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June 30, 2007
What Challenges Will the iPhone Bring to Email?
I am going to need to get one of these in the next week or so for "R and D" purposes. At least that is what I am going to tell people.
Visto will let business e-mail reach the iPhoneVisto announced Thursday that its push e-mail software will support the iPhone, giving gadgetheads a round of ammunition for the upcoming battle with their IT department.
Apple isn't pitching the iPhone as a business device, but lots of executives with money to burn on sexy gadgets might try to find a way to use their new toys for business purposes. The iPhone supports the MAP e-mail standard with SSL encryption, which means it is feasible to connect an iPhone to any mail server using IMAP. However, this isn't the most secure way of connecting to a corporate network and is therefore likely to be met with blank stares from the IT guy when you ask to have your snazzy new iPhone set up with corporate e-mail.
But if your company is using Visto's software to send e-mail to mobile devices, you'll be all set, said Haniff Somani, vice president and chief architect for Visto. You won't have to enter a username or password to access your e-mail, and the IT guys won't have to make any changes to their policies regarding mobile devices, he said.
The problem is Visto is not that big in the U.S., where the iPhone goes on sale tomorrow. Visto has a larger customer base in Europe, but the iPhone is not expected to arrive there until later this year. Research In Motion, king of the push e-mail world, has yet to indicate if it will support the iPhone.
Comments (0) | Posted by dylan at 3:30 PM | Permalink
June 29, 2007
You Could Share a Bunk with Paris Hilton
This is an interesting take on the law. But it has merit. If you think about it.. if you have an image only based email and your images are suppressed, well then your image link to opt out will be as well. A little gray area here on all the ways that they could unsub, but if it is all images and suppressed, technically it could be a one way ticket to the gray bar hotel.
From Ken Magill
Marketers who send e-mails using “click here” buttons instead of text for opt-out links risk breaking federal law, said e-mail expert Jay Schwedelson during a presentation at the Direct Marketing Days New York Conference last week. The federal Can Spam Act requires marketing e-mails to include an opt-out mechanism and a return address.However, images are blocked by default in 59% of consumer e-mail and 69% of work e-mail. As a result, if the opt-out link is presented as a graphic, it won’t appear to many users.
“When an image comes up broken and [as a result] there’s no ability for someone to remove themselves, and there’s no physical address of the sender, the marketer is no longer in compliance with Can Spam,” said Schwedelson, corporate vice president for list firm Worldata.
Coincidentally, Magilla Marketing recently learned of a consumer who reported a marketer to the authorities over just such a mistake.
Comments (0) | Posted by dylan at 4:27 AM | Permalink
June 28, 2007
We Don't Just Rock Email Marketing
Some of our competitors in the email marketing space claim to be rockstars, others claim to make you a rockstar. Well we are Rockstars and one a trophy last night to prove it.
Well last night we had to perform in the First Annual Portland Advertising Federation Battle of the Bands. The theme was ButtRock. So some it may be "buttrock" but to us it is lyrical works of beauty. The team assembled an in house all eROI band and got the set list and costumes together.
1. Breaking The Law - Judas Preist
2. Big Bottom - Spinal Tap
3. Home Sweet Home - Motley Crue
We played last of 8 and brought down the house, even against Avenue A Razorfish/Microsoft ..... in a vote by the audience.
Video was shot and we are currently editing it. Should make you proud to know you read this blog today... as you hang with Winners.
See More Photos after the jump >>
Comments (0) | Posted by dylan at 4:40 AM | Permalink
June 27, 2007
Time to Get Sender Score Ceritified
I know that we are jumping on the ReturnPath boat. It might just be the ticket of all tickets. We are going to spend some time digging into this to learn more and I suggest you do as well.
From Ken Magilla Images and links are now on by default in Windows Live Hotmail for messages from organizations subscribing to Return Path’s Sender Score Certified service, the deliverability concern announced today.Though images and links have been turned off by default in Windows Live Hotmail—the newest version of Microsoft’s free e-mail service—they have been turned on for Sender Score Certified mailers for several months, said George Bilbrey, general manager of Sender Score, Return Path’s delivery assurance unit.
