I think it is time to talk about Christmas :-)

More and more, I  receive more corporate digital Christmas cards than tradicional postal cards. I notice it, at least. And you? Personally, I've been "crossed" to e-cards to wish the best to family and friends too.

Maybe you're thinking about changing your Christmas greetings system or, at least, you have doubts whether do it or not. I believe that today you can send  traditional corporate greeting or digital postcard-but customized, of course-. Nowadays, both of them are valid.

I invite you to ask us personalized advice and learn how we can help you wish your clients a Merry Christmas in an elegant and effective  way.

Ho, ho, ho!

Surely, applying this mathematical formula in your e-mail campaigns you will achieve your marketing goals. Although I am not designer, I would like to talk about this matter from another point of view: corporate communication.

I thought about this when I received an email that was composed of only an image, and it was a deformed image on top of that!. What I had in my inbox was an e-mail marketing  "disaster": you could not see the product, you could not read the text because it was distorted too and, in short, the corporate image of the company seemed very inappropriate.

I think that comming of Christmas  promotes the growth of e-mail marketing, especially about promotional gifts, Christmas hampers, printing works and similar articles. I believe this is the reason why the quality of mailings go down and their amount increase .

If you're thinking about making e-mail marketing actions to these special dates, do not neglect the ways and ask professionals. And remember: text,is  text; image, image.

Here we are ;-)

We often say not to use Outlook or any other email client to send your e-mail campaigns. All the email marketing software are specifically created to achieve effective results and the other ordinary email clients don´t .

Anyway, if you use Outlook for that, please, do not use the option "High Importance". When you send all your messages with high priority, they stop being all important; so when messages are really priority, nobody takes it as important. The email can be deleted without open. Dou you remember the fable "The Boy Who Cried Wolf"? It is the same essence.

For example, on September 18th I received an email with "High Importance" asking me to enroll a course whose registration period ended ... on October 5th! I think this time the symbol is dispensable. Don´t you think?  If we add that the subject line was written in capital letter, it seemed the announcement of the imminent arrival of a meteorite ;-)

Be careful with this...

The eMailing Experience gives you warm greetings in this "back to school," especially to all those who, like me, are still "landing" and reading the mail in our inbox ;-) 

My inbox is full of interesting emails for analyze, what about yours?

We are 100% to continue writting about good tips, new tips and, the best and the worst we found in our Inbox. You will make your e-mail marketing more effective.

Recently I received in my inbox a newsletter. I had not subscribed to it. They asked me to send by postal mail my personal information to unsubscribe. What is this?

First, I do not want to receive their communications ; second, I do not want to spend my money and my time to undo something that I do not do.

I sent them an email asking for my unsubscription and telling that I did not send anything by post. They never send me anything else. I think this is a very, very bad marketing strategy. Why did they want that I receive their newsletter if I will never contract them? In fact, they have created an angry no-customer.

To avoid this kind of situations (and you are identified with this sure) note:

-Try to make that  your recipients give you their information.
-Include an "unsubscribe button" at the bottom of each e-mail you send
-Tell your recipients reply your e-mail to ask for the unsubscription
-Do not ask for difficult things to unsubscribe. Why do you make it complicate? You only will get that check all your e-mails as "spam" 
-Obey the laws that protect your recipients´ information

I think that this kind of situations discredit e-mail marketing and the company that make it. Do not fall into this mistake :-(

The Spanish Association of Electronic Commerce and Marketing (AECEM)  has published a White Paper about Electronic Commerce. The book (in Spanish) deal with interesting online marketing practices.

Whether you have an online store or not, I recommend reading this book. You will see many ideas about how to sell online and communicate your products and services.

Section 6.9 talks about e-mail marketing in a clear and concise way. You will find many useful advices that we expand in The eMailing Experience: databases, open rates, subject line... There are four pages with very specific points to keep in mind the essence of e-mail marketing.

Tell us what you think about the book!

Everybody says that the email is a cold way to communicate. I disagree.

We will not forget the limitations of email, but  there are many resources  to transmit emotions through an email. I am going to focus on the text:

-Orthographic symbols are enough to express feelings: exclamation marks, question marks, suspension points ... Everything communicates.
-Bold, italics and underlined: a classical. Emphasize on what interests you.
-Words you use in your email will say the tone: distended or formal. Choose it looking at your target and your organization.
-Phrases. Short one, build a dynamic text; long one,a  formal text. All depends on what you want to say.
-If you finish your sentences with a "smiley" will give feelings to the language, expressing your mood. Be careful! Do not fill your email  with happy and sad "little faces" Remember, less is more

Analyze how you are doing el-communications with your customers. Do not think you can put something  of life in your emails? ;-)

One of the key to make successful marketing campaigns -and successful sales- is know our target. Everything you can. Why not ask them? If we subtly do it we will get many results.  That is the way...

An e-mail marketing campaign  or a newsletter with appropriate links can bring us first-hand information such as what our customers interest and need. For example, products that we must promote or  discounts we must offer How decide it? Publish it in your newsletter .  All people who  "click" will be a great target for a future e-marketing campaign. Be sure.

