We have already told about the many advantages of e-mail marketing opposite to other tools communication. Today I am going to talk about form.

We can show the content of our e-marketing  in "wrappers" as:

• Offers
• News
• Newsletter
• Subscriptions
• Invitations
• Polls 
• Specific formats for specific season, such as Christmas cards

The choice depends on what we want to say to our target and the kind of customers in our database.

We need to explore different ways of communication. We must try to get thar our recipients understand the message. E-mail marketing will adapt to any of them!

Continuing with the analysis series in this blog, I’m going to comment on an email I received recently.

In this case the email almost has no images so the major concerns are about textual contents and deliverability. It showed up in this way when received:

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It didn’t look more interesting after activating the images either:

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Apart from the poor appearance of the contents and the lack of an unsubscribe link or a short legal text, let’s talk about text itself.

Although the subject line is quite well crafted (it reads “Beat your competence” in Spanish) because is short and to the point, the contents make use a lot of well known inappropriate words and content techniques.

They have personalized the email using my name in the second sentence which is good, but the first sentence in the email includes the word “Free” (gratis) and is formatted in bold big fonts and with exclamation marks in it. This is not a good idea as long as this weights a lot in spam filters. This by itself is not enough to trigger spam filters, but the “free” and “success” words appearing several times in the text should probably be. The use of uppercase words in several parts of the text counts too.

Going into more technical details, the return path declared email is in the domain acambiode.es wich has two email servers registered as valid ones for handling that domain:

• relay.grupointercom.com
• mail.grupointercom.com

But the email was sent using a different email called push4.grupointercom.com so a lot of server filters that check for a valid originating address will flag this email as using a faked sender and prevent it to go to the users inbox.

This phrase can be applied  in many moments of our professional and personal live. It will be useful when you write a newsletter too :-)

When you write a newsletter try to minimize what you want say. Arouse your readers curiosity in a headline, summarize what you want to say in three lines and show a link, a "click here" or a "more info":  the recipient will increase the information "on demand". You must avoid a feeling of saturation that make delete the e-mail.

Another advantage if you let the information "hiding" below a link is that you will know exactly who is interested in what, becouse your software will tell you who has clicked in what link.  This information is vital for future offers to specific target. 

Take care of this and tou will improve the composition of your newsletters. It will be more attractive with less text and the value of each communicated will increase for you.

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  ;-)

Nowadays, there are companies wich think that corporate communication means the diffusion of its image through a letter and envelope  with its logo. This anachronistic thought is a big mistake.

You should not forget that "everything communicates" and "it is impossible not to communicate". Any organization  must show a coherent image in any corporate appearance. Don´t trust it to chance. This includes the presence in different traditional and  emerging technologies media.

Sometimes we neglect something as basic as our website. Our web must provide all the information about our company and must be our "visiting card" for all users too. Not just "copy" and "paste" the content of our dossier Coporate. We need to give them it in an attractive way appropriate to our image.

The same happen with our e-communications, such as newsletters and e-mail marketing campaigns. They are a very good vehicle to spread our corporate image. We recommend a content of interest to our target and an esthetic that identifies it with the organization they belong.

Although  an insipid contents is the worst way to make our electronic communications, an unpleasant image can overshadow the most interesting information. We recommend you to take care of things such as your email and newsletters templates  to be pleasing to the recipients and strengthen interest in the contents.

The Interactive Advertising Bureau can help us making  a sucessful e-mail marketing campaigns. You can find at www.iab.net a lot of resources about the best practises in e-mail marketing.

Glossaries, legal terms, metrics, audiences measurement, case studies... All kind of data that can update your knowledge. You will refresh your information and be more creative in your communications.

We propose you to visit the website and get some ideas for your e-mail marketing campaigns.

Enjoy!

Although  an e-mail marketing campaign  seems something as simple as a bulk sending,  is more than this.  The fact is that a good communication in this area must have a solid starting point based in the planning.  Their success and, consequently, the achievement of objectives will depend on  the proper planning and its implementation.

The first step of the planning is setting goals. We have to decide what needs must  be covered in the short, medium and long term. 

We must bear in mind that any action has be done  in due course, so we must mark a calendar that reflects each part of the communication process.

So we can not let any stage at random. We have to avoid improvisations 

Another point to plan an e-mail marketing campaign  is the target definition as explicit as possible. We must anlyze the conditions and features  of potencial market.

Although the planning of an e-mail marketing campaign has to be defined from the moment of its creation, we must not be rigid. We have to see every stage  to detect and correct deviations.

We have to adapt the e-mail marketing campaign to the response of our audience.

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 :-)

Although I do not like "catechisms" about marketing or any other subject, sometimes they are necessary to recapitulate interesting thinkings and refresh your memory. You must keep in mind what  people say in your sector.

Current trend for successful business is the orientation to the customer. Marketing has to rethink itself to get to the point. Now, corporate communication must be organized on terms such as:

1. Inbound. Customer approach exceeds product approach
2. Initiative. Customer decides when and how contact us.
3. Customers identification. We need to articulate new mechanisms to select customers
4. Customers Intelligence. We must develop tools to get knowledge about customers and guide our product towards them.
5. Interactivity. We must maintain a constant interaction with the customer through any channel.
6.  Marketing and product / service customized.
7. Investment. Treating the customer as an asset whose profitability will return in the medium-term or long- term.
8. Identifying new business opportunities, such as cross-selling or creating new product lines
9. Retention rates. Give the customer a differential value (individualized treatment, personalization service ...)
10. Impact on the income statement. The cost of achieving a customer is more than maintain one .

The e-mail marketing becomes the perfect tool to help you in the change towards a customer orientation. Do not discards it as a piece in your corporate communication strategy.