MarketingSherpa Blog

In today’s blog post, I provide four examples of how not to run your email marketing, based on U.S. presidential campaigns. I will also provide four tips for the campaigns on how to improve their efforts, which I think many marketers can learn from as well. I tried to keep this blog post as politically neutral as possible, which turned out to be easier than I thought when I started since  most of the efforts were pretty poor.

The 72-day study of presidential campaign email marketing

I enjoy David Meerman Scott’s use of U.S. presidential campaigns as marketing case studies in his blog posts. I agree with him that the lessons learned can be applied by all organizations. Inspired by this and with my focus  on email marketing at MarketingSherpa,  I signed up on March 7 to receive emails from each U.S. presidential candidate: President Barack Obama, Ron Paul, Mitt Romney and Rick Santorum.  (Please note Newt Gingrich did not provide an opportunity to register for email alerts.)

I consider the need for candidates to win over my vote for president of the United States to be a complex sale, and I correlate it with the long sales cycles of B2B organizations. After watching my inbox fill up over 72 days, here is what I discovered from my unscientific study of the candidates’ email campaigns as related to B2B email marketing best practices. Unfortunately, the experiment turned into mostly what not to do.

  Read more…

Most email marketers still batch and blast their audiences, sending one email to everyone in the database, said Responsys CEO Dan Springer yesterday at Responsys Interact 2012. Springer spoke during the event’s kickoff session in San Francisco, and noted that not every marketer is guilty of batch-and-blast (Full Disclosure: Responsys sponsored my attendance of this event).

“For all of you that are already innovative, if you want to maintain your innovative status, you are going to need to keep pushing,” he said.

Where you should push is toward integration, Springer said, which he called the future of digital marketing. Yesterday’s sessions were loaded with examples of how companies are integrating email marketing with other channels. Here are two that stood out:

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So I’ve got this old friend from college. At first, we had fun. Now I only hear from when he needs something. Then after I help him out … he disappears again.

Sound uncomfortably like your B2B marketing and sales efforts? Listen in as I speak with Brian Carroll, Executive Director, Revenue Optimization, MECLABS, about lead nurturing and post-sales nurturing, based on research from MarketingSherpa’s 2012 B2B Marketing Benchmark Report and MarketingSherpa’s 2012 Email Marketing Benchmark Report.

“The goal with nurturing is not just always be closing or always be selling,” Brian said. “It’s really, always be helping.” Watch the above video to see what other insights Brian shared. Here are a few key pieces of information that may help you: Read more…

One thing I really enjoyed at Email Summit 2012 was being able to walk around and talk to the email marketers of the world about the tactics they’re using. For example, I learned about marketers’ experiences with sales and marketing automation for small businesses over breakfast and European privacy regulations over lunch.

If you weren’t able to attend (and even if you were), I hope this blog post can serve as a proxy for that experience. During some of the general and breakout sessions at Email Summit 2012, we conducted a live poll using Acxiom technology where attendees could text to vote. (Full Disclosure: Acxiom was an Email Summit 2012 sponsor.)

In this blog post, I’ll share some of these results, along with some resources to help you act on these tactics.

Please keep in mind that I don’t intend this data to be regarded as statistically valid, rather view it the way you would anecdotal information you would attain from networking.

There are many validity threats, including the fact that the sample we surveyed (Email Summit attendees) is likely a skewed sample and much more active and experienced than the average email marketer since they invested the time and money in attending Email Summit. So the average email marketer is even less likely to be using these tactics.

That said, let’s jump right in …

How are you deploying mobile in your marketing strategies for 2012?

In research conducted for the MarketingSherpa 2012 Email Marketing Benchmark Report, mobile was identified as the most challenging channel to integrate with email.

So it’s not surprising that only a handful of email marketers considered themselves advanced at deploying mobile in their marketing strategies.

• Advanced (3 respondents, 7.31% of all respondents): We currently deploy advanced tactics to reach our mobile audience (e.g., geo targeting, mobile apps, SMS outreach, email optimized for mobile)
• Basic (16, 39%): We have optimized our website (or) our emails for mobile
• Considering (19, 46.3%): We are considering mobile marketing, but have not yet decided upon a strategy
• Unconvinced (3, 7.31%): We do not believe that mobile marketing is the right fit for our audience

Some resources to help you with mobile marketing:

• B2B Marketing: A discussion about integrating mobile, email and social
• B2B Marketing: 7 mobile and social media tactics
• Email Summit: Mobile marketing panel on the complex sale

Have you used SMS and/or QR codes for email list sign-up?

We asked this during a session I moderated with Ryan Amirault, Digital Marketing Manager, Whole Foods Market.

