Category Archive: Email best practices
Improving your email list
How to use advanced tools and strategy to nurture your growing audience
Yesterday, I offered tips for turning your email readers into buyers, but those tactics may not do you a ton of good until you’ve really engaged your audience. Today, we’ll look at a few strategies for nurturing your growing audience.
Make time to nurture your growing email list.
Your list is all grown up. What now?
At this stage, I imagine that your email marketing goals are more advanced. You’re keen to keep your original fans while attracting a larger crowd, but as you do so, you want to maintain strong delivery rates and engagement. Now’s the time to pair your goal of growth with additional measures like effective messaging, relationship building and higher delivery rates.
Here are a few ways to do just that:
+ Segment beyond demographics. Your audience list likely falls into more relevant categories than male/female and north/south. For example, a brand new subscriber may respond better to being treated like a very special newbie than simply receiving a particular demographic’s message. To kick off that relationship, develop a series of welcome emails for new subscribers that introduces them to your content and messaging. Retool a particularly successful past campaign or build a new one from scratch, or both. (For more ideas, Cody gives tips galore on segmenting your subscribers based on their relationship with you.) Alternatively, if you have a longer purchase cycle than traditional retail, you may want to segment based on your recipients’ place in that process. Read my perspective on segmenting based on customer lifecycle.
+ Elicit audience actions to help your emails succeed in filtered inboxes. Most popular webmail clients (like Gmail and Hotmail) do some automatic filtering for their users. Unloved email senders start to get filtered to the “unimportant” category — and sometimes right out of the inbox. To combat this, encourage your readers to perform the actions that say “this email is valuable” to the inboxes that use these algorithms.
A reply is one of the most powerful indicators to the inbox filter that your email is wanted. Ask your subscribers to reply to your email, vote in a poll or ask questions. Subscriber clicks are also powerful boosts for your reputation; craft situations where readers click, even if they’re not shopping or reading more. For example, let subscribers provide feedback by clicking on links right from your email. Keep in mind that every non-open hurts your reputation with all recipients at that domain, so send and segment wisely.
Email expert Mark Brownlow encourages subscribers to reply directly to him.
+ Measure past the click to learn what speaks to your audience. Your Emma response page shows you which links in your newsletter were the most popular. For an even deeper look into your audience’s preferences, tag your links using an analytics tool like Google Analytics to learn where your subscribers are ultimately landing. For a tutorial, read Cassie’s guide to implementing Google Analytics.
+ Develop a plan for non-engaged subscribers. Disengaged subscribers hurt your sender reputation. Periodic pruning of your list is a good idea. First, define what “inactive” means for your brand. Is it someone who hasn’t opened, clicked or engaged through any channels in three months? Six months? A year?
Next, create your plan of attack. Will you send a few emails asking folks to opt back in and then remove those who don’t? Is opening the reactivation email enough to be considered active? Give your plan a try, and then move those lifeless email addresses out of your regular sending list. You may decide to remove them completely or send less frequently for a while before saying goodbye. Just don’t be alarmed if your reactivation campaign doesn’t win the majority of folks back. With email address turnover these days, many of them may not be salvageable.
Moving beyond “one size fits all” messaging and saying goodbye to your non-openers isn’t always an easy transition, but your response rates will reflect the additional effort. Before you know it, those folks who stick around will be engaging with you in ways you may not have expected — and helping spread the word about you to new, attentive subscribers.
This is part three in our blog series on audience growth. Read parts one and two.
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You have a list of email subscribers, but are you ready to send?
Creating a positive subscriber experience before your first email campaign
Sometimes you procure an item that you just know will serve a grand purpose later but, perhaps, the timing of its use isn’t quite clear yet. For me, it’s an electric sander for all of the furniture re-finishing I plan to do in the rooms of a house I don’t own yet (but that’s the subject for another post).
For some of the companies I talk to each day, that item is a precious, albeit outdated, list containing the email addresses of all of their closest friends, customers and prospects. You may know what I’m talking about: you’ve gathered a rather impressive email list over time, but now the dust is beginning to collect, and you realize that you’re running the risk of being forgotten by those signups.
