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January 31, 2008
eROI WINS EEC Email Marketing Award
The first ever award for email marketing campaign excellence for the EEC and little old eROI wins? Wow. We are humbled. With the likes of REI, AOL, Accor, and Genetech out there we were honored to be in the finalists but now, we won?
It is like the ancient days of Rome here at eROI.
Actually not in the least. The team is excited but hard at work looking forward to the event in San Diego.
What was odd about this award, and makes all the sense in the world with what we do, is that I actually found out today in an email. But not from the DMA or EEC, but from our old friend Google Alerts. That to me was the kicker. Google told me about it before the people giving out the award told me.
Oh the power of email and the internet, it never ceases.
Cheers and hope to see you at 72 and sunny SD, CA.
Comments (1) | Posted by dylan at 4:56 AM | Permalink
January 30, 2008
I'm a VIT but You're a TWIT
Okay, if you love Ben and Jerry's raise your virtual hand. This stuff is like crack to me. Really it is one of the best things in the freezer aisle. BUT their emails kill me. So many missed opportunities to drive people to an online or offline location. This email started out great and delivered on a real simple premise, you are a VIT or Very Important Taster, and we want you to come by one of our shops and taste a few new flavors before they hit the shelves.
Good buzz factor, good pass along factor, good execution (except almost all images). Until I noticed that there was not a place to click in the entire body of the email except in the header logo. Really? Go to your local shop? Through a hunt for which is closer? (We have a few in Portland) How hard would it have been, and how much time would they have saved people by simply adding a link to a store locator?
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When you are driving people from an online touch point to an offline location, give them the tools to make it happen right there. The hunt takes them away from your site and to other places where you had the opportunity to capture some brand impressions at the very least.
Off to Google Maps now... oh wait there is a Baskin and Robbins 31 flavors a block closer... sorry Ken and Harry's, someone else made it easier.
Comments (0) | Posted by dylan at 5:00 AM | Permalink
January 29, 2008
More Ideas to Understand Twitter
A quick summary of all the ways you can use Twitter for both your professional or personal life, from DoshDosh.com
1. Get Feedback. Need an alternative perspective on how a website looks or the right course of action to take? Blast out a message asking for advice and you'll receive replies from other users. This collective intelligence can be used as fodder for articles or projects.
2. Hire People. Need a good logo designer, marketer or programmer? Send out a message asking for recommendations. This is a very quick and easy way to hire freelancers or even companies based on familiar recommendations.
3. Direct traffic. Twitter can be used to get traffic to your websites or the sites of friends. If you ask your friends to tweet about it, the message will spread faster and further as other active users pick it up. There is a viral nature to all types of news, even on a site like Twitter.
4. Read News. Twitter users often link to useful sites or articles and can be a source of scoops and alternative news. You can also subscribe to Twitter feeds for specific websites/conferences, which allows you to receive and view content quickly. This is very useful for active social news participants.
5. Make New Friends. Like any other social network, Twitter has a built-in function for you to befriend and track the messages of other users. This is an easy way for you connect with people outside of your usual circle. Make an effort to add active users you find interesting. A Twitter acquaintance can be developed into a long lasting friendship.
6. Network for benefits. Twitter can be used as a socializing platform for you to interact with other like-minded people, especially those in the same industry. It can be used to establish consistent and deeper relationships for future benefits such as testimonials or peer recommendations.
7. Use it as a ToDo list. Use Twitter to record down what you need to do while you are away from the computer. Mark the tweet as a favorite to file it for referencing. Another alternative is to use an Online task management service that is synced with Twitter. One example is Remember The Milk.
8. Business Management. Twitter can be used as a company intranet that connects employees to one another. Workers can liaise with each other when working on group projects. Particularly useful when certain workers go out often in the field. Updates could be set to private for security reasons.
9. Notify Your Customers. Set up a Twitter feed for the specific purpose of notifying customers when new products come in. Customers can subscribe via mobile or RSS for instant notification. Twitter can also be used to provide mini-updates for one-on-one clients.
10. Take Notes. Twitter provides you with an easy way to record important ideas or concepts you want to explore further. Include links relevant to ideas you want to explore. Note taking can also be done offline via mobile applications.
11. Event Updates. Businesses can use Twitter as a means to inform event participants and latest event happenings/changes. This is a hassle-free way of disseminating information, especially when you don't have the means to set up a direct mobile link between you and the audience
12. Find Prospects. Twitter can be used as a means to find potential customers or clients online. Do a search for keywords related to your product on Terraminds and then follow users. Tweet about topics parallel to your product and close prospects away from public channels by using direct messages or offline communications. Discretion and skill is needed in this area.
13. Provide Live coverage. Twitter's message size limit prevents detailed coverage of events but it can allow you to provide real-time commentary which may help to spark further discussion or interest on the event as other Twitter users spread the message. Very useful for citizen journalism.
