All Posts by Sam Gosling

0 Why Marketers Need to Continue Sending Emails

After every holiday it is common for people to clean their email inboxes. However, a lot of people keep asking themselves why marketers are always sending them a lot of emails of all kinds sometimes more than twice a day. The simple explanation is that email marketing works! Emails have stood firm as the most effective method of acquiring new customers today than social media. Emails are 40 times effective than Twitter and Facebook combined when it comes to acquiring new customers.

This is essentially because consumers in the UK and North America are still using emails daily. Also, the rate of purchases promoted by emails is still three times better than that Facebook, Twitter and the entire social media networks with the order value on average also 17% higher than that of social media.

This is not to say people should be bombarded with tedious junk mail. It is also important to indicate investment in social networks, mobile app messaging and instant messaging is very important for the modern marketer who wants to utilize any platform available. However, those marketers who are thinking about shifting their marketing budgets from email marketing need to think again because an inbox whose power has been harnessed is very important.

The click is important but the final destination critical

If you are a marketer obsessed with your email marketing and email visuals, copy or even the subject line, it is imperative to ensure you are not forgetting the important thing in all this; destination where a click of the email will be taking the contact. The email will be the first part in the entire consumer decision process. The email is essentially a process of interaction with products or brands and it is the prerogative of the marketers to make sure they know where the email will be sending the contact.

For example, it does not make sense to invest time and money on emails only to take a user to a generic or substandard home page. Rather, an email that takes a customer to a landing page customized for that purposes by sending him or her right onto the offer or item in the email will raise conversion exponentially, even by over 25 percent.

It is also important to remember out of all marketing emails sent 45 percent of them are opened in mobile devices. A lot of marketers do not really optimize these vital landing pages as they should. In case you think it is not a huge deal, remember Google has found out that out of all mobile site users 61 percent will not return to one they were unable to access with about 40 percent turning towards a competitor.

Sharing the information

Those small businesses who view each email as the perfect opportunity of learning about a consumer are poised to raise their total sales percentage without increasing email campaigns. The idea is all about capturing data and ensuring the learning objectives that come with every campaign have been defined before sharing them with the group mandated with marketing as well as the entire company. If something is not working, it is the prerogative of the entire email marketing team to know why.

Relevancy-personalizing every message

With the social media and other platforms competing with emails, it pays to be as personal as possible. It has also been found that the most effective emails are those personalized or customized to a specific clientele. This is why it pays to build a targeting engine that ensures your email marketing campaigns reach the right people. For instance, a retailer of home goods reported a ten times boost in response rates after adopting a personalized method of sending emails founded on catalogue and on-site shopping behaviour of users. You should aim at making your free email marketing campaigns as effective as possible and personalizing emails is a perfect way.

0 Email marketing-Why not to use Do-not-reply Email Addresses

Email is a two way communication channel. If you want to speak to your subscribers, then you ought to give them an opportunity to speak as well. When you send an email from a do-not-reply address, you are simply telling subscribers that “we just don’t care and if you may, please keep your opinion about us to yourself”.

When it comes to email marketing, your subscribers are your potential customers and there is no justifiable reason why they should be insulted with no-reply addresses, whether you are using free email marketing platforms or not. Here are a couple of reasons why no-reply addresses are hurting you and why you should stop using them now.

Address book

The best way to ensure emails are delivered to subscribers’ inbox is by having them add your email address to their address book. There is no reason why a person would add a no-reply address to their address book. It also means that you could be loosing subscribers to your email list on a daily basis.

Not everyone wants to unsubscribe

Not all recipients look for an unsubscribe link. Some will simply hit reply in an attempt of asking to be unsubscribed from your mailing list and when this isn’t possible, they will report the email as spam and this will hurt your email reputation.

Out-of-office email replies

The main reason why you use no-reply addresses is perhaps to avoid getting out-of-office replies. It can be tedious and time consuming to wade through thousands of replies searching for one with genuine information, but in the long run that genuine reply will give you insight on the subscribers’ opinion of your product or service.

Replies also give you an opportunity to clean up your email list by removing inactive addresses and also update personal information of subscribers.

No-reply address makes you look rude and arrogant

Using a no-reply address sends a negative message to subscribers and it makes you seem out-and-out rude and arrogant. By using a no-reply address, you are telling your subscribers that they ought to listen to you but you don’t want to listen to them. You are also telling them that you don’t care of their opinion and they should shut-up. This is a negative in email marketing and should be stopped.

