EMail Marketing

Jimwwwww,

We use email marketing as one of our primary ways of marketing to our existing members. We've found the monthly events are a great way to build a profiled database, and then following up with email communications every 2-4 weeks helps maintain those relationships. One blast to our email database helped us sell over 100 tickets to the Holiday event in less than 24 hours (last Friday)... so for me, yes, email marketing works WELL

Generally the only advertising we do is of a digital nature. We implement email marketing as a large percentage of that. It''s cost effective, direct and our lists are only opt-in so it's reach is pretty good too. We can also track the response better than with traditional advertising.

Email broadcasting is a huge help to us, especially for bringing our hits up on our website. We email the people that download our demo software from our site a few months later, just to give them a little push towards actually purchasing [;)]. Our software has email broadcasting capabilities, so it's a perfect chance to give them an example of what we can really do!

What tool do you use for your e-mail marketing?

I know a lot of people make the mistake of using a blind carbon copy that is usually blocked by most companies e-mail servers. The most effective e-mail marketing we have done is to