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December 31, 2006
Emails Role in the 2006 Vote
E-mail played a less important role in the mid-term elections than in last year's presidential race, with just 12% of American adults receiving political messages in their inbox this year, compared with 15% in 2004. That's according to a new report by the Pew Internet & American Life Project.
The organization, which surveyed 2,562 adults last month, also reported that registered Republicans were the most likely recipients of e-mail ads, with 16% reporting such messages, followed by Democrats (12%) and Independents (11%).
Wealthier respondents also were more likely to get e-mail, with 20% of those earning more than $75,000 a year receiving ads in their inboxes, compared to 6% of those earning less than $30,000.
While e-mail use appeared to dwindle this year, direct U.S. postal mailings increased. Sixty-one percent of respondents said they received snail mail from candidates, up from 49% two years ago.
The report doesn't speculate on why use of e-mail dropped, but one explanation is that politicians were more afraid of being labeled "spammers" than in the past. Of course, it's also possible that consumers weren't receiving as many e-mail messages now due to overly aggressive spam filters that weeded out the political solicitations.
Comments (0) | Posted by dylan at 5:00 AM | Permalink
December 30, 2006
Adults Like Email Too
I love seeing these studies. They really help me to better understand just what people are doing. And in this case I use the word people to refer to adults. Most of us target the grown up in our campaigns and looking at data on kids and teens only goes so far. Read the study extracts below and see if you fall (or your consumer falls) into these buckets. It actually brings up a good idea for an exercise that you might think about doing yourself. Make a chart and see if you can classify your subscribers into online demographic profiles. Who is on your lists? What else do they like besides you? Could you find some things to do with your lists based on this type of targeting? I know I could.
Adult Online Habits Top 10 Activities Of U.S. Adults With Internet Access
Source: MRI's Fall 2006 Survey of the American Consumer
Used Email: 70.5%
Got Latest News: 40.2%
Made Purchase For Personal Use: 34.2%
Paid Bills: 30.7%
Used Instant Messenger: 26.8%
Got Financial Information: 24.8%
Got Sports News/Information: 23.8%
Played Games: 22.4%
Made Travel Plans: 19.8%
Got Medical Information: 17.4%
Comments (0) | Posted by dylan at 7:55 AM | Permalink
December 29, 2006
70% of Online Users USE email
Online: Reading Blogs, Video Grow Most; Email, News, Shopping Most Popular
Visiting blogs, watching online videos and making phone calls online posted the biggest year-to-year increases in the number of users among internet activities; however, email, newsgathering and personal shopping remain the most widely used internet activities among U.S. adults, according to responses from Mediamark Research Inc.'s recently released fall 2006 survey.
Some 11.4 percent of adults said they had watched an online video in the previous 30 days - a year-to-year increase of 123.7 percent, according to MRI. Those who report they visit blogs increased 163.9 percent during the same period, to a total of 6.7 percent of the adult population. And 2.6 percent of respondents report making a phone call online, an increase of 197.7 percent.
Nevertheless, those three internet activities remain the least-used by the adult U.S. population. The internet activities performed by the greatest number of adults are emailing (70.5 percent), obtaining news (40.2 percent) and personal shopping (34.2 percent).
Looking over a four-year period, the biggest increases in the number of adults conducting an internet activity were for making a purchase for personal use (up 57.7 percent, to 34.2 percent of the adult population), making a purchase for business use (up 51.5 percent, to 10.7 percent of adults), obtaining real estate information (up 36.6 percent, to 12.3 percent of the population) and visiting a TV network's or TV show's website (up 35.1 percent, to 14.1 percent of the population).
Comments (0) | Posted by dylan at 10:37 AM | Permalink
The Disposable, Simple Email Address
Just so you know, I am completely against these ideas. Why would I want to give anything away if I know that I am going to have a database full of emails that are bad and will begin to bounce once I send the confirmation (if your sends are delayed). This is going to cause an increase in list management and invalid emails sent to your lists. Will this hurt your online email reputation?
How many times has this happened to you? You visit a web site but registration is required, with a valid email address needed for confirmation. But maybe it's just a message board you want to read one time only, or a store you have no interest in shopping from again and from which you don't want to be saddled with a lifetime of spam. And you can't use a made-up email address because you have to confirm a link or send back a reply.
One solution is to register for a free email account specifically for uses like this by visiting one of any number of web-based mail systems, such as Yahoo! Mail, Hotmail, or Gmail, but registering for any of these takes an eternity. Then there are passwords to contend with, a mother's maiden name to input, all kinds of overhead in getting the account set up and logged into. I use these kinds of accounts, but sometimes the password gets lost, and eventually they fill with spam, making it a pain to navigate.
Here are 3 in the Growing Market:
http://lashback.com/
http://www.mailexpire.com/
http://spambob.com/
Well here's a brain-dead simple solution to the problem: 10 Minute Mail (Note: Web traffic from this story may be causing the 10 Minute Mail site to crash. If it doesn't load, try it again later.), which provides, for free, exactly what is promised in the name: An email address that vanishes after 10 minutes. There's no registration, no verification. Just click over to the site and hit "Get my 10 Minute Mail e-mail address." You'll instantly be given an address that ceases to exist after 10 minutes. You can then use this address in filling out web forms or whatnot, and a very simple web-based interface gives you full access to any mail the account receives. You can reply to any messages, but you can't send mail to an account that hasn't already emailed you. If you can't get the job done in 10 minutes, you can reset the timer to 10 minutes at any time. There's no need to login, no password to remember.
For safe surfing and spam avoidance, I haven't found a simpler, more elegant solution than 10 Minute Mail. It works flawlessly and couldn't be easier to use. It's earned a place in my Favorites folder. Give it a spin and see what you think!
(Update: The site seems to be having trouble handling the crush of traffic from this post. You might bookmark this page and try again in a few hours.)
Comments (0) | Posted by dylan at 7:17 AM | Permalink
December 28, 2006
Multi-tasking and Email Marketing
Just how important is it to get make your email impactful? Well if I just looked at this report alone I would think that getting the attention of the average young person in email is impossible. (80% of them are multi-tasking when using email). But then I look at myself and others around me. I am not "young" and not "old" but in the middle. And in the demo that marketers want in most cases. I have email ADD worse than most and am often asked to stop typing while I am doing anything (or everything) else. I multi-task always and at all times. So does this study concern me? Not really, but it does make me think more about what is going to drive that conversion, sale or brand exposure when placed in the middle of IM, RSS, SMS, Blogs, Social Media, and that damn dog barking outside. (there are more distractions than just the computer you know)
Consider your audience and put yourself in their shoes, or sandals or heels.
Eighty percent of kids and teens juggle multiple media. By Debra Aho Williamson - Senior Analyst - eMarketerA new analysis from the Kaiser Family Foundation finds that kids and teens are least likely to 'multitask' when they are watching TV or playing videogames. The activity that is most multitasked? E-mail.