14. Time Management and Analysis. Twitter can simply be used to keep a detailed record of what you are doing every daily. This might be boring for others but this type of usage is useful when you want to analyze how you spend and manage your time.
15. Set Up Meetings. Twitter can help you organize impromptu meetups. For example, you can twitter a message while at a cafe, event or art gallery and arrange to meet fellow users at a specific spot. It's an informal and casual way of arranging a meeting.
16. Acquire Votes. Send a link to your stories you've submitted in other social news sites like Digg. Sometimes your followers will vote up the stories because they agree with it. This allows you to acquire more support for your efforts on other social media websites.
Source: http://www.doshdosh.com/ways-you-can-use-twitter/
Comments (1) | Posted by dylan at 5:00 AM | Permalink
January 28, 2008
Vote for eROI Today
Subject: Email Performance Award Voting Ends Today - Vote Now!
Don't forget to vote for the 2008 Email Performance Award. The polls close today at 5pm EST so cast your vote before it's too late.
Here is the link: http://www.surveymonkey.com/s.aspx?sm=TrahHVi24mD0SFs45oAqDQ_3d_3d
Comments (0) | Posted by dylan at 10:00 AM | Permalink
Thoughts On Twitter
How Smart People are using Twitter
(Excerpt from http://www.901am.com/2007/the-top-5-ways-smart-people-use-twitter.html)
Streamlining your electronic inboxes. When you start using Twitter, you'll probably find yourself using IM, social bookmarking, RSS readers and email less.
Aside from the public chat feature Twitter has, it also has a private direct messaging feature, so you could use that if you had a private message to send. You could also use Twitter direct messaging instead of email, which I've noticed some of my colleagues doing.
By using Twitter you may actually be able scale back on the influx of incoming information and electronic devices you use, which is something we can all appreciate.
As for those people who have been completely turned off to Twitter because of some of the more frivilous, immature uses of this global communication tool-I hear ya!
There's only one way to deal with those annoying folks: Ignore them.
Instead, imitate the people who are using Twitter intelligently.
If you do, you just might find a new way of connecting with your target niche, scoop a story before your competitors, meet a future business partner, or streamline your arsenal of electronic communication tools.
If you're still not convinced of the merits of Twitter, that's fine.
Twitter is not for everyone, but if you're the slightest bit intrigued as to why smart folks are singing the praises of Twitter, the only way you'll ever satisfy your curiousity is to try it out for yourself.
Here are some Twitter Clients. My favorites are TwitterBerry (for blackberry) and Snitter (for desktop).
Comments (0) | Posted by dylan at 7:00 AM | Permalink
Are you on Twitter? Why Not?
Just a little shout out to see if any of you are using Twitter? I have been for about 10 months and man is it addictive. I can't tell you what it is achieving yet, but it has created some more interaction between friends, community and people that we don't run into or talk to each day. It is like micro-blogging and at eROI has really taken off for people to share thoughts, experiences and events with one another in a new manner.
I think it is powerful. But what impact will it have on email marketing? I can tell you from a few months of research, conversations with other users in the Portland area, and testing how to feed it into other campaigns (web based and mobile based) that it is going to get BIG this year. I think in Portland, Oregon metro alone I have tracked over 90,000 people using it already. That is just one media market.
We are finding ways to feed Tweets into sites, but are looking at how to feed it into email. Does it have a place in a campaign? I can see how brands can use it, as well as news sources, mass transit and how it changes personal use of email and IM. But here is the test. We are going to wrap it into a few campaigns this quarter with some brave clients and brands. I can't release all the details yet, but I think it will work well.
Any ideas?
And if you want to see some powerful resources, here are a few?
twitterwhere
twittervision
twitthis
tweetscan
twitdir
Comments (1) | Posted by dylan at 5:00 AM | Permalink
January 25, 2008
RIM to Add HTML in Next Release
Alex Williams noticed tonight a release from RIM that the next upgrade of the OS will offer the ability to properly display HTML emails and Rich text. Nice find Alex.
HTML and Rich Text Email Rendering - BlackBerry smartphone users will be able to view HTML and rich text email messages with original formatting preserved including font colors and styles, embedded images, hyperlinks, tables, bullets and other formatting.
Comments (0) | Posted by dylan at 5:40 AM | Permalink
January 24, 2008
Mail Policy Changes at Comcast and Updates on AOL
ReturnPath, are you making me fall in love all over again with so many GREAT proactive emails? I know it is close to Valentines Day, so watch out as the love is coming back at you soon.....
Mail Policy Changes at Comcast and Updates on AOL
There are a few new developments regarding Comcast and AOL that we would like to inform you about.
COMCAST
Today Comcast announced that they've recently instituted a global throttling policy that rate limits inbound mail to 6 recipients per second from a single IP address, regardless of the number of domains sending from that IP.
