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Follow the rules

At first glance it Appears That the sender of this message gargantuan Neglected to follow and Stock of the Rather clear can-spam requirements – Such as Providing a valid postal address and a method to opt out of future mailings. However, When we view the offending email with images Turned On , We Can See That They did at least try to Comply, They just put all of that information Within the images – where no one Would ever see it.

Speak the language of your readers

Looking at this email with images Also Reveals That Turned on the Message was Clearly Intended For People That Can read Turkish, of Which I am not one. There is one line of the message Written in Inglés “Winner of the Best International Tour Operator WTF China 2008.” They did Why bother? Does The Fact They won an award in China make Anyone want to get this message translated? I Seriously Doubt it. Also That reminds me, Be Careful how you use abbreviations. I do not know what “WTF” mens in Turkey or China, but I’m guessing it’s not the Same thing as in the USA It Means

Do not buy generic email lists

Would you buy the New York City phone book Hoping That half of One Percent of everyone in it Might Be Interested in What You Have to Say if You Call Them? Of course not. So why do Business continued to pay money for lists That Have addresses like “webmaster” & “info” in Them? I’ll tell you why – Because They Are short sighted. They CAN buy a generic list of 10 names for $ 50 million or a targeted list of 20.000 names for $ 1.000. And, They Know That It Takes The Same work up front to send mail to all 10 million addresses as it does to send to just 20 Thousand, so why not save the money and just do it? Let me ask you this, How much is it worth to your brand image not Have to Be That of a clueless spammer? How much is it worth to Not Have Your IT staff deal with 8 million bounced back messages? How much is it worth for your company to Be Able to send email Every Day? That’d wager Each is worth more than $ 950.

Rarely is the Easiest Also the best solution

As a professional email marketer, it really irks me when I see companies, Both small and large doing it Badly. I’ve ranted in the past about Other failed e-marketing I’ve been subject to, and Unfortunately, I suspect this Will not Be The Last Time I Do It Either. I blame the surveys. It Seems barely a week goes by when to eat out yet another survey Showing how fast, easy and cheap e-marketing is, That Anyone Wanting to Survive the Economy Better Be doing it soon. Please, somebody stop Them.

All images in e-marketing email = fail

Because of the wide Variety of computer systems, email client software and human languages ??on the Internet, it is a Practical impossibility to Ensure That What you send will look the Same to the reader as it does to you (Even When sending plain text). One of the MOST abused Methods bad lazy uninformed Attempt email marketers, the message is to create an image from Entirely, or group of images. Seems like a simple solution, right? WRONG! While sending your email as embedded images Could just make it look the Same to the reader as it does to you, it Does Not Guarantee They Will it ever see events, or UNDERSTAND it. In FACT, it lessens the likelihood of Actually Being seen it. Consider Many email spam filters made up of just images to Be Such as junk and will block Them. Those That Do not block the message, will block the images Themselves Usually That All so your reader will see is red X’s Where your image (s) Should Have Been. The image Shown here is a small piece of an email I recently Received an e-marketer from Cleary Who Does Not Understand how email systems work. The thing is HUGE! I Had to patch together three screen shots for you to see the Entire email at once – it’s More Than a foot wide and two feet long. The only part of the email NOT made of images is the link at the bottom advertising for the company They Used to send it. All I (and Probably MOST of the recipients) saw Was a lot of red Xs alerting Had Me That outlook blocked the images. What About That Could Possibly entice Anyone months to allow Outlook to download the pictures That It Had blocked – nothing. The sender Did events include alt tag descriptions to give me a hint at what i Might see if I downloaded Them. Other Than professional curiosity, this message Gives me no reason at all to Not Just delete it.

Read the Email Marketing Studies.

