In the aftermath of September 11, my email inbox was flooded with expressions of sympathy for the victims and their families. After the thirtieth, or maybe the fortieth, message in under a week, I began to wonder what purpose those emails served.

Don’t get me wrong - I cried buckets as I sat glued to my television set more horrified than I thought possible. Those acts of terrorism, so close to home, shocked me to the core. It was personal. It was terrifying. It changed my world forever.

But I can’t help wondering why so many email marketers felt required them to publish a special bulletin of condolence, regardless of the nature of their regular mailings.

Read More…

Suddenly, everyone I know has a blog. Mostly, they talk about their day, their dog, their job and their friends. A few have blogs devoted to a specific topic - a hobby or their area of professional expertise. And all are enjoying the freedom of self-publication.

It reminds me of the early days of the web - anyone could be a publisher. There weren’t standards or benchmarks, we just sorta made it up as we went along. Back then, being an expert meant using synergy at least twice in every three sentences and making up cool new multi-syllabic words. Talking to a web expert in those days involved more confusion than communication.

At least we’re over that false arrogance now. And that’s what makes me so excited at the prospect of blogging. It isn’t (yet) a commercialized medium. Graphics, audio, video and html markup code are relatively absent. People just write what they think. Or hear. Or see.

Read More…

YOUR WEBSITE AS A CUSTOMER SERVICE AND SUPPORT TOOL

I’m an Irish lass, through and through. Born on the Blarney Stone. Really - I’m almost never speechless. Except lately.

These days, it seems that every time I venture forth to beg for customer service, I end up caught in a web of automated answering systems that force me to listen endlessly to menus and pre-recorded messages, telephone service representatives that don’t actually work for the company I’m calling and no authority to solve my problem. This experience has usually been preceded by a frustrating visit to a website that didn’t have the information I needed.

AND THIS HAS “WHAT” TO DO WITH MARKETING?

Everything!

Read More…

CANADIANS CAN’T LIVE WITHOUT EMAIL
At least, not according to a recent study released by Ipsos-Reid. 88% of all Canadians check their email several times each week, 62% on a daily basis. “Email has fundamentally changed the way we communicate with people, and has become an essential [ communication]tool,” says Steve Mossop, a Senior Vice-President with Ipsos-Reid in Vancouver.

Marketers need to remember that Canadians also view their inbox as a private space. With email marketing, you have only one chance to…

GET IT RIGHT
You have the list. You have the offer. You have killer creative. You can’t lose - right? Wrong. None of this matters in the least if no one even bothers to open your email. So what do you do?

Here are some simple tips to help make sure your message doesn’t end up in the dreaded Deleted Items folder.

Read More…

According to the September Email Trend Report issued by DoubleClick, 12.6% of all email messages bounce. As an email marketer, you need to understand the basics of bouncing - when to take action and what action to take. Make sure that your email service provider is capable of handling both hard and soft bounces accurately.

A soft bounce occurs when the mail server recognizes the email address but is unable to deliver the message. Soft bounces are usually temporary problems - for example the mailbox has reached its quote or the mail server is not responding - and don’t require any action on your part except to keep trying.

A hard bounce occurs when the problem is permanent. It may mean that the user name is not recognized or that the mail server no longer exists. These are problems that won’t go away and you should remove the name from your list immediately.

When evaluating an email delivery service or software, make sure that the bounce management procedures accommodate both hard and soft bounces, and that the process is consistent with your own strategy for managing the cleanliness of your list.

Read More…