If you suspect this is affecting you, look for a 4xx error message (temp-fail) during the SMTP transaction. If the rate-limit is impacting your ability to deliver mail, adjusting your server's delivery settings to ensure a less than 6 recipient per second rate of delivery should resolve the issue. You can find more detailed information on Comcast's website.
AOL UPDATES
On Tuesday, AOL announced a few changes to their authentication methods and whitelist program. (go here for the original story). However, there were a few additional notes from AOL's presentation to the ESPC that we thought you might find interesting.
AOL is providing a tool to test DKIM implementations - We haven't tested it out yet, but AOL indicated that they were providing a "reflector" to test DKIM implementations. Apparently, if you send a message to [anyaddress]@dkimtest.aol.com, it will generate a bounce message. The bounce message will indicate whether your implementation passed or failed.
There are no changes to the enhanced whitelist for now - As you may know, AOL operates an enhanced whitelist for IP addresses that: (1) are on their regular whitelist and (2) have really, really good reputations. The enhanced whitelist is automatically chosen from the best performing IPs in the "regular" whitelist. The benefits of being on the whitelist are that images and links work by default. AOL indicated that there were no changes.
AOL is providing DKIM results headers - AOL is providing DKIM results (i.e., did you pass?) in the headers of messages. If you are a user of Return Path's Mailbox Monitor tool, you can view the headers by viewing the message source of messages sent to AOL seeds.
To learn more about DKIM and authentication, sign up for our Quarterly Education Series starting February 12th where you will learn about the benefits of authentication, more about DKIM and how to get started with implementation via a special email series and live webinar. Email editor@returnpath.net with "Sign Me Up" in the subject line.
Comments (0) | Posted by dylan at 8:00 PM | Permalink
eROI and Wacom - EEC Performance Award Finalists
Today the Email Experience Council announced the five finalists for its first annual Email Performance Award, which recognizes an organization that has created an email marketing campaign that demonstrates the full power of the channel. The winner of the Email Performance Award, which will be selected by the eec's members, will be presented during the Email Evolution Conference, which will be held February 12-13 at the Sheraton Hotel & Marina in San Diego.
In alphabetical order, the five finalists for the Email Performance Award are: Accor, AOL, Genentech, REI and Wacom.
For more details on each of them, including copies of their nomination forms and supporting materials, visit the eec's Email Performance Awards page. Congratulations to the finalists.
Members of the eec can vote for the winner from among the Email Performance Award finalists (see below). Just log into your eec account and follow the instructions. Voting concludes at the end of day on Monday, Jan. 28.
Comments (0) | Posted by dylan at 7:00 AM | Permalink
2007 Oopsy Hall of Fame
If you have not had a chance to check out the Oopsy Hall of Fame for 2007 from Chad White at Retail Email blog, it is worth the read.
We have all had our shares of mistakes and email campaigns that should not have gone out. We might have thought that all was well, but email marketing is not bullet proof. Servers cause issues, email clients mess things up, databases do not get segmented right, etc etc etc.
Live and learn.
Visit the 2007 Oopsy Hall of Fame
Comments (0) | Posted by dylan at 4:38 AM | Permalink
January 23, 2008
AOL Changes Authentication and Whitelist Standards
A great ReturnPath alert today. These guys are being so proactive with sharing knowledge with their partners and customers and it is really appreciated. I wanted to pass on the love and share it with you.
NEWS:
We've recently learned some news from AOL about changes to how they authenticate inbound mail as well as changes to their whitelist program. We'll know more after a question and answer session with AOL this afternoon (hosted by the ESPC) but here's what we know now.
Changes to AOL White List
AOL is making a few changes to their whitelist - to the point where calling it a whitelist is probably a misnomer going forward. AOL indicates that in the future, the "whitelisting" process is simply a way for a mailer to introduce themselves to AOL and let AOL know a little about what kind of mail they are sending. AOL will want to know:
Domain and IP information for each mail stream
The kind of mail that is sent for each mail stream
AOL will then take that information and plug it into their reputation system. If your mailstream's performance varies a lot from what is expected for that type of mail stream (e.g., transactional mail) this will likely cause delivery issues. Currently whitelisted IP's will be subject to the same reputation process for determining delivery of email. There is no need for re-application (or re-introduction as the case may be). In AOL's analysis, that vast majority of whitelisted IP's will not be affected by the changes since their reputation is within guidelines.
AOL Implements DKIM
It appears that AOL has been been using Domain Keys Identified Mail (DKIM) for a month now. With the addition of AOL, that makes three major North American ISPs (Yahoo, Google and AOL) that are using DKIM. If you've been thinking about implementing DKIM, this should make the decision a little easier.
A few things to note:
DKIM (by itself) will not improve delivery rates - Like all authentication mechanisms, DKIM simply authenticates that the mail is from the domain that it purports to be from. That doesn't by itself mean that AOL should take the message.