When watching TV as a primary activity, young people spend 45% of that time multitasking with other activities, such as eating, doing chores or engaging with other media. When doing computer-related activities, such as looking at Web sites or instant messaging, they are multitasking nearly two-thirds of the time. And when doing e-mail, they are multitasking nearly 80% of the time.
Comments (0) | Posted by dylan at 8:39 AM | Permalink
December 27, 2006
MSN Continues Educational Outreach
This came in an email last week from my MSN account. Not the lesson I wanted to learn but interesting that they are pushing it as 1 of the 4 messages in the email. The email promoted all the things that are new in Live Mail but also continues to educate. I love the education of the consumer, but what about one addressing what actually happens when you flag it as Junk? It states (and I bolded) do not reply or unsub, just flag as junk. Now come on, how does this help anyone?
How to report junk mail
MSN® Hotmail® provides several ways to help protect your account from unsolicited e-mails. To help combat junk e-mail, you can report and block all messages sent from a particular user.
To do this:
Within the Inbox, click on the check box next to any e-mail messages you want to report as junk e-mail.
On the toolbar, click Junk.
Click OK to confirm the messages as junk e-mail.
Notes:
Reports are used to improve junk e-mail filters and lessen the amount of spam you receive
To report an already opened message, click Junk on the toolbar. Do not reply to junk e-mail, even to ask to be removed from the sender's mailing list. You may only be confirming that your e-mail address is valid. It’s best to delete the message and to set up the junk e-mail filter.
Comments (0) | Posted by dylan at 5:00 AM | Permalink
More Pay For Email Delivery Ideas
"Startup Makes Spammers Pay By John Hudson- Wired.com"
The title of this article alone "really" builds credibility with this new company. So they are going to charge people to email you. So if you remember each time to add the sending email address of newsletters, etc that you sign up from (hey what about transactional emails after you just bought some more christmas gifts at Pottery Barn? Think those will be charged?) then they don't get charged. Or what about those friends that email you that you have not heard from in years? Do they get charged? And how does that work? And the most important of these to me is How many of these emails will go missing? ISPs already have issues with MIA emails, if they are going to be another layer on it, will you run a larger risk of losing emails?
One last thing, THEY are going to make money on your email. So the more you use it, the more they make (this is as long as you don't have everyone flagged in youe white list.) They aren't doing it for the good of mankind, but as a business to make money.
If you've ever wished you could bill spammers for the time spent reading and deleting unsolicited e-mail pitches, your day has come. A new e-mail-forwarding service hopes to make senders pay for access to your eyeballs, and is offering you a piece of the action.
San Francisco-based Boxbe lets you set up an e-mail address and add your friends, family and co-workers to an approved senders list, allowing them to e-mail you for free.
Anybody else who wants to reach you will have to pay. You set your own price, which can be as low as 3 cents or as high as $99 (if you think you're all that). Boxbe will give 75 percent of funds collected from advertisers to users, who could optionally direct the money to a favorite charity.
Comments (0) | Posted by dylan at 5:00 AM | Permalink
December 21, 2006
Happy Holidays from eROI
If you have not had a chance to see our company holiday video (you should subscribe to our newsletter) I wanted to share it with you. We are a zany bunch here at eROI that works just as hard as we have fun. We actually pride ourselves on wanting to wake and come to work in a place and culture that we have fostered. Not many places that have kids schwinn bikes in the office for getting around inside. (That kind of throws visitors off at times.)
Warning, the video is not corp, and may not make much sense, but man it really shows some of the team in real life. Seriously, watching this video could make you dumber. Which in turn could make us seem even smarter. (or at least that is what our copy writer thinks) Be you own judge.
Enjoy some time away as we will be pounding away like Santa's elves on Adderol.
Comments (0) | Posted by dylan at 4:10 AM | Permalink
December 20, 2006
What I Did On My Holiday Break
I know I have been a little slow since returning from The Email Insiders Summit. It is not that I have not been blogging, I have, but I have not been posting. I am working on them over the next few weeks to give you some better content. It just seems to me that the 2nd and 3rd weeks of December are busier than any other time of year... and even noisier in email , blogs, news and video. So I am giving you a little rest to get you ready for 2007. It is going to be a break out year for email marketing and one of new directions for alot of people that have been doing the same old thing time and time again.
If you need some reading, check out Ryan (our CEOs) posts on his blog Email Days. He has posted his annual 10 predictions for the new year on not just email, but online marketing as a whole. (If you didn't know eROI is not just one of the best email marketing agenices with our emailROI platform, but also a FULL service interactive agency.)
Another good read is RetailEmail.blogspot.com. Chad really does a great job covering what is happening in the world of retail email marketing from major brands each and every day. It should be one you read regularly.
Thank you for all of your support these past 2 years and we look forward to staying busy blogging to bring you our (my) perspectives. Also look for my columns coming twice a month in the Email Insiders newsletter and on the blog at Mediapost.
And if you need a recap each week delivered to your inbox, sign up in the right hand side for automated emails from our blogs (using our RSS to EmailROI engine).
Cheers.
Comments (0) | Posted by dylan at 9:00 PM | Permalink
December 15, 2006
We've Updated Our RSS Feeds
Just wanted to throw out the news that we have changed out RSS feed address. For those of you that subscribe by RSS, make note to update your feed for us to: http://feeds.eroi.com/TheEmailWars
And for our other blog:emaidays.com
http://feeds.eroi.com/LoveEmailHateEmailViralEmailMarketingInbox
And for the ReturnOnSubscriber.com
http://feeds.eroi.com/ReturnOnSubscriber
IF you have no clue how to use RSS, then you can subscribe on the right hand side for weekly email recaps using our new RSS to EmailROI platform. That's right, you will be using RSS and have no clue how or why, but it powers the emailROI plaform for you automatically. It's magic like how Santa gets his big can down that skinny little chimney.
Thanks for continuing to read the rants.
Comments (0) | Posted by dylan at 1:19 PM | Permalink
December 13, 2006
Day 4: The Email Insiders Wrap Up
David Baker, Jeanniey Mullen. Loren McDonald, Bill McCloskey - The Email Insiders
Bill: So happy to see everyone throwing the good and the bad out in the open. Why are we, the good email marketing folks here, the ones that are trying to work so hard at creating better programs, better content, better value for subscriber when we have to fight the real bad guys polluting the inbox? When will the C level execs start seeing the value in email marketing as a channel?
Jeanniey: One of the biggest benefits of this event is that people are sharing so much with one another, sharing collective insights, successes, agencies and vendors not acting competively but working to advance email overall and sharing with one another. (Like cats and dogs sleeping together.. is this the end of the world?) the people that are here some some of the most impactful brand marketers in the world and really working hard at doing all of this right.