You may want to clutch that list in desperation (it’s hard-earned!) and send out a blast (ick!) to all of those recipients. Instead, consider fine-tuning your list, and think about making the experience personal — you’ll begin the email relationship with your subscribers on the right foot.
- Review your list. Your audience isn’t just a list of email addresses – it’s a collection of people who have shown interest in your product or service over time. But, do you remember what you signed up for a couple years ago? Your audience probably doesn’t either, so it’s worth your time to review your email list before sending your first mailing. Start by giving Emma’s Privacy and Permission Policy a once-over, and narrow your list down to folks who have done business with you or opted in during the last 18 months. Next, segment the remaining subscribers by their relationship to you (friend, client, etc) or by their signup date. Consider sending newer subscribers a welcome email, and reintroduce yourself to people who signed up more than a few months back. Remind them that they’ve signed up, explain that you’re going to start mailing to them and mention the opt-out link in case a few recipients’ interests have changed.
- Set conservative sending goals. Consistent communication strengthens the relationship with your audience. But crafting great emails takes time and planning. Do you know what kind of information you plan on sharing, how it’ll benefit your audience and how often you’ll be able to share it? If you establish your content strategy before you start sending, you can spare yourself some major headaches down the road. Next, determine frequency. For many, a monthly newsletter is a sustainable pace to establish. But if you’ve identified a need for weekly or daily emails, you’ll want to set that expectation with your audience.
- Design a preference center. If you’re developing different types of messages (a regular newsletter plus periodical promotional messages, for example), or different audiences to target (like male versus female shoppers), give your audience as much power of choice as you can. By designing a signup form with options that best reflect your audience segments, you’re also setting up a “preference center” for current audience members. This will allow your subscribers to opt down (receive emails less frequently) or opt over (move to a different mailing group) in lieu of unsubscribing altogether. You’ll be rewarded with much more responsive audience groups. For instructions on customizing your preference center, head on over to this nifty page in Emma’s Help Guide.
There you have it – your three-step plan for rolling out a top-notch email experience for the folks on your list. If you have any questions about getting started, let us know.
This is part two in our blog series on audience growth. Read part one here.
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Interested in learning more?
- One of our delivery experts dives into opt-in email marketing.
- Emma’s Director of Content talks about content strategy.
- Molly answers FAQs about email marketing.
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Not yet an Emma customer? Your first 60 days are free!
Every picture tells a story
How stock photos add visual appeal to your emails
Jessica enjoys a ferry ride from Victoria to Vancouver. (We're jealous.)
Today’s guest post is written by Jessica Hughes, social media and public relations specialist at Fotolia. Learn more on the Fotolia blog, or follow Fotolia on Twitter.
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When you think about your creative content, many factors come to play: your copy, your font choices, the layout and, of course, the images you choose to communicate your message. In short, looks count.
It’s no secret – incorporating an image is powerful! It’s a fun way to engage and capture attention. What’s more, including imagery boosts your campaign’s impact and drives traffic to your site. The key is finding the right image to match your message. Here are seven rules and examples that show how to pack the perfect visual punch.
Rule 1: Grab your reader’s attention. You only have a few seconds to get your reader’s attention, and a sharp image will reel them in fast. Use clever imagery to compel people to read on so that your overall message is delivered from soup to nuts.
Rule 2: Use visual aids to enhance communication. You know that old saying, “A picture is worth a thousand words?” Considering that you don’t have a thousand words to interest an email recipient, why not let an image state your case? Choosing unique visuals that tell the story for you is an efficient way to get your point across.
Rule 3: Be bold. Avoid being too literal. Yes, your image will be subjective and influenced by your content to some degree, but consider other angles to make an impression. There are millions upon millions of royalty-free images available to you, so enjoy your image browsing and dare to be different.
Rule 4: Consider images that feature people. People like to look at people. Studies show that one of the reasons Facebook is such a hit is because of our fascination with what other people do. By nature, humans feel a need to relate to others. Using images with a person increases your chance of drawing your audience in.