DKIM will help reduce spoofing - If the vast majority of messages from a given domain are authenticated and have a good reputation while the unauthenticated messages from a domain have a bad reputation, AOL will provide a negative spam rating to unauthenticated messages from the given domain.
There is one more "identity element" on which to hang a reputation on (and to monitor) - Going forward, senders are going to have take into account both IP-based reputation and domain based reputation. AOL (and likely other senders) are going to take into account all available information about a given message (domain, IP, URLs, etc) before making a delivery decision.
Learn more about DKIM. Sign up for our Quarterly Education Series on Authentication starting February 12th. Email editor@returnpath.net to sign up.
Comments (0) | Posted by dylan at 8:00 AM | Permalink
Creating a Unique Landing Page
This page was not sent in an email campaign, but passed on to me from a co-worker here at eROI. After watching what should be a standard ecommerce page it made me think that this is an amazing idea of how to create a landing page that drives a person through the page from top to bottom and then back.
Take a look at HEMA's product page. You can't order anything and it's in Dutch but just wait a couple of seconds and watch what happens. It creates a connection, even when you cannot read it.
If this was a landing page experience I would wager it would not only convert, but also drive people to talk about it and share it. Completely unexpected and very powerful.
Comments (0) | Posted by dylan at 5:00 AM | Permalink
January 21, 2008
eROI Is Hiring - Come to Portland
Interested in joining the eROI team? We offer a creative work environment, excellent benefits, a great location in Portland, and plenty of bottom-shelf vodka and premium red wine. We always enjoy talking to interesting people: email us your resume at the addresses below, including relevant URLs and we'll look it over with a fine-tooth comb and contact you if there is a match.
HERE ARE SOME OF OUR CURRENT JOB OPENINGS:
Support & Training Coordinator: 1-3 years experience. If interested, please email your resume to supporthire AT eroi.com.
Marketing Coordinator: 1-3 years experience. If interested, please email your resume to marketinghire AT eroi.com.
Senior Designer: 3-5 years experience in an interactive agency environment. If interested, please email your resume to designhire AT eroi.com.
Web Application Developer: 1-3 years experience in programming using PHP, MySQL and JavaScript. If interested, please email your resume to productionhire AT eroi.com.
Account Executive: 4-5 years experience in an interactive agency environment. If interested, please email your resume to accounthire AT eroi.com.
Technical Project Manager: 3-4 years experience in an interactive agency environment. If interested, please email your resume to accounthire AT eroi.com.
Office Assistant: 1-2 years experience. If interested, please email your resume to marketinghire AT eroi.com.
Chief Financial Officer: 10-12 years experience in financial management, strategy, and accounting for software and interactive companies. If interested, please email your resume to cfohire AT eroi.com.
Comments (0) | Posted by dylan at 4:05 PM | Permalink
January 16, 2008
Thank you ReturnPath For your Alerts
Funny thing is one of our team caught this yesterday and had me audit some SenderID records to make sure they did not get messed up.
From ReturnPath today.
Microsoft Phishing Filter Error
We just learned of an issue at Microsoft domains that may be affecting your inbox percentages. Starting on Monday you may have noticed some of your campaigns being routed to the junk folder with the message: this message may be a phishing scam. It is very likely this was caused by error with the Microsoft phishing filter that flagged a very common link in HTML content, specifically: http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml.
We have been in contact with the Microsoft team and they have assured us that the issue has been resolved.
You don't need to do anything. We just wanted to let you know why some of your deliverability numbers may have been off during the last 24 hours or so.
Questions? Just pick up the phone; your Return Path account representative is ready to help.
All best,
The Sender Score Team
Comments (0) | Posted by dylan at 12:11 PM | Permalink
January 15, 2008
Look Beyond Money - Building Customer Value
We released a new guide today in our Resource Center.
Customer value -- revenue, loyalty, advocacy
Brands preach that they are trying to build a base of customers who will keep coming back year after year, but all of their marketing and sales strategies point to a one-time sale so they can get their short-term revenue up. so, how can you stay away from this poorly designed sales strategy? Build customer value. Value comes in multiple forms -- each requiring more involvement from your customer -- revenue, loyalty, and advocacy. the following is a brief description of each and some ideas for metrics you can use to measure each.
Don't just focus on price for the one-time sale to a short-term customer, build customer value. Value comes in multiple forms -- each requiring more involvement from your customer -- Revenue, Loyalty, and Advocacy. Learn how to make brand advocates out of your customer base.
If you have not visited our new resource center, now is the time. The new center allows a one time registration to keep track for you of what you have and have not read allowing you to focus on growing your knowledge through our experiences.
