email Archives - Ron Kness Writing

You Have to Work at Email Marketing Success

If there’s one thing that’s become clear, it’s that email marketing takes work, but it’s very much worth it. Your email list is an invaluable asset to your business that allows you to stay in touch with your target market, send them commercial offers and to cement a loyal relationship from them.

It’s also an asset you wholly own, unlike a following on Facebook or Twitter…those are things that can be taken from you at a moment’s notice, but an email list is 100% yours.

If you’re new to email marketing, I hope I’ve provided you with the knowledge you need to take the plunge into email marketing. From the technology to the techniques, we’ve gone through all the nuts and bolts. Of course, everyone’s business is different, so you may worry you don’t have all the answers to get started, but the best way to learn is to do.

There will probably be bumps in the road, but these are tremendous learning experiences that can help you improve your email marketing along the way.

To give you a little summary about the important keys to get started, here are some things that will help ensure your success:

Choose the right autoresponder service: While there are many choices and it might be difficult to decide which is right for you, you can change things later on. Sometimes moving lists is tricky, but it can always be done.

Set up your offer: Know what value you are going to bring your potential subscribers and shape your offers around that. Create at least one opt-in page that will be central to your list building efforts.

Get to know your audience: Use the tips for engaging your subscribers to understand what they need and deliver it to them. This includes understanding the types of products they would find helpful and creating or promoting them as well.

Track your results and tweak: The more you grow your list and the more you email them, the more data you will have at your fingertips to improve your results. Do more of what works and toss out what doesn’t.

Take it one step at a time, but keep moving forward. The power of email is an indispensable part of your business success. Thanks for taking the time to read through this series and all the best to and your business.

Eight Email Conversion Tips or How to Sell More Stuff

We’re now to the point in our discussions where we’re ready to talk about improving your conversion rate; that is, how to get as many of your prospects to become paying customers.

Here are eight tips for keeping your conversion rate high.

1. Maintain Multiple Lists

Depending on what mailing list or autoresponder service you use, you may be able to maintain multiple mailing lists. Having different lists allows you to send only those e-mails that are likely to be of greatest interest to each individual on a list. You can build these different lists either by asking individuals to sign up for multiple lists directly, or by segmenting your existing list depending on what each individual has done on your website in the past.

2. Keep Your Emails Brief

The solicitation emails you send to your list should be no longer than absolutely necessary. If your solicitation requires more background or explanation, then provide a summary of the key details in the email and provide a link back to your website with the complete story. Alternatively, you may consider breaking up the solicitation into a series of shorter emails.

3. Be Creative

Use the marketing principles that you know will be effective, but don’t be afraid to try new things. If you simply recycle the same old e-mail texts, and the same formatting or “look and feel,” then your prospects might conclude you’re not really offering anything new. Be creative and try new approaches.

4. Find the Best Time to Send

Some studies have shown that it’s best to send out your e-mails on Tuesdays and Thursdays, right around midday. Of course, there is a risk that if every other marketer sends their emails at that same time of day, your email may get overlooked. Plus, your mailing list isn’t the same as everyone else’s, so you won’t know until you test out the best time.

Start with those Tuesday and Thursday sending times, but try other times as well. Test the effectiveness of the different times, and study your conversion statistics.

5. Use Analytics

Speaking of statistics, you need to have the data before you can analyze them. Make sure you’re using some type of analytics software or service so that you can monitor every aspect of your e-mail marketing campaigns, and use that information to make your future campaigns even more successful.

We mentioned Google Analytics earlier and it’s one of the best things you can use…plus, it’s free.

6. Focus on Quality

Many marketers have found that they’ll achieve a greater total number of conversions if they send out fewer offers or solicitations, but work to make sure those solicitations are of the highest possible quality. But you’ll never know what works best until you test it out, so above all, focus on delivering the best content and offers to your list.

7. Be Mistake-Free

With respect to quality, it’s absolutely essential that you double and triple check that there are no spelling or grammatical errors in your e-mail solicitations. Even among readers who claim not to care much about such things, you’re hurting your hard-earned status as an expert in your niche.

8. Be Yourself

Finally, as you consider the tips on this list, make sure that your personality (or your business’s image) comes through. Marketers are successful by creating a strong identity for themselves, and using that to build long-term relationships with their prospects and customers. Let your personality come through in all of your marketing activities.

