The Conversion Scientist™

Science by Email

The Superstitions That Keep You From E-mail Success

November 24, 2008 on 8:57 pm | In Audio Available, Email Marketing, Methodical | 2 Comments

In my somewhat facetious post about The Father of E-mail, I make the statement:

If you’re considering investing in a social marketing campaign, and you haven’t nailed your e-mail strategy, you may be investing in the wrong place.

I don’t think business owners and marketers are dumb. I think that they’re just superstitious. Like walking under a ladder, they fear that if they really step up their e-mail strategy, they’ll come to some sad end with only the pity of their loved ones to show for it. Often, they’re afraid they’ll be punished by the god of “corporate image” and the unforgiving taskmaster, “brand.”

Here are the superstitions that keep us from making e-mail the effective, inexpensive marketing tool that it should be.

If I send e-mail, I’ll be seen as a Spammer

So, what is SPAM? It’s unsolicited or irrelevant e-mail. Technically, irrelevant e-mail isn’t SPAM, but the reaction is the same, and usually involves words that I won’t publish here.

So, what isn’t SPAM?

• It’s e-mail that I’ve specifically asked for.
• It’s e-mail that I anticipate getting, even if I don’t read it all.
• It’s e-mail that let’s me opt-out any time I feel it’s not relevant.
• It’s information delivered to me in the way I want it if my inbox is my primary information source.

If you can satisfy these requirements, you are providing a valuable service. In fact, if you don’t send e-mail to someone who has opted into your newsletter or notification program, you’re breaking a contract with your prospects and customers. It’s dishonest to offer something and not follow through.

People get too much e-mail

No. People get too much unimportant e-mail. If you send valuable information to people who need it, you too can be important. You may not be “I read every one of your e-mails immediately” important, but you can be.

Don’t worry. If their needs change, if they lose interest, they’ll tell you by unsubscribing (since you make this so easy).

People don’t want e-mail

If not by e-mail, then how will your prospects learn to solve their problems? Do you think more of your prospects are reading blogs? Do you think more of your prospects are on social networks? Twitter?

That people are using social media to get their information is only true for very specific segments of our the population. Members of the Baby Boomer generation and Generation X love their inboxes. Millennials do to, they just won’t admit it.

Let your readers decide. If you don’t have a plan for helpful, engaging e-mail, you’re denying them one of their favorite avenues of communication.

E-mail is old technology

E-mail is in its infancy. It is not a mature medium destined to fade away soon at the feet of a social media god. We are just learning how to deliver effective communications via the inbox. New technologies are being brought to bear, enabling inbox jockeys to get only the e-mail that is important, urgent, or highly desirable.

You just have to be sure you’re delivering something that is important, urgent, or highly desirable.

It takes too much time to do a newsletter

Then don’t do a newsletter.

If you can write a blog, you can write an engaging e-mail. In fact, if you have a blog, services such as Feedburner and Feedblitz will automatically send an e-mail to your subscribers every time you post. With Feedblitz, for example, you can create a template that includes promotional offers that will go out with your blog-to-e-mail posts.

My boss is more interested in social marketing and video

E-mail has an amazing quality that so many social media don’t. It’s measurable. You know who opened, who read, who bounced, who clicked, what they clicked on and if they forwarded the e-mail to a friend.

Plus, if you believe my premise that e-mail is the largest social network on the planet, you know that there is no better way to expose your video and social properties than through a list of interested individuals who’ve said they want to receive it.

No social network grows without e-mail. Why would your offering spread without it?

The “I’m No SPAMmer” Recipe

Since it’s easy to send e-mail without being a SPAMmer, why not do the following things:

• Add a way to subscribe to your helpful or entertaining e-mail communications on every page of your Web site. Add a checkbox to every form. If you want to be extra diligent, ask the recipient to verify their e-mail address before they’ll receive anything.
• Take the time to generate content that is going to help your readers solve their problems, educate them, or entertain them. Write as a human to a human. You do it everyday when communicating with your colleagues. Worry less about the design and more about your reader.
• Be sure to offer an unsubscribe with each e-mail. Be CAN SPAM compliant by putting your mailing address on the e-mail. Don’t send e-mail to people who unsubscribe.
• Send as often as the quality of your content allows. I received five e-mails in one day from American Airlines. They were telling me about the status of the flights I was scheduled to board. This wasn’t too much. It was welcome. Certainly there’s something valuable enough to send once or twice a month.