Rule 5: Stay current. As tastes and styles change, so should your mindset for the way you choose images. While your intention for a certain image may be to show that you’re edgy, you wouldn’t want to turn anyone off. Get a feel for the lay of the land before you send. What’s new politically, socially or stylishly? You can be retro and still be cool, but do keep up with the Joneses.
Rule 6: Know your (image) rights. Get your pictures from a source that specializes in royalty-free stock photography. As tempting as it is to snag a picture from a free source like Google, it’s just not legal. Stock photography sites give you peace of mind and creative license. When you have rights to an image, you can modify it and turn it into something that completely embodies what you want to communicate. The avenues for creativity are limitless, and you better believe no one else will have an image like yours if you play it up.
Rule 7: Mind your specs. Aside from selecting an image that suits your concept, pay attention to colors and contrast –- they’re part of the “wow” factor, too. The colors in your image should complement the remainder of your content, including font styles and other branding. Resolution, aspect ratios and formats vary, so check out Fotolia’s usage guide to help determine what kind of image is the best match for your project.
There you have it. Seven tips to help you pick a fantastic image for whatever your needs may be. Remember, your image should be the butter to your bread. The dynamic sidekick to your content’s super hero. Helping fight crime and take the world one villain at a time. Or, wait … What I’m really trying to say is that the right image can help your message resonate with a resounding “POW.” So sock it to ‘em.
Lifecycle mailings help you reach your audience at the right time
Email examples for different stages of the subscriber relationship
If you plan on catching up on your Sophocles over the holidays and you’d like to avoid spoilers, you might want to skip these next few lines: they give away the answer to the Riddle of the Sphinx. Ready? What goes on four legs in the morning, on two legs at noon and on three legs in the evening? The answer: a man, who crawls on all fours as a baby, walks on two legs as an adult and uses a cane in old age.
Consider this: there’s a morning, noon and evening (of sorts) to your email subscriber’s relationship with you, too. And, just like our riddle’s subject, your subscribers will benefit from a little extra help in the different phases of it. That’s where lifecycle emails come in.
Lifecycle mailings are your opportunity to customize your readers’ experience from the very beginning — and to tailor consequent messages to the different stages of your relationship with them. For example, you might send a welcome email early on to offer new subscribers help getting started. Or, you might offer a unique deal or extra appreciation to active subscribers (those that regularly open, click or share your email). On the flip slide, you might want to give special attention to subscribers who have lapsed into inactivity. Lifecycle emails are a great way to show subscribers that you’re aware of the connections you’re building with them. Best of all, they really work. As MarketingSherpa reports, targeted mailings increase open rates by as much as 30% over non-targeted ones.
Emma’s trigger mailings and audience search capabilities make it easy to set up an automated lifecycle mailing program that meets your audience members wherever they are in their customer relationship. Looking for a little inspiration? Here are a few examples from companies that make lifecycle messaging a central part of their email strategy.
Welcome message series
Ebay welcomes new members in a series of emails.
You’ve got to crawl before you can walk, right? Your new subscribers are a special group: they’ve just joined your audience, they’re eager to learn more and they won’t know what to expect from your mailings. They’re also among your most engaged readers. A 2010 report from Experian Marketing Services indicated that the average open rate for welcome messages is as much as four times higher than the normal mailing.
Your welcome message is your first opportunity to tell new subscribers what they should know about you. As Molly demonstrates in this blog post, crafting great welcome emails is something of an art form. And sometimes, one welcome message may not be enough. I received a welcome email from Ebay on the day I opened my account. Then, two days later, I received a follow-up message with additional tips on getting started. There’s a lot to learn about how to use Ebay — so much so that it can be a little daunting for the uninitiated, and I appreciated the extra messaging.
Think about creating a series of welcome emails. They’ll help your new subscribers learn to navigate your service and offerings over time.
Anniversary messages
Redbox sends a note on your customer anniversary.