David: This event has fostered so much collaboration and openess. So many people have said that they are taking so much back with them, and so many close new contacts that they can communicate with after they leave here. ( I personally saw Lenovo and HP having a great conversation). The biggest challenge for us is how we craft our email stories when we walk out of this event. Taking this understanding that we all have and face the same or similiar issues and collectively we have helped to solve a few this week.
Loren: Is part of what we have been talking about is that email does not have that ONE thing anymore? It has so many other benefits and roles now. Acquisition, Relationship, Promotional, Customer Lifecycle Value, etc. We are opening up our eyes to how we can best leverage it and how people want to get it.
Brian: (Cisco): The conversations here not only during the event but at the dinners, skiing, drinking... brought so much more insight as a community.
Ryan Buchanan: Can we have a way to keep this dialogue going on all year? Can we use the EEC site or another forum to talk to one another on issues, nuances, what works, feedback, etc.
Audience Comment: There is no one right answer to email I learned. It is enlightening to know everyone has a different strategy and can show how it works. No one solution works for everyone but everyone here has given more ideas in 3 days than I have got in 3 years.
We need to band together as a group and really help work on the bills coming out in Congress and State levels and work on some consumer education campaigns.
Overall everyone is looking for to the May 07 event in Scottsdale AZ and looking to actually spend more time with some international, CLV, Targeting, etc focused workshops.
Comments (0) | Posted by dylan at 5:00 AM | Permalink
December 12, 2006
Day 4: Bigger Lists Are Better - Myths and Facts
Morgan from ET made some good points about the following:
Bigger lists are better. Cutting dead weight may result in a lower number of total opens/clicks/conversions.
It is not true at all. Keping your DBs cleaner and lists smaller may perform better than just mailing to the same large list.
Example 1: Cosmetics Retailer
Cut lists from 5.2 million to 2.1 million
59% reduction in costs post opt in
30% increase in total sales after opt-in
222% increase in total revenue per email sent
Example 2: Retail Store
67% reduction in email lists size/email costs
5% lift in average number of unique clicks
40% increase in total conversions
Myth: The Average industry open rate is 30-40%
Single and batched targeted sends skew data. When you hit 200K emails it stabilizes a campaign.
Myth: Subject line testing requires 1000's of subscribers per test cell and several days to get stastically significant results.
Nope: Active "clickers" are VERY sensitive to subject lines
Email aficionados tend to check email often and provide insights quickly
Using very small samples of the right subscribers works well
You can test a small ACTIVE group and small INACTIVE subscriber list and see within 1-2 hours what each group would respond to.
Michelle: Pivotal Veracity
Myth: All emails render the same properly across web based and desktop clients
Fact: All emails clients treat html differently. You subscribers mayy have a VERY different experience with your email campaigns, based on how and where they access their emails. Fonts all work differently, links can change colors, extra buttons or links can move or shift.
Myth: Delivery does not affect rendering
Fact: It does. When and email hits the bulk or junk folder in many email clients, images and links will default to OFF. So if you are not getting to the inbox, then you are not going to show up right at all. In many bulk or junk folders it actually takes a few more clicks to show the images, html and then activate the links.
Myth: Rendering does not affect deliverability
FACT: The coding done in your email creative can send an email right to the bulk/junk folder. When you write your code in a tablized image map, etc, it can reduce the chance of a good email ending up in a bad place.
Myth: Opt in Means Opt in for life
Fact: Your Subscribers feel differently. At what point will your subscribers work against your companies reputation? What is the cost to mailing to EVERY subscriber? What is they are not performing, reading, buying. Why keep them? Clean your lists.
As the consumer life grows on some lists (from a study) the length of time on a list can actually grow the possibility of spam complaints. At 31 months, 43% of a list were more apt to complain. Be introspective and look at your files and take those non performers off your list. Decide what is a good record. Don't just have a list to have a list. More important to have interest than risk a complaint or bad reputation.
Best email Practices:
Design to your most popular domains in your lists
Ensure your code is W3C compliant
Track your email delivery
Conduct audits of your lists and move inactive people out or target them and ask if they are still interested.
Puresend:
And Open Conversion on the Acceptability of questionable delivery
Using coding tactics in the source to decieve the ISPs to counter what the ISPs are filtering. Basically throwing conversation code, book passages, etc into the html code that was not visible to hide the percentage of the flagged content.
Don't be afraid to pass on a sender /client if you see bad efforts or slamming done on their parts or past creative. Look at and ask for IPS that they have been sending off of. Ask them to send you current or past HTML campaigns.
Do a SenderScore look up. www.senderscore.org
Check out Google Groups
Look up stats on Senderbase.org
Comments (0) | Posted by dylan at 5:00 AM | Permalink
December 11, 2006
Day 3: AM Session Two
Reputation Rules:
What is Reputation?
1. End User Complaints: hit the junk buttons, sends to abuse@
2. Unknown User Rate: an Account that does not exist at a domain.
3. Spam Traps or Honey Pots: Accounts that have NEVER opted into any newsletters.
4. Sending Infrastructure: There is a Checklist of 40 things that ISPs look for - Wish I could type it all out for you.
5. Sending Permenance: If your email frequency is not even or it is bursty then it is a flag for ISPs. Balancing out your volumes and sending schedules helps.
Des Cahill, Haebas
ISP Perspective: 99.95% of all email senders are spammers (now that is a nice look at things)
There are 200 million IP addresses around the globe that are sending emails.
They see about a 20% non delivery to the inbox on average for all good email marketers. (makes us feel good to be well above average).
Your Reputation is driven by: Your Mailings, other departments in your org's mailings, mailing that go out from your affiliates or partners.
No matter what you are using, you need to be looking at using an online reputation monitoring system.
Delivery is not the MAIN problem in email if you are following best practices.
Email 2.0 is about tigheter data integration and not widgets and applications.
John Ouren: Goodmail
He thinks that complaint rates driven by users will be the biggest influence on delivery at ISPs. ISPs are going to be watching closer and listening better based on user feedback. (This drives the question in my mind if 25% of people are using the Report This buttons to get off a list instead of unsubscribing using the system, how will this impact delivery? Seems to me we need a serious consumer education campaign in partnership with the ISPs.
What is the ecomonic cost if it is not getting to the inbox? If you images aren't loading? If you are not getting delivered period? Can you measure it? Do you know how?
Email is the most effective and highest ROI marketing you can be doing.
Charles Stiles: Postmaster AOL
You should not be having a delivery problem. This is due to the fact that you are not using best practices. They have a simple list of questions that we actually ask ourselves most of the times.
If you are trying to use tricks to get your mail delivered, we will consider you to be a non legit mailer. If it walks like a duck, talks like a duck, it is a duck.....
QA:
Who can help us?