Legal requirement

Most countries do not allow no-reply addresses and there are rules in place for such practices. You are required to have a working address where people can reply to you in case of inquiries.

It is not easy to deal with thousands of email replies, and that is why you use no-reply addresses. Though this makes your job easier in the short-run, you tend to lose more subscribers in the end. It is easy to lose people’s trust than it is to gain it. Adding a reply address will help you maintain subscribers for longer. If you must use a no-reply address, leave some reply information at the footer of your email otherwise it is best to avoid no-reply addresses at all costs.

0 Beat Email Fatigue in 2019 This Way

It is normal in the early days of 2019 for friends and acquaintances to ask how they can deal with email fatigue at this time after a very busy Christmas and holiday season while keeping on reengaging subscribers in 2019. There are many things you might want to say but there is a way of going about it.

Offers increase later in the year

If you have noticed, every year your email inbox begin to fill up with all kinds of offers and promotions early in November or there about. This sets you up for a festive time that you will have to purchase gifts and perhaps treat yourself to a number of things you have been craving or desiring since January. However, in January you are in a whole new mode altogether and feel you would like to detox yourself. Every subscriber at this time is ready to pass any offer seeking to sell something.

Real value to grab you

If a brand will surely grab your attention in the early months of 2015 while you are in a detox mode, the email must have real value. This must transcend the usual “act now, limited time, save big, get discount” value but much better that will make you feel inspired, smarter and actually improves your trust and builds the relationship you have with the brand or business sending the email.

Time to show you are the real deal

After a season of spending and being allergic to salesy emails, it is advisable for marketers to show in the early moments of the year that they can be trusted in the long run and are worth your confidence. It is time to share advice and tips related to the service or product although they do not have to be all about your services and products.

The emails sent out should be focused a lot on making your life easier and all the things that tell a subscriber you care about his or her well being. Every email should show your authenticity to your brand as you find ways of offering the audience ways of managing subscription preferences.

The way you handle the email experience at the beginning of the year will mean a lot going forward in the eyes of the subscribers. Some might unsubscribe from a list but it is alright. There are lots of subscribers around and equal emphasis need to be put on attracting as much new subscribers as possible in the same way you are working tirelessly to retain subscribers you already have. You can even make the most of a free email marketing plan at this time as you fight email fatigue in the New Year.

0 Email Marketing-Tips for Resending Emails to Non-openers

Email marketing is an invaluable tool in getting the message across to individuals on your mailing list. When the email has been conveyed successfully to the recipient, there are those that open while others choose to ignore. For the group that never opened the email, you can try resending them the exact email, whether you are using free email marketing or not. Resending emails to non-openers can be a good option for re-engaging with subscribers on your mailing list but sometimes this may go haywire, especially with individuals who love their privacy and don’t like to be bothered.

However, the sure-fire tips for resending emails to non-openers go a long way into ensuring you have succeeded in resending an unopened email to subscribers on your mailing list.

Checking delivery framework

Changing your entire mail and then resending it is vital. You should first of all do a thorough check on the email’s delivery framework. Key areas to look at are the algorithms and the ISP. If you are certain everything is fine and dandy, you might proceed to do a number of things.

Change subject line

You will need to make the subject matter look different to give the perception of a new mail to the reader. Apart from tweaking the subject with a couple of words such as “last chance” and “reminder” that gives that level of urgency you are looking for you can definitely come up with a novel subject line very different from the one you were using before. A tweaked subject line lets the recipient of the email to know that it was not sent to him or her by mistake.

The recipient knows that the email is important and that is why you resent it to ensure they missed out on nothing. However, remember that resending should only be done on very vital email campaigns.

Trying changing resending time

You will need to do some research regarding the best time to send the communication. Some prefer early in the mornings on weekdays whereas industries would prefer a weekend campaign when they are free. Timing is everything and you need to pay attention to your audience. For instance, you cannot send to an audience mostly made up of Christians on Sundays when they are mostly at church or engulfed in church related issues throughout the day.

Changing snippet text

The snippet tool gives the reader a short preview of what to expect. This means the snippets have to be made as attractive as possible to develop interest from the recipient.

Behavioural profiling

Profile the behaviour of your mail subscribers and group them based on their behaviours. This way you will get a clearer picture of who opens and who doesn’t. Finally supplement promotion with information.