They grow up so fast, don’t they? After the first few months, your new subscribers aren’t so new anymore. If your messages are relevant and you’re targeting the right people, your subscribers mature into readers who don’t need as much handholding in their messages. And after their peak activity as early subscribers, your regular readers’ activity tends to level out as they make their own decisions about which messages and offers hold the most appeal to them. But even though they’re standing on their own feet now, they’ll still appreciate a specialized message every so often. In this eye-catching anniversary message, Redbox rewards their subscribers with a free rental. For your audience, it may be a free cup of coffee or just a follow-up check-in, but recognizing milestones in the relationship is a great way to let your readers know that you value them.
Re-engagement campaigns
Chico's lets you know that you've been missed.
Even if you have the most engaged of email audiences, it’s normal to have a batch of inactive subscribers, too. In fact, you may see 20 to 30 percent of an email audience lost to bounced emails and unsubscribes over the course of a year. Since a 2007 Return Path study indicated that only 22% of business professionals actually unsubscribed from emails they no longer wished to receive, that means that, at any given moment, your audience is likely to contain recipients who have moved past their prime as responsive audience members.
What to do? A targeted mailing to the unresponsive section of your audience is a great way to reconnect with lapsed subscribers. A simple audience search in Emma can help you target everyone in your audience who hasn’t opened a mailing in a set period of time (a year is a safe place to start).
This re-engagement campaign from Chico is an example of solid messaging for inactive subscribers. It acknowledges that the reader hasn’t been active in a while without sounding creepy, and it gives a strong incentive to re-engage with the brand. If you’re planning a re-engagement campaign for your own audience, remember that tone is everything — keep it sincere and conversational. “We haven’t heard from you in a while” is a much better way to connect with a lapsed subscriber than “It looks like you haven’t opened an email campaign in 12 months.” You want your audience to feel that you’re listening to them, not that you’re watching them like a hawk.
Re-engagement campaigns will win back some audience members who would otherwise have wandered off into the sunset, but it’s important to keep realistic expectations: if they haven’t responded up until this point, many of your audience members may have reached the end of their day. After giving these members a few opportunities to come back into the fold, it may be time to remove them from your list.
And, don’t despair — as one section of your audience is going gently into that good night, there’s a whole other section whose day is just beginning. Catch folks — and speak to them — where they’re at, and you’ll be on your way to a solid list of engaged subscribers.
Growing your email audience
A primer to start building your email list easily and effectively
Taco Mamacita wisely mixes required and optional fields in their signup form.
It’s a frustrating feeling to have a great announcement to make, but no audience to hear it — just ask any business owner who’s just beginning to build their email audience list. Your news may be more about software updates or new product lines than cupcakes, but the challenge remains: If the classroom doesn’t come to you, how do you find the right folks to share in your celebration?
Fortunately, there are plenty of ways to find the right audience members and play well with Emma’s permission policy, too. With a little advance planning, you’ll set yourself up to share your brand with the right folks — and engage them from the start.
If you’re new to email marketing and not sure how to attract subscribers, follow these tips to get your program up and running:
- Create a strong signup form. Your signup form is the perfect place to gather all the subscriber information you need to know. Make a clear distinction between what you must have (mark it as required) and what can be shared at your subscribers’ discretion. You might need to know their zip codes to send them accurate info about a store in their area, but you don’t need to send birthday coupons to everyone — just the folks who choose to fill in their date of birth. Remember, subscribers may abandon your form if they feel that the process is too long or intrusive. Also, let your subscribers know what to expect as a new member of your list. Will you be sending daily, weekly, monthly or on some other schedule? Will they see promotions along with newsletters? Can they pick and choose the news types they want to receive?
- Identify all of your customer touch-points, and get used to asking folks to join your email list. Think beyond your website for a moment. Does your company send transactional emails? Do you tweet? Have a Facebook page? You’ll reach the biggest audience by making your email signup forms as visible as possible in as many places as possible, so identify your points of contact. And think beyond your online presence. Put a fishbowl near your store’s register so customers can sign up by dropping in their business cards. Encourage your sales team to bring up your newsletter in their daily calls or demo classes. Even include a link to your signup form in your own email signature. Every interaction is an opportunity to build a relationship.