[whole foods]

Ryan’s team saw some impressive results — generating more than 2,000 email subscribers from SMS and QR codes. Ryan’s advice:

• Place QR and SMS in strategic locations. For Whole Foods, that meant table tents, meat/deli/seafood scales, bathroom stalls, registers, cafés, grocery aisles, eating areas and guest services
• Test QR codes before deploying creative materials

However, 67% of Email Summit attendees have not tried this tactic at all.

Here are a few resources to help get you started:

• Mobile Drives Email List Growth: How to use SMS and relevant content to add opt-ins
• Direct Mail and SMS Combo Lifts Rewards Program Membership 5%: 5 Steps
• Consumer Marketing: 3 mobile tips for consumer marketers

How are you designing your emails to fit into your mobile marketing strategies for 2012?

There was limited response to this question, which is not surprising considering that we learned in the first survey that a minority of marketers are really engaged in mobile tactics.

• Relevant (7 respondents, 15.5% of all respondents) – We deploy emails targeted for relevance in the mobile environment (e.g., geo-targeting)
• Responsive (6, 13.3%) – We have designed our emails to be responsive for a handful of mobile operating systems (e.g., iOS 5)
• Visible (14, 31.3%) – We have added a “view on mobile device” link at the top of our emails
• Considering (18, 40%) – We are considering integrating email with mobile marketing, but have not yet decided upon a strategy

Here are a few resources to help you with your mobile email design:

• Mobile Marketing: Get your audience’s attention – wait till they’re bored
• Location-Based Email Marketing: 6 tactics to leverage social check-in to grow email lists and improve engagement
• Email Relevance: 8 tactics for leveraging timing, segmentation and content

Do you optimize email landing pages for specific devices?

Let’s get a little more granular, and instead of talking about mobile as a big picture, look at how marketers handle devices …

• Yes, iOS – 5 respondents, 6.17% of all respondents
• Yes, Android – 1, 1.23%
• Yes, multiple devices – 23, 28.3%
• No – 48, 64.1%

If you’re thinking about getting device specific, here’s some help:

• Mobile Email Marketing: iPhone-targeted landing pages boost conversion rate 40% for Ritz-Carlton Destination Club
• Mobile Marketing How-To: 9 tactics for improving ranking in Apple’s App Store and the Google Android Market

With regard to email testing, which of the following best represents your organization’s efforts?

While mobile clearly is a hot topic for marketers, let’s look at a more tried and true tactic – email testing.

• Basic testing (14 respondents, 21.4% of respondents) – Subject lines, personalization, copy
• Average testing (11, 37.2%) – Templates, timing, automation
• Advanced testing (4, 17.3%) – Validated tests, multi-varied options
• Expert testing (2, 23.9%) – All aspects have been tested and optimized

Some inspiration and ideas to get you started testing or give you new ideas for future tests:

• Copywriting Contest: Write the best-performing subject line and win
• Email Research: The 5 best email variables to test
• Email Marketing: Triggered emails that target the conversion funnel boost revenue
• Research Update: The state of email marketing testing and optimization
• Headline Writing: How a junior marketer beat the CEO’s headline by 92%
• Email Messaging: How overcoming 3 common errors increased clickthrough 104%

What do you think will have the biggest impact on email marketing in 2013?

At the MarketingSherpa Email Summit, we focus on what really works. However, sometimes you have to look past what is already proven, gaze into the crystal ball, and try to make strategic decisions today to position your company for the opportunities (and threats) of tomorrow.

So what will tomorrow bring? Let’s take one extra spin on the email marketing carousel of progress and take a look at what your peers think will have the biggest impact on email marketing in the near future.

• In-line Video (15 respondents, 10.7% of respondents)
• Social Data/Content Integration (48, 34.2%)
• Privacy Legislation (29, 20.7%)
• Dynamic Content (48, 34.2%)

As you try to peer over the hill for your own marketing efforts, here are a few resources that may help:

• Great Scott! 5 Email & Social Marketing Tips from the Future
• Email Newsletters: Social media integration yields 135% more traffic for New York Public Library
• Online Behavioral Advertising: How to benefit from targeted ads in a world concerned with privacy
• Email Marketing: HP uses dynamic email content to drive 300% open rate and 600% clickthrough increase

A successful email campaign is not the result of a single tactic or dumb luck. There are dozens of factors — everything from your list, to your timing. Knowing which factors matter most can greatly improve your “luck.”

Three factors are critical to successful email campaigns, says John Murphy, President, ReachMail:

Factor #1. Offer

Factor #2. Audience

Factor #3. Design

Murphy mentioned this in an interview for our latest article on email design. His comment got me thinking about how email marketers can improve in these areas.

