In this free whitepaper, the good folks at Inbox Group explain why welcome emails play a huge role in email marketing, offer tips on the content and timing and structure of welcome, and showcase winning welcome email messages to inspire your own.
Why invest in welcome emails?
- They provide foundation of success email and marketing success
- Drive immediate response
- It works FAR BETTER than you might think
How do welcome emails perform?
- Four times the open rate
- Five times the click rate
- Eight times the revenue
What you’ll learn in this whitepaper:
- How to use welcome email to drive action now, and loyalty later
- When to send, and how to approach, welcome emails
- If you need a welcome email or a welcome series
- How to milk it for all it’s worth!
Download Here
Don’t worry, the guys at Inbox Group are very cool. Your registration information will be kept private and used only for non-evil purposes.
#1) Making an Unprofitable First Impression
First contact is typically the best opportunity to move the sale/relationship forward and a common email marketing mistake. Here’s the fix…
Create a Welcome Email that Means Business – A well-crafted, automated ‘welcome email’ will set the proper pace and garner a very nice ROI if the marketer doesn’t beat around the bush or blow smoke. This is the time to drive action and set mutual expectations.
Create an Onboarding Series that Tells the Tale – If the offer can support a series of emails, start now. Besides communicating the full value of the product/service an onboarding series will set the stage for putting an email marketing program on autopilot, the Holy Grail for smart marketers.
#2) Not Working Hard Enough Where it Really Matters
Email marketing eats man-hours and brainpower, so we’ve got to prioritize in order to maximize the human capital investment. But often times the best allocation resources and ROI has nothing to do with campaigns…
Invest More into List Growth – Email marketing is largely a numbers game. The bigger the email list, the more revenue that list will produce (assuming that the subscribers are qualified and receptive). Organic email list growth can seem painful and slow but if marketers would only be more strategic, and execute at every appropriate/feasible opportunity, they will see a substantial lift.
#3) Working Too Hard On the Wrong Things
Let’s face facts; it takes time to create a single email marketing campaign, much less a kick-butt email program. Marketers need to automate at every opportunity if they are to focus on the ROI. Here are two huge time savers…
Connect Your Lists and Applications - The exporting and importing of lists is not only a huge waste of time it’s also ripe for human error. Examples of connecting of customer databases, with that of an email service provider, include syncing lists with a CRM system, e-commerce platform or product recommendation engine. Marketers have already paid for these tools; why do they not use them to their fullest? Not only will syncing applications create efficiency, they can also automatically segment lists by activity, product, you name it. Going further, this will help to increase relevance by sending individualized messages, which are based on the subscriber’s actions and attributes. It’s a onetime fix that most of customers tell us was well worth the expense.
Let Automated Emails Do Most of the Work – Once these automated emails (a.k.a. autoresponders, triggered emails) are locked-down marketers need only to review/test their performance periodically. Even the simplest of today’s email marketing delivery tools offer some form of marketing automation. These triggered includes are typically date or user behavior based; examples include product expiration notices, birthdays/anniversaries, appointment reminders, and recommendations based on historical data.
#4) Sending Too Few Campaigns for the Wrong Reasons
Again, email marketing is a numbers game. Send more email, to more people, and more revenue will be generated. Simple stuff right? Yet this is usually the biggest failure. Here’s two fixes…
Consider Outsourcing Production - As we all know, it takes a considerable amount to time and expertise to plan and execute an email program. If an organization doesn’t have the resources for their program to be effective, managed email marketing services might be the best option.
Test the Frequency Tipping Point - Email is not a marketing channel for the timid. Try sending more campaigns, a lot more. Perhaps the list will tolerate, or even appreciate, a considerable increase in campaign frequency. Test it internally or work with a partner, but test it.
#5) Partying Like It’s 1999
The way in which customers interact with emails has forever changed; mobile readership is growing exponentially, inboxes are busy places, and attention spans are plummeting. You’ve got to future-proof your message framework now…
Update those Crusty Email Templates – A template refresh would ensure that all messages are actionable on desktop and mobile devices, today and tomorrow. Recommendations include the addition of pre-header (preview) text in order to further incentivize an open, organic and seamless personalization using known data, as well as a highly skimable approach to content, fingered-sized bulletproof buttons, and compartmentalized, truncated content to aide mobile email readership and ultimately clicks.
| Now what? As luck would have it we can fix every mistake outlined above and quite a few more, so let’s talk email marketing! |
One of the perks of living and breathing a niche business, like an email agency, is that it affords one the opportunity to ponder what the future may hold.