“When they released Windows Live Hotmail, they released it with this functionality built in,” he said. “It’s just to the point where now we’ve tested enough to make sure it works all the time.
Comments (0) | Posted by dylan at 4:24 AM | Permalink
June 26, 2007
What is Domain Blocking Doing to Deliverability?
With so many spoofing emails out there from eBay, Amazon, National City, Amex, Hallmark, etc, what effect does domain blocking have on a brand?
I have not seen any conclusive studies or tests about this issue, but it is on my mind lately as I see so many scams out there. Even ones we get spoofing our domains. We know that they are not legitimate, but if this is happening to people you might email or that are already on your lists and they decide to block junk by the domain... it just might impact your campaigns.
Does anyone have any stats or insight on this? Or should I just not worry about it?
Comments (1) | Posted by dylan at 10:04 AM | Permalink
June 25, 2007
Why Do I Care About the Preview Pane?
I had a call with an agency client last week after submitting their creative through ReturnPath Preview Pane testing. To me it shows why I want to design things so that they have the highest chance of working in any situation. Others seem to doubt the importance of designing emails so that the recipient has the highest possible chance to see what is of value to them and tell them in the first glance what you want them to do. I drink the preview pane Kool Aid.
Here are some stats from www.emailstatcenter.com/Creative.html
26.6% of online customers use preview panes (instead of look at your whole email). - MarketingSherpa (2007)
64% of people who are offered preview panes start using them as their default. - MarketingSherpa (2007)
69% of at-work email users usually view emails in their preview panes. -
MarketingSherpa (2007)
80% of at-work users in the US rely on Outlook, which offers preview panes. - MarketingSherpa (2007)
38% of online consumers now use preview pane 'capable' email clients. -
MarketingSherpa (2007)
Now do stats like these tell you not to care? I don't think so. So if you aren't using ReturnPath testing like we do for all of our creative for client projects, you need to at least set up multiple email accounts to do this before you send. But then again, do you have the time to do this? I know I don't. Chalk up another reason I heart ReturnPath for giving me back a few hours a week of my life.
Comments (2) | Posted by dylan at 5:13 AM | Permalink
June 22, 2007
We All Need a Little Sin
We were very excited to work with HBO/Cinemax on a new project for Sin City Diaries that started it's inaugural run this month. Our partner KickApps brought us to the table to execute a campaign for this new series with just a few weeks to go. We delivered on time and I think, with a stellar social media site.
We have set it up to be it's own niche social media and contest site and traffic is already climbing daily. We hope to draw some more visibility and viewers into this new series.
Have a look if you need a little Sin today.
Comments (1) | Posted by dylan at 10:04 AM | Permalink
eROI Wins 15th Fastest Growing Company Award
Well we are very excited to end up 15th in the top 100 companies in the State of Oregon for Fastest Growing. I can only say thank you to all of the companies and people that have believed in us and honored us by allowing us to be their emarketing partners.
And of course a big hats off to the whole eROI team for the amount of work, drive and love they bring to the table each and every day (and many late nights).
Ending the week on a high note and excited to crack the Top 10 next year for this award category. Who know what else might be on the horizon for us and our clients.
Thanks to everyone and come to the party July 20th at the eROI offices if you are in Portland, Oregon. We can celebrate together then. Until then... back to great ideas, great work, great partners/clients and the best team.
Comments (1) | Posted by dylan at 4:59 AM | Permalink
June 21, 2007
Can You Hear My Screams?
I just about made the front desk receptionist drop her coffee and the guy 6 stories up welding re-bar across the street fall when this landed in my inbox this AM. I mean this might be the best and worst study I have ever read.
Let's start with the article title: DM Mail More Likely to be Opened Than Unsolicited EMail, no #$%^$. And guys.. check the EEC but last I saw Email was email all one word and lowercase. Not TWO capital letters. Can you honestly tell me that it is okay to spam my home, real world mail box and I MIGHT open it as compared to my email inbox.
Hell, are you kidding me with this article? You are telling me " HEY send the hell out of the junk mail to someones house, cut down a few more swaths of trees, add to the landfills, add to the footprint it takes on the environment to produce this stuff that odds have it won't get opened. But if we send enough misleading on jacket prints there is a chance...."