Comments (1) | Posted by dylan at 8:00 AM | Permalink
The EEC Blogger Panel is Ready
The blogger panel will take your questions now
At the eec's Email Evolution Conference in San Diego next month, I'll be sitting on a panel with fellow email marketing bloggers Tamara Gielen of BeRelevant, Chad White of The Retail Email Blog/EEC Blog and Maddy Hubbard of Blue Hornet. We'll be talking about why we blog, how we keep up with it, and lots of other aspects of our blogging. We'll be answering questions from the moderator and the audience -- but we also wanted to give our readers a chance to chime in and ask us questions. So if you have burning questions for me or any of my co-panelists, please let me know by either commenting on this post.
If you're attending the conference, super! You'll see us tackle your questions first hand and learn from the other 100+ speakers at the event.
If you haven't signed up yet, don't miss the early bird pricing deadline. Sign up by this Friday (Jan. 18) and save $300 on registration with the discount code "EMN." (Not an eec member yet? Become a silver member for $179 and save even more since members get an additional $200 off the registration fee. So if you're not an eec member, now is the perfect time to join.)
For those of you who just can't join us, we'll have Alex Williams of eROI blogging about our panel session from the show. Visit this blog on Feb. 13 in the morning to see the play-by-play.
Comments (0) | Posted by dylan at 6:00 AM | Permalink
January 14, 2008
2008 Email Predictions : THREE
2008 Return Path Predictions
What is in store for large BRAND marketing using email and what opportunities and challenges exist for major brands?
Email is already getting more attention from brand marketers. Due to the power and success of email as well as the need to create more synergistic 1:1 relationships with customers, many brand marketers have already made the shift from being mass marketers to becoming direct marketers. As a result, brand marketers will place more value on email as a vehicle for message impression - primarily provided by a subject line, but also a preview pane. One way to track the effectiveness is to watch search traffic on keywords featured in subject lines and offer headlines.
What should small to mid size businesses be doing to make their programs more successful and what resources should they dedicate to it?
Every business can afford to have a world class email program. Tools are becoming more accessible and affordable at the low end. All it takes is a clear goal, a specific owner, consistent execution and the stitching together of free and inexpensive vendors.
How will consumers have mind shift to email campaigns and subscriptions as they become more astute as consumers and are more conditioned to email they get?
Subscribers have always been in control of their email inboxes. Providing relevant and interesting messages at a volume valued by subscribers remains key to customer engagement. Today, the penalty to marketers for not doing so is steeper than ever - irrelevant content drives ISP complaints, unsubscribe requests and tuned out subscribers. As a result, we marketers will finally be forced to really listen to our subscribers and deliver high quality experiences through message content and value. Technology is improving and will help us understand and tap behavior as well as self reported data. It's still, and always has been, always about the subscriber experience.
Comments (0) | Posted by dylan at 7:00 AM | Permalink
January 11, 2008
Brands Add Social Media to Email
I have seen two good examples of brands incorporating social media assets into email campaigns. I think that this is a great natural extension of content that a community is building for you. Instead of always trying to create new content, why not leverage your community content into the email? Time savings? Yes. Credibility and Trust? Yes. Encouragement to get your 15 minutes of fame in a brand campaign? Of course.
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If you are using or thinking of using social media (blogs, message board, forums, reviews, etc, think about how you are leverage it as content in 2008. And if you do also take a look at your content use and privacy policies so you don't encounter shock at your use of this user generated content.
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Comments (1) | Posted by dylan at 7:00 AM | Permalink
January 10, 2008
Comcast Retires RoadRunner Domains
It came to our attention earlier today that Comcast has officially retired the following Road Runner domains:
- jam.rr.com
- midsouth.rr.com
- mn.rr.com
- se.rr.com
- sport.rr.com
- swfla.rr.com
- ucwphilly.rr.com
- houston.rr.com
What does this mean for your deliverability? Any mail sent to these domains is bouncing with permanent, network DNS errors. Comcast has been forwarding mail for several months and reminding subscribers to update their accounts -- and just recently retired these domains permanently. These dead addresses cannot be translated to @comcast.net - the individual user must update their own account.
What action should you take today? We recommend a proactive approach, start by disabling any address that has the above listed domains. In addition, check your system for addresses that return a bounce code (usually a 500 error, with: ''PERM_FAILURE: DNS Error: DNS server returned answer with no data'') and suppress any that are associated with the domains listed above.
Comments (1) | Posted by dylan at 2:11 PM | Permalink
Will Email Hurt Facebook Trust?
This is an odd topic I know, but after getting my first spammy email from someone purporting to be Facebook, I was wondering what impact these type of emails have on the brand and trust with social networks. From past experience I know that with MySpace I get 100s of emails from people "wanting to be my friend" and I don't even have a MySpace page. So when I get one in a new social network that I have some trust in, it makes me wonder how far off this is for Facebook. Will this same issue ruin trust, reputation and credibility with users? A few more like this and I know my perceptions will be affected.