The following is a future-vision of what email marketing will look like in year 2017 for practitioners, marketers and consumers alike.
The Name of the Game Has Changed
Fast forward six years and the term “email marketing” has disappeared from our vernacular entirely. Although lower than 2011, email marketing still produces a considerable ROI; however it is but one digital marketing vehicle.
In this future, the integration between social, mobile, location-based and home-based marketing is seamless. Individual messaging channels are irrelevant.
There are slight nuances to delivering effective messages through each of those marketing channels but those differences are largely driven by well-documented consumer preferences not the delivery mechanism itself. The primary function of using these blended delivery channels is the same as it was back in 2011: the distribution of relevant and timely messages. In other words, the goal was, and has always been, to put the right offer, in front of the right person, at the right time.
Because the terms “email marketing”, “social marketing” and “mobile marketing” were too restrictive and increasingly offensive to a marketing-weary consumer, they had to go. Welcome to the age of Digital Messaging.
However, the biggest changes in modern Digital Messaging was not how it was referred; it was the commoditization and consolidation of technology, the need for talented implementers, and the perception and empowerment of the consumer.
The Shift Was Rapid and Sweeping
Now, in the year 2017, Digital Messaging Providers (DMPs for short) can easy distribute personalized marketing messages across devices, time and space. They now encompass real-time, adaptive communications which flow effortlessly across new channels, like interactive TV, and old ones, like point-of-sale. But the DMP’s offerings are not limited to the dissemination and tracking of digital marketing messages. They have made surprising advancements in data analysis and marketing automation.
The reporting and campaign production too is infinitely smarter and more efficient, it has gone far beyond opens and clicks and WYSIWYG editors. Think live, multivariate testing and manipulation, multi-sourced dynamic content assemblage, responsive delivery and rendering, as well as closed-loop, cross-channel ROI calculations to the 10th power.
DMPs also offer robust methods of data collection. This rich data pours in from every interaction; from simple subscriptions on a mobile device to behavioral data collected from multiple offline customer touchpoints.
But how did the DMP’s offerings evolve so quickly? Back in 2012, the Email Service Providers ( than called ESPs) scrambled, Google-style, to keep marketers within their interface-and only their interface. A technology and intelligence arms race ensued.
The Perks of Lower Costs and New Power
What this Digital Messaging warfare meant to the everyday marketer was that the cost of digital messaging services began to decline substantially and the tools began to improve rapidly. This was obviously welcome news for the marketer but also for the Digital Messaging Providers, because sweeping consolidations and acquisitions took place that forever change the industry.
On a mission to incorporate every feature that marketers demanded, the DPMs began to acquire media monitoring and data scoring companies. They hired analytic masterminds and UI experts. They opened their applications up to the world and cranked out new versions every quarter. They were on fire.
The small and mid-sized Digital Messaging Providers could not keep up with the frantic pace and reduced revenue. They were either crushed or swallowed. Niche providers were relegated to add-ons. For a marketplace that was once flooded with competitors, now only a handful of global behemoths remain.
Modern DMPs generate far less revenue-per-customer as they once did. However, their scale is so vast that, if it weren’t for their lobbyists and strict self-regulatory guidelines, anti-trust and privacy advocates would start to take an unhealthy interest in their activities.
They discovered new revenue too, top of which is generated from licensing the customer data they warehouse. This intelligence is offered to, and exchanged with, research firms and competitive marketing channels like paid search, direct mail, and digital display.
The Rise of Craftsmen and Technicians
The comprehensive tools, offered by Digital Messaging Providers in 2017, are now within reach to nearly every marketer. However digital messaging programs are far more sophisticated. Skilled personal is the key differentiator between programs that generate poor, mediocre and exceptional ROI from Digital Messaging, but as history tells us not all specialists would make the cut.
Because the reporting is so robust and actionable, marketers no longer need in-house or outsourced marketing mathematicians to analyze data and make recommendations. However this data must now be applied and the programs must be optimized. The rockstars of the Digital Messaging industry now fall into two camps, craftsmen and technicians.
