially unsubscribed. Consider removing these addresses — you’ll have more accurate response metrics with an up-to-date audience.” Losing folks from your list may feel initially painful, but think of the better response rate you’ll have later. See the rest of Mary’s insights and tips.
Ready to spring into action?
You can download what you’d like on our content template page. Of course, you’ll want to add your own voice so that what you send reflects your particular style. After these templates get you started, let us know what else we can do to help with your content and email marketing plans. We’d like to know what trips you up, and how we can help smooth the way.
And remember, if it’s that free email writing offer with Scripted you’re after, just post a comment below, and we’ll get back in touch with the details for the first 15 Emma customers.
Additional resources
Content strategy basics, part one
Emma’s Oh Blather List: writing ideas for when you’re stuck
5 questions with Melissa Junge of Animatics
B2B email campaigns, keeping content fresh and spending time in Santa Clara
Melissa writes content for Animatics, and Kym Chao does graphic design.
Melissa Junge, Sales and Marketing Assistant at Animatics Corporation in Santa Clara, CA, is passionate about her company and their communication strategy. Check out an archive of the “SmartNews” email campaigns she sends using Emma, and read below for her thoughtful answers to five questions.
Describe what your company does and what makes you stand out in your industry.
Animatics manufactures motion control systems including servo motors, table top robots, gear heads, controllers, shunts and power supplies. We are best known for the creation of the SmartMotor, an integrated servo motor that encompasses an encoder, controller, amplifier and drive all in one, and can be programmed directly from any laptop in a million different ways for any industry application. Our products are used in multiple industries including aerospace, food, semiconductor, automotive, entertainment, etc. SmartMotors can pretty much be used in any machine that moves.
How do you use Emma to communicate with your audience? Which features are your favorite?
Our marketing efforts, and the way we use Emma, is dual purpose. One audience is our value-added distributors: independent resellers such as Minarik, Onexia, Bertelkamp Automation and others that sell our products to end customers. We communicate with them, and they pass along whatever gets their attention and will be useful as sales tools. The other audience is our end users: primarily machine builders, design engineers and manufacturing specialists who build our motors into their larger machine designs. We use the email campaigns as the primary B2B marketing channel to both of these groups as it’s the quickest and most efficient way to get both groups the information they need.
Favorite features would have to be social media buttons and the tech support. I love the social media share buttons and use the campaigns for most of my Twitter and LinkedIn news. Originally we were using a home-coded mail merge program that didn’t have response tracking or social media capabilities, but now we’ve increased our emails from one every three months to one every two weeks with Emma’s help. Emma tech support is also great. Any questions I have are answered immediately, and I have yet to have a problem that hasn’t been solved.
You send email campaigns every two weeks. How do you keep your content fresh?
We use the email campaigns for a number of things: product announcements, company news, case studies, new marketing collateral and more. Being able to send out content in multiple categories as well as pushing to always innovate and improve our products usually gives us a lot to talk about.
Let’s say your friend from out of town has four hours to spend in Santa Clara. What’s on the must-do list?
Come visit our office, first of all! Get the tour of the training rooms, production (where the magic happens) and some of our new “toys” like the mini mill and SmartMotor powered artwork. We are right across the street from California’s Great America theme park (close enough to hear people scream from the tops of roller coasters during our lunch) so I would say that’s at the top as well. Then, go to a San Jose Sharks game!
What’s the last song that was playing on your iPod?
“Ding” or “Music Monks” by Seeed. It’s reggae musical sound with German rap lyrics. Sounds ridiculous but after you hear it, it becomes addicting.
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