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Comments (0) | Posted by dylan at 7:00 AM | Permalink
January 9, 2008
What You Can Add to Your Marketing in 2008
Sure you have a pretty tight email program going. Things have been good. You have a routine, you are driving sales, everyone seems happy. So how to you shake it up and drive some excitement in 2008 to your online marketing? How can other mediums drive increases in brand, sales, and targeted list growth?
Well I am glad you asked as here is what we are doing for many of our clients in 2008. And do note it all starts or ends at the internet.
Are you Blogging?
I know such a scary word for many companies to think about allowing the outside world to see inside the machine, but it does more good to create open communication and participation than it does to work so hard on CONTROLLING the message. The Search Engine impact, the PR impact and the dialogue impact are huge and a blog can actively grow your email opt in list as well. There are some time commitments to consider about blogging, compliance issues in certain industries and some strategy.
Video in your campaigns
6 out of 10 people watch video online at least once per week. Now if that is not a viable audience that is looking for content from you then maybe you should wait until it is 8 out of 10. But video is a serious consideration in 2008 as it is accpeted and expected in both the consumer and the b to b markets. Not that I am telling you to add it to the email per say, but add it to the landing page. I personally don't like a video in email for many reasons (does not play in all email clients and can force audio on you in a preview pane) and would drive you to place it on the landing page.
Widgets Spread the Gospel
Now besides being able to embed a video in your Facebook page, etc. Widgets are powerful communication devices to move data from one place to another (desktop, web page, mobile) and you can push stories, deals and community through them. Look at people like Splashcast.net for some really interesting widgets for video, chat, voting, news, etc.
Twitter
So Twitter really broke out about a year ago at SXSW in Austin, Texas. Many of us experimented early with it and are still using it today. From searching in Portland, Oregon alone there atr over 90,000 people using it on desktop and mobile devices. Take a look at some other locations and see who is there. We are using this to load mobile data and ideas from people into web sites and even into email campaigns. Allowing people to aggregate short stories as a community on the go, at an event, or during a collective time is really powerful.
Mobile
We have been using a new Mobile RSS News Reader to dirve branded and semi walled garden communications to our clients customers. By giving a mobile system to their customers we are gaining more daily brand and messaging control around things that impact thier lives. We have added a new mobile ad system that works with most ad networks or serve your own ads as well as a new interstitial page system to drive clicks to a phone number/call center, or email opt in for more info. Not everyone has a good mobile browsing experience, so why force them to a web page that does not render. Take a look at our one for Travelocity Business. Mobile Travelers Rejoice!
Social Networks:
Whether it was for ABC, Widmer, Justin Timberlake and HBO, the Seattle Seahawks or some new start ups; we are nailing the social network using our partner KickApps. We have also built some custom solutions for Wacom, Konami and MatchPoint. These niche communities are much more focused and powerful than the mass community sites. And people are very happy to join in and opt in. These people are more apt to want to interact on a daily or weekly basis vs how they might with a standard web site for a company or brand. Gathering like minds and opening up the channels works wonders to grow a list and grow a community.
Don't Forget the Basics
We also want to help you to focus on the basics of email for 2008.
List Hygiene: In some recent studies we have been doing we are finding the majority of deliverability issues are stemming from list hygiene and bad email addresses that people are not cleaning off thier list. Make this a focus, or ask us to help manually clean your list. It is a tedious process but it opens up some other ways to engage with those that have not been reading as well as email addresses that you should retire all together. Stop knockling if they aren't home.
Email Design: Let's freshen up your look. Let's create a series of email looks you can use to keep the program moving forward and engaging. And besides you have been sending that same old thing for at least a year now.
Rendering Testing: Do you know how your email looks in all the email clients? I bet you don't.
Just some ideas to create a spark with you in 08.
Comments (2) | Posted by dylan at 9:30 AM | Permalink
eROI Opens NYC Office
Hello Brooklyn, or maybe Mid Town NYC. After 6 months in the planning we are happy to announce that our NYC office is open and ready for business. After reviewing our client base this past year and also our inboxes to see where we could provide the most help, we found that we needed a full time east coast presence. And is there really any place to be on the east coast besides Manhattan?
Chris Masagatani for our Portland office was promoted to a Director level role and is tasked with being there for you and growing the NYC office. Many of us are now catching the red eye once a month to jump into the city for a few days and meet with clients for campaign and strategy planning.
We are currently making our home at 23rd and Park Ave, but are eying some other digs a few blocks from there that will allow us better room to grow out a full team.
If you are in the city and want to set up time to meet Chris, take him to drinks (okay maybe lunch if you must), or learn more about eROI in time zone sensitive and possibly in person meeting... let us know.
Comments (0) | Posted by dylan at 9:00 AM | Permalink
eROI Launches Power of the Pens for Wacom
We wanted to share a recap of a campaign we just wrapped up this week that started in the month of December. Yeah, December, great month for a campaign right? Well actually even with all the noise in the retail channels it was a perfect time to make an impact with an idea that a large community was not expecting.