And then this quote made me not only gag, but think about forwarding ALL my print junk to Pitney Bowles (Bowels). "The research... shows that consumers still prefer mail over e-mail... we continue to find that mail is the most effective marketing tool businesses can use when communicating with their customers."
Are they just trying to prop up their industry with this study? I believe in DM with EM as a winning combination but I find this study to be crap. (I feel a little like Bill McCloskey right now... sorry Bill)
A recent survey by International Communications Research, commissioned by Pitney Bowes found that 73 percent of consumers prefer mail for receiving new product announcements or offers from companies they do business with, as compared to 18 percent for e-mail. Mail was also preferred by 70 percent of respondents for receiving unsolicited information on products and services from companies with which they are not currently doing business.
Comments (0) | Posted by dylan at 12:30 PM | Permalink
They Have the Boss and Now a New Spam Bill
Ken Magill reports on the new legislation passed in NJ. I wonder if we will see more state centric laws this year. I know from the others that have been passed they have not been as powerful as Can Spam to date. I love the idea, but I think all it does it give a better legal right to sue and not combat the issues.
The New Jersey Senate yesterday approved a bill its sponsors claim expands the federal Can-Spam Act.
Dubbed the New Jersey Can Spam Act, or S-1129, the bill would establish criminal and civil penalties for activities typically involved in spamming.
The bill would prohibit using a computer located in New Jersey to relay or transmit multiple commercial spam messages to mislead recipients or service providers about their origin. It would also ban registering for multiple e-mail addresses or domain names with false information to transmit spam and accessing another computer without authorization and using it to transmit multiple spam e-mails.
Comments (0) | Posted by dylan at 5:58 AM | Permalink
June 20, 2007
The Growth of Daily Focused Email Newsletters
One of our clients we have worked with for about 4 years has just launched the Men's Only version of daily candy. The site went up a few days ago and the first editions per city should be rolling out soon.
Similar in the idea of Daily Candy, Ideal Bite and some others in the space. We have even seen local markets like ours start Portland Picks, which is geared towards women. I also had a conversation with a start up out of Colorado this week which is looking to start up a daily (5 days a week) health and fitness email with tips, ideas and more.
Many of these sites/blogs/dailies reach subscriber numbers from 15K to over 500K from what I have personally seen.
I have seen many of these grow fast and actually charge close to 5K for a daily ad in the email and up to 18K for a stand alone focused email just around their product. Interesting ideas and so many opportunities. I just wonder what the opt in vs opt out rate is on these as personally I have removed myself from dailies and gone to weeklies with my inbox already so full.
Comments (1) | Posted by dylan at 4:25 AM | Permalink
June 19, 2007
But How Will It Look On My Blackberry?
iMediaConnection had a good article written by Clint Smith of MyEmma today on Blackberry and mobile device rules. Some good best practices in the article, but the number one thing is GIVE YOUR TEXT VERSION SOME LOVE.
So often I see people just go with the auto generated Text version of an email and they do not take time to review and reformat the text version. Yeah I do, but this is my job. I detest getting an email on my blackberry that is HTML garbage or has more space from the top down that you have to scroll 2-3 times to get to the meat. Give me the content and make it work.
Four tips for designing handheld-friendly emails that deliver their message on any screen or device.
So you've pretty much got this email newsletter thing down. Design looks great. Copy is crisp. Flow is, well, flowing. Inboxes everywhere are going to love what you're about to send their way. And your finger is hovering over the send button until someone -- probably that pimply intern Nick you never liked in the first place -- chimes in with, "So, how's this gonna look on my BlackBerry?"
And there it is, the question most senders hope doesn't get asked. But the mobile device crowd, while still a fairly small slice of the overall email viewing audience, is growing. Use of BlackBerrys and similar devices continues to rise, and research by the NPD Group shows that as of last September, 6 percent of people viewed their email on mobile phones, up from 3 percent just six months earlier.
So while there's no need to rework your entire email strategy around mobiles, it is time to make sure you include them in your design and testing mix. And a few small adjustments will probably do the trick. Here are a few ideas to get you started:
Keep Reading at iMedia Connection -->
Comments (0) | Posted by dylan at 10:00 AM | Permalink
June 18, 2007
Robert Scoble in Portland
If you are in the Portland area July 19th, you should make a point of registering for the Internet Strategy Forum. We have been working with them since the start and the line up of speakers is amazing this year. Robert Scoble just confirmed this week I learned and with this line up it is going to be the event of the year for e-marketers in the Pacific Northwest.
