MindComet

Testing and Segmentation to Avoid Full Email Boxes

Stefan Tornquist, Research Director of MarketingSherpa, has various presentations throughout the summit.  He addressed us this morning with an introduction to the day.  He addressed various challenges with email marketing that everyone has to face. 

The number one Challenge email marketers have to face:
All recipients email boxes are full. (36%) 

It was a great start which created a solid foundation for the various breakout sessions that are being offered today. 

He covered a hand full of email marketing lessons that I would like to share.  These may seem basic, but as we reported yesterday, we over complicated many pieces of marketing and overlook the fundamentals! 

• Newsletters still work!
  
• SPAM is in the eye of the beholder
  
• Reputation is also in the eye of the beholder
  
• Raising Opens and Clicks (High Segmentation is KEY)
  
• Vary your Templates
  
• Top Tests
  -Conversion rates 10-50% higher when removing navigation links!  Creative designers will fight this, but demand it
  -Repeat the main message on the landing page raised conversion rates up to 60%
  
• Testing is the Best Metric
  

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Posted by MindComet on Feb. 25, 2008

Start of Day 2 in Miami

While MindComet was preparing for the MarketingSherpa Email Summit we were given the chance to speak to a presenter, Vicki Morris, Vice President of Marketing for NorthStar, a leading B-to-B wealth management software provider to financial services institutions.  Vicki will be presenting B2B segmentation strategies and sharing how her company doubled the number of client engagements in just one year with an aggressive email marketing program.  We are looking forward to her presentation and had some questions in order to prepare. 

The enticing piece of Vicki’s presentation will be seeing how they came to report that NorthStar doubled the number of client engagements in as fast as one year.  Their testing was based on the way they target for their email sends.  With each send, results increased and they were able to prove that the more targeted, the better.  This is a very easy tactic if you think about it in a marketing perspective however it is easily forgotten when we think we should message in terms of urgency instead. 

Vicki stressed to us that, “...metrics are an increasingly important part of every successful marketing project.  I strongly encourage all marketing executives to establish clear metrics and expectations with sales and executive teams before launching any e-marketing campaign.”  In most industries time is of the essence, however if we do not take the time to set metrics and give the campaign something to measure upon, there is no real value in the results we see for future planning and tactics. 

Vicki had so much to say so look for more posts on her interview about NorthStar’s Segmentation Strategies and Procedures presentation.  We look forward to seeing Vicki’s presentation today and all the great tips we will receive that we will convey to you.

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Posted by MindComet on Feb. 25, 2008

MarketingSherpa Email Summit Day 1 - Email Certification Course

We just got through a day of email marketing best practices and training which is typically a few days worth of training conducted by Marketing Experiments.  We have to give Marketing Experiments, Director, Flint McGlaughin our thanks again, as he not only crammed our heads with insightful email information but made it all very interesting by going over many examples they have previously tested in addition to live examples from the crowd.  Marketing Experiments not only reiterated some of the best practices that we follow through on a daily basis but also shed light in other areas that we can take back to our clients and encourage them to try out some new tactics.  One of the key takeaways from today’s event that I couldn’t agree more with is that optimization takes place in the mind, not on the landing page that you are trying to get a user to click through to - I’ll expand more on this later with some other key insights we left with.

In the meantime, I’m looking forward to what’s in store over the next two days of the Summit.  We’ll be online throughout the two days so keep checking back for the latest updates on MarketingSherpa’s Email Summit Agenda.

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Posted by MindComet on Feb. 24, 2008

LIVE from the MarketingSherpa Email Summit

So it begins!  Today is the first day we are here in Miami attending the MarketingSherpa EM@IL SUMMIT ’08 Expo & Awards.  We have 3 full days of learning ahead of us.  The first day is already complete and we have enough information to write for weeks.  Just like with anything in life, even though you are doing something correctly, doesn’t mean it is the most effective way you should be doing it.  We are learning how to test, test, test, test and test (see a pattern?) until you find the most effective ways!  We will be blogging live from the summit to bring you real-time information that is shared with us that you THINK you already know, but trust us…you DON’T! 

There are various speakers and attendees who have so much knowledge to share.  I have already had the pleasure of speaking with Eric Stockton, the President of MarketingSherpa.  It was an honor to steal 15 minutes of his time and speak one on one about email marketing.  He assured me that email marketing is not dead, it is definitely on the rise and a promising piece of any marketing campaign.  We joked about how easy email messaging and marketing really is and how we complicate it too frequently.  He was adamant to stress that before we do any piece of marketing, whether email or blogging, to ask WHY are we doing this?  Ask 2 main questions in order to begin planning and executing any piece of marketing, #1 What is your objective?  #2 What is the BEST way to achieve your objective?  It is key to dig to get these answers before you dive into it.  Do not rely on what you think as a marketer, seek answers and correct information from who you are marketing to.  Its as simple as the basic sales rule, Know Your Audience! 

After I spoke with Eric, everything we touched on was stressed in the presentation of the day.  There is so much to share on email marketing, stay tuned to receive the knowledge transfer we are going to be communicating to you for free!!  Can’t beat that.

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Posted by MindComet on Feb. 24, 2008

Miami, Here We Come!

Only 3 days until our email marketing team arrives at MarketingSherpa’s Annual Email Marketing Summit in Miami!

We are so excited for all of the email info we can fit into our ears!  Hopefully a lot of our readers will be attending as well, but if you are not and would like real-time updates, I will be blogging live from the Summit! I will be sharing breaking news from the presentations, workshops, and one on one interviews, so make sure you stop by the blog a couple of times each day to receive great info and updates.  If you have any specific requests, don’t hesitate to leave a comment and I will follow-up.

Until then, to get your fill on some email marketing news, check out a special report MarketingSherpa just released: “Dirty Dozen: Email Newsletter Mistakes That Nearly Everyone Makes”. It’s available only in PDF so download here: http://DirtyDozenPR.MarketingSherpa.com

This report has samples of well-known, frequently made mistakes that happen with email newsletter campaigns and messaging as well as examples of companies who are doing newsletter emails correctly.  It will help you understand why your newsletters need to change in order to keep results moving and examples of what you need to change to show successful results.  This report touches on mobile readers, increasing revenue by focusing on good deliverability and subject line importance.  It is a great read for any email marketer who is looking for direction to increase newsletter campaign success.

Stay Tuned!!!

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Posted by MindComet on Feb. 21, 2008

Upcoming Email MarketingSherpa Summit

One week until Marketing Sherpa’s Annual Email Marketing Summit and I can’t wait.  Not only is there a lengthy list of great attendees but its my first summit.  Im really looking forward to the hearing others case studies in regards to email marketing success, struggles and lessons learned.  We’ll be blogging from the event so be sure to tune in for the latest.

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Posted by MindComet on Feb. 18, 2008

Charter Accidentally Deletes 14,000 Email Addresses

Our friends over at MailChimp have recently discovered that Charter Communications (based out of St. Louis) accidentally deleted nearly 14,000 of their customers’ email accounts.  Your bounce totals may have been a bit higher than usual (especially if your database of contacts are based out of the midwest).  To combat this, you may want to exclude ALL Charter addresses until they sort everything out.  They believe it will take a week for Charter to reinstate those deleted addresses.

Any further developments will be reported as we find them.

Thanks again, MailChimp.

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Posted by MindComet on Feb. 05, 2008