Over time, you’ll come to discover what works best for your mailing list and learn how to use it to both help your subscribers and grow your business. We’re nearing the end of the email marketing series, but I have just a few more parting thoughts and encouragement for you. I’ll be back soon with that.

Your First Steps to Setting up a Mailing List

For many businesses, their email marketing lists can be the single most valuable asset they own. Here are some tips for helping you get your first mailing list up and running.

Select Your Service Provider

Step 1 The first step in setting up a new mailing list is to make sure you have the infrastructure in place to handle it. This will almost always mean that you’ve selected a service provider (such as the ones we previously discussed) to help you manage and administer your list. Consider the various different features offered by a service, its pricing structure, and its ability to meet any particular needs you have in order to find the best fit.

Decide How You Want to Target Prospective Contacts

Step 2 How are you going to target your prospects? It’s not enough to tell people you have a mailing list and tell them to sign up. You have to give them a reason why. One common method is to provide something valuable (usually a downloadable informational product) in exchange for someone giving you their e-mail address. Depending on your niche, this could be an e-book that introduces basic concepts to someone who is unfamiliar with your niche, a checklist to help them accomplish a specific project or goal, or transcripts of interviews you may have available on your website.

Enable and Review Your Analytics

Step 3 Regardless of the email service provider you’re working with, you’re likely to have a number of different options for how and when you can collect data relating to your email marketing activities. Make sure you’re collecting as much as possible, and start reviewing this information as soon as possible. Obviously it’s going to become more valuable as time goes on and you have more data to analyze, but it’s still worth getting in the habit of using it as part of your decision making process from the very beginning.

Plan and Prepare Your Messages Beforehand

If you’re only sending out a weekly broadcast for example, prepare that email at least a day or two before you plan to send it out, so that you have the opportunity to take a fresh look at it one last time before it actually goes out.

If you plan to send a series of emails, then draft all of them before you load them up. It might seem like a big task, but it’s almost always best to approach your autoresponder series this way. If you instead draft each email only after the last one goes out, you might find that you’ve overlooked certain points that you should have made in earlier emails, or that the autoresponder series as a whole doesn’t have a good flow. Review all of your emails, in order, before you start sending any of them out.

Make Use of All Available Resources

The actual technical and administrative steps to setting up a new mailing list will vary depending on the service you use. Fortunately, most service providers have tutorials, videos and other educational materials that can make this process much easier. Be sure to make full use of all the resources that are available to you. You may even wish to consider these resources as a factor when deciding between which autoresponder service to use.

Now, it’s time to get to work and start setting up your lists. In the next couple of posts, we’ll be talking about effective ways to grow your mailing list. So make sure your ready to get started!

Should You Use Single or Double Opt In?

Confirmed or Single Opt-in? It should be fairly apparent that your approach to email marketing should only involve sending e-mails to individuals who have signed up or opt in to receive them. This might be done as a sign up on your website to receive your newsletter, an autoresponder series, or some other type of information. Avoid any temptation to send unsolicited emails under any circumstances. I know I probably don’t have to say that, but just in case.

The process of getting people to sign up to receive your emails can be accomplished in different ways. The simplest way is known as “opt in” or “single opt in.” This is where you add the e-mail address to your list after someone enters their address on your sign-up form. You may decide to send a “welcome” or “thank you” e-mail to that person as soon as they sign up. This e-mail will likely contain instructions and a link for unsubscribing, and the subscriber will begin receiving your e-mails without having to take any additional action.

The other common technique is known as a “confirmed” or “double opt in” sign up. With this method, as soon as an individual submits their e-mail address in your form, you send back an automated response that asks them to click a link to confirm their subscription. If the individual does not click the confirmation link, then they will not be added to your e-mail list.

Each of these methods has its own advantages and disadvantages.

Single Opt-In

Pros:
• This is by far the simplest for prospective subscribers; they provide their e-mail address once and then they’re done.
• You can begin sending your messages to new subscribers right away; there’s no need to wait for them to click a link in a confirmation e-mail.

Cons:
• This method does not confirm that a particular email address was actually submitted by the person who owns it. Sometimes people make mistakes or write in bad addresses and you definitely don’t want to email those addresses.
• A competitor or someone else who wants to harm your business can submit third party email addresses, and those individuals could complain that they never signed up for your mailings – and get you blacklisted with spam services.