The Internet Strategy Forum's Executive Summit conference returns on July 19th (with an optional symposium on July 20th) and is open to all. We have confirmed a great line-up of presenters and panelists:
Cammie Dunaway, Chief Marketing Officer, Yahoo!, Inc.
Tim Kopp, Chief Marketing Officer, WebTrends
Mark Colombo, VP Electronic Channels and Strategic Marketing, FedEx
Rey Ramsey, CEO, One Economy Corp.
Erik Kokkonen, VP, Global Publishing Services, CNET
Mike Moran, Distinguished Engineer, IBM, author of "Search Engine Marketing, Inc."
Bryan Rhoads, Sr. Internet Strategist, Social Media, Intel
Mark Erickson, Sr. Computer Scientist, Adobe
Mary Alice Colvin, Senior Marketing Consultant, Allyis
There are less than 100 spots left, so don't delay and get registered.
Comments (0) | Posted by dylan at 9:42 PM | Permalink
For Those About To Rock
I wanted to take a moment to plug an upcoming show of the Portland Advertising Federation, which is actually in the new building we are currently building out and should be in towards November 2007. (June 26, 2007 / 7:00 PM / at Someday Lounge ) This type of event has been big in other cities and we are excited to hold one here in Portland for all the ad agencies to participate in. Not only will it ROCK but eROI is fielding a band of employees. They are hard at work selecting just the right set of Butt Rock to blast out and will be taking some extra hours to get it right. It helps that we already have a Fridays at 4 event each week in the sales area where some tunes are selected and then hacked up into little irrelevant bits based on employees life stories.
Here is my favorite part. The Band had to have a name. e.R.O.I. aka Evil Rock Overlords Inc. If you can imagine it in a 1980s gothic font on the front of my stained t-shirt then there you go. I will be posting video from the show.
So if you are in the Portland area around this time, come and let us rock you. June 26, 2007 / 7:00 PM / at Someday Lounge
Comments (0) | Posted by dylan at 3:22 PM | Permalink
So Maybe I Don't Hate MySpace
Now I can't tell you when I opted in for email newsletter from MySpace, as this is the first one I have ever seen, but it must have been from some campaign profile pages we built for some clients a long time back.
I hate MySpace, not for the idea of it, but for how ugly the whole damn site is. It reminds me in a scary way of my teenage bedroom where I had covered every wall and spec of ceiling with any scrap of magazine or random thing I found. (I understand now why mom was so happy for me to leave and head to college so she could reclaim that part of her house for the Queen.)
But this email is solid. It is well designed, built and rendered. I had a hard time saying no to it when it arrived today. This is how email should be done when you have so much information to communicate. So hats off to you MySpace for getting it right.
The color blocks were clean and called me into the spaces with just enough text to let me know what it was about and why I would want to learn more. The width was dead on and all the actions drove my eye through the email in the path I would love to emulate.
Look for emails in your inbox that inspire you and if you have not opted in for about everything under the sun online, you might just miss a great campaign.
Comments (1) | Posted by dylan at 4:55 AM | Permalink
June 15, 2007
Father's Day Email Payloads Delivered
This was a great new trick I saw this week. Send an email spoofing the from line as one of your own email addresses, when you open it, render it like something you expect, then run some inbox mojo and re-arrange it to actually be a spam payload.
I had to look at this again and again as I had never seen this trick. Once executed I could not get it back together as it was a one time payload. Make me wonder what else could be delivered in this nefarious method.
I mean what Dad does not need some of this magical elixirs?
Here is another one that "exploded" in my inbox. Funny thing is when you read the copy it is spoofing a Proctor and Gamble product and uses their name,
Comments (0) | Posted by dylan at 5:49 AM | Permalink
June 14, 2007
Email Marketers: Practice What You Preach
Jeff Mills on our team wrote an article that was published today on iMediaConnection.com
By keeping the interest of the customer first, email marketers can enjoy the benefits of increased read and click rates.