Many of the ESPs are using the above speakers tools (eROI uses ReturnPath). If you or your ESP is not, you can contact them direct for audits and issue mitigation services.
How do my partners impact my reputation when they promote our products in their mailings.
AOL: we not only look at IPs but also at factors like domains, patterns, frequency, how often to your messages get read, how often are they reported, content, recipient validilty. Think about a FICO score based on all these factors.
You need to be aware of everything that is happening with your IPs daily and how others are using your domains in their emails. Controlling how your domains might be used can be hard.
Charles: Report this as Junk button
When a consumer uses it they need to be removed from your lists. Use the Feedback loops, If you continue to mail to them, they will most likely hurt your AOL reputation.
They tried to use some education to the consumers about how to use this button. Not sure what impact it had.
What we (AOL) needs to do is to habe a accredidation system that we can use for all emailers to enter into with us so we know who is going to be sending what to our subscribers. (I think that there needs to be a standardized system for all ISPS to use together. There needs to be some standards set and agreed to by the ISPs as to how they would like marketers to work with them.
List maintenance is really important to delivery. If there are people that are not reading or interacting with your emails, why not remove them?
Comments (0) | Posted by dylan at 8:00 AM | Permalink
Day 3: AM Session One Keynote
Case Studies on Segmentation Practices
Michele Souder, General Mills
Betsy Alperstein, General Growth Properties - Large Retail Malls
Mark Braitsky, Peterson's
Loren McDonald, JL Halsey, Moderator
Segmentation, we all know we should be doing it. Targeted segmentation drives 5X revenue returns vs batch and blast marketing that many email marketers use. Many plan on using dynamic data (from last year's study) so we should expect more email marketers to be using it starting 2007.
Overcoming the Challenges:
Capturing the Data
Accesing and Segmenting the Data
Creating the Versions of the Content
Getting the Resources and Budget
General Mills: Opt in forms drive to a self selection of content and issues
Many people internally thought that the form was too long and asked too much, but after some A/B testing they found no difference (long or short) with completion rates). So there was not any noticable difference in conversion to subscriptions. Some extra non required feilds provide extra (Box Tops) points if they complete.
Creative: Using tests based on geo driving online couponing and recipes. Retailers like to participate in the emails as they see offline lift in sales with the couponing.
General Growth: Paper forms at the malls drive lead capture (Gender, Kids and birthdate (for age) are the most important). The online form asks for basic data, HHI, Family members and ages,
Peterson's: Short forms, Basic information on first page. Secondary page asks for more information. They believe that shortening the forms into steps helps completion. They are concerned about geo, role (parent/student/educator), expected date of enrollement (timing), and program of interest (can provide leads to schools). There are multiple forms on the sites that roll into a single CRM/database that they can then use to market out of.
Question from David Baker: How are you taking the response or non response data in different areas of these emails and using it to change, adapt or remove content blocks?
Many of the marketers are not as focused on dynamic content or changing based on behavoirs and more driven by acquisition. They are looking at those that do not open at all to re-engage them with different content. The re-activation program is driven by multiple campaigns (surveys, subject lines, education on changes to the sites, education on savings and coupons). They stuck with things that they have ongoing but approached it in a new way. Some are taking the approach to those that never read or engage, to send them a last ditch email to scrub them from the list or re-activate them.
Creating the Content
General Mills: It was of interest to hear that all the brands want to run their own campaigns but there is not enough content with many brands to be relevant and engaging by themselves. It makes more sense to create content at the TOP brand level and creating content blocks that represent different brands withing the parent. This allow people to "self-select" the content they are most interested in. I think that it is interesting to note that there really is not a preference center to change the types of content you want. Like, I like baking, I love snack foods, tell me more about family meals. They have been testing a link in the newsletter in the top left that actually triggers a content specific email as it is easier for them to create an email campaign than it is to create more content or pages in their websites. Amazing that General Mills is resource constrained.
General Growth:
189 Malls, 3 account reps, and 2 graphic designers. They rely on the malls and national brands to get them content to popluate the mall templates to send out. They run a newsletter (like 3-4 store offers) and a one brand stand alone (usually a national brand offer).
Peterson's:
They run 4 newsletters that are informative and leverage existing content from the website into the email campaigns. They do have a CMS that allows them to create new landing or content pages as needed for the newsletter. In the content segmentation side, content is similar, tones are different based on focus (student/parent/educator/ professional). Many times the text message in the headers are very different (but a similar message focus) based on who they are.
Resources:
Peterson's::
In total there are 4 dedicated team members running the websites and online marketing. They do have access to other resources if needed, but they can typically handle the challenge. In order to grow the revenues they beleive that they will need to grow the head count to drive more marketing, content, value, etc.
General Mills:
Interactive Marketing sits over a large group of people from Brands, Website, Household/DB Marketing, Editorial, IS Dept, and External Agencies and ESPs. But many of these teams are just a few people.
Me: It sounds large but many of these teams are fairly small. It is interesting to me with so many consumer good s companies dirving more ad revenue and focus online and have not scaled the teams accordingly. Why is this? We often hear that it's the internet, it is like magic, just make that change.
General Growth: About 6 people on the team handle the campaigns. They are looking at adding 2 more to the team for 2007. But they had to present the business case of the higher value of the online subscriber (which was $1200 more a year spent and 6 more visits a year than the average shopper). Really helped to bring in an outsourced ESP instead of trying to produce and send it from an in house server system and software.
Who is Driving Segmentation:
It is not being driven by the higher levels or brands, but by the email teams. Management is not really concerned about it. They are driven by significant revenue growth and not how or what it takes to get it there.
Is there a way to take data up to management to show why larger teams are needed to drive revenue growth? They seemed to agree that taking email reports up to management are pointless, but really showing overall results in growth and interactions. It is not a thing that many people care to understand within a company, mainly what is driving growth of the company goals.
Key Take Aways:
Most brands are only using simple segmentation and content driven (dynamic data) emails. The reasons being: time, staff, true understanding, and resources (money). Most of the brands are taking this last years data to better shape 2007 campaigns. The reasons being that we are just starting to get enough data to target based on behavior and wants/likes.
Taking a simple approach to your emails is a good stating point. Things like Gender, Frequency, and timing (if you know a end date for a certain purchase of a product or service). Other segmenations are based on engagement. If you can pull people out that are not reading, clicking or engaging, take that opp to see how you can bring them in with surveys, education or offers specific to just them.
Comments (0) | Posted by dylan at 5:00 AM | Permalink
December 10, 2006
Sen Clinton Introduces Privacy Bill
Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton, D-N.Y., has promised to introduce a "privacy bill of rights" that would give consumers the right to sue when privacy rules have been violated (don't they have that right already?), freeze credit when their identities have been stolen (sorry, too late), and challenge the government to exercise best practices in dealing with their personal information (sorry, too vague). Should such a bill become law, chief privacy officers will batten down every hatch while outside lawyers will exploit every gray area. Great for the lawyers, but not much good for everyone else.