Read more…

The MarketingSherpa Email Summit 2012 audience was treated to Brian Solis, author of The End of Business as Usual: Rewire the way you work to succeed in the customer revolution.

He opened with the idea that the real marketing challenge is the culture of the organization, and he provided a phrase he uses to describe this:

“Digital Darwinism is the evolution of consumer behavior when society and technology evolve faster than your ability to adapt.”

Another big idea he offered was “social media is the new normal.” He continued that, “Social media is different than other media channels before it. Here, it’s about relationships, recognition, engagement, value and help.”

As you might guess from this set-up, the intro of Brian’s talk focused on social media and the mobile experience, and he offered many data points, such as:

• More than 350 million Facebook users access the platform via mobile devices
• Daily mobile social networking grew 58% in 2011
• Accessing social platforms via mobile browser is up 25%
• Accessing social platforms via mobile apps is up 126%

And given these numbers, Brian offered a chart that illustrates that the “connected consumer” isn’t limited to a certain age group:

Click to enlarge

Brian said, “My mother uses Facebook more than I could ever hope to use it. I may have to opt out of her feed.”

The mobile and social introduction led into the main theme of the keynote: integrating all the channels including social, mobile and email.

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Editor’s Note: Email Summit is attended by hundreds of marketers every year from a wide range of companies —solo entrepreneurs all the way up to Fortune 50 stalwarts. So to give the small- and medium-sized business readers of this blog some actionable advice from this year’s Summit, we’re giving Rebekah Henson, Education Marketing Associate, AWeber, a chance to provide the SMB perspective. In full disclosure, AWeber sponsored an SMB-focused special report from MarketingSherpa, is a sponsor of Email Summit, and the editor of this blog used to root against Chris Webber (no relation).

“The customer is king.” That’s been the overarching theme of Email Summit 2012. From the first words of Dr. Flint McGlaughlin’s keynote on day one, promising not to teach us new things but instead to teach us to see things differently, the focus of this year’s Summit has been all about valuing your customers.

That is right up every small business’s alley. Speakers from all different backgrounds and business sizes spoke on panels and presented on their findings, but you can easily apply several key takeaways from the week no matter how big or small your business happens to be.

Read more…

Day one of the MarketingSherpa Email Summit 2012 opened with Sergio Balegno, Director of Research, MECLABS, and Dr. Flint McGlaughlin, CEO and Managing Director, MECLABS, the parent company of MarketingExperiments, with an emphasis that this is a research-based event driven by the 2012 Email Marketing Benchmark Report, featuring W. Jeffrey Rice, Senior Research Analyst, as the lead author.

The afternoon kicked off with two sets of breakout sessions featuring both direct sale and complex sale tracks.

I was able to catch a complex sale presentation, “Mobile Marketing Panel: Integrating mobile campaigns for the complex sale.”

The panel was moderated by Meghan Lockwood, Research Analyst, MECLABS, and featured these presenters:

• Josh Herman, VP of Product Strategy, Acxiom Corporation
• Kate Williams, Independent Consultant, currently consulting for T-Mobile
• R.J. Talyor, Director of Product Marketing, ExactTarget
• Nick Fuller, Director of Strategy and Analytics, eDialog

Attendees were presented with a few data points to set the stage:

Click to enlarge

All four panelists provided the audience with case studies. I will highlight one of those here.

Josh offered a case study on mobile advertising and the mobile CRM handshake.

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New technology is always bewildering. We get a newfangled tool. We play with it. We relate it to other stuff. We try to understand it.

The problem is that new technology is new. You can relate it to older stuff at first, but you have to move on. Thinking about it in old ways can hold you back.

Take email marketing, for example. Companies used it as a digital form of direct mail for years. We now know email is not direct mail, but some companies continue reliving the past. Here are a few examples:

Read more…

Yesterday’s blog post featured the thoughts of Larry Drebes, founder and CEO of Janrain, a social user Web management platform, on the social media channel and marketing over the next six to 12 months.

Today we have insight and advice from Loren McDonald, Vice President of Industry Relations, Silverpop, an email and marketing automation vendor.

Loren will be joining us next week at Caesars Palace in Las Vegas for the MarketingSherpa Email Summit 2012, and will participate in the innovation panel Wednesday afternoon, February 8^th.

Social media marketing is an important channel for both B2B and B2C marketers, and Loren offers up a valuable perspective on the topic and some actionable takeaways to maximize that channel over the rest of this year.

This chart illustrates Silverpop research on where all marketers are utilizing social media:

Click to enlarge

Here are Loren’s thoughts on social media marketing:

  Read more…