‘Best Practices’ Articles

We understand the difficulties involved in developing a good customer list–it requires dedication and perseverance.  Taking short cuts and purchasing third party lists requires a significant amount of due diligence.

1. Are list members customers of the seller?
2. Is there an active sign-up  form you can see?
3. Is the seller/list owner willing to be disclosed as the source of the list in your email?
4. Can the list owner or broker provide references?
5. Claims like Double or Triple Opt-in are a Red Flag.
6. When was the list last emailed?
7. You get what you pay for – If sounds to good to be true it is
8. Can I pay you(list owner) once the list passes an Admail Compliance check?

Below is a prime example of a third party list that got a client permanently suspended from our service. The client purchased a list from Data Depot. It was “Opt-in” according to the list broker and while it initially was able to get past our Compliance check the end result was only 67% was deliverable. To make matters worse it triggered an RBL listing so the client even jeopardized their web site hosting service.

Why third party lists are a bad idea!

An organically grown list takes more time but the list members are worth that much more!

FACT:
In five seconds or less, your company’s email subject and content will determine whether a customer decides to keep your newsletter or update;  Or flag-it as SPAM.

Try to be deceptive or coy and all of your future email will be trashed. Customers want the facts and it is your responsibility to give it to them. Make the Open-or-Delete decision easy. A well thought out email strategy is a vital part of any traffic-driving effort, and we see a close connection between email frequency and the use of multiple email marketing channels and traffic.  But I am getting ahead of myself; The topic of this post, 5 Seconds You Can’t Afford To Waste!

Can your email answer these questions in two seconds or less?

Who is the e-mail from?

• Keep it familiar.

What’s in it for me?

• Keep your Subject focused.

What do you want me to do?

• A clear course of action.

ACTIONS:
Write clear, not cutesy, subject lines. State the value proposition there, and build on it in the snippet/pre-header text (the first line of text in your message).

State the Details with a clear course action in your email:
Moms (and other shoppers) want to know prices and final costs up front, both the discount and the amount of money saved, not just the percentage off. Some said they were frustrated to find out how expensive shipping was after clicking on the offer and going all the way through the checkout process. That builds distrust in your future messages.

Keep your subject focused, we all know that one of the most important parts of an email campaign is the subject line and everyone is trying to come up with the perfect one.

Here are four subject lines that you should never use in your campaigns or transactional emails. Not only do they violate best practices, but in some cases they break the law. The CAN SPAM ruling states that for any commercial email, you must have your subject line relate to the content of the email.

Subject Line #1 – Hi, My name is Paul
Subject Line #2 – I need your help, please?
Subject Line #3 – Bob, I haven’t received your shipping address yet.
Subject Line #4 – Bob, Please accept my sincerest apology.

These gimmicks to trick the recipient into opening an email are a bad idea. It may raise curiosity, however, when the recipient opens the email they’re going to feel tricked and unsubscribe or worse report your email as SPAM, because these subject lines most likely will not relate at all to the  body copy. You may trigger complaints and attract  the FTC attention for violating CAN SPAM rulings. Subject line #3 is particularly onerous; it seems like the sender is trying to get more information from the recipient. Because it’s personalized, the recipient may actually give it!

CONCLUSION:
Be clear and concise make sure your subject leads the reader to the body of your email. Keep the first portion of the email’s body easily identifiable with your company identity, brand and purpose. It is critical to provide a link to your website in the first paragraph–this lends credibility to your offer and ease of use for your customer. Remember, consumers and business professionals today are bombarded with useless misinformation. They will appreciate (and become more loyal) if you’re accurate and to the point, even if they aren’t placing an order today.

1. Does my subject line entice readers to open?
   They are the most important 8-10 words in your campaign. Make sure yours is a clear, concise introduction that entices your readers to take a look inside.
2. Am I making the most of the preview pane?
   At first glance, many of your recipients will just see the first few inches of your campaign, so make your point and your brand standout, also assume they may not see your graphics USE TEXT!
3. Is my email easy on the eyes?
   With simple, intentional font and style choices, you’ll help grab and keep your readers’ attention.
4. Does the message come through, even if the images don’t?
   Since many email clients don’t automatically display images, balancing yours with text will help you make your point in any display possibility.
5. Does this email have a personal touch?
   Whether it’s with a personalized greeting, warm tone, or specialized content, make sure your email feels like a conversation with people who know you, not a blinding “blast”.
6. Does my email need to be gender specific?
   Fact: Women read, men scan bullets & images – the List Builder “Signup Form” lets you ask and Email Builder “Target Filters” help you target your audience – it only takes a few seconds to ask. For help contact Customer Service.

A Feed Back Loop (FBL) is a direct data feed that is sent to an email sender when the recipient presses the “Junk” or “Spam” button. The benefit is that the email sender can clean their subscriber data, allowing them to maintain their reputation with Internet Service Providers.

What triggers (flags) cause ISPs to block your email? Sometimes it’s a dirty list containing non-deliverable addresses. Other times it’s the ratio of spam complaints from that domain, which can include false positives.

Here are the grades for ISP’s where legitimate messages were flagged and determined to be false positives: Yahoo! gets an A, Hotmail B, AOL C, and Gmail scores the lowest with a D.

Some techniques to avoid false positives are:

• Don’t use words, terms, or phrases in the subject line or message that trigger spam filters
• Understand domain-specific user interfaces to request address book entry. Here are some examples.
• Manage list hygiene to ensure messages are not sent to unknown domains. (Admail.net’s system catches these and purges from your list member file)

As always–be aware of your list.

Don’t be intimidated by Search Engine Optimization (SEO); there are a lot of tools to guide you through the process.

Search engines organize and prioritize over 5.5 billion web pages that compete for the internet users’ attention. The focus is certainly on providing a much richer end searcher experience. The site with unique content, that’s easy to use, with good navigational elements will get high quality links. If users can complete the desired task; add to cart, enroll in class, subscribe to newsletter, etc., they will be satisfied and come back.

Companies need a website that is rich in keywords and phrases. These keywords and phrases get people to your site, by means of search engines that find your keywords. SEO leverages Search Engines’ desire to display most relevant pages that match users’ target keywords. Research also shows 26% of searchers use two word searches, followed by 23% using one word and 21% three word search. The following sites can help you determine your industries keywords and phrases, with up to date research. (more…)