Email Resource Center
White House Will Not Support SOPA, PIPA
Source: Catharine Smith, The Huffington Post
Saturday marked a major victory for opponents of proposed anti-piracy legislation Stop Online Piracy Act (SOPA) and PROTECT IP Act (PIPA), which would target foreign-based websites violating U.S. copyrights.
House of Representatives bill SOPA and its Senate counterpart PIPA are designed to punish websites that make available, for example, free movies and music without the permission of the U.S. rights holders. Opponents of the bills, however, worry that the proposed laws would grant the Department of Justice too much regulatory power. Google Chairman Eric Schmidt has called the measures “draconian.” Other Internet giants who oppose the bill include Facebook, eBay, Mozilla, Twitter, and… read entire post here
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You might also want to read: http://www.whitehouse.gov/blog/2012/01/14/obama-administration-responds-we-people-petitions-sopa-and-online-piracy
5 Awesome Landing Page Lessons from Real Life Examples
Source: Corey Eridon, www.hubspot.com
On a previous blog post about marketing tests, a commenter asked for some examples of great landing pages. We’ve received that request more than once and figured it’s about time to deliver! So I set out to find some of the best landing pages out there, and to get started, I went to some of my favorite companies. I figured they might be a great place to start because as a marketer, my favorite companies have to not only have a great product or service; they have to be great inbound marketers. Whether you’re B2B, B2C, a product or a services business, these five companies have created great landing pages from which we can learn some serious lessons.
To help hammer those lessons home, I’ve also included suggestions for how these landing pages can be improved even more. These suggestions are based on landing page best practices, and don’t take into account that sometimes, you can shirk the best practices based on the results of A/B and multivariate tests. I have no insight into whether these companies have run tests to reach these designs (many probably have!) but the lesson for all marketers is…Read entire post here
Image credit: Tina Phillips
WHITEPAPER: Data Licensing Guide to Leveraging Data Acquisition/Use for Better ROI
Data has always been the linchpin to success in any marketing campaign. As we move further into the 21st century; watching both consumer and business media consumption trends evolve rapidly while customers’ high expectation levels drive stiff competition, the ability to obtain and leverage quality data at an economical price is becoming even more of a critical factor.
Click here to download a Complimentary Copy of the Whitepaper
How Marketers Use Email
There are two main usages of email by marketers:
1. New Customer Prospecting/Acquisition:
- Lead generation
- Sales
- Brand/awareness building
- Grow mailing list
2. Customer Retention:
- Transaction confirmations
- Account summaries
- Newsletters/news alerts
- Promotional
Market Opportunity for Email
By Mark Brownlow, Email Marketing Report, May 2010
People unfamiliar with email marketing often wonder what all the fuss is about. Didn’t spam kill email as a marketing vehicle? And if spam didn’t kill it, what about blogs, Twitter and all the other clever ways we can communicate online? Isn’t email outmoded?
Those wondering about the benefits of email marketing in today’s ever-changing online and marketing environment will find the answers below.
IT WORKS
Businesses engage in email marketing because it works. And works well. Here are the numbers…
According to research conducted by the Direct Marketing Association, email marketing generated an ROI of $42.08 for every dollar spent on it in 2010. As such, it outperforms all the other direct marketing channels examined, such as print catalogs.
- In Datran Media’s 2010 Annual Marketing & Media Survey, 39.4% of industry executives said the advertising channel that performed strongest for them was email. This was the top result.
- The Ad Effectiveness Survey commissioned by Forbes Media in Feb/March 2009 revealed that email and e-newsletter marketing are considered the second-most effective tool for generating conversions, just behind SEO.
The money is following the results…
- A December 2009 survey of 300 email marketers by Silverpop found that their companies were feeling the effects of recession, but “four out of 10 marketers reported that their email budgets in 2010 would increase, and nearly half (47 percent) said their budgets would stay the same”.
- A November 2009 survey of B2B marketers found that email marketing was likely to see more spending increase than any other form of online marketing bar website development.
- A Q2 2009 survey of over 5,000 senior US executives revealed that email marketing was the channel most likely to see an increase in marketing budget.
- 46% of North American small businesses surveyed in 2009 by Hurwitz & Associates use email marketing, with another 36% planning to do so in the coming year.
WHY IT WORKS
Email marketing works for a variety of reasons…
- It allows targeting
- It is data driven
- It drives direct sales
- It builds relationships, loyalty and trust
- It supports sales through other channels
Modern email marketing services and solutions support database integration, segmentation and various other tricks and techniques for improving the targeting of outgoing messages. Advanced methods generate on-the-fly emails customized down to an individual recipient basis.
And every email campaign you send out generates a heap of actionable data you can use to refine your approach and messages.
Email promotions and offers generate immediate action: sales, downloads, inquiries, registrations, etc. Informative email newsletters and other emails send people to offline stores and events, prepare the way for catalogs, build awareness, contribute to branding, strengthen relationships, encourage trust and cement loyalty.
All in all, a pretty good way of going about your marketing business!
Why Segment Your List?