Use e-mail marketing as more than a tool to promote products and attract potential customers. With imagination you can get more from e-mailing. Look for the feedebacks.  And remember: do not let your recipients discover it ;-)

Sometimes,  we have told you the importance of simplicity. You must not show all information when you write a newsletter, but show a "more info" or "click here" . Now  we recommend the same idea  in creating an  e-mail marketing campaign .

Typically, in our inbox are a lot of e-mails full of  information. Finally, you do not know exactly what kind of message you just received so you delete it and read the next one.

Our advice: do not get tired. Use a message to say one information only. Probably your company offers many products and services you would like to list but  concentrate on one idea that does not disperse the attention of your recipients. Avoid the noise in your communication.

Remember, you can not bomb all the information about your company in an e-mail. Try  link to your website and interested people will go there to analyze your products and services. Sure they will appreciate it  :-)

In times of "lean" we have to be original to enhance. We need results but we can not spend money. So, we have to look for alternatives... Have you think  in e-mail marketing? It will help you! Sure...

Email is a cheap alternative to make good marketing. Perhaps now is time to think about buying an email marketing  tool. You will measure your campaigns and get real results of your actions.  You will stand out from the competition too and improve your image.

In these times, you must also take care of your current customers. Keep your customers is more important than get new ones. You can get their loyalty ,for example, by developing a newsletter with specific offers.  You can do that with a suitable software.

We have stressed these ideas on many other posts because we believe in what we do. Do not underestimate the power of email marketing and its ability as a communication tool. Now more than ever.

Krasis has taken part in the conference  Online Marketing: small investment, big profits, organized by the Club Financiero de Vigo. I presented the speech "Email Marketing. Find and maintain your customers" where I summarize very, very, very much what is e-mail marketing, what are their main advantages and how start a e-mail marketing campaign.

You can read it here (in Spanish). Enjoy it  ;-)

Before sending a massive email to apologize for some mistake, we must think aspects such as:

- Are you sure that this is the best way to correct something you said?. Maybe it looks like you are  hiding  behind a screen... If you know that the offence was serious you must use another way. Sending an e-mail is easy and many people do not take seriously the apology.

- The inmediacy of e-mail make it an advisable way to start some kind of apology. It can be requested when the error is still latent.

- You must include the word "forgiveness" or "sorry"in the subject line. This will ensure that the aggrieved party open your mail.

- Do not include anyone else in CC or Bcc without express permission of the recipient. Let the injured party decide if  he want everyone know that you've apologized or not.

But remember that say what you feel in a message is different  that saying that through other ways. Above all think if it is the right channel for your apology and pray for the injured party has ever happened something similar and he will accept your apologies :-)

 

I think  I can assert  that the formula to get what is the perfect day to send a newsletter does not exist .

Although there are studies that say that the best day is Wednesday,  I say that "depends". Marketing by email is not  "2+2 = 4" because our target is a specific person, belonging to a particular sector and with particular opinions.

The best is adapt the contents and frequency of our newsletter to those who will receive it. One of our clients sends a newsletter where you can find suggestions for weekend and sends it successfully every Friday. Who call those who have developed the study and tell it  them?

My experience tells me that what we should do to get success with open rates of our newsletters is test, test and test. Select  one day and send the newsletter analyzing results. Select another day and analyze.... Try  and try and see what happens ...

It is laborious, but very effective. It's worth it!

Recently we've made a minor update to our MAILCast service that lets you use the new Office 2007 file formats for your mailing source data.

Now, you can upload files in .xlsx (Excel) or .accdb (Access) format when you need to update the source of mailing data for your channel. These formats join the classic .xls and .mdb file formats that we supported and that you can keep using if you will.

Hope this helps!

Congratulations!  You’ve got your new MAILCast Channel and attached or uploaded your database, and now? What? Come on, send you first campaing or newsletter. There are up to three ways to compose an e-mail in MAILCast:

1. Composing it from scratch
   
   

   Go to “Channels customization>Change this channel's template and signature” and be sure than the checkbox “Automated format” is unchecked and Save it.

    

   

   Then, click on “Compose and Send” , choose your channel and select “Create content from scratch”.

   

   Finally click on “Next” to create your e-mail.

   
   
   

2. Composing it with an automated layout template

   
   

   Go to “Channels customization>Change this channel's template and signature” and be sure than the checkbox “Automated format” is checked.

   

   Then, choose a template, write your e-mail signature (optional but we recommend it) and Save it.  Now, when you go to “Compose and Send” (and select your channel) you will see automatically collected your news that you've created in the section “News” , just write an introduction to your newsletter and send  or schedule it.

   
   
   

3. Uploading your email into a zip file

   
   

   Go to “Channels customization>Change this channel's template and signature” and be sure than the checkbox “Automated format” is unchecked and Save it.

   

   Then, click on “Compose and Send” , select your channel and “Create from previous content” and choose the zip file from your computer.