But for a daily campaign over a 2 week period of time? Is it going to have a frequency problem when this brand has NEVER emailed on a daily basis for an extended period of time? Would the participation be low based on the fact that they have never had a community site let alone a community campaign?
eROI did their homework in advanced because we nailed this one, drove interaction and even set the ground work for a year round social media community of artists and designers that we are brainstorming on as I type this.
Learn about the Power of the Pens and how email drove record results and built a community in our latest case study release. And take note of our new case study layout and design, it sure is pretty. Love any feedback you have on it.
Comments (0) | Posted by dylan at 8:00 AM | Permalink
January 8, 2008
Did You Forget the Links?
I subscribe to over 20 auto brand email newsletters to see what they are doing on the large scale. And from what I have learned, no one is perfect. Even a great brand like Mercedes Benz drops the ball from time to time. As an owner, I thought this was a good email. Cross selling me on some items I might be interested in for my car. Well as I dug deeper in the content (which as 500 pixels wide and over 1600 deep, what email clients are they targeting?) I was shocked to see that there were not any links I could use to drive deeper into a product site and get info and make a purchasing decision.
Missed opportunity, but without failure there are not any lessons to learn from. Fail Harder....
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Comments (1) | Posted by dylan at 5:18 AM | Permalink
January 7, 2008
2008 Email Predictions : TWO
Here are some thoughts from the Blue Hornet team for 2008.
1. What is in store for large BRAND marketing using email and what opportunities and challenges exist for major brands?
Brand marketing via email will be all about building and fostering relationships and loyalty. Brands have the opportunity to do this by:
a) Actively managing their online brand reputation. Tools are emerging to make this process easier and more effective.
b) Brand marketing has attempted use email to focus on lifecycle opportunities, but they've either focused too narrowly on consumer life events (ie: making generalizations about baby boomers or new parents),
or they've tried to squeeze consumers into a mold that works in terms of their own product lifecycle (using email to sell as much as possible as soon as possible). 2008 will provide brands new opportunities to
centralize their customer transactional and behavioral data, which will help them make true lifecycle marketing a reality--understanding and predicting when a customer is more likely to buy or engage with a brand, then being there with the right message at the right time.
2. What should small to mid size businesses be doing to make their programs more successful and what resources should they dedicate to it?
Small and mid-market emailers still need to focus on improving list acquisition and hygiene efforts.
3. How will consumers have mind shift to email campaigns and subscriptions as they become more astute as consumers and are more conditioned to email they get?
Consumers will continue to approach their inbox with distrust and apprehension. As long as online marketers' "strategy" centers around increasing message frequency without targeting their emails and building the relationship component of their email marketing program, consumers will ignore, delete, unsubscribe, or report emails as spam--whether they opted in to the program or not. So in addition to advanced segmentation, targeting, and respectful sending practices, ongoing adoption of authentication standards will be critical.
Thanks to the Blue Hornet Team for weighing in.
Comments (0) | Posted by dylan at 6:05 AM | Permalink
Go Daddy... Go Spam
I was a little shocked to see this service roll out from a domain registrar, but then again it is GoDaddy. They like to make waves.
But releasing an email engine that is so cheap it is only going to allow the 1000s of people with zero knowledge or understanding of compliance to start dropping email campaigns and ruin the pool. Hey look is that a Baby Ruth the Daddy just dropped in the deep end? Kids, out of the pool.
This seems like an major issue to me to give anyone the power to load a list and send it for $7.99. Come on now, who was in charge of this genius decision?
Here is the service:
https://www.godaddy.com/gdshop/blazers/cb_landing.asp?isc=cjcdom001t&ci=8898
It is definitely compelling for joe website owner but is it what the world needs? Giving anyone the ability that bought a domain for $3.99 an email engine ready to blast, and I mean blast, emails is dangerous and will end up ruining the IPs they use and most likely really tick off the ISPs and system admins.
Regardless, if you scroll down to the feature tabs, there is a neat way to "see it in action" and get yourself mailed from the godaddy platform different message types.
They are SO BAD. And the opt out link is a mailto: abuse@godaddy.com. Is that an opt out link or a way to file a complaint?
I think your Super Bowl ad this year should be a shot of you in the gray bar hotel or having coffee with the FTC.
Comments (0) | Posted by dylan at 4:08 AM | Permalink
January 4, 2008
Get Yourself to San Diego
I am not sure where you are at today when you read this... but it is 39 degrees and rainy here in Portland today. The only thing I have keeping me going is the promise of San Diego in 6 weeks for the EEC Email Marketing Conference. If you have not yet made plans, get on them. The panels are great, the registrants so far are amazing and it is going to be WARM. Can you say booze cruise? That should be enough to make you take some action.