There Are Countless resources on the web to teach you Everything You Need to Know about Email marketing. Studies Have Shown That Consumers Are Getting an average of 35 emails a day and business an average of 100 recipients. With That Much Email for your subscribers to wade through, You Need to make sure yours gets to Them at the best possible time. Opinions Vary regarding What day of the week or hour of the day is best. However, in general MOST Agree That If You Are B2B Email sending, send marketing pieces So They arrive around 11 a.m. or 4 PM, and on Tuesday, Wednesday or Thursday. If You are sending B2C Email Marketing, Then weekends are your best bet for Higher Email Open rates and Should arrive around 9 PM or 11 PM If You Have the Ability to do so, Recent Studies Have Shown to many high engagement rate Can Be Achieved if you get mail to your subscribers on the Same day of the week and time of the day That They subscribed.

Your Email Message Is Readable?

After your recipient gets the message, can they read it? The Email Experience Council reports 21% of Emails That They reviewed images Appeared Were Completely blank When Turned Off. Guess what? That Also Means That That people like me get mail on a Smart Phone, Will Not much see your work over, beautiful piece Either marketing. If Allows your system, create a message Botha That sends text and HTML formatted version at the Same Time. This Allows the device and software readers to decide. Otherwise, create two Separate lists and allow your subscribers an option to choose one or the Other. When using HTML code to a minimum keep spam filters as tendon to choke on it.

Personalized Email Campaigns.

If your process Allows, You Should Consider definitely Personalizing Some aspect of your Email marketing. However, the statistics show That Personalizing the subject line and nothing else will DECREASE Actually your open and click-through rates by about a percent. One study by Eichmann That just Including the company name in the subject line INCREASED the 30-60% open rate.

Sadly, I do not think Many e-marketers realize That HAVING email flagged as spam have to Greater Than Potential Impact lost just one pair of eyes. Many email systems now report spam upstream to larger, shared lists of spammers – no mail blacklists from Which Will Be accepted. Many of These lists feed from Each Other, get your company on one and soon it’ll Be on several. Blacklists Are One of the Easiest thing to get on, But Some of the hardest to get off. Get your company on one of These blacklists and it’s not just your marketing emails That Are block, it’s ALL e-mails. Do you want to Explain to your CEO That I can not email pictures of precious historical miniature yorkie’s puppies to His sister in Phoenix Because you wanted to save the company $ 950? I did not think so.

Read, read, read – then send

It Seems Like Such Obvious thing, But make sure you and someone else your message Proofs (more Than once) Before you click “send.” Our friends at Ragan Communications recently Were Reminded of this the hard way; They sat a daily e-newsletter out Twice on the Same day, about 30 minutes apart. Why? Because the first one had “ExxonMobil” Spell as “ExxonMobil” in the subject and in the body. A subtle, pero important difference.

It’s true, research has proven That Actually email marketers Are Dumber Than Previously Thought events WAS possible. In the Interest of fairness and full disclosure, I Have to tell you I am an email marketer. Although, Sometimes When I Meet someone new I lie and say I’ma garbage collector. Most people like garbage collectors What do for a living.

It’s not the size of the boat, it’s the motion of the ocean.

The crew at returnpath.net recently Concluded a 19 month study Into how email marketers handle non-responsive addresses . I Do not Know What the Researchers Expected to uncover, pero Were the results shocking, at least to me anyway.

I’ve Told You Before, it’s a good idea to purge addresses from your mailing lists if you know people Those That Have Never, Ever Open or clicked on your messages. I mean, why make your math more and lower your results Complicated Because A Few People Do not want (or never see) what you send Them?

I think I’m safe in Saying That if left up to the people That Actually push the “send” button, mailing lists Would Be as lean and clean as possible. Unfortunately, Many Are That stuck with bosses believe when it comes to mailing lists (and Probably Other Things), size matters – and bigger is better.

Which Brings us to the first Finding of the study, 73% of the 40 companies Studios continues to send email to Completely non-responsive email addresses for the full 19 months of the study. SEVENTY-THREE PERCENT! Come on – are you serious? I can UNDERSTAND Almost Not Wanting to mess with your math DURING the current campaign year, But why not start the year with a nice clean, fresh, VALID mailing list? Let’s Get Those lists clean up, you can do it, just call it spring cleaning – or maybe a little fib and tell your boss it’s a can-spam Requirement and you Have to do it, I promise I will not tell.