Confirmed or Double Opt-In

Pros:
• An individual who takes the extra step of clicking the confirmation or double opt in link is likely to be more interested in your marketing message than someone who fails to make the confirmation.
• It protects you from sending email to the wrong addresses or addresses that simply do not exist.

Cons:
• If you’ve never sent e-mail to a particular individual before, your confirmation or double opt in follow-up could easily be routed to their junk folder. Unless they happen to check it and notice your e-mail, they may never get the opportunity to confirm their scripture.
• Some people might simply be too lazy to actually click on your confirmation link.

What’s the Right Way?

Analyze In summary, it’s far from a clear choice on whether you should use a double opt-in method to build your mailing list. The best approach may be to analyze the sign-up, confirmation and conversion rates for whatever method you’re currently using, and use those numbers to help you decide whether a different approach may be more effective.

The same considerations apply even if you’re setting up your very first mailing list, which we’ll discuss in the next post. We’ll go through the first steps you need to do, so you’re well on your way to using the power of email marketing.

Understanding the Difference Between Autoresponders and Broadcast Emails

In our previous article we discussed the autoresponder services that can help you become significantly more efficient with your e-mail marketing efforts. It gets confusing when we use the phrase “autoresponder services” and then talk about “autoresponder messages” and “broadcast messages”, but an autoresponder service can generally send both types of messages. So don’t worry, once you have chosen an autoresponder service, you’re ready to use both of these different techniques.

Comparing Broadcasts to Autoresponders

Let’s discuss some of the differences between autoresponders and broadcast emails, so that you know what type of communication is likely to be better suited to each of your promotional campaigns.

Autoresponder Messages

Autoresponder Messages Autoresponder e-mails are a series of messages that are sent to a subscriber at predetermined intervals once they sign up for your mailing list. The interval term is generally somewhere between a few days and a week or two, depending on the nature of your content. This allows you to build a relationship with each subscriber over time, and position yourself as a trusted source of information.

Pros:
• Autoresponder messages are relatively easy to administer. Once you’ve prepared a series of e-mails, you can use an autoresponder service to have them sent out at predetermined intervals to each new subscriber who signs up.
• Autoresponders can strengthen the relationship with your readers because they allow you to communicate with those individuals over an extended period of time.

Cons:
• Autoresponder messages may grow stale. Even though your messages can be reused for multiple subscribers over time, you still need to periodically assess whether the text of those messages needs to be revised in light of developments within your niche or industry.
• Autoresponder messages, if not drafted properly, can come off as impersonal and perhaps even having too strong of a sales message.

Broadcast Messages

Broadcast messages are those that occur outside of an autoresponder series of e-mails. One of the key features of a broadcast e-mail is that it can be highly topical and relate to “breaking news” type events. Broadcast e-mails can also make your mailing list aware of a new item or new promotion that you may be running.

Pros:
• Broadcast messages can be highly specific and targeted to some or all of the individuals on your email list.
• Broadcast messages don’t require the reader to commit to reading a series of emails over time; each message is a self-contained marketing message.

Cons:
• In contrast to autoresponder messages – where your subscribers have signed up specifically to receive them – you don’t always know when your subscribers will find a broadcast message interesting or valuable.
• It can sometimes be difficult to determine “how much is too much” when it comes to broadcast e-mails. The last thing you want to do is have one of your broadcast e-mails cause someone to unsubscribe from your list.

Now that you have a better idea of when to use an autoresponder series and when to use a broadcast message, you can decide what techniques you should use to build your mailing list and that’s exactly what we’ll talk about next time.

Choosing an Email Marketing Autoresponder Service or Software

Autoresponder Decision Ah technology. It’s such a great thing, but sometimes can be frustrating to figure out what exactly we need and then how to use it. Let’s explore some of your options when it comes to email marketing and hopefully things will become a bit clearer.

As your mailing list grows, it should quickly become apparent to that you don’t want to try to manage it manually. Not only will it become a significant administrative burden, but sending emails with more than a dozen or so recipients can greatly increase the likelihood that your autoresponder messages will be marked as spam, and never reach your intended audience.