   

   The best way to create the e-mail is putting together the html file and the folder containing  the images, and then zip them at the same time. But be careful, the zip file must be 500Kb at least and the html file ought to be in the root or you’ll get back an error when uploading . The file may be “.htm” or “.html”, no special name is required (also the folder doesn’t need any special name).
   So you can use your favourite html editor (as Dreamweaver) to create your mail, and use the MAILCast’s editor just to correct something if is necessary.

Remember that you can create or order us your customized automated template. We are also able to desing your personalized e-mail for your marketing campaigns. Ask fot this service to our customer service.

A few days ago I was interviewed in BaquíaTV. I had the chance to talk about e-mail marketing, Krasis and, of course, this blog too.

Interview (in spanish, sorry) has two parts. In the second one I speak about our other bussiness line at Krasis: on-line developer training on Microsoft's technologies. (www.campusmvp.com). I hope you'll find it interesting :-)

Nowadays a lot of people receive e-mail in their mobile phones (400.000 in Spain alone). Most of them used to be business travellers that use Windows Mobile devices or Blackberrys. But no anymore...

Today, given the small fees you must pay for GPRS/EDGE connections and unlimited e-mail plans, a lot of people is cathing up. At current SMS prices, you only need to send as few as 34 SMS mesages in order to equal the average unlimited e-mail plan fee. This leads to e-mail being considered cheaper and more useful than the far-limited SMS format.

In Japan, for example, they have been using e-mail in a regular basis for several years, and SMS almost has disappeared.

The current mobile e-mail usage it's expected to soar in the next years, being duplicated in two years, and being twenty times bigger in a 5-years time span. As soon as 2010 are expected to be at least 350 million mobile e-mail accounts worldwide. And these will not be only corporate accounts, but GMail, Yahoo or Hotmail accounts too in a high degree.

What does it mean to you as a marketeer?

Well, the conclusion is clear: you must take in account that many of your e-mail marketing recipients are going to read your mails through mobile devices. And this is now, not in two or three years.

Fortunately MAILCast has built-in support for this kind of situation. When you are creating your new campaign content notice that you have a tab that read "mobile version".

There you can enter the text you want your mobile recipients to receive when they download the e-mail in their cellulars. You can customize the content too.

Click to enlarge

If you not enter any content in this especial tab MAILCast will generate a simplified version of your full featured e-mail for you. This version will have all the text contents of your main e-mail so that at least people can read it in their phones. However we recommend to generate a shorter, summary, down-level version yourself.

Back in their desktops they will download the full-featured e-mail for easy reading in Outlook or other e-mail client.

You will never have to be concerned again about your customers not being able to read your e-mails while on the road :-)

Krasis has the pleasure of announcing a new version of MAILCast.

Our developer team, taking into account the needs and requests of our users, has working hard last months to finally achieve an excellent result.

As many of you would already know from this morning after log into your user account, MAILCast has new functionalities. All of them have been done to make it easier for you, sending your email campaigns and your newsletters.

Next I will introduce you the latest improvements of MAILCast 4.0:

· New “Basic” interface. Now you can choose whether working in the classic interface, or new basic one. This new simplified version allows to access to all channel’s functionalities from a single screen. You will not have to scroll the side bar. Try it! You’ll enjoy it.

· Excel integration. Many users were demanding this and here it is. MAIL Cast’s external channels that before were linked to Access, now they can also work with Excel.

· "One-Click ZIP Publishing".  This new functionality extremely simplifies your direct marketing´s tasks. Publishing your graphics bit by bit, and after composing the HTML in the content editor is over. Design your communication in HTML on your computer with any program, and include images and resources, as you wish.  Then include all your files in a ZIP file and upload it to MAILCast who will process them, publish them in the Internet and will get them ready for edition just before you do the mailing. Publishing an own design was never easier.

· Specific version for mobile devices. In the first step of the campaign composing process, you will find a new sheet called “Mobile version”. So you can type a shorter version for those subscribers who will read your mail from a mobile device.

· Sender’s personalization for every user. You only need to include in your Access or Excel document two fields called “Sender" and "SenderEMail". That way every subscriber will receive the email from the appropriate sender. Your marketing could be even more personalized.

· Personalized fields with own values in the test emails. Now you can introduce the values for each personalized field, as you wish. So that you will obtain a more “real” test version of the final mailing version.

· Content index automated generation. With a new label in the automated templates, you will have the option of generating an index, short or larger, with internal links to the different news included in an issue. MAILCast will automatically do it for you.

· News reutilization between issues.  When you are using the automated composing functionality in MAILCast, so useful creating newsletters, you can mark already used news as available for composing again, and vice versa. This facilitates the reutilization of the content between issues of the same channel.

· New templates versión. Although you may not notice it in Outlook or other ESPs, the new templates are optimized to improve the visual experience of subscribers using Yahoo, Hotmail or Gmail.

· Improved stats. At the time of checking the reports, you will find that they are generated faster tan before.

 · Improvement linking external databases.

And don´t be shy, your opinion counts!! So, please, don’t hesitate in sending us feedback about MAILCast. It will help us improving more and more…