Send from a recognized email address

When sending to your subscribers; use an email address and a name that they know or familiar with. It is important to personalize the email as well.

Keep test-running an array of test such as the A/B split test for determining effective subject lines. CTA placement and litmus test are important before launching an email marketing campaign.

0 Email Marketing-How to Make the Most of Email Newsletters

Email marketing is a sure way of driving up your sales while at the same time establishing a strong relationship with your customers. It Keeps customers up to date about your existing products and the release of new products which end up making the customers loyal in turn driving up your sales margin. Effective email marketing can make or break the relationship you have with your customers depending on how you use it. Here are a number of things you should put into consideration while writing and sending email newsletters so as to get the most out of it, whether you are practicing free email marketing or not.

Plan and write ahead

Failing to plan and write ahead of time might make you to compose a poor newsletter which may turn out to be a total turnoff for your customers and they may opt not to waste their time again reading poorly written newsletters.

Be engaging and personal

You should customize the newsletter in a way that each of them carries the name of the person it is intended for. It’s also recommended that you write the newsletter like you are speaking to an individual as opposed to a group so that your customers can feel you are speaking to them on a one on one basis.

Delivery time is vital

You will need to create a schedule for distribution that is regular and consistent so that your customers can always be looking forward to receive your newsletter. You can have a weekly or monthly delivery but monthly is the most recommended as it will keep your customers waiting for it eagerly as opposed to weekly where it might actually bore them because it will end up looking like spam.

Promotions

You can offer promotions for your email newsletter readers as a way of encouraging others to subscribe to your list. It will also make sure your customers actually read your email newsletter as they may not wish to miss out on the promotion.

Professional design

A professional design of your email newsletter makes a great impression to customers while also making the email newsletter attractive to peruse or even read.

Make it about the reader

Don’t just talk about your products throughout the newsletter. Provide some information on how your customers can actually make savings or just anything you can think of as long as it will make their lives better.

Make it mobile-friendly

Don’t ignore this part as most people these days read their emails through their mobile devices, from Tablets to Smartphones and anything in between. If the email newsletter can’t be supported on a Smartphone then you might actually be locking out a large number of your customers from accessing your newsletters.

Update your subscribers list

Before sending your email newsletter, ensure that people who unsubscribed from the newsletter are not included in the list of recipients as there is nothing as irritating as getting an email from a source you unsubscribed from two or so months ago. Ensure no new subscriber is left out of the list.

Social media network icons and pages

You should include your own social media network icons to get more social following. Display these icons at the top of the page since not many people read your newsletter to the last word on a page.

0 Email Marketing-How to Get More Leads

Are you an internet marketer looking for the best way to generate leads through a perfect email marketing strategy? Is your plan the best method of generating leads through email marketing? Well, if all these inquisitions are creating a problem on your mind, then you have come to the right place. Here are a number of quality dos you might want to know when it comes to applying an effective email marketing technique that will in turn generate more leads for you, whether you are into free email marketing or not.

Subject Line

To be factual and upfront here, the subject line of your email matters a lot. It will determine if leads are going to read your email or not. One of the best ways to captivate or engage your leads is to create a subject line that practically addresses their business problems or needs. On this note, it is expedient to make your subject lines actionable such as ”download our latest tutorials” or ”attend our IT Forum”. You can as well personalize your subject lines to pass effective and touching message to your leads.

Brevity

Do you know that prospective visitors and leads are bombarded with massive amounts of email on a daily basis? For this reason, it is a good idea to keep your email brewing with succinctness while at the same time engaging and very concise. Do not forget that the more you bombard prospects the more they switch off from your emails and the first thing they will do when you send them quality and informative emails next time will be to delete or spam them without a second look.

Imagery

Using images along with your content is a great way to pass quick message to your leads. Studies have shown that the human brain captures image message faster than pure text. To be on the fast track, ensure to garner the beauty of your email with images. However, sometimes you might want to stop embedding video to your email and if you must share one offer your leads a link to the video on another page off the email.

Social integration

It is a good thing for your leads to spread the sent email on their social network. This will even give more people the opportunity of understanding the value of your email. For this reason, you can always incorporate social media links within your email. This will help your leads to further share the message in what is called word-of-mouth advertising. You can incorporate social media links on Facebook, Google+, LinkedIn, and Twitter just to mention a few.