An autoresponder service can help accomplish the dual goals of freeing you up to work on other important tasks within your company, and making sure your email messages reach their targets. Here is a summary of a few of the leading services, and the pros and cons of each.

Aweber

Aweber is one of the leading services for automating the process of building your mailing lists, and sending emails to everyone on your list.

Aweber

Pros:
• Aweber has a very reliable delivery mechanism.
• Aweber offers strong support for autoresponder series, including conditional moving of subscribers from one list to another. For example, if someone buys the product you’re promoting with a particular autoresponder series, you can configure Aweber to move them from that autoresponder series to a different one immediately after their purchase (after all, you don’t want to continue promoting the product after they’ve already purchased it).

Cons:
• Aweber does not offer a free trial (although it does offer the first month of service for just $1, with a money back guarantee).
• They have changed their interface a lot recently and many complain that it has become more difficult to

arpReach

arpReach, formerly known as AutoresponsePlus, takes a somewhat different approach to the other major services in that it offers downloadable software that you pay for once, rather than an online service that you pay for each month.

arpReach

Pros:
• One-time cost; there are no monthly fees, and your initial license fee is not tied to the number of addresses on your list or the number of messages you send.
• Full control over your list with the ability to import subscribers as you’d like.

Cons:
• The arpReach software must be installed on your web server, but you can pay one of their recommended installers to install it for you.
• arpReach is currently not compatible with GoDaddy hosting services.

Constant Contact

Constant Contact has rapidly become one of the most recognizable services for email marketing, and has a strong customer base that includes some very large companies.

Constant Contact

Pros:
• Constant Contact allows you to run social media campaigns to supplement your email marketing efforts.
• A free 60 day trial is available for a mailing list of up to 100 names.

Cons:
• Potentially more expensive than other services as your list grows.

iContact

iContact, formerly known as Intellicontact, provides email marketing support services as well as higher value advisory and strategy services.

iContact

Pros:
• A large number of highly stylized email templates.
• The ability to create custom messages with the proprietary MessageBuilder and MessageCoder applications.

Cons:
• Only larger customers with Premier Accounts can use Google Analytics and split testing features.

If you’re looking for your first autoresponder service or software, the best approach is to try a few of the ones on this list before making a commitment.

Next up, we’ll be talking about the difference between autoresponder and broadcast messages. Both have their benefits, so let’s take a closer look at that.

Why Email Marketing is Important for Businesses

I promised to be back and here we are, with possibly the most important discussion about why email marketing is important for business. Let’s get right into that.

Facebook, Twitter and other social media outlets have certainly become important avenues for online marketing campaigns, but good old fashioned email marketing still holds a great deal of value for organizations and businesses of all sizes.

In fact, email marketing even has a number of advantages over some of the more “cutting edge” marketing techniques that some tend to focus on. Here are a few of the top reasons why email marketing is important for businesses today.

Email Marketing is Personal

Email is a personal and direct way of initiating a “one to one” conversation with prospects and existing customers.

Based on the information you request on a sign-up page in addition to the email address, you may be able to make sure you’re targeting that individual most appropriately.

For example, you might ask a prospect to check boxes indicating their areas of interest while signing up, and then use this information to decide what types of email messages to send to them later.

Email Marketing is Trusted

Since reputable businesses only engage in email marketing to individuals who have signed up to receive emails, this marketing channel is inherently trusted by the recipient. The individuals you’re marketing to have already decided that your business is one they’re interested in hearing more from – that’s why they signed up for your email list. (Don’t be tempted to send unsolicited emails to people who haven’t signed up with you; you may find yourself on a spam list, and getting off that list can be very difficult.)

Email Marketing is Measurable

Measure Email Marketing

Because the action items in each email generally consist of links back to your website (or to your Facebook page), you can set up special landing pages in order to measure the “click through” rates for each of your communications. On average, click through rates are generally in the 4%-5% range, so being able to measure your response rates and improve performance even slightly can have a significant benefit to your bottom line.

Email Marketing Works

This is perhaps the most important factor for a business to consider when deciding whether to use email marketing is its effectiveness. Industry surveys continue to confirm that email marketing generally has the highest return on investment of all other marketing tactics. Simply put, email marketing works.