Comments (0) | Posted by dylan at 11:20 AM | Permalink
December 9, 2006
Gmail NOW Accepts all Emails
So how are you going to deal with this news? Gmail is now able to recieve email from ANY email account into the GMail system. Imagine your subscribers are getting email at Yahoo, MSN, iWon, or thier work or ISP email account. NOW they can get all of that mail into one place. The Gmail Inbox.
I am not sure how this is going to affect delivery and deliverability. Thinking it through late at night right now.... Will it be better or worse for email marketers and email marketing companies. My gut is if I only had one type of email client to deliver to... it sure would make the world simple to send it the right html way to the right ISP and manage relations with one, instead of 100s.
But not so quick...gmail is still not as large as MSN, AOL or Yahoo.. and will the business user or your mom (always my litmus test, mom if you are reading this... get off AOL, please, I swear it will be painless and better) switch over to using it.
I know this will not be an instant impact to many, BUT your current early techie, student, adopter will and most likely before this post is live. It reminds me of the AOL "we are going to give you a vanity URL and still send it to AOL" idea, but better as I actually love gmail.
Let's see what happens... I will keep you updated.
Google quietly added a small feature to Gmail this week called Mail Fetcher. When that feature launched, Gmail became perfect.
Mail Fetcher allows users to access non-Gmail email accounts from within the Gmail interface. If you have a Yahoo email account, and a work email account, etc., you can simply access that email from within Gmail, using POP settings. Gmail will now work in a very similar way as Outlook does on the PC desktop.
Read the Full article at: http://www.techcrunch.com/2006/12/09/uh-oh-gmail-just-got-perfect/
Comments (0) | Posted by dylan at 10:58 PM | Permalink
December 8, 2006
Email Marketing 2.0 Panel
Brent Hill: Feedburner
Sean Meehan, eWay Direct
Bill Nussey, Silverpop
Corey Honza, Quiznos
eWay Direct: Desktop Applications
Why did we look away from email and look at desktop applications to deliver the email messages to the desktop and away from the inbox. Integrates into any email client. Improves performance 5 to 50%.
Provides a way to isolate best and most enthusiatic customers.
Using this allows you a way to bypass the ISP and inbox for 100% delivery.
Time based events - ie 12 hour sale - then disapears
Toggles with email, so they can remove the app and still be engaged in email inbox
Own space on the desktop
Bill: Silverpop
RSS and why you need to look at it for your channel. Silvepop is drving Individualized RSS. Which means that each subscriber gets a personal feed. Uniquely encode each RSS feed to track it.
RSS is TRUE persmission. Pulling them in is an effort.
RSS has ensured delivery.
I would challenge this as it is there, yes, but when is the person going to access it. Most people are not using RSS daily or many times a day, but more like a few times a week or once a week. So if your message is time based, will they miss out?
Bill is showing so many ways that RSS is a tool for sending data someone wants, but not using it as a promotional vehicle. So is the newsletter dead? Is email not relevant to Silverpop? Are they and RSS company now?
Corey: Quiznos
Mobile Applicaitons: Current and Future
Used Mobile to test with Amp'd Mobile to test offers with Video Content. 2000 subscribers watched the content on the mobile phone. Exciting, but just a test.
iTunes/IPod
Posting latest ads on Apple iTunes - 11K downloads a month of the ads, of that 1.5 are taken to the IPod to watch.
"Subscriber List" - where else can we reach users. How can we use our subscriber lists to see what cross over channels might exist.
Building a Mobile website: Store Locator, Menu, Register for online coupons with email and mobile numbers from the mobile device. Building the whole site out in CSS so that it works on all platforms.
SMS: Currenlty collecting mobile numbers to use for mobile coupons that are national, regional, and store specific. Mobile Sweeps: only 7000 out of 870,000 have opted in so far.
Does it Matter Q/A
Bill: It is important to dip you toe now.
Corey: SMS and mobile is really important to our audience
Sean: We have to think about the userbase for OS issues.
What are Costs and Metrics?
Bill: RSS is easy to get into and not a high cost. SMS is a little higher in costs.
Sean: On the deskptop side we can see amazing metrics from the app. Southwest Airlines drove millions in bookings with the DING desktop app.
Corey: Looking at the metrics from reach to increase of business/sales is a little hard as they are a franchise business. Working with a middle man SMS company helps as there are so many carriers, just like ISPs.
Bill: Mobile Aggregators are in the process of consolidation that will help to push SMS and mobile.
Is adpotation more b to b or b to c?
Bill: No trends yet, but assume that consumer will be most empowered by RSS.
Sean: Desktop is great for b to c. Not sure about b to b.
Comments (0) | Posted by dylan at 9:00 AM | Permalink
Day 2: AM Session Two Panel
Brian Ellefritz: Cisco
Syd Jones: IBM
Stephanie Miller: Return Path
Denis McGrath: P&G
Daryl Neilson: HP
Geoff Atkinson: Overstock.com
Relevancy and Consumers Having Control:
Daryl: Email is viewed as a relationship vehicle, 80% of our business is through email communications. Challenges are finding good information on each person ad pulling the communications into a brand communication and not a product channel communication strategy. The US is the hardest market. It is here that they can invent solutions and campaigns to pass out globally.
They were hitting people in asia 2-3 times a week and were seeing bad results. Moved to 2-3 a month and saw rates rise. With the global countries, the world is still working in the mindset of 1995 where people are still climbing online faster than the US.
IBM: They have the same issues. Keeping brand channels from emailing so many times and not getting in sync with frequency.
Steph: Why did you use Spam in your answers?
P&G: First round of consumer research was shocking as to how fluid the concept was. Not just what we think it to be, but anything they get that they don't want is "spam". Might be appropriate today but could be junk tommorrow. The consumer changes relevance perceptions all the time. Let the consumer be able to change the frequency rate. Is the point of view consistent with your lists? Are you segmenting and delivering the right content? You might not experience the issue if you explain up front and continue to communicate the focus (CLV).
Steph: Should we re-permission?
Brian: Opt out survey, on the exit opt out, ask some questions as to why they are leaving. Most frequently he sees it due to job or position change. So with consumer relationships it can be the same, life changes, view changes, timing.
If you take time to listen and measure and target based on based behavoir, you will see lift.
Geoff:
We are very similar to the relevancy issue. We know what is going on. We might know too much (click data, purchase data, search data, visit data). We found that the most recent data is the most powerful. More focus on what they are doing now as opposed to what they did 2 years ago.
Steph: Do you have data that has them opted in for self selection?
Geoff: We would like to, but we don't have a whole preference center. We are developing a preference center for new customers, to better understand what they want to know about, buy, watch, etc. It has to be relevant or the churn moves fast.