We recently completed our eROI Q2 email marketing survey that provides a look at how marketers perceive email design and coding. Specifically, we polled more than 200 marketers and asked them what they deem important when creating an email, how they design emails and how they test deliverability and rendering. We then compared those marketers that handle all creative and design in-house versus those using an agency. We found a vast difference between what they say and what they do, which was a bit surprising, but not completely shocking.
First, let's take a look at what marketers say are the most important elements when creating emails. Our survey finds that 87 percent feel that relevant content within the email is the most important. Email deliverability comes in second at 81 percent. One interesting point that we uncovered is that only 68 percent of respondents feel that it is very important that email is coded to work across email clients (email rendering).
Comments (0) | Posted by dylan at 9:13 AM | Permalink
Did I Speak Too Early About My Lawn?
The other day I posted the Scott's email that rendered so poorly in MSN Livemail. I thought, and I know actually, that the folks that help put this together would read it and take some steps to correct it. Well no such luck in time for this edition. The June edition arrived and well... same issues. I had to go back and compare them to make sure that I was not reading the same email again. Nope May and June.
So I wanted to post this again to let them know to take a look at the rendering testing as this is another one where my poor lawn is starting to have a mind of it's own. Maybe they are just segmenting by A-Holes that slam the rendering of their emails? Per chance?
The good news is I had a chance to speak to them yesterday AM and they got the issues corrected. It stemmed from the way that they wrote the email template code with nesting tables. They tell me all fixed now and that makes both my lawn and me happy. Maybe we can chase away those brown spots now with some Scott's regular maintenance now that I can read them.
I am hoping that they send me an explanation to share with you about what the exact problem was and how to correct it if you are experiencing it yourself.
Comments (0) | Posted by dylan at 4:43 AM | Permalink
June 13, 2007
Why Kill the Messenger?
So I travel from Portland to NYC a few times a year and it makes sense to grab flights on Jet Blue. So of course I subscribe to keep me in the loop on any news, changes and deals for flights. Well this AM I got a call from some clients that need me out in NYC in July. Well good timing as I had just got some emails from Jet Blue in the past few weeks that highlighted a $50 off savings. So being wise, I opened up my "Xmas" folder (I call it this as it is loaded with 1000s of emails from brands I use for good and bad inspiration for campaigns and blog posts), found a few of the emails and clicked on through.
And voila... a dead page and no coupon code to complete the transaction. Needless to say I was more than a little upset. I mean even if they had expired or they had killed the campaign, it would have been better to tell me that on the landing page than just kill it off. I should have read the whole email that it expired at 11:59 on the 1st of June, but of course I saw the call to action and took the plunge.
What this hammers home with me is the fact that so many people tuck emails away for later viewing or use and if they are killed off then no conversion and a bad email marketing experience. My point to you here is make sure to either redirect, change the page or leave them open for a little while. Not like it really costs you any hosting charges to leave a few pages live if it converts some more sales.
Regardless, I am booking, but a little miffed. Hopefully my 48 hour trip into the Big Apple and back is worth the $50, as that $50 would have just covered cab fare from JFK to midtown.
Comments (2) | Posted by dylan at 4:27 AM | Permalink
June 12, 2007
Webinar: Acquire an Eye for Email Design
On June 21st at 11am PST, Eyetools Inc. CEO and founder, Greg Edwards will join eROI's Dylan Boyd to speak about best practices in email design and how eye tracking studies can impact your design. You will be amazed at how eye tracking is so different from click tracking and what it can tell you about how lift your email campaign results and metrics.
Learn the ‘What to dos’ and the ‘What not to dos’ from these seasoned industry professionals. They’ll be looking at some before and after case studies to explore the difference even the smallest tweaks can make to the performance of your emails.
Register today for next week's event.
Comments (0) | Posted by dylan at 8:00 AM | Permalink
June 11, 2007
The Hell WIth my Lawn - What About My Email?
I am quite at a loss with the recent 2 miss-fires I have got from Scott's. Long a loved email marketing program, but ever since the move by MSN from Hotmail to MSN Livemail I never get the right rendering. And I want to read about this as the data is targeted and segmented to me by ZIP and lawn type.