- Create a welcome trigger. Catch your subscribers when their curiosity is piqued: right when they sign up. Your automatic welcome emails can net four times the normal open rate and five times the normal click-through rate. A welcome email is the perfect time to reinforce the benefits of your newsletter, give subscribers a discount on their next purchase or simply thank them for signing up.
- Ask subscribers to share your emails with their networks. Then, provide unique and entertaining content so they can’t help but do so. Incentivize the share, too. Reward those who share with a special coupon or unique content from your brand. That’s a built-in loyalty program!
Give a little thought (and a lot more action) to these four tips, and you’ll be growing your email list in no time.
This is part one in our blog series on audience growth. In our next installment, we’ll talk about more ways to maintain a healthy, engaged list.
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Want to read more?
- Learn how to create a smart signup form
- Meet your customers where they are (and ask for their email address)
- See a few welcome triggers that work
- Read about Emma’s Social Sharing feature
Video: Quick tips with Emily
3 reasons to test your email campaigns
Hello, fearless email marketer. It’s been a while, but I’m back with another video of quick tips to help your improve your email marketing efforts and make the most of your Emma account. In this edition, I’d like to share a few reasons why testing your emails before send-off is so important.
Your Emma account comes with a Test Group that allows you to store up to 10 email addresses, and sending to that group is always free. Play the video above to hear why I think the test group is a super helpful account feature, or read my reasons here.
Top three reasons to test your email campaigns:
- Testing ensures you’ve got a small group of people clicking on your links first — before they go out to your whole audience. These folks can confirm the links are pointing to the right websites. It’s what keeps you from linking your whole audience to Goggle.com instead of Google.com.
- Testing gives you the opportunity to see how your email will look on a mobile device. You can make sure the message is clear, even on that teeny tiny screen, and that the campaign is easy to navigate on a smart phone.
- Testing lets you get early feedback on subject lines, headlines, and of course, how it all looks together. That’ll ensure you have time to make any final changes to add some style before your audience receives the mailing.
So, go ahead, send to the test group included in your account, and test your mailings as much as you’d like. And tell us what other reasons you’ve found to make a good case for sending test emails. Comment here to share tips and stories.
See Emily’s first quick tips video here.
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What’s in an email subject line?
Ten tips for effective and memorable subject lines
As is the case with many puzzlers, coming up with a winning subject line is a hit and miss operation. Thoughtful experimentation will help you hone in on what works for you and your audience. And while there are no hard and fast rules about subject lines, a little know-how goes a long way. I’ve compiled ten of my favorite subject line tips and included links to some further reading, if you’re so inclined.
- Plan ahead. Don’t make writing the subject line the last thing on your list. As you’re dreaming up your next campaign, why not start with the subject line? After all, it’s the only part of your email some recipients will see. Moreover, crafting a descriptive subject line from the get-go will bring your overall campaign to a focus. When you’re waffling about word choice, check Google to see what terms trend highest.
- Mention your brand. Studies show branded subject lines really work, so if you aren’t including your business name, website or publication in the subject line, start now. Branding your emails will result in increased familiarity with your organization and remind recipients why your email is in their inbox.
- Stay relevant to the campaign’s goal. Make sure your subject lines express the overarching theme and purpose of your message. Decide what you want the recipient to do as a result of reading your email, and begin drawing them toward that action in the subject line (think verbs!). There isn’t a one-size-fits-all formula, but descriptive subject lines that match the tone of the content inside will be most effective. For a content-rich newsletter, informative subject lines work best. Similarly, event invites need to say what’s special about the occasion and provide a registration deadline. And if you’re sending a purely promotional campaign, be upfront about the value inside to convey a sense of urgency, like “Fairytale Books: Celebrate Dr. Seuss; 40% Off Today Only.”