From the Audience:
When does an Issue of non-delivery throw a red flag (20%?).
Syd: They don't look at it too hard from a high level, but on a product manager level. The upper level management is not concerned about it as it lies in the lap of the Director to manage and focus on.
HP: Issues in developing countries
P&G: We look at it as a challenge
Overstock: We watch it closely as it directly impacts sales.
Cisco: Not too many people understand the issue, they are just concerned on total campaign goals holistically.
Ryan Buchanan asked: Why would I sign up for some of these emails I have seen this AM. They look safe. Are you pushing the envelope of content?
Cisco: We are looking at using more of the new positioning (shown in the video) that is a new feel and experience. We are looking at video ALOT to use for our marketing.
HP: Driving new content with Tips and Tricks (Excel tips), being a resource. Death by Powerpoint was a great topic that worked. Not just LOVE ME HP positioning. Interesting note that HP creates 50 versions in the US of newsletters plus individual personalization. And in the rest of the world they do 100 versions. (Wow)
P&G: By nature we are a safe company. We try to be mainstream and not edgy. What can we do with the boundaries we draw around ourselves to still be engaged. The family relationship is important. There is a place that they can play in the US. In other world regions, they push the envelope more. But is stays there.
Overstock: We need to segment more by demographic. We do not want to ever offend our subscribers.
THOUGHT: Are we as brand marketers ruining our own pool or email? I heard that they are just "blasting out emails" to other places and countries with no real local relevance. They need to change this. Are they hurting the rest of us, or are we all hurting ourselves? Take a step back and look at if you are sending campaigns for the sake of a timeline or goal as opposed to relevance and preferences. The customer is getting used to take control, give them a way to manage this so that you are not on the path to losing them as an opt out or complaint. What kind of relationship is it when one person does all the talking?
Top Priorities for 2007:
Brian: Who do you invest in the media mix and how do we invest in email as part of this mix
Syd: Stepping back and focusing on basics. Give respect to get respect from the relationships they have with thier subscribers. Teams are being seduced by 2.0 and need to look at focus.
Denis: Unsubscribe/Spam issues, more understanding of the measurements.
Daryl: Get more personalized, focus on deliverability
Geoff: Personalization and CRM. Focus on long term customer value.
Comments (0) | Posted by dylan at 5:00 AM | Permalink
December 7, 2006
Day 2: AM Session Two: Cisco Systems
Has Email Lost Its Way?, Brian Ellefritz Cisco Systems
Email is a prolific and great tool for Cisco but it is also a changing tool.
In the Beginning... (1995) What are you going to do to control the online world? Email and the web browser were to tools to grow your subscriber base and business. It was a great time to be a brand. Everyone was opting in to everything at a rapid pace and loving everything they got in this new INBOX place that they have.
Search disrupted the love. Consumers no longer needed to wait for the email, but they could go look for it. Changed the email opt in rates. Brands had to reposition as consumers are all about finding what they need when they need it. They have community sites, peers, blogs, youtube, IM, search.. all of these make email more important and more of a focused approach is what needs to be done.
Letting go of control and becoming part of the consversation is what we need to do. People are becoming responsible participants.
Email: Is still working, is still issues are front and center: Phishing, Deliverability, Click Through, Open Rates, etc.
Where is our Email 2.0? We hear Web 2.0 each day where are we going with email in the 2.0 or 3.0 mix? Where is the tipping point to support the entire mix (RSS, SMS, Search, Social Media, Live events, blogs, online events). Email has a role, but how will it play out?
We all have the same experience with our own personal email about the junk that flows into our inbox.
(How do we become that shining light in the inbox that gets you excited to get real email you want? )
Strengths or Weakness?
Ubiquitous and accessible
Measurable
Flexible (html, text, urls, etc)
Where is out Up and to the Right Feature List? Where is our 2.0 in email marketing?
Video is a possible way to beter engage in email, but with all of the suppression and issues with playing video in the inbox not sure about if we will get there. (See http://vismail.com/)
Comments (0) | Posted by dylan at 7:00 AM | Permalink
Day 2: AM Session One: P&G
Proctor and Gamble
Denis, P & G for 18 years. In online with PG since start.
Created P&G Everyday Solutions Program
What's Right with Email Marketing
"A Praise Sandwich" some positive with some negative with some positives.
Success is based on Relevance
What your delivering is what the consumer wants to hear every time.
Consumer Relevance takes many routes and you need to identify what yours is.
How do you deliver an engaging message on a low involvement category - Many brands are doing and sending things that they believe that the consumer might not like to hear about on a daily basis. Deodorant, Toilet Paper: Charmin, Batteries: Duracell? Do you want an email about these items?
How do you craft a message that works. Aggregation is the solution. Bring them into other combined efforts. 10-12-14 interesting tid bits to talk about monthly instead of stand alone brand emails.
They are successfully using product sampling or couponing camaigns, contests, sweeps, special offers as part of the monthly mix.
EDS - Everyday Solutions
It takes all the pieces to make it work, cannot run one content block without the other. All the content from all the collective brands need to work together. Really a simple email. Very successful and very simple. Introduces cross brand offers in a newsletter format that is openly wanted by subscribers.
Pampers Interactive:
Talking to a specific consumer
New Mom, Preggo mom, Expectant Dad, Grandma, etc.
Relevance is driven by: Deep consumer insight, incredible content, consumer respect (doing this across all of their brands.
Starts with the Reg Page:
DOB or Due Date - Childs Name, Gender, Relationship to Child
And other geo data - Interesting that all the data is required
Welcome email has a whole slew of fact abot what you are going to get. And OFFERS you a chance to unsubscribe if this communication is not going to meet your expectations. They would rather you leave now than leave later to keep a good brand relationship.
See the expectations set
The flow of information changes dramatically from pregnancy to birth. Mom's are like sponges about getting information. Weekly emails pre-nautal, monthly after birth as mom's get busy. (Customer Lifecylce Value)
New baby really changes on educational issues and questions that new parents want to know.
They talk lightly about the Pampers solutions but have found that being a resource is more important as a brand than about selling the product. The product sales come with the Brand Relevance with drip marketing.
Why does it work:
Direct, Interested Audience (they came to them to opt in), Measurable (since they do not sell direct they have to look at measuring the sales impact using offline sources, but it DOES work).
Measurement is a great source that proves investment in this media channel, but for now. It is not working quite as well as it used to. Not sure of how it plays out in the future.
(Maybe they are not changing their measurements. )
The Email Environment:
Consumers that mark emails from PG as SPAM found that 25% of those people use that method to unsubscribe. (Consumer Reports actually told people NOT to trust the unsubscribe links as they are the tricks of the devil. Instead report it as junk or spam. 85% of those people do not remember flagging it as junk or spam with surveyed.
