Ten Ways to Keep Your E-mail Marketing Effort From Bombing
Web Marketing Today, Issue 104, October 1, 2001
 Al Bredenberg EmailResults.com |
1. Define your target market
This is old-time marketing religion, but it's often ignored. To sell a product or service you must know who your target audience is. If you think the answer is "everybody," better think again. To be successful, narrow down your target market as specifically as possible. This market knowledge will inform everything else you do in your email effort -- developing your offer, designing tests, selecting lists, and writing copy.
2. Make sure your Web site is ready
In most campaigns, the e-mail advertisement functions as an attention-getting device to hook the recipient and persuade that person to click through to a webpage and take some action -- such as purchasing a product, becoming a member, filling out a survey, or entering a contest. For that reason, the website needs to be well thought out, well designed, well written, and easy to use.
Many times I've received an interesting offer by e-mail and clicked through -- only to land on the generalized front page of the company's site with no mention of the offer that got my attention. Sites often suffer from poorly written copy and confusing designs that make it hard for customers to respond.
3. Build your own list
Renting e-mail lists and advertising in newsletters can cost a lot of money. If you're serious about e-mail marketing, I strongly suggest that you place a priority on developing your own e-mail lists.
I'm not saying you shouldn't buy outside media -- advertising has its place. Nevertheless, someone else's list will always be an expense. Your own list is an asset. If you invest in building an e-mail list, whether it's for sending out newsletters, announcements, daily tips, or weekly specials -- you will have regular and long-term access to your audience at a relatively low cost. You can build a relationship with customers and prospects and expose them to your message over and over again.
4. Establish a permission policy
One of the greatest disasters than can befall you as an e-mail marketer is to get labeled as a spammer. You can lose your Internet access and your website. Your reputation can be ruined. I've seen it happen to well-intentioned business people time and again. One company CEO told me he hired a bulk e-mail firm to send out an ad for him. The result: His office was deluged with flames and obscene phone calls. Someone rigged up a computer that dialed his toll-free number repeatedly for three days.
Make a conscious decision about how you will collect e-mail addresses and what kinds of rented lists you will use. Will you assume it's all right to add everyone to your e-mail list who has sent you e-mail in the past? Anyone who has given you a business card or filled out a warranty card?
Obviously I recommend a permission-based approach to building lists. If you make sure everyone you place on your e-mail list actually wants to be there, you'll be heading off trouble in the long run.
5. Choose outside lists carefully
When you rent an e-mail list or advertise in a newsletter, first check to make sure this list is really directed at your target market. Watch out for fly-by-night operators. Actually talk with a human being on the phone before giving them your money. Find out the level of permission for this list: How were the addresses collected? Be careful: Many spammers are trying to pass off their lists as "opt-in."
6. Develop a compelling offer
Your e-mail marketing message should be based on an offer, and every offer should be based on your target customer's needs. Basically an offer expresses: What are you going to do for the customer and what are they going to do for you?
In some cases, you are going to give them the product and they are going to give you money -- a straight offer. Perhaps you're going to offer them a special price for this week only, or two for the price of one. Or maybe you're going to offer them a freebie or a chance at winning a prize in exchange for filling out a survey or providing personal information.
Your offer is a critical element of your email message and the webpage used for conversion. Keep your offer front-and-center.
7. Employ professional creative
The creative in your e-mail and Web communications -- that is, the concept, copy, and design -- will make or break your marketing effort. Poorly written copy or a clunky design will reflect negatively on your product and create hesitancy in the mind of the prospective customer. You can't afford that. If you don't have good writing and design expertise in-house, hire a pro.
8. Test!
Don't spend your entire media budget on one big e-mail list from one vendor. Do mailings to smaller samples of a variety of lists. E-mail lists vary in their quality and responsiveness. Besides testing lists, you should also test your creative and offer. Which works better, "50% off," "Two for the price of one," or "Save $30"? Test each offer with different segments of the same list and see which one pulls best.
9. Measure your results
Don't fly blind. Set up a tracking system to measure the result of each e-mail campaign -- the click-through rate, the conversion rate, and all the costs and profits involved. Use a combination of testing and measurement to make continuing improvements from one mailing to the next.
10. Use e-mail to build relationships and trust
E-mail is a powerful communications tool. With a website, you have to entice a user to come, but with e-mail you can reach out and communicate proactively through the user's inbox. Make sure your e-mail communications are well received and are actually read. Work to provide tremendous value in every communication, respect your recipients' time and privacy, and operate on a permission basis to maintain the respect and good will of the market.
Al Bredenberg is publisher of EmailResults.com (www.emailresults.com), a Web resource for permission e-mail marketing. EmailResults.com includes the Marketers' Market, a trading exchange that brings together buyers and sellers of e-mail lists and marketing services. Al is also president of Broad Mountain Associates (http://www.broadmountain.com), an interactive consulting firm.