OK, so 73% is Surprising, But Not in the big picture terribly Harmful to anything in the long run, right? Wrong. There is a chance average Better Than That the reason the emails Are Not Being Opened Because They’ve Been is tagged as spam. If that’s the case, each additional message you send is Another nail in the coffin of your email marketing program as your reputation gets Worse and Worse and you get added to more and more of the spam blacklists.

What I found shocking MOST research in the Return Path Was the sheer volume of email That Were These companies sending. These companies sat on average 10 emails a month. Means That Every three days an email. Think that’s bad? It’s Almost tolerable Compared to the two top Offenders.

Neiman Marcus sat an average of one email a day over the 19 months. Every day? Really?

However, the worst offender Was a company named “Bluefly” which from looking at you website Their Might Be Fooled Into thinking they “get it”. You’d Be Wrong – at least as far as email marketing is concerned. Bluefly started the test with an average of 30 emails a month and ended it with 54 to month. Yep, two messages a day. Can you imagine if Other retailers did this? That You Might Have That pimple-faced kid from McDonalds at your door a couple times a day … “What do you mean you’re not hungry? You Bought A Big-Mac from us two months ago, how can you Not want an apple pie – or a delicious shake? “

I wonder if the e-marketers and executives at Bluefly Tolerate That Behavior as Consumers. I suspect not. So why do they do it as a company? Do Unto Others But Not Unto Me? Do as I Say, Not As I Do?

How many of the “real” people That Get All Those messages get so frustrated from Bluefly They drop out, or Worse – tag as spam Them?

NOTE: I Reach Out to Bluefly via twitter to see if They Would mind Answering Some Questions about Their Techniques, if I get anything from Them I’ll post an update.

What’s the right way to do email marketing?

If you’re an e-marketer, how do you handle non-responsive addresses, let me know in the comments.

If you’re a consumer, What do you Consider the right frequency for companies to send you email, let me know in the comments.

Generally, a market test is performed before the release of a new product, to assess their acceptance or host, and thus reduce the risk of introducing new product to market and it does not have enough demand. Some examples of market testing simple and low cost that can be made:

* We can set up a small stall located strategically in accordance with our target audience, where we sell the new product, and look at the reception that has the public at the same time, we measure the purchases made during the day, based on Thus, forecast sales that we might get to have multiple outlets.

* We can set up a tasting booth where demos to test or sample the new product, and observe the acceptance and public reaction to it, while we consulted for their views or opinions.

* We convene a group of people and give them to test or experiment with the new product, observing their reactions and behaviors before it, and then consult you for their impressions or opinions, and ask for their suggestions.

The design of the questionnaire is to ask the right questions, which allow us to obtain the required business information.

For example, if we gather information about the tastes and preferences of consumers regarding a product (for example, a piece of jeans), one of the questions might be:

Which of the following finishes prefers jeans?
* Embroidery
* Closures on pockets
* Colored stones
* Prints
* Other

Or, if we need to gather information about the possible acceptance of a new product (for example, a brand of jeans), one of the questions might be:

Would you be willing to try a new brand of jeans?
* Yes
* No
* Do not know / no opinion

Read the rest of this entry »

A person can lean a great deal about marketing designs by reading design news. While not every business person is interested in following the latest trends for themselves, watching where the latest trends are in designs can be very helpful. Designs have one purpose in the business world, that is to appeal to consumers. They are ascetically pleasing, but they are designed to make money, plain and simple.

Consumers however, are a finicky lot. Trends change from year to year, sometimes season to season. Without reading agency news, it’s hard to keep up. The smart business person, instead of trying to figure out consumers likes and dislikes, will look to design agencies and their latest design campaigns and take advantage of their latest offerings to try to gauge the latest trends.

Cashing in on the latest trends is important. If a person were to read the latest agency news, they could hear about new marketing campaigns before these campaigns are officially launched. It is the equivalent of cashing in on someone else’s market research. The latest and most up-to-date news is typically online. Magazines are out-dated before they reach he news stands and newspapers rarely cover design trends in great depth. The web is about the only place to get free, up-to-the minute design news that a person can use.