Email Marketing is Affordable

Email Marketing is Affordable In relation to the benefits you’re likely to receive back, email marketing is one of the most affordable methods for marketing your business. If you have a very small list you can consider administering it manually. However, once your list grows to a certain size you may wish to take advantage of a professional email list management service. Most of these services are quite affordable, and provide you with a variety of pricing options.

In the next post we’ll take a closer look at some of the leading services, and the pros and cons of each. It’s not always easy picking the right service (hint: there probably isn’t a perfect autoresponder unless you code it yourself), but at least we’ll cover some of those details so you can make an informed decision.

Meet Andy Johnston, Our New Guest Blogger

If there’s one thing for certain, email still makes the online world go around. Despite the doom and gloom many have predicted for email with innovations like RSS and social media, email still rules the day. It’s a crucial marketing medium for the success of any online business (or any business at all), so I’ve brought in our guest blogger, Andy Johnston, to take you through all the important aspects of email marketing.

I’ll let Andy tell you a little more about it…

Hello to all and thanks for the welcome. I am looking forward to sharing a whole lot about email marketing in the coming weeks. I plan to cover everything from why email is important to all the nuts and bolts stuff you need to know to make email marketing successful for you business.

Here are the topics I’ll be covering for you:

– Why email marketing is important for business
– Choosing an autoresponder service or software
– Understanding the difference between autoresponder and broadcast emails
– Should you use confirmed / double opt-in?
– Your first steps to setting up a mailing list
– The importance of the opt-in / squeeze page
– Surefire ways of growing your list
– Engaging your readers and delivering exactly what they want
– Email conversion tips

If any of that terminology isn’t familiar with you, don’t worry, I’ll explain everything. We’re going to cover a lot in the next few posts, and I look forward to helping you turn your email marketing into an important profit source for your business.

Running a Successful Drip Marketing Campaign

Drip marketing, also known as email marketing, is a way of communicating with your client base on a routine basis where predefined messages are sent to them or “dripped” with a specific predefined action as a goal. It can be used to nudge the customer into taking some kind of action or you can use it to continue to increase their interest in your business by keeping your name in front of them. Through drip marketing, you can reach out effectively to your clients. However, to be effective, each drip campaign must have a clearly defined goal or outcome.

Sending the right message

The behavior and demographics of your clientele are most important as you want to send right message. Your messages need to satisfy a need of your viewers, but by sending the wrong message, or too many messages, you risk turning them off. But when planned strategically, drip marketing can be very effective.

What is the best approach?

Many businesses prefer to use a blog or other social media like Facebook or Twitter to contact their clients, however, by using these methods, you are relying on your customer to go to these places online to get your marketing message. With drip marketing, you are bringing you message directly to them via email. In this hectic day and age, your clients may forget to visit your blog.

Solve their problem

As a customer, there is nothing worse than receiving tedious, sales pitch. Drip email campaigns are not like that. When planned properly, they actually help people solve their problems by giving them latest information and best practices of your industry. For example, a drip email could talk about the advantages of using electric toothbrushes. In short, your content should be useful to them. If done properly, they will look forward to your emails as you are helping them.

Or another email might be based on some kind of new research information or study result in your industry that just came out, and you assessment of that information and how it may prove helpful to them.

Drip promotion can be analogous to irrigating your garden. You study the need when your flowers need watering and then you control how much and when you provide that water. It is the perfect picture of an email drip campaign.

Overall look Matters

Because you want simplicity in your messages, your content should not be overshadowed by flowery design and images; these things should be used sparingly and only support your drip campaign.

However, auto-responder programs, the software used to create and send your emails, have a variety of templates to pick from, so it is easy to get one that complements your message and builds your company brand.

Effectively using drip email marketing campaigns

Email campaigns are a great way to promote a new service or offer a discount or special pricing on a service or product. But not every email’s purpose is to “sell” something.

You will also want to use your campaigns to notify, discuss, and educate. Sending out some useful tips is always valued by customers as is creating a “how to” sequence of articles.

Ask them to participate in survey. Honest feedback can help change your future techniques and goals. Encourage your clients to forward, discuss and share your campaign with their friends, family, and colleagues. It can be a great way to increase your customer base.

With a well thought-out promotional strategy, your drip email campaign can achieve your desired goal; it will also enable you to focus on future strategies that not only engages your client, but satisfies as well.

Contact me to discuss how to effectively set-up a drip email campaign for your business.