And if not a little gift from me to you might do the trick:
Here are you secret discount codes:
"EVIP" and share however you would like with anyone else in email marketing -it gets you $200 off.
Use it here
http://www.the-dma.org/conferences/emailevolution08/
Hope to see you there!
Comments (0) | Posted by dylan at 10:01 AM | Permalink
Let Your Subscribers Clean Your Database
One of our clients recently sent out an email to let the subscribers help them clean up their email lists. I applaud this action as too many marketers use the total subscriber number as a metric to live and breath by and not the real one to measure. Who wants your email and who will be your most valuable subscriber.
If you are to segment as they did on opens, reads, clicks and conversions over a period of time (I often use a 6 month time frame, depending on how many campaigns you are sending) and then target those that are inactive or less active with an email like this, you will get the response you need to cull the list.
When your lists are healthier, then your campaigns will perform better.
We typically take those that have no action on a campaign like this and move them to an inactive list which then takes a less frequent and different approach with the Customer Lifecycle Value process.
It is a new year, and time for some pre-spring house cleaning of your lists. Ready to take the challenge? I hope so.
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Comments (1) | Posted by dylan at 7:03 AM | Permalink
January 3, 2008
Does Sex Sell Spam
Having some pretty good filters on our internal email system, I am often entertained and interested when one slips into the inbox. It is actually a good learning experience for me to open the email headers and take a look at how our systems filtered the email and why it let it in.
This one in particular made me laugh as it was complete spam, why would I opt in to TRUE and why would take up so much email real estate at the footer to tell me how compliant they are. When I see this it always tells me that they are just trying to cover their asses with those that might get this and not be sure.
Listen, spam is spam when someone thinks it is spam. Legally we know what spam is, but after many years in this industry we know that no matter what anyone can mentally make that call and you have to defend the opt in with the ISPs. Even when you have a closed loop, time stamp, double opt in, date stamp, web page stamp and 2 years of email campaign data on someone, they can file a complaint.
Lucky for you TRUE I believe in email karma and just deal with them with the delete and filter training buttons. Still makes me laugh that maybe sex changes the perception of spam.
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Comments (0) | Posted by dylan at 6:55 AM | Permalink
January 2, 2008
2008 Email Predictions : ONE
Stefan Pollard, Director of Consulting Services, EmailLabs
1. What is in store for large BRAND marketing using email and what opportunities and challenges exist for major brands?
Most major brands will continue to move slowly and attempt to go for reach and quantity over segmentation and quality. There simply isn't enough mindshare with major brands for them to devote serious attention to the proper use of email as a communication channel vs. a broadcast medium. Consumers will continue to tire of "this weeks ad specials" and engagement levels will continue to decline.
Delivery will continue to be the major challenge as ISP's place increased restrictions on large volumes of non-responsive email and reputation factors driven by consumer complaints. Eventually the downward pressure of delivery and decreased success will drive the marketer to seek professional help (consultants, agencies, educational webinars or conferences).
Some more progressive brands will continue to incorporate web analytics into their email programs and develop improved auto-responder campaigns that move beyond the transactional recipient or abandoned shopping cart.
2. What should small to mid size businesses be doing to make their programs more successful and what resources should they dedicate to it?
This group is more flexible and has tighter budgets. Small changes in performance are much more quickly noticed and gain higher priority attention. As such, the move to more integrated programs with Blogs, RSS, and Email all working together appeals greatly to this group.
Challenges come from the pressure to grow quickly - usually forcing mistakes by assuming permission, purchasing lists, bad co-registration partners, etc.
3. How will consumers have mind shift to email campaigns and subscriptions as they become more astute as consumers and are more conditioned to email they get?
Consumers will continue to experience inbox overload and continue to be discriminating over what belongs in their inbox. More tools for filtering or blocking, including disposable email addresses will increase consumer control. Inbox placement is a privilege that will be bestowed on only the most relevant and desired messages.
More "alert" style messages will be received both in inboxes and on mobile clients that drive the consumer out of the email client and back into the web interface of their favorite social network.
4. How will technology change for marketers?
Use the e-mail marketing platform as the basis for an interactive company - stressing a complete digital dialog that blends channels together with better integration. Shameless plug for our newly launched HQ product goes here.
No more will email be a stand alone tool, it will work seamlessly with CMS tools, SEO, Web Analytics, RSS, etc. Allowing the average marketer to better understand the "digital dialogue" and talk with consumers in the platform of their choice.
5. How will technology change for consumers?
ISP and email clients will continue to create more advertising opportunities, while providing the consumer the ability to control who they wish to let advertise to them. More education will be stressed over how to recognize wanted information from unwanted and how to filter it. Conversations will not stay in the inbox, but rather move seamlessly between web, client, phone. More multi-channel options will be provided for consumers.
Comments (0) | Posted by dylan at 9:07 AM | Permalink
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