CTA

Finally educating your leads about the service or product is highly important. The best way to help your leads understand about the product or service is by making them consume the content. This can be done by an effective CTA (call to action). This can be in the likes of “register”, “download”, “try now”, or “read”. You will have to give your leads a way of instantly taking the next step. With all the points above, you are sure to draw more leads through email marketing.

0 Email Marketing Hacks Capable of Doubling Response Rates

Most companies often do not know the benefits of implementing a successful email marketing strategy when trying to improve their sales. Here are some hacks that can help to double the response rate of emails for better sales.

Come up with a process

When it comes to email marketing top hacks, you might want to begin with implementing of a well planned process. Most people think that such a process will only halt them or slow their process of email marketing. Whether you are doing free email marketing or not you need a process that is well defined and you can be sure of a great effect. As an email marketer, you will have a lot of time to be as creative as possible and even have time to continue experimenting since you will not be dealing with serious errors or trying to put out a fire.

While your email marketing service provider such as Email Mojo is handling the important part of relaying the email to your subscribers, and giving you data on the opening rate and even click-through rates among other things, you are left to deal with your strategies and ensure everything has fallen into place effectively.

Resend if you have to

One of the worst things email marketers do is being shy of resending an email. It is worth noting that if an email is not opened, it is the same as if the email does not exist. Since the metrics and data from your email marketing provider will show you who did not open the email, you can always resend and the success rate might prompt you to wonder why you just did not think about it sooner.

Use personalized messages 

When you need personalized messages, you can always make sure that you send messages according to the individual or niche target from the market. Through the process, you will be capable of doubling response rate in the market when looking for the deals that you need from the market thus increasing growth from the market.

Use diverse channels

For those companies that have used email as a means of marketing tool, they have been able to increase sales because it is a perfect choice that exists in the market. When you use the idea, your company will always be in a position to reach the best leads and present great deals to subscribers for improved sales through a perfect platform. As a result of email marketing and using other channels of marketing such as social media, phone calls and direct mail, you can be sure of huge sales for the company.

Send subscribers great deals  

If you have lowered your marketing costs, introduced new deals, better discounts, new products, and a new service, seasonal deals, coupon codes and many others, always let your subscribers know. You can also use the opportunity on your site to let your audience and new visitors know about the deals and request that they subscriber your newsletter to get the information on the deals and any subsequent critical information.

0 5 Reasons Your Emails Have Refused to Get You the Results You Need

Having an email campaign is usually very important when it comes to promoting a business product to as many people as possible. However when it comes to spending and writing quality content, returns may seem to be very small as the open rates just do not show progress. There are usually a number of reasons that make potential clients pass your emails and go to others, whether you made the most of free email marketing or not.

The subject line on email is boring

This literally means that the title of the email is not enticing enough or captivating. To make email marketing successful, ensure that it does not sound too promotional and salesy in the process. Terms like “free”, “$$$” should be avoided at all costs, as they always seem like spam.

Also, rather than sell the steak simply stick with the sizzle, a rule that is very clear for those who write ad copies. To ensure that you are writing or coming up with an email that sells itself, you must avoid a number of things, for instance focusing on the service or product’s features such as how the product looks like, its shiny attributes or how a button or dongle works.

Impersonal email address

Email marketing emails should be seen as human by the email address being used. This literally means that instead of using the businesses name only you might want to use the writers name together with the business name. This usually helps to let the person reading the email know that it was written by someone and not an email response created by the business.

The subject line doesn’t talk of something specific

When it comes to the subject line of an email, talking about the uniqueness of the business is a must. The email marketing subject should centre on specific uniqueness of the email product being promoted and what it offers.

Emails sent at the wrong time

Basically the most common mistake done with email marketing is sending the emails to the recipient’s inbox at the wrong time. Many tend to send emails Monday or Tuesday, however this should not be done as people are usually swamped with work. It is better to send emails in the afternoons when the week is ending, as people are generally bored and the opening rates are highest then.

Long subject line

People generally are bored very quickly with emails, and thus when an email tends to be too long they move on to the next thing. Using a short email subject line that is catchy is Key to get the opening rates for the business. Personalization of an email address and enticing preview of the first lines, together with a short catchy subject line is vital for any successful email marketing campaign.

An email can also have a number of testimonials, especially if the email is mostly written as an ad copy. Keep changing your testimonials with new ones with every email you submit and avoid sending the same testimonials you have submitted for a decade.