- Pay attention to your audience. Writing subject lines people love may seem like magic, but unless your audience is made up of Muppets, “a la peanut butter and jelly sandwiches” won’t cut it. Nevertheless, put yourself in the Amazing Mumford’s shoes for a minute and think about why everyone remembers that line. Jim Henson knew a thing or two about childhood appetites, and you’re likely to have the inside track on what your audience likes, too. So have a little fun and design a subject line that puts your audience’s interests first.
- Be enticing without being pushy. Avoid subject lines that read like something Mr. Radio Announcer Guy would squawk over the airwaves louder than your toddler in the back seat. Email recipients can spot a hard sell a mile away, so anything that sounds like it belongs in the Sunday circular should be rewritten. If you’re struggling to figure out which email subject lines are most likely to convert, try running a few pay-per-click ads with various subject lines to see which one has the highest click-through rate.
- Avoid spammy words and slogans. Including the word “free” may seem like a good way to get customers in the door, but since spammers throw “free” around like cheap lipstick, your email could wind up in the trash if you combine it with other frequent spam offenders like gratuitous exclamation points, typing in ALL CAPS or terms like “blowout” and “cheap.”
- Be clever, but don’t get too kooky. When getting attention is the name of the game, it’s tempting to write a Page Six worthy subject line. But since subtlety is lost in the inbox, your reader may pass over your line before taking a moment to get the joke. Check out Matt’s tips for more advice on creating a catchy hook.
- Test, measure and repeat. Testing variables such as branding, length and punctuation can demonstrate what subject lines carry the most weight with your audience. Coming soon, Emma’s Split Testing feature will give you the ability to send up to three subject lines to a portion of your audience and automatically distribute the winning subject line to the rest. Read more about Emma customers who split test, and learn about Emma’s split testing feature (and a whole slew of other cool enhancements coming your way).
- Review past results. Emma lets you compare the results of up to five mailings at a time so you can see at a glance just which campaigns — and subject lines — performed the best. Use this information to craft your next subject line, and keep an eye on how it stacks up.
- Steer clear of industry clichés. One surefire way to stand out from the crowd is to find an original way to state the obvious. Think about it: If a person has signed up for your emails, they probably have emails from similar brands in their inbox. To make sure yours is the email they read, find out what the competition is saying and do something different – tell your audience something they don’t know.
Ultimately, though, a winning subject line can’t stand alone. A successful campaign depends upon the audience’s level of engagement with your brand, the relevance of your previous campaigns and at least a dozen other factors ranging from time of day and general busyness to the blood sugar level of the recipient. The subject line and “from” name, however, are the two main factors in encouraging recipients to open or delete. Sure, there’s no secret formula that will work for everyone, but these ten principles are what great subject lines are made of. Next time you’re grasping at straws, put one of these tips to the test, and don’t forget to report back — we’d love to hear what’s worked for you.
This is part six in our holiday series where we answer email marketing questions provided by our customers. Visit part five here.
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Optimized email signup forms look smart, and act even smarter
Six tips to make your opt-in form do more
We see lots of consternation over list growth, and we get it. Inbound marketing is a two-way street with a single point of access — permission to engage. That’s why you’ve optimized your website six ways to Sunday and deployed a small army of pay per click (PCC) ads to bring traffic, right?
Visitors are primed for engagement when they hit your site, and your email signup form has mere seconds to snap up that attention; in short, your signup form is the nexus of your conversion funnel. So make sure you’re optimizing it to attract the right leads.
Here are six tips to optimize your form for new subscribers:
- Generate curb appeal. Your signup form needs to draw the viewer’s eye. Lead site visitors to your form by placing it in a high-traffic area where it doesn’t have to compete with other centers of attention. Making sure your signup form is seen is job #1, and it never hurts to stack the deck. Gilt Taste has a very welcoming homepage, with not one but two places to subscribe above the fold.
- Build trust. Of course, you wouldn’t sell someone’s email address or share it with another company. We know you’re better than that, but potential subscribers may not. Tell them in no uncertain terms that you’ll respect and maintain their privacy.