The craftsmen are those that create the plans and carry them out; be they thinkers, managers, or creatives. The technicians are those who diagnose problems, which range from deliverability speedbumps to integration hiccups, and rectify them.
Consumer Behavior and Perception
The consumer is now keenly aware of the numerous, yet relevant, marketing messages that swirl around them. This has forced marketers to convert, what once were, one-sided offers into customer-focused dialogues. These conversations take place on a one-to-one level and amongst virtual crowds. They evolve over time as the consumer’s demographics and behaviors change and shift with cultural norms.
The data that is provided by the consumer, and extracted from their behavior, is now boundless. The marketer has seemingly unlimited insight into the mind of the individual as well as predictive models of their demographic classes. The marketer uses this information to deliver what the consumer is most likely to purchase now, and in the future, as well as predict their lifetime value and then allocate the appropriate resources.
Because the consumer is so conscious of behavioral marketing and concerned that the practice will ultimately become too invasive; a privately-owned global permission repository has recently been established, simply called “Choice”.
Choice is a cooperative, centralized data management and preference center that is both highly secure and omnipotent. It will afford the consumer the opportunity to control, exactly, what type of data is collected and utilized by the marketer and which messages they will accept, and from whom; as well as how and when those messages will be delivered.
This is a free service to the consumer but the Digital Messaging Providers must license this information, which will ensure that they meet consumer expectations and comply with the Digital Privacy Protection Act of 2015.
The Reversal of Roles
In the year 2017, the Digital Messaging industry has all but inverted itself. In the early days of email marketing, the lion’s share of the cost, time and attention went toward the tools themselves. But now that the DMPs services have been commoditized, the true value of Digital Messaging is solely dependent on the talent that wields their tools.
This role reversal is also reflected in the relationship between the marketer and consumer. Marketers are now far more sensitive to the needs and wants of their customers and prospects. If they are to continue the conversation in the years to come, they have to be. And in exchange for their deeply personal information, the consumer receives tailor-made, high-value offers and experiences control over their privacy like never before.
About the Author: Scott Hardigree is the Founder of email agency, Indiemark. He can be reached at scott@indiemark.com or indiemark.com
Indiemark Joins Inbox Group
10/31/2011
Inbox Group, a Dallas-based email marketing services firm, today announced their acquisition of Indiemark, a creative email marketing agency. Founded by email marketing veteran Scott Hardigree, Indiemark has been providing stellar email strategy, creative, integration and deliverability services to small business and Fortune 500 companies alike.
This acquisition reflects Inbox Group’s belief in the incredible growth opportunity in the full-service email marketing marketplace. With Indiemark in the fold, Inbox Group now has the staff, processes and infrastructure in place to accommodate the company’s ever-expanding email marketing tools and services available to companies of all sizes.
“Indiemark is a perfect fit for Inbox Group,” said Christopher Donald, Vice President of Sales and Marketing for Inbox Group. “Our cultures and steadfast dedication to offering best-in-class email marketing customer service while providing leading-edge email marketing solutions make it a solid acquisition for Inbox Group.”
Indiemark’s founder, Scott Hardigree, will remain with the company and will continue to be a driving force at Inbox Group. Hardigree stated, “This union ensures the continuation of our respective traditions of providing the highest value email marketing services, anywhere. I couldn’t be happier.”
“We’ve always respected how Scott Hardigree and Indiemark managed their clients with the highest level of integrity, industry knowledge, and truly some of the best customer service on the planet,” Donald added. “We’re excited to welcome the Indiemark brand to the Inbox Group family.”
Indiemark will maintain operations under its own brand and continue business as usual with the addition of Inbox Group resources.
About Inbox Group
Since 2009, Inbox Group has been providing businesses and non-profits with email marketing agency and deployment services. Inbox Group offers an array of email services, including email strategy, creative, email deliverability, list growth and management, as well as email deployment solutions. The Dallas-based email marketing agency and email service provider manages email marketing strategy and deployment for Fortune 500 companies, multi-national brands, non-profits and large associations, helping to increase their ROI with the use of email marketing, social media and multichannel campaigns.
For more information on Inbox Group, visit Inbox Group’s website at www.inboxgroup.com or call 214-716-0268.
