Out-Smarts Marketing Services

A recent article by a local Vancouver writer Sheena Daniels, in Blitz Magazine debated the benefits of newsletters versus blogs. A blog and newsletter are two totally distinct tools marketers can use to grow their business. Each should be aimed at an entirely different audience and used for different purposes.

The article points out 3 important considerations should you have to choose between the two:

1. Audience you are trying to reach;

2. Internal resources available;

3. Message you are trying to communicate.

Unless limited by the 3 above, why choose between the a blog or a newsletter at all? Each can and should be used for distinct purposes to enhance marketing communications and by using both you can hone in on 2 distinct audiences with distinct marketing messages and increase effectiveness of each.

A newsletter, unless you’re a spammer, is aimed at adding value to existing contacts, partners and customers (people that have already “touched” you) and should be used to keep your company at the forefront in the minds of those important in your network and to reinforce your presence with them.

An blog is aimed at a wider audience many of whom are unknown entities. It should be used to bring attention to what you do, spreading awareness and establish expertise with new prospects or new markets. They key difference is that a blog is a collaborative medium aimed at supporting on-line interaction between interested parties via comments. Its a two way street whereas newsletters are a one way push.

Both are complementary technologies and as the article points out, you can blog a newsletter via RSS allowing your efforts to reach people the way they want to be reached. But consider this, if you intend to focus on newsletters and use RSS you cannot call this a blog as the article suggests, not unless your newsletters go out at least once a week. A corporate blog, to be considered effective and established should be updated once a week at the very least.

Lets get something straight here first and foremost - I am female: I look like a woman and I sound like a woman but yet I have been called Mr. on two separate occasions recently.

The first was an e-mail following up on a booth I visited at CES - the e-mail actually mentioned how much they had enjoyed meeting me!.

The second was in a voice mail left from someone referred to me by a service provider. The person listened (but did not hear) my message and yet still called me Mr. To spare these people the embarrasment I won’t actually mention their names or company (although they probably deserve it for their blatant ignorance) but these occurrences served to remind me how important it is in business to know your customer.

What do you think the chances of me doing business with either of these companies are? I’d say somewhere less than zero. Not only did they offend me from the start but the first had the gall to blatantly lie in their communication (enjoyed meeting me indeed) - it did nothing for their credibility.

It takes nothing to pay a little attention to your customer, prospect or potential client and offending someone will be counteractive to your cause.

So next time you are planning an email or phone campaign or any marketing or sales activity for that matter, give a little thought to your audience:

1. Don’t dare to assume that the recipient is male when they could be female and vice versa. If you’re not sure if someone is male or female then its often best to avoid such a salutation.

2. If you’re not sure of the spelling of a contact’s name then omit it (you should see the collection of incorrect spellings I’ve collected over the years with a name like Mhairi).

3. If in doubt either don’t take the risk or take a little time to do some detective work to find out.

A little attention to detail can go a long way in helping you open the door to business so take heed and take time to know your audience. It will be worth your while.

In a world of never ending SPAM it’s a real challenge to create successful e-mail campaigns but its not impossible. Here are some pointers to bear in mind:

1. Avoid the hard sell - people get so much spam these days that if you try to sell to strangers via e, you’ll hit the junk file faster than you can say spam;
2. Better to use email to keep in touch with clients than to try to sell - newsletters are better than sales letters;
3. Use a call to action title - one that is brief, catchy, intelligent that will entice people to open the mail;
4. By adding an unsubscribe button, your mail is perceived as more professional - just remember to delete those who request it from your mailing lists - always;
5. Drive them back to your website by including a link - you can then easily track click throughs to make follow up calls more targeted;
6. Make it simple stupid - the old adage applies here too - don’t add too many fancy images or graphics - it will just clog people’s mail boxes;
7. The body of the text should include some incentive to act but don’t overdo it or you will raise reader suspicion;
8. War and Peace just isn’t appropriate in an e-mail. Keep it short and to the point if you want people to read;
9. Think outside the box- content and topic should unique and should tell them something they don’t know about your product service or offering - something that makes a difference to them;
10. Build your email list by encouraging visitors to subscribe online, and telling people about your newsletters in the real world;
11. Don’t SPAM ever, ever. Always use valid e-mails from people you have actually met or who have given you business cards at events and shows. If you don’t its the fastest way to get an unsubscribe.