- Lead with the benefits and explain what’s in store for subscribers. An email address is a precious commodity so make this an appealing transaction. While you can and should employ your brand’s signature wit and wisdom, your pitch is about what’s in it for subscribers. Do your emails make people smarter than the boy next door? Will joining your list score a table at Sunday brunch? Giving people an idea of the email goods you’ll deliver (and when) will head buyer’s remorse off at the pass. Creative firm Rule29‘s newsletter signup form does this very well.
- Be quick on the uptake by limiting your form to three or four fields. We marketers and our precious databases are insatiable when it comes to numbers. Be aware that for every required field, there’s a 20% decline in signups. Put the email field front and center, and unless you require additional information to survive on a desert island, don’t ask for much more before subscribers click submit.
- Encourage self-segmenting. Enabling your audience to choose from a menu of available groups during the opt-in process is a great way to show you care about their preferences, and it’ll sustain their interest over time. If your content strategy has more than one track and your sending schedule’s hopping, let people decide for themselves what they’d like to read and when. To learn more about newsletter menus, see this Ask Emma article.
- Ask politely to learn more about subscribers. It’s quite possible to collect email addresses and demographic data without turning people off. Consider sending a survey with your welcome trigger to give new signups an easy way to tell you their likes and dislikes. If you’re hooked up to Emma’s API through a custom web form, why not create a multi-tiered signup process to keep the opt-ins *and* the data flowing? You’ll want to put the email field on the first page, next to the benefits and submit button. After people click submit, you’re free to direct them anywhere to share their birthday, favorite ice cream flavor and what-not. Lastly, be sure to thank subscribers for what they’ve shared. Read more about thank you pages here.
Gilt Taste's signup is pretty irresistible .
Rule29's signup has perfect pitch.
No sizzle, no signup, no sale
Inbound leads are personal now. It all begins with an email address and, if you’re lucky, a name. An optimized website deserves an equally optimized signup form. So take that signup form off the blocks, test until you find what works best for your audience and watch the people meter wave them in.
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If you like this post, take a look at these:
- Molly highlights an opt-in form that leaves an impression
- Megan shares five ways to jazz up your signup form
- How to add an email signup form to your Facebook page
Stepping out of the inbox
Give your email campaigns a second life with social media
Here’s an interesting question: When you set out to create your company’s newest mailing, do you think of it as an email or as a campaign? Of course, your audience will see it as an email among others in their inbox. But you’re not just creating an email — you’re creating a message that’s worth sharing. And that message (or series of messages) can go beyond the inbox. If you think of it as a coordinated effort or campaign, you’ll realize it’s worth spreading through other channels, too.
Take a closer look at your social media presence on Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn and more. I’ll bet you’ve got more combined followers than you realize. Do all of them know how to receive your email updates? Have they heard about your latest campaign?
It’s easy to expand your email’s reach beyond the inbox by enabling Emma’s Social Sharing feature, which allows subscribers to share your email with their social networks, and it’s about to be easier for you to post your email to your social networks, with the release of our new Social Posting tool this winter. With a few clicks, you’ll be able to send a mailing to your subscribers and simultaneously post it to Facebook and Twitter. It’s an easy step that makes a big difference. In anticipation, let’s take a look at a few companies who’ve made an art out of extending the reach of their email campaigns via their social channels:
GOOP
GOOP shares a link to their emails on Facebook, generating lots of fan dialogue.
Gwyneth Paltrow’s lifestyle-oriented email newsletter, GOOP, won’t turn you into an Academy Award-winning actor/singer/cookbook author, but it might make you feel like you’re having a weekly teatime chat with one. GOOP carries on lively conversations with its audience via its Facebook page, and when the latest issue hits the inbox, you can count on a timely post with a concise, appealing teaser.
GeekChic Daily
GeekChicDaily plays hard to get with a Facebook teaser.
Like GOOP, geek culture email newsletter GeekChicDaily thrives on email engagement. But GeekChicDaily takes an interesting approach to extending its email newsletter’s online lifespan through social media: It tells, but doesn’t show. Take a look at this Facebook post. If you’re hooked by the promise of news from the Jim Henson Company (and really, what self-respecting geek wouldn’t be?), then you’ll have to sign up to get the word.