Opens, clicks, ets are going down. So is email working for them?
The Shrinking Inbox:
Inbox window is shriking, ads crunching in, subject lines getting truncated, more going on around the message. Images suppressed, preview vs open measurements
The Impact: Testing Content, Deliverability, Reputation, Looking for Measurements that work.
Lots of questions even the largest brands have about email marketing. And who has the answers?
Comments (0) | Posted by dylan at 5:00 AM | Permalink
December 6, 2006
Spam Doubles, Finding New Ways to Deliver Itself
We are all battling with the increase of JUNK hitting our inboxes. In the Email Insiders Summit it was a hot topic as all of the legitimate email marketers are believing it to be responsible for reducing their campaign effectiveness. It was echoed across the board by all that why are all of us trying so hard to follow best practices, focus on reputation, hammer on delivery with ISPs when all of these scam artists are finding ways to circumvent the rules. An article in today's New York Times covers this in detail.
What really needs to be done is we all need to collectively educate the consumers of how to help us flag, tag and recognize junk. If we can get the consumer to know how to help the fight and understand that the newsletters, offers and communications that they opt in for are in the same email war that they are in, we might see some changes.
Comments (0) | Posted by dylan at 1:40 PM | Permalink
Hats off to eROI's Ryan Buchanan
We were excited this week to see Oregon Business Magazine name our CEO Ryan Buchanan as one of the 50 Great Leaders for Oregon. He was actually (and appropriately) named a SuperConnector. This is a great honor as if you take somt time to look through this list, he is the youngest one and one of the most connected throughout the state in all verticals. Ryan does some great things (as does eROI) for non profits and the community as we hold a belief that if we are going to live here, we are going to make it a nice place for everyone to live and our children to live.
Read 50 Great Leaders for Oregon.
Comments (0) | Posted by dylan at 9:36 AM | Permalink
The Gang is All Here at the Email Insider Summit
Well today the Email Insider Summit is wrapping up. I took time to blog the comments made by most of the speakers. I will be editing my fat fingers (typos) work tonight and posting it for you over the coming days.
Lots of great people. The Email Experience Council, ReturnPath, Goodmail, Pivotal Veracity, David Baker and the Ave A/RZRFSH team, Ogilvy NYC and SF, Barclays, Jenn from Summit, David Fowler, Lola from Warner Music Group, IBM, Quiznos, Datran Media, Charles from AOL, Yahoo, MSN, Weather.com, HP, Robeez, and many many more. And of course Bill McCloskey a personal favorite. The eROI team had a great time (last night was a late one) and learned so much.
I just can't stress what a great group of people there are that come to this event. Put the May 07 event in your plans. You can't attend a conference where people are so open and willing to share. Companies and Brands large and small (even competition) share openly about what is working, not working, challenges, and solutions. The most important part is that they are all here to move the industry forward and make it better for eveyone. you can't get this much collective knowledge in a room anywhere else and have them all really want to share and grow. Trust me as I go to alot of events.
If you are reading this blog daily, weekly or monthly, make the commitment and join us in May. Also think about OMMA in LA in March 07. One of the best collective intereacrtive events out there.
Thanks MediaPost and The Email Insiders for putting this event on.
Comments (0) | Posted by dylan at 9:02 AM | Permalink
How Much Will You (Or They) Take
I can't tell you how many spam emails I get a day. It is actually ridiculous at this point in time. We use some systems as well as desktop clients that catch and quarantine the majority for daily review, but so much still slips through into the inbox. It is amazing that these people can beat all the systems out there and many marketers doing the right things get caught in traps, tar pits and non delivery dilemas all the time.
It is a WAR on both sides of the battlefield. We are fighting to do right for deliverability and at the same time are fighting to keep the junk out of our inboxes as well.
Spam, Spam, Spam!, From eMarketer
The Monty Python team said it best. According to a number of sources, the spam problem is getting worse.
In a survey conducted earlier this fall by Bluestreak, US online users did not seem overly concerned about the amount of spam in their e-mail boxes. With the exception of users ages 50 and older, none of them thought spam accounted for more than 20% of the volume of e-mails they received.
But several more recent surveys say otherwise.
According to the online security firm IronPort Systems, 62 billion spam messages a day clogged US e-mail systems in October, and that is twice the volume of the previous October.
IronPort analysts cited two reasons for the increase: one, more types of spam, and two, an increase in the number of "bot" networks that deliver spam. Together they account for a record crush of unsolicited commercial e-mail.
IronPort estimates over 80% of spam is delivered by bot nets.
"[Spam] is rocketing," John Thielens of Tumbleweed Communications told USA Today. "It is less costly to launch an attack because of the widespread availability of bot nets, and there are real economic returns for phishing-related spam."
The news comes as a blow to anti-spam advocates, many of whom — after a leveling of unsolicited commercial e-mail in 2005 — foresaw a decline in spam this year.
Corroborating the increase, Postini, an e-mail message management firm, tracks more than one million bots carrying spam each day — also more than twice the number of a year ago.
In fact, from September to November, Postini saw a 59% increase in overall spam.
The firm reports that unwanted e-mail is currently 91% of all e-mail, and over the past 12 months the daily volume of spam rose by 120%.
"This dramatic rise in spam attacks on corporate networks has the Internet under a state of siege," said Daniel Druker of Postini. "Spammers are increasingly aggressive and sophisticated in their techniques. Spam has evolved from a tool for nuisance hackers and annoying marketers to one for criminal enterprises."
The problem is not limited to the US, either.
A survey from the European Commission found that over half of all e-mails sent in the EU are spam, with some users reporting that up to 80% of their inboxes are stuffed with the unsolicited messages.
"Spam is still making up between 50% and 80% of the mails that we are receiving in Europe," said EU spokesman Martin Selmayr.
Europeans blame much of their spam problem on outside sources, however.
Mr. Selmayr said the US accounted for 21.6% of the spam coming into the EU. China ranked second with 13.4%, and in third place was EU member France, which accounted for 6.3% of the volume.
Comments (0) | Posted by dylan at 5:06 AM | Permalink
December 5, 2006
Time to Start Taking Mobile Email Seriously
If you are not thinking about how many of your subscribers are reading email on their phones already, time to gear up. Gmail, MSN, Yahoo and the Business Users Gateway Drug of choice... the Blackberry are grabbing more and more 3rd screen time. I would not expect Grandma to be using it but any kid with a mobile phone to the mobile professional is going to begin to use it more. And they will not get your messages in the way you sent them out. Start testing your emails today so that you are ready tommorrow.