Most of this functionality will be provided by any of a hundred E-mail Service Providers (ESPs) for about a penny an e-mail. Plus, they’ll manage your relationship with Internet Service Providers to ensure that more of your e-mail makes it to the inboxes it’s destined for.

We’re talking about all things related to online marketing strategy and conversion at The Conversion Scientist. Get every post directly to your inbox and you won’t miss a thing.

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Photo courtesy zettmedia via stock.xchng

Science by Email

Father of Email Claims His Social Network is the Biggest

November 4, 2008 on 12:09 am | In Email Marketing, Spontaneous | 2 Comments

AUSTIN, TX – Ray Tomlinson, the man responsible for putting the “@” in our email addresses has apparently gone on the warpath against MySpace, Facebook and other social networks who claim they have the largest memberships.

“Zuckerberg Schmuckerberg!” Tomlinson was overheard saying at a social gathering. “My social network has been around since the 70s. We support photos, videos — everything Facebook does.”

The social network to which that Tomlinson refers is the world-wide email system, a system that has been in use since 1971 when Tomlinson inserted the “@” character to “separate the user from their machine,” according to Wikipedia. The symbol, known as an “at” sign, “ampersand,” was reportedly taken from a rune used by secretive Freemason accountants signaling other Freemason brothers to “ask for a discount.” This has not been confirmed.

The global email system has been embraced by Viagra retailers, relatives of Nigerian government officials, and that guy who thinks any joke is funny enough to share. But, the biggest social network on the planet has been overlooked by thousands of legitimate businesses.

Tomlinson has been largely out of the spotlight since a major cable company attempted to trademark the “@” in 1996, proposing that all email addresses take the form “name@™domain.com”. Tomlinson successfully argued the disk space that servers would need to store the additional characters “TM” should be saved to fix the Y2K problem.

It is not known if Tomlinson is seeking some form of compensation for his work, or if he simply had too many Appletinis. For instance, when it was pointed out that email doesn’t offer social applications like those supported by the OpenSocial standard, he is reported to have said, “what do you think viruses are!”

Tomlinson was not asked to comment on this story.

If you’re considering investing in a social marketing campaign, and you haven’t nailed your email strategy, you may be investing in the wrong place. Don’t miss our next post on the myths that keep businesses from using email to its full potential.

Photo copyright BBN Technologies.

Science by Email

"Evil" Best Buy Develops Personas

October 28, 2008 on 2:57 am | In Developing Personas, Spontaneous | No Comments

Oh no! The secret’s out. Best Buy actually took the time to profile their customers with the intention — GASP — of selling more to them. The Consumerist finds this somehow disingenuous, that one of the biggest consumer electronics retailers on the planet is not interested in selling to customers that aren’t profitable.

Maybe it’s not OK for Best Buy to do this, but do you feel some moral obligation to sell to anyone, even if you don’t make money? I don’t.

According to writer Meg Marco, Best Buy’s sins include catering "only to its most profitable customers, or ‘angels.’"

That sounds like a pretty good idea to me.

Keep reading, and I’ll lay an even bigger shocker on you.

We All Carry Personas Around With Us

The truth is, that The Consumerist has a set of personas. They just haven’t written them down. A quick review of their content will tell you that one of their key personas is the angry, cynical or distrustful consumer who likes to rant, and who will spread The Consumerist’s message to their friends via email, Digg, StumbleUpon, etc.

This is how they grow their business.

These crazed consumers are their "angels." Meg may even see someone like me — a marketer — as a "demon" on their site. The Consumerist content is targeted, relevant, and engaging, but only to those readers who will help them sell more and more advertising.

That is the power of personas, and you can use them in your business too if you want to sell more or generate more leads.

A Scandal in the Making

Here’s the shocker. I have a set of personas for this blog. And I’ve even gone so far as to write them down.

Yes, it’s a scandal in the making. I can already see the headlines:

If you’ve read this far, you’re probably one of my angels. I write for you and seek to provide value to you. You specifically. I’ve created my personas so I can target my topics and writing style to you. I think this will make you read more and share my stuff with your friends.

This is how I grow my blog.

I’m going to introduce you to my personas in the course of this series on conversion Web strategies. Don’t miss a post.

Do you think you will see yourself in them?

Thanks to Britton Manasco of Illuminating the Future for sending me this.