About Indiemark
Founded in 2008, Indiemark is led by email marketing thought leader Scott Hardigree and supported by a gifted team of strategic, creative, and technical professionals. Indiemark provides a full suite of email marketing services including strategy, design and production, deliverability and optimization, as well as software integration and customization services.
For more information on Indiemark, visit Indiemark’s website at www.indiemark.com or call 407-970-9372.
Zombie Survival Guide for Email Marketers
10/10/2011
If you’ve seen Zombieland or The Walking Dead you know that there are rules for staying alive in the midst of a Zombie plague. I know what you’re thinking, “How can I apply those rules to my email marketing?” No?!
Okay, surviving the (un?)likely event of a post-apocalyptic zombified wasteland might take priority over the success your email marketing efforts but given the season, and my fascination with Zombies, it seems appropriate to share a slightly modified version of these rules with you now.
- Cardio. Like outpacing a Zombie hoard you must be able to run your email marketing program for an extended period of time. No sprinters here. If you’re going to survive thrive, endurance is key.
- Double Tap. It takes at least two gunshots to safely deal with a Zombie. This is the same when dealing with customers and prospects. You’ve got to tap them again and again and again to demonstrate your value.
- Beware of Bathrooms. You are at your most vulnerable to a Zombie sneak attack when you are in a bathroom. If you become comfortable and relax for too long; your email marketing program can run into the same problem. Be vigilant. Keep testing. Always be on the lookout for opportunities and dangers.
- Travel Light. It will be harder to out run a Zombie if you’re carrying more than you can handle. No dead weight. This goes for both the objects and people (practices and vendors) you carry with you. If they can’t pull their own, ditch ‘em.
- Dress smart. Clothing should be tight-fitting and purposeful, with easily accessible pockets. The same holds true for your emails; tight in their construction, purposeful in their message and accessible across mobile devices and desktops.
- Limber Up. When entering a Zombie zone you’ll want to be as limber as possible. Have everything in order before pushing the “go” button. Your contact strategy. The creative. Landing page. Sales support. Let’s do this!
- Know your environment, use it to your advantage. Outside of their apparent supernatural sense of smell, Zombies have limited insight into their surroundings. You’re no Zombie. Observation and information are your most powerful weapons. Previous purchases, subscriber behavior, stated interests, calendar dates. Data is the next best thing to Zombie repellant.
- Buddy System. Never, ever, ever, under any circumstances shall you EVER go anywhere alone (yes, this includes the bathroom). You can’t always see a Zombie coming from every direction. Having an email marketing partner can be a huge help, preferably one with extensive Zombie hacking experience. They can be objective to things you may not want to see, try or do; helping you save time and money.
- Enjoy The Little Things. When fighting Zombies you’ll need to take time and entertain yourself (and your subscribers) every chance you get. Enjoy getting to know your clients and enjoy testing new ways of selling. Enjoy the added-value (e.g. branding, social sharing) that email marketing can provide. Have fun but never rest.
This list is intended to be a living document, designed to be passed from survivor to survivor. Please comment so that we can add, edit or consolidate these rules. Our future depends on it.
- Scott Hardigree | Indiemark | @indiescott | Facebook.com/indiemark
In case you missed it, here are the slides to the webinar that I (and the team from Mass Transmit) put on last week.
Along with several eye-opening stats and HTML coding tricks, you’ll also find really good tips for creating a one-size-fits-all email template framework, that renders well across mobile devices and desktop clients.
Refreshing News About Email Subject Lines
09/08/2011
Last week Adam Holden-Bache from Mass Transmit and I were interviewed by Refreshing News, a Coca-Cola publication for the food and beverage industry. The topic was email marketing subject lines. They were gathering tips on how to increase the likelihood of an email message being opened.
They were especially in the market for unique and unconventional tips, and examples of earth-shattering campaigns. I’m sure that what we discussed wasn’t exactly what they were looking for because the truth is: getting a single message opened should NOT be the end goal. Here’s the bullet-points from the interview:
What you should focus on
- Recognition, Interest, Action. — Not just on Opens.
- Consumer Experience and long term revenue — Less on single-instance Open Rate
Research and experience tells us…
- Short subject lines works best, but don’t sacrifice on message just for the sake of it.
- Subject lines with company names in them do better, at least in the short run but does that work for you?
- Don’t use First Name personalization, instead use product or content preferences, interests, past purchases, web site activity to make message more relevant to the unique end-user.