Thank the stars for the view this as a web page link, but I think with 2 back to back strikes, Scott's needs to do some pre-campaign email rendering testing. That might help prevent these issues in the future.
Have you tested your email rendering pre-campaigns? We do for our clients and i can tell you it does provide some great ways to code better with the constant changes in web based email clients. Scott's try our friends ReturnPath out. I know they can help.
Comments (1) | Posted by dylan at 5:49 AM | Permalink
June 8, 2007
Postini IPO Coming
We’ve been hearing that Postini, a security and compliance company, is on track to file for their initial public offering in the next few weeks.
They recently hired a new CFO, Murray Demo, who can handle the IPO process. He was with Adobe for ten years and served as CFO for the last six. According to our source, the company held what is called a “bake off,” which is a selection process for the investment bankers who will market and sell the company’s stock in the IPO, and selected Merrill Lynch as the lead underwriter. Merrill Lynch just happens to be one of Postini’s early customes, so loyalty may have played a part.
Postini’s revenues are rumored to be at around a $75 million run rate, and is “very” profitable.
This bodes well for the industry as a whole.
Comments (0) | Posted by dylan at 12:17 PM | Permalink
What about Email 1.0?
I think I almost threw up in my mouth a little this AM when I got this email. It was hyping an event on email 2.0. Holy #$@$, can you please get email 1.0 right first.
Guys there are some basic rules out there:
1. Put the action above the fold
2. Keep the copy simple and tell me what to do or drive me to a page to give me more info
3. Don't use a NON clickable image AS BIG AS YOU CAN and not make it a hot link if that is ALL the client displays.
4. Only promote things in a NEXT (V 2.0) step when you nail the basics.
5. TEST rendering and appearance in ALL email clients ( B@B meet ReturnPath)
Sorry for the vent as this is half humorous and half revolting.
Comments (1) | Posted by dylan at 11:33 AM | Permalink
Study: Email Deliverability Still a Challenge, but Content Not Main Culprit
Contrary to widely held belief, email message content is not a major cause of deliverability challenges for most email marketers, according to the Lyris EmailAdvisor ISP Deliverability Report Card for 1Q07.
I had this discussion this AM with an NBA team about what is important in email marketing. Sure content can play a role but rep, IP, domain, code, frequency, list hygeine, complaints, feedback loops and a few others make it all work.
Moreover, most of the largest U.S.-based ISPs have the lowest rates of delivering email to the inbox, according to (pdf) Lyris, a subsidiary of J.L. Halsey (via MarketingCharts).
Comments (0) | Posted by dylan at 5:35 AM | Permalink
June 7, 2007
eROI Idol Party Invite
In the spirit of inclusion, I wanted to make sure that ANY of you that read the blogs know about our annual party. This event is a blast and typically closed to a few hundred folks that are friends, family, clients, partners, and entourages.
But in the spirit of IDOL... America, we want you.
If you happen to be in Portland June 20th at 5pm then you have NO excuse not to be here. We have already been in touch with some "celebrities" (yes we have spoke to Tayna Harding and she is a celebrity) to be the judges for the evening's Karaoke contest.
Food from Andina, Drinks from our celebrated "bartenders" DJs, dance, and a few hundred close friends for the evening.
Please notice we have moved it from the staple Thursday night to Friday as dragging the staff into the office still inebriated and the floors being so sticky that it felt like the party room of a greek row house. This is for everyones greater good.... hence the introduction of the ice luge this year.
Cheers and let us know if you can make it OR not. Video, will be live after the event.
Comments (0) | Posted by dylan at 10:31 AM | Permalink
Who's Trading Your E-mail Addresses?
Bennett Haselton is back with another piece on e-mail privacy.
He starts "On April 14, 2007, I signed up for an AmeriTrade account using an e-mail address consisting of 16 random alphanumeric characters, which I never gave to anyone else. On May 15, I started receiving pump-and-dump stock spams sent to that e-mail address. I was hardly the first person to discover that this happens. Almost all of the top hits in a Google search for "ameritrade spam" are from people with the same story: they used a unique address for each service that they sign up with, so they could tell if any company ever leaked their address to a spammer, and the address they gave to AmeriTrade started getting stock spam. (I don't actually do that with most companies where I create accounts. But after hearing all the AmeriTrade stories, I created an account with them in April just for the purpose of entering a unique e-mail address and seeing if it would get leaked.)" Bennett continues on if you're willing to click the link.