YAHOO PLANS TO OFFER E-MAIL and instant messaging on Nokia phones, expanding a partnership it began with the mobile giant last year. The new services will at first be available on the Nokia 6300, 5300 XpressMusic, and 5200 handsets before being added to other Nokia Series 40 phones. Previously, Yahoo has teamed up with Nokia to provide search on Nokia smartphones and Yahoo Go Mobile, its mobile Web browser, on Nokia handsets for AT&T and Cingular Wireless subscribers. In addition to e-mail and messaging, Yahoo will also offer its Personal Information Management application on Nokia phones to sync contacts, tasks and calendar dates between a PC and a mobile device.
Comments (0) | Posted by dylan at 7:19 AM | Permalink
The Reach of Mobile Devices
I know that some of us are likely to be a little more forward than the average cell phone user, but have you seen my RSS news reader of my mobile? www.freerangeinc.com. Then you might have a different thought around what you can be doing with mobile devices.
I have all the mobile email clients, a web browser, Google Maps with Traffic Reports, and my RSS news reader... and I use them multiple times a day on top of my Blackberry email client. But alas I am not the norm.
I found it interesting that the one email client to stand out thus far is Gmail on mobile devices. Not that I would not expect it, as it is one of the better and faster ones so far that is not controlled through a browser but it's own self contained and icon'd application.
ESPN, G-Mail Popular On Cell Phones by Mark Walsh, Mediapost
ESPN AND THE WEATHER CHANNEL have a much greater proportion of users on mobile devices than PCs, while the search functions of Yahoo and Google are just the opposite. That's one of the findings of a new service started jointly by Telephia and comScore Networks, comparing mobile and PC-based Internet audiences.
The MobileWeb Metrix service is intended to help media companies better target online investments by analyzing the relationship between mobile and desktop Web usage. It also reflects increasing efforts by research firms to offer clients wider audience information as media platforms proliferate. Earlier this month, Nielsen Media Research and NetRatings unveiled a new database that merged information from their TV and Internet panels into a single product.
"Web publishers want one integrated view of the audience for their Websites across all access modes," said Kanishka Agarwal, vice president of new products at Telephia, which specializes in telecom and mobile research.
As part of the MobileWeb data, Telephia and comScore derived index scores based on a site's reach among mobile users divided by its reach among PC-based Internet users. ESPN, which has a mobile reach of 17.9% compared to a PC reach of 9.4%, ranked second only to AccuWeather on the U.S. mobile-to-PC index with a score of 190.
"Sports is an especially powerful category in mobile, along with weather and news, because they really lend themselves to getting quick snippets of information," said Agarwal. But the demise this fall of ESPN Mobile shows that a high mobile-to-PC ratio doesn't necessarily ensure the success of a premium mobile sports offering.
The search services of Yahoo and Google, by contrast, posted indexes of 25 and 23, respectively, because Web users are more likely to access them from home computers than mobile devices. With an index of 107, Citysearch had nearly the same reach on cell phones as PCs. As these companies build out nascent mobile search services, however, their proportion of mobile users may increase.
Among the four top e-mail services--Yahoo Mail, MSN Hotmail, Gmail and AOL Mail--only Gmail had a higher reach via mobile than PC.
In addition to comparing basic Internet metrics between mobile and PC users such as unique visitors, reach and total minutes per month, the MobileWeb report includes comparative data based on age and gender. Information on other demographic factors including income, race, and ethnicity will be added by early next year.
Comments (0) | Posted by dylan at 4:51 AM | Permalink
December 4, 2006
Email Insider Summit Day 1
Well we pulled into Park City Utah last night, just in time for the Mediapost Cocktail hour(s). Great turn out from ESPs, Agencies and Brand Marketers alike. Inteesting to see some new technology providers here at the event and I am excited to see some of these new tools.
The EEC (Email Experience Council) was in the House and ready for a afternoon summit on Tuesday.
Cold and Snowy here, so we could not ask for much more. I will try to keep you updated as the event progresses.
Wish you were here.....
Comments (0) | Posted by dylan at 7:27 AM | Permalink
Judge Sides with MediaWhiz in Email Marketing Case
Today, performance marketing firm MediaWhiz stated that a California Superior Court judge has ruled in favor of its WhiteDelivery division and four other defendants, rejecting all of a plaintiff’s claims that included practices including sending unsolicited email.
In court, Judge Neal Cabrinha ruled against Infinite Monkey, the plaintiff that allegedly purchased domain names, redirected email sent to those domain names to Infinite Monkey, and subsequently filed lawsuits for the alleged receipt of unsolicited emails. Cabrinha found that the plaintiff is not a “recipient” under California law on unsolicited commercial email, because the emails “were not intended for plaintiff.” The judge also ruled on October 30 that Infinite Monkey’s business was not impeded, because its servers were set up for the sole purpose of capturing allegedly unsolicited email.
Additonally, the judge rejected Infinite Monkey’s claims for unlawful business practices and unlawful advertising practices, due to the fact that no tangible damage was incurred.
“As a leading email marketing company that is committed to following industry best practices and maintaining stringent compliance measures, we are very pleased that the court’s decision found in favor of our business model,” stated Yannick Tessier, Co-President, MediaWhiz and founder of WhiteDelivery, in a statement.
Comments (0) | Posted by dylan at 6:24 AM | Permalink
December 2, 2006
Bill and the Future of Email
The Future Of E-mail, Mediapost, by Bill McCloskey
A REPORT OUT THIS WEEK claims that there has been a significant rise in spam since June. The report, released by anti-spam solution provider Postini, claims that currently nine out of 10 e-mails are spam. And I have to admit that the number of pump and dump stock scam e-mails I've received lately has dramatically increased.
I think it is clear that this type of spam is something that we will always have to deal with. But how does it affect legitimate e-mail marketers? We know about the high ROI generated by e-mail marketing. We know that retailers cite e-mail as the No. 1 demand-generation tool for the holiday season. But we also know that e-mail marketers face an uphill battle internally when fighting for budget against other marketing channels. Convincing top management to invest in e-mail when top management is bombarded with the same inbox spam as the rest of us can be a challenge.
Comments (0) | Posted by dylan at 8:13 AM | Permalink
December 1, 2006
The battle for holiday response
We are running a survey just in time for the holiday season. We will be releasing the results next week as long. This survey is only about 10-15 questions long and will provide some very valuable insight to you and other readers.
Take 2 minutes (literally) to take our survey
Comments (0) | Posted by Jeff at 8:57 AM | Permalink
Using the Welcome Back Email
My job takes me on the road every week or two and thus I end of booking all of my travel myself online. I am sure that many of you reading this do the same. We all have choices, and when someone takes the time (sure this was an automated time based email trigger) to ask you how the trip was, it scores points with me. Travelocity is good with this as illustrated below and will get my business again. It makes me think, Hey they care about what I think and not just about my money. Many other airlines and travel sites miss this part of the loyalty email equation even if it is so simple.
Take the time no matter what you are selling to solicit feedback and ask, how did we do for you?
Comments (0) | Posted by dylan at 5:49 AM | Permalink
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