0 Email Marketing-What Makes Subscribers to Unsubscribe?

Email marketing is one of the most popular and most effective ways of growing your business. It is also the best way of cultivating the best relationship with your subscribers, leads and audience who have decided to opt-in in your mailing list. You definitely want to maintain your subscribers and to ensure you are always marketing to them all the time when you have something to promote to them and perhaps to provide them with an occasional newsletter. However, there are things that make subscribers to desire to leave your mailing list.

Certain steps need be followed very carefully otherwise subscribers will click unsubscribe. Here are a number of common email marketing mistakes you should know and perhaps do right, whether you are into free email marketing or not.

Dispatching too many emails

Sending too many emails is the most common reason behind your mail list unsubscribing. There should be a proper limit in the number of emails sent because too many emails on the same subject or uninteresting subjects will irritate your subscribers. Similarly, too much or too little promotion can make compel them to leave. Some marketers send emails every day and others feel they should not send often. To be on the safe side, there must be an equal balance between too much and two often depending on your business and offer to the customers.

Inconsistency

Ensure the same email id or sender’s name is used throughout your emails to your customers to avert confusion. Always send some email templates so that your brand can remain consistent within your mailing subject. Trust in online email marketing is very important especially in bringing customers up to speed and boosting the engagement rate.

Poor or confusing subject lines

Generally marketers emphasize on content but neglect the crucial subject line, which is very vital. This is because customers open mails depending on the subject. Subject line gives the reader a reason to keep reading or open the email and follow the message it contains. So if the subject line is missing or way too poor, then everything inside the mail is wasted.

Call to actions

Make sure that you have incorporated your call to action several times in your email because many customers skim through emails. It has an unconscious effect of compelling subscribers to do something, especially if they have opened the email.

Not verifying before hitting send

Ensure emails are read through, proofread and revised before you send them to your desired customers. Also make sure your email is readable within the common email platforms spread across the internet and beyond such as Outlook, Gmail, Hotmail, Yahoo! Also make sure it is attractive and useful.

Your content is repetitive or boring

Some email marketers send emails to their customers repetitively to grab their attention. Instead of grabbing their attention, it ends up compelling the customers to unsubscribe.

Your emails aren’t relevant

This is a very common cause behind unsubscribing. Customer usually search for the unsubscribing link if they realise the information is very irrelevant.

Avoid using no-reply emails

Before some customers unsubscribed they first try to reply with their concerns. Give them a chance by having an email that they can reply to immediately.

0 3 Main Reasons Why Nobody Opens Your Emails

An email campaign is one of the greatest backbones when it comes to promoting a new product, a program, service or any other thing. This is mainly due to the fact that many people use emails, with studies suggesting that over 900 million emails were sent in 2013 alone. It is a great way to get the people who do not have time to look at other types of advertisement especially those who believe in the professionalism of emails and privacy of their messages and what they do with them.

In which case email marketing helps to cover up all the other marketing channels and take sales to a whole new level, even if you are into free email marketing. However, as one starts the email marketing campaign there is always likelihood that most of the emails will be ignored. Below are some reasons why nobody is opening your emails.

The subject is not appealing

This is actually in a literal sense where subject line might not be telling the audience what it shall do for them. When the subject talks of the company or the abilities of the product in question, any one seeing or reading it immediately makes up his or her mind that it just another promotional message. Instead of going for more open rates, think of wordings on how the product will help the people reading the emails and ensure its not too salesy but an email with a message that helps.

Wrong timing

Sending emails to people at the wrong time is a main contributor to why nobody opens your emails. With meetings coming up back to back on Monday and Tuesday mornings, this at first may seem as a good time to send emails as people will be reconfirming their schedules. However the truth is that they will see the email as a nuisance and you definitely do not want that. Instead, wait for a time where things are going slow, and people do not have much to do and are typically bored. Do it at the end of the week or even on weekends and people will open the emails much more.

Lack of personalization

When it comes to reading emails, people generally want to assume there is a person at the other end of the line who cares about them, knows their names and cares to address them through their names and through the content. However, when a product name or a company name is used, this usually drives the readers away right from the start due to the simple reason that the email looks like it has been automatically generated by a company or brand that does not care.

It is much better to place in a name of an actual person in the company who heads the campaign itself before the company name as the email address, this way the emails will have a higher chance of being opened as it relates to people and clearly has been sent by a human.