Read more of this story at Slashdot.
Comments (0) | Posted by dylan at 7:56 AM | Permalink
June 6, 2007
Seth Godin: Spammer
Spam is an issue that not only can be arbitrary at times, but it is really (in my mind) often the perception of the subscriber. As a company that ONLY works with clients with confirmed or double opt in lists, we still see people (with the ISP feedback loops we have established) flag emails that they opted in to as Junk or spam. This is unfortunate as they are neither, but many people either tire of the emails or figure that by using these methods they can safely unsubscribe from a list.
Little do they know that it damages the reputation of an IP address and a sender's rep with an ISP.
A quick Read from Seth Godin's blog:
A friend was checking his email on Yahoo yesterday, and he accidentally hit the Spam Folder button.Up popped a list of 1,232 soon to be deleted pieces of spam. The first one? An announcement from me that I had emailed to my super-permissioned email list. This is a list of people that has never been rented, sold, harvested, compiled or messed with in any way. By any definition of spam (except of the one that matters... Yahoo's) this is not spam.
But they say it is, so it is.
I'm not annoyed at their filter or even at the situation. I am disappointed, though, that spammers have had such an impact that email marketing (or even email notification of free online content with no money involved) is breathing its last.
Comments (0) | Posted by dylan at 1:48 PM | Permalink
June 5, 2007
Long Live DomainKeys
DomainKeys Identified Email Becomes Standard
By Robert Barclay, Senior Product Manager
The Internet Engineering Task Force has approved DomainKeys Identified Email (commonly known as DKIM) as a technical standard for email. This clears the way for emailers to implement DKIM and for ISPs to potentially use it to either block or allow email through its system.
We actually think this is great news. It means that DKIM will eventually become the replacement to DomainKeys (DK) as the primary cryptographic-based authentication standard. DKIM has some great advantages over DK, but for my money the biggest one is "third party signing," meaning it allows a domain other than the "From:" domain to sign the messages. There are many cases where the person sending the mail doesn't control the "From:" domain. Third party signing solves that problem, and as a result makes it much more likely that large companies can sign all their mail, even when outsourced to an ESP.
Comments (0) | Posted by dylan at 10:59 AM | Permalink
Declaring Email Bankruptcy
Here's an interesting article I saw today in the Washington Post on how more and more people are declaring email bankruptcy.
Just what is email bankruptcy you ask? Well it is people just saying they are either DONE with email as it takes up too much or their time, or they cannot keep up with the steady stream of email in the inbox in a timely manner. I know I have set personal rules around email inbox management so that I never end a day without having:
1. Responding to any actionable emails
2. Sorting them into the appropriate folder IF they have been acted upon
3. Keeping my inbox to a MAX of 40 messages at the end of each day.
If something still requires my attention and I do not have the answer or the time it stays there until I can respond in the right manner. If it delays longer than a day, I respond that I can look into it but please be patient as it might take some time. The last thing anyone wants is for you to ignore them completely.
By creating rules for myself, it helps me to deal with the amount of email I get. I have seen so many people, even co-workers, let the inbox grow and grow until it is over 1000 or more messages in the box. Just how in the hell are you supposed to find, manage and maintain a steady flow of communication if you have that many? I have no clue.
Just imagine many of your subscribers with inboxes so out of control that they cannot read or act on the messages you send them. And in the end it will either be deleted, not read or even throw them into a state of email bankruptcy.
The supposed convenience of electronic mail, like so many other innovations of technology, has become too much for some people. Swamped by an unmanageable number of messages -- the volume of e-mail traffic has nearly doubled in the past two years, according to research firm DYS Analytics -- and plagued by annoying spam and viruses, some users are saying "Enough!"
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/05/24/AR2007052402258_pf.html
Here is how they dealt with it:
1) Collect the email addresses of everyone you haven’t replied to. Paste them into the BCC field of a new message you’ll send to yourself.
2) Write a polite note explaining your predicament. Apologize profusely – some people have managed five mea culpas in as many paragraphs – and promise to keep up with your email in the future. Try to sound credible.