- The best performing subject lines tell what’s inside.
- Lead but don’t mislead.
- Preview-text is a powerful tool, and great place to use first name personalization.
Try these tactics
- Instill a sense of urgency, it drives action. “Order by Midnight: Save 40%”
- Use data, such as known demographics and customers history. “Men’s Cardigans – BOGO Sale”
- Use emotion. “Your wife will LOVE this cardigan”
- Use controversial Headlines. “Cardigans Linked to World Peace”
- Use teasers (from time to time). “What’s our most popular cardigans?
Real world examples
- “3 Hours Only! 40% off + FREE Shipping” – Banana Republic
- ”HootSuite Pivot – CONFIDENTIAL & INTERNAL” – HootSuite
- “Mystery Coupon…what will YOUR savings be?” – Brookstone
- ”The Truth About Email List Rental” – Indiemark
- ”Take your pick: Our 9 Favorite Dresses” – Retailer
- ”How to Impress Your Cranky CEO” – Software Company
- “Countdown to the Awards Gala: Reason #3 to Attend” – Event Producer
- “5 Miserable Ways You Could Die (Infographic)” – Advanced Riskology
Takeaway
- Find your voice, but mix it up (remember too that clutter is an issue, especially during the inbox busy season)
- Getting a single email is one thing, a sustainable email program is something else.
- Always test! Use the available tools or do it manually, but test. Put your best foot forward but don’t assume.
I’d love to hear YOUR thoughts and see more examples, please comment and contribute!
- Scott | Indiemark
Feeling the Customer Love
08/24/2011
For a few years we’ve using “We Love Email” as our tagline, catch phrase, or whatever you’d like to call it. I’ve been told that it’s an effective branding mechanism; I don’t know about that.
But every so often our customers will go out of their way to send us a some extra love. I suppose that’s proof that our “We Love Email” message not only resonates with our customers it’s also in line with what we promise. Thanks to you all, much love!
Justin with Golf Outlet
Make Those Transactional Emails Work Harder!
06/27/2011
Are your transactional emails one of the workhorses of your email marketing program? Or just sitting in stalls not helping at all?
“Whoa!” you be thinking right now. “Transactional? Marketing? Aren’t those two different kinds of emails with two very different jobs?”
Your transactional emails aren’t marketing. They’re business, you’re right. But they can do some heavy lifting on behalf of your marketing. They can subtly promote product and build brand without distracting from their primary purpose.
People are very receptive to transactional emails because they are sent in response to an action on the part of the customer or subscriber. It’s therefore an email they anticipate and open. By transactional emails we mean communications like:
- Welcome emails
- Order confirmations
- Receipts
- Shipping confirmations
- Billing notices
- Regular statements
These types of emails are more likely to be opened by the recipient than your regular promotional email marketing messages because they are anticipated and welcomed. That makes them ideal partners to their marketing cohorts.
Transactional emails are an opportunity. The people getting transactional emails from you are already communicating with you and even buying from you, so the trust is there. And they are already opening those transactional emails, so the opportunity is there.
Use your transactional emails for subtle sales by cross-selling and up selling similar products or relevant products or services. Here are some possibilities:
- Promote products or services that complement what the customer just bought.
- Drive traffic back to your website for more shopping.
- Encourage recipients to sign up for email communications.
Ask yourself: Is there targeted selling information that could be included in your transactional emails that’s relevant and useful without distracting from the business nature of the message?
And there’s more. When I say workhorse, I mean workhorse. Selling isn’t the only extra task these emails can tackle. They can be brand builders too. By ensuring the look, feel and voice of the transactional email fits with all your other messaging everywhere else, every message sent is one more brick in the brand you’re building in the customer’s mind.
Review your transactional emails: Do they share the same look and feel as your branded emails? Is the email copywriting written in a voice that matches your brand? Or are they just dry and straightforward business communications? Your transactional emails need not be splashy HTML to reinforce your brand. You can be plenty creative with text only emails. Just make sure the messaging is spot on inline with your brand.
Don’t let your transactional emails munch hay all day when they could be making hay instead. Put them to work promoting product and building brand!
About the Author: Marco Marini is the CEO of ClickMail Marketing and an acknowledged expert in email marketing with over a decade of experience in the field. Follow ClickMail on Twitter: @ClickMail