I just got back from a great trip to Jamaica. On the eve of my departure from the resort I received a letter giving my departure details. Item 6 on the list informed us that they would send an evaluation survey by email. “DO NOT DELETE FROM YOUR INBOX” was highlighted (the only capitalized words screaming from the page I may add) along with the justification - “We use this as a management tool to improve our services”. What baloney! They don’t want you delete it for one reason and one reason only - so they don’t get caught up in the spam filter. When the email comes in I will therefore be even more likely to simply hit delete.

To obtain email buy in, the company should have:
1) been completely transparent up front giving customers the real justification for keeping the email and
2) they should have offered the customer an incentive to add them to contacts or subscribe (they took enough photos - perhaps a thumbnail or 2 would have been appropriate).

With all the spam lurking in people’s inboxes, companies need to become more creative and upstanding if they have any hope of being whitelisted otherwise their communications could have the opposite of the desired effect.

At a time when buyers have limitless amounts of product information available on the Internet and are taking longer to come to a decision than ever before, it is vital to use every tool at your company’s disposal to speed up the sales process if possible.

Email can be a make or break medium in terms of facilitating the sales process. Today’s article in the Marketing Profs Blog describes how to use email segmentation to shorten the sales cycle. The article points out that email campaigns should be targeted rather than blanket making the message more appropriate for the intended audience; that an effective email strategy should take into account where in the sales cycle the recipient is (i.e. send different emails to customers than you send to prospects and so on) and the message should be appropriate and compelling. The article also reminds that no-one will appreciate being inundated with mail and that that only serves to hinder the process.

Used right, email is a vital and effective component of your sales and marketing strategy.

Recently I had a very negative experience with Gmail - Google’s e-mail offering. My young son asked me to set up an e-mail address for him and, having used iGoogle for quite some time, I thought it would be a good excuse for me to try out Gmail to see if it really does cut down the spam. So I went through the process of setting up an e-mail account to link to my iGoogle so that I could make sure my son wasn’t receiving some of the dreadful spam I get. Once done, I went to set up an email address for myself only to discover that my sons address was the primary address and that there was no way to change this. So I deleted the address to try again since I wanted his as a secondary address but apparently to no avail. At this point I am awaiting feedback from Google support, waiting, waiting, waiting.

Now I have an e-mail that doesn’t exist as my primary e-mail and its telling me if I want to start again I have to sign up for a new account. If this means I have to set up my whole account again then I can tell you, Yahoo! will be my first port of call. Google, you really need to take your strategy for web site look and feel and apply it to the other services provided and keep it simple (for stupid?).

Now I’ve wasted a bunch of time trying to fanny about to fix my problem and I still don’t have an e-mail for my son and I am getting tonnes of spam. Talk about a bear with a sore head.

I really hope that some of you Google champions out there come to my aid to resolve this! When they do I will let you know all if it solves my spam problems.

Tips to make your email marketing more effective:

1. No selling - its better to use email as a means of keeping existing customers happy rather than annoying potential new ones. This has tyhe added advantage of helping avoid the communication being tagged as spam;
2. Use an Attention Grabbing title - one that is brief, catchy and intelligent. It will elicit opening of the mail;
3. Always make it easy for people to unsubscribe by adding a link in the mail that allows them to do so easily. When someone does unsubscribe, be sure to delete them from the list otherwise you cold risk unwanted negative perceptions;
4. Make it easy for readers to do business with by including a link back to your website and full contact information;
5. Don’t use too many graphics or animated images - not all users will be able to see them and it could clog recipient email servers;
6. Include a compelling reason to follow up - for example: “first ten people to respond receive….” and remember to make the reward worth it;
7. Don’t include too much text - no one has time to read endless emails and it risks confusing the issue and dilluting the point you are trying to make;
8. Always remember to add value- your email should be informative and unique - tell readers something they don’t already know;
9. Make it easy to subscribe - allow users to subscribe to your email newsletters on your website and publicise them on other promotional materials;
10. Check your spam rating before sending - use sites like eNetplace and SiteBuildIt! to assess whether your mail will get past the spam checkers