3) Ask for a resend of anything particularly pressing, and offer to give such messages special attention.
Are you a candidate for email bankruptcy? If so you better get a plan together and fast or just quit email all together and go back to the phone.
Comments (0) | Posted by dylan at 5:37 AM | Permalink
June 4, 2007
Help Me to Help You
Have you ever booked a restaurant online? I often do when I am traveling and have found Open Table to be one of the best. But I recently found that they had my information wrong when I got this email. Now it was not any of my more important information they had wrong, but my city. I thought to myself, nice that they know I like to eat out in Las Vegas, but I don't live there. I first wondered how it was targeted with this info (add 5 to the score for sending relevant content targeted emails) but then realized that the last time I used them was for a dinner at CES in Las Vegas. My bad.
This email gave me the opportunity to help them as they had helped me notice that my information was in need of some updating on my end.
It leads me to ask you this, do you have an easy way to allow people to tell you more or update preferences based on the data you target with? So many email marketing systems I see only allow you to change name, email and maybe some mailing info, but not preferences. We have the ability in our own system to give 75 self manageable and customizable data points in every emailROI customer account our clients use. It is so important to everyone to keep data fresh (people's tastes change and they move remember). If you can leverage the individual the ability to self select and help you to keep your targeting relevant then you will lose less people from your lists and in turn lift the overall success of your campaigns.
No I could bash them on the amount of unused space they had in this email as the overall design and arrangement was poorly optimized, but I won't as they were relevant and gave me the ability to tell them what needed to be changed.
Looking forward to a table for 2 soon.
Comments (0) | Posted by dylan at 4:33 AM | Permalink
June 2, 2007
Google Buys Antivirus, Anti-Spam Company
Is the security software that protects against malware and spyware by quarantining Internet sessions from the rest of the system destined for Google's toolbar?
Google is adding an antivirus and anti-spam solution to its arsenal with the acquisition of GreenBorder Technologies Inc.
Google did not return press inquiries by deadline but GreenBorder, a Mountain View, Calif.-based security company, posted a statement on its Web site, telling users that it has been bought by Google. Financial terms of the deal were not disclosed.
Comments (0) | Posted by dylan at 11:01 AM | Permalink
June 1, 2007
Kudos to Mindcomet
I have long been a fan of the design talent of Mindcomet based in Florida. Not only this newsletter, but all of their sites, blogs, pod casts and more are truly doing it right. They are an agency that I would really like to salute for not only doing email right, but getting it right time and time again.
Their monthly newsletter is so beautifully produced with all the color separation, the icons they create and the content that I look forward to getting it in my inbox each and every month.
Do you have emails that you actually "look forward" to getting? It made me think as I write this as lately I am just ho-hum about email marketing that I see. With all the talk we create everyday in blogs and at conferences I would expect to see more people "getting it" and am let down so often from large and small brands alike. Now can you tell me that there are not enough guides, studies, webinars and events in place to help anyone interested in doing a great job with email that any of us need to be barraged with so many poor emails?
Look here, the time I have to spend in my inbox is enough already, just make it a place where I can come to and be happy to give it my attention.
Mindcomet... I salute you. Now go sign up for their newsletter today.
Comments (2) | Posted by dylan at 6:23 AM | Permalink
Nike Embraces Email... Finally
As a citizen of the Shoe Capital of the world, Portland, Oregon, (Nike, Adidas, Keen, Doc Martens, LaCrosse Footwear, AndOne , Columbia and more) I have been a long time email subscriber to Nike.com. I have always been amazed with the lack luster approach they have had to using email but now it seems they are on it. And just doing it very well.
I purchase shoes online for gifts for those that run in my family and I thought that maybe after all the purchases I would get more emails, nope. Over the past few years I have actually been sent only a handful. Now they are taking it to a new level and really doing a great job at it.
Here are some samples of some recent creative. Nike gets the internet with the amount of work they put into microsites and brand sites and it is carrying over to the email side of the business as well.
Notice the storytelling in the first example and then the subsequent examples using the call to action of the 20% off as the header that would be seen in the preview window.
Comments (2) | Posted by dylan at 4:13 AM | Permalink
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