Brite Revolution
Brite Revolution manages to work the sizzle & the steak into one tweet.
If you monitor your emails’ response activity over time, you’ve probably noticed a trend: an early spike in activity (usually in the hours immediately after the send-off), followed by a steady decline in new activity over the course of the first 24 hours. However, as the folks at Brite Revolution know, last Friday’s email content will still be fresh on Tuesday for those who didn’t receive it in their inbox. They’ve packed a lot into this tweet: In addition to linking to both their newsletter and their signup form, they’ve set the expectation for how often they email — and communicated a clear benefit for joining. Not bad for 131 characters!
As email and social media become increasingly intertwined, it’s important to remember that they evolved to answer different but complementary needs. As you join the conversation with your followers on social networks, remember that your email campaigns are a unique opportunity to share sophisticated, content-rich updates. And Facebook and Twitter’s link-friendly environments mean that email updates may prove remarkably well-suited for your social media audience.
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See what we’ve got in the works this winter at Emma. It’s a Featurepalooza!
Email click-throughs aren’t as elusive as you may think
Small changes in your campaigns can increase your click-through rates
Getting clicks on your newsletter is one of the elusive goals that requires a combination of the right information at the right time to the right recipient. No sweat, right? Well, it makes sense that the percentage of people who click is usually in the single digits. According to the Email Stat Center, the average click-through rate is 5.9%. You aren’t going to be able to meet everyone’s need in the right stage of the purchase cycle. However, there are a few things that you can do to encourage those on the fence to go ahead and learn more.
Right off the bat, you need to know that you have very little time to engage the person who has just opened your email. Think about that person for a moment; she has just deleted 12 other emails, she’s drinking her morning coffee and she is checking her day’s schedule. Or maybe your recipient is wrapping up before lunch (because at least one time zone always seems to be at lunch). He is seeing your email amongst social media notifications, YouTube videos from his sister, and all he can think about is that club sandwich in his future.
All that is to say, after you spend the time perfecting the content of your email, consider that you only have two seconds to capture the attention of your subscribers. That means that you must share what you’re offering in a clear, swift and appealing manner.
Here’s a good test: Hand your email to a colleague who has not helped design or write it in any way, preferably one who’s unfamiliar with your campaign. To be generous, give him 5 or 6 seconds with it. At the end of that time, he should be able to answer the following questions:
- What are you offering me?
- How can I get it?
You don’t have to be offering a coupon for this test to be relevant. If you are offering your expertise on choosing a wine to pair with dinner, that’s valuable. It just has to be clear.
The “How do I get it?” question is where you really figure out if your message is effective and actionable. Here are some tips (and some of our favorite click-related articles) for optimizing your emails.
- Make it easy to find. Your “click area” should be immediately obvious. Is it a different color? Does it have a giant arrow pointing to it? Is the model in your image looking toward the button? (That has been shown to increase clicks.) It should be very obvious, and you should use visual design techniques to grab the attention of readers. Try different shapes, colors and sizes of your buttons. Experiment with different areas of the page, too. Put the button above most of your copy and see if more people convert.
- Make it easy to click. Again, an immediately apparent button is going to help. (For mobile readers, make sure that your button is at least 44 by 44 pixels and preferably a few lines away from another button to avoid mis-clicks.)
- Make it convincing. The text matters, and slight variations can really make a difference. “Learn More” and “Buy Now” may bring you to the same landing page, but they will appeal to people on different ends of the buying spectrum.
- Limit your subscribers’ choices. Giving too many places to click may overwhelm or confuse your readers. Remember, you only have 2 seconds!
- Use some psychology. Did you know that we lose far more joy by missing out on something than we gain by actually getting it? Consider this as you design your messages.
The small changes go a long way, so give one or two a try and report back — we’d love to know which strategies work best for you.
This is part four in our holiday series where we answer email marketing questions provided by our customers. To see part one, click here. Visit part two here and part three here.
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