Category: Email Marketing

How hard would it be to give me multiple email marketing sign-up options?

Yes, I would love to receive an email once every Tuesday with new album, single, and video releases available on iTunes. However, I don’t particularly care to get three emails a week – especially when two aren’t relevant (I’m not an Oprah groupie, sorry!).

Sheez.

There’s another email list I just unsubscribed from.

One of the major drawbacks of having a Windows Live Workspace has finally been eliminated: the (in)ability to connect with a Blackberry!

I personally am tech-savvy enough that I don’t require the assistance of Windows Live to update my website or check my email, but its super easy to navigate interface and the capability of accessing your entire account (email, contacts, documents, website, etc.) from anywhere in the world with an internet connection is perfect for my dad and other users of our corporate account.

Obviously, you can imagine my excitement when I went to Nextel.Blackberry.com and entered my corporate email addy and password (just out of curiosity, to see if the two finally decided to be friendly) and voila – I was instantly configured and received a “success” message on my device.

Way to go guys!!!

PS – There is still one drawback on the Blackberry side of things… the (insert your service provider here).Blackberry.com manager doesn’t work with Firefox. LAME! I hate having to switch to IE to change my email signature. Maybe they’ll stumble across this blog and fix that 🙂

I really wouldn’t think this would be such a tough topic for email marketers to understand.

I can’t even begin to tell you how many emails I receive each day at the email address that I’m migrating away from (because as soon as I leave Road Runner, I’ll lose it) and how many companies would miss the chance to market to me if I didn’t take the time to return to their site and re-sign up for their email newsletter… all because of one simple mistake:

they only provided me with a link to unsubscribe from their newsletter… rather than a link to manage my preferences/online profile/information or to update my email address!I can guarantee you that there are many busier (or lazier) individuals out there who will just click “unsubscribe” and go about their merrily. What are you left with? A shrinking audience.

Remember – visitors to your website and subscribers to your email newsletters need to be handed their options on a silver platter in the easiest to navigate and understand manner as possible. Without boiling your content down to it’s most basic essence, you might unknowingly compromise your effectiveness and (gasp!) – your audience altogether.

Merry Christmas, happy holidays, and best wishes for a successful 2009!

Email marketing tip of the week: always build your contact list, but please… don’t wait two years to send the first communication!

During January of 2007, about 20 of my sorority sisters and I visited Washington, D.C. for a weekend of celebrating the installation of a new chapter of Pi Beta Phi at GWU. During this time, we chose to stay at the D.C. Hampton Inn (which is not my preferred choice of hotels, but the D.C. HI was nonetheless very nice, well-equipped, centrally-located and very well-priced).

I made my reservation online, received the confirmation emails, etc. and went along my merrily. A great time was had by all and the weekend was a great success.

Point of the story? Here I am in November of 2008, nearly two years later, checking my email when what should appear in my inbox other than a promotional message from “my friends at the Hampton Inn – D.C.” – the first promotional message at that.

Seriously?

The most ironic part is that I was actually just in D.C. last weekend. Luckily, I stayed with friends and didn’t need a hotel, but wouldn’t it have made better sense for the Hampton Inn to occasionally contact me every few months or so after my stay instead of two years later? Just imagine how many times I could’ve realistically visited D.C. since.

Long story short: building an email list is great. Waiting two years to put it to good use? Slack.

PS – Since making my January 2007 reservation, my email address has changed as I’ve migrated away from my ISP-specific email address (here’s hoping I’ll one day be able to get away from the mini-monopoly that is Time Warner Cable). Luckily for the sender, I have it forward to my Gmail address, but MANY emailers aren’t that tech-savvy… I wonder what their bounce rates were like!

Both Peggy and I constantly preach about the necessity of a branded email address and yet still… some folks are missing the boat. Check out her blog post from today that covers another reason to brand your email address: because AOL, BellSouth, and Yahoo aren’t paying you for the free exposure you’re offering up!

While we’re at it, if you engage in any sort of email promotion or marketing, please take 30 seconds to familiarize yourself with the guiding principles that are the CAN-SPAM Act. (No one wants to be fined up to $11,000 by the FTC.)

Prime Example: Since activating my NC real estate license, I have received numerous unsolicited emails about property listings that not only don’t include opt-out methods, but when I’ve contacted the actual sales team, they can’t come up with a concrete answer for how they actually received my email address (although they swear the TMLS didn’t sell it to them… I am a bit doubtful and will be making a few calls today).

What kills me is that they are for properties that are available for sale in areas that not only am I not any sort of interested in, but neither are any of my clients. Having your email address marked as “spam” by Hotmail, Yahoo, Gmail, Bellsouth, and Road Runner personal email users will get you automatically sent to the spam folder very quickly. (And let’s not even mention the black-hole that is emails that are automatically blocked by these ISP before the ever even get to the spam folder…)