Delivering relevant content to segments in personalized ways requires more than an email address. It requires a database that accommodates multiple fields of information and data capture points with information entry fields corresponding to the database. The more information collected, the greater the ability to segment and personalize with relevant content which is essential to improve relevancy of content delivered. Email personalization is essential to building trusted relationships. The more detailed and personal the information the less willing prospects are to provide it and marketers are to request it. continue reading »
Types of Email Marketing Lists
There are three types of email lists used for email marketing. It is important to know what type of list is being referred to or reported on when it comes to performance metrics. It is like comparing apples to oranges and can provide very misleading expectations.
Following are the three types:
- CRM - Current customer database or house file which will always out perform the two mentioned below by very high percentages.
- Third Party - Homogeneous group of people such as readers of a specific magazine like Tennis Magazine or Golf Magazine. This list type will perform decently because of being highly targeted but you can expect to pay premiums to use it.
- Compiled Data – This is aggregated data brought together to build a database from a variety of opt-in sources. Typically this will include publishers, sweepstakes, consumer survey data, retailers, etc… This type of list will not perform as well as the two mentioned above but is good if you are looking for large volumes and can overall with other targeted information like demographics and other behavioral targeting selects. The pricing is much more affordable than a 3rd party ‘subscription’ type list.
Know what type of list you are using and set expectations accordingly.
Image credit: digitalart
6 Ways to Spice Up Bland Email Marketing Campaigns
Here’s another post chock full of strategies that can be used in acquisition email campaigns. I especially love the “secret code” segmentation which can be easily applied to any V12 client launch. It’s also a GREAT tactic to see what offer outperforms. The tips on VIP status and exclusive email offers have been proven to work so that’s always a strong angle. Read the post in its entirety here
Source: HubSpot, Guest Post written by Kimberly Lindquist of ListEngage
Do you remember creating your first email marketing campaign? Those emails were going to catapult your business to new levels, blow your content’s ROI through the roof, and make you an instant digital mogul in your industry.
How long did that excitement last? Are you still in the honeymoon phase, or do you find yourself staring at your email templates bored, uninspired, and unsure of where to go next?
Whichever way you feel about your email marketing, whether you’re on your first campaign or the hundredth, emails can fall flat and lose the appeal they once had for both you and your subscribers. So how do you bring the spark back into a boring email program and inject some va-va-voom into your campaigns? It’s all about approaching your email with a little creativity. Here are 6 ways to spice up your email marketing the next time your creativity (and email marketing ROI) needs a jolt.
1. Try On-the-Fly A/B Testing
For a marketer, there are few things more appealing than knowing whether your campaigns are successful while they are still in motion. In this sense, A/B testing is the sexiest email marketing feature there is! Nowadays, many email service providers (ESPs) have a feature built into their platforms that allows marketers to send and compare the performance of variables like subject line and “From” sender names to sample audiences, with the winning email getting deployed to the remainder of the audience.
2. Crowdsource Your Next Email Campaign
As hard as you try, it’s sometimes impossible to know exactly what your subscribers want, which is why your next email should flat-out ask them. Survey your customers to see what they want more of, less of, or what would make them visit your site more. Not only do prospects and customers appreciate your consideration of their opinion, but you may also be handed a brand new email campaign that your marketing department never would have thought of.
Although many ESPs have basic survey tools included, you can also collect information on your website through a customized landing page or a survey collection tool. Suggestions for what to ask might include their topic preferences for articles you produce, what sorts of deals would entice them to purchase more often, what additional products and services they’d like your company to offer, and what sorts of service updates would be helpful to hear from your company.
3. Send “Secret Code” Emails
Everybody enjoys the thrill of a good scratch off ticket now and again, so why not give the same offer to your email recipients? Segment your subscribers, and send each segment a “Secret Code” or “Hidden Discount” email that requires them to click through…
Read more: http://blog.hubspot.com/blog/tabid/6307/bid/30313/6-Ways-to-Spice-Up-Bland-Email-Marketing-Campaigns.aspx#ixzz1icPnnvWW
Image credit: digitalart
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posted in: Creative | Metrics & Testing | Targeting & Planning | Testing | Trends | Writing Effective Copy Available Data Selects
V12 Group has over 260+ selects (specific data fields) that can be used for highly targeted email acquisition campaigns. This includes demographic, geographic, lifestyle, interests, and behavioral data.
An email address has no value unless you know something about the person who owns it. An email opt-in list, like V12′s provides clients with the necessary additional information on consumers so email campaigns can be targeted with relevant messages.
Here is a listing of all the selects available to use for targeted email campaigns.
Download V12 Consumer Database Selects
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Types of Opt-ins
There are three different types of opt-ins when it comes to building a permission email database:
(1) Single opt-in
(2) Double opt-in
(3) Pending opt-in
The double opt-in process is more complex and reduces opt-in rate and is far less likely to be used. The below graph is part of a survey conducted by MarketingSherpa. The graphic below shows that the most used opt-in method is the single opt method. Source: MarketingSherpa’s Email Marketing Benchmark Survey. Methodology: Fielded Jul-Aug 2009, N=1,493 (click image to enlarge)
There are pros and cons to using all three opt-in methods. Following is a listing of those pros and cons by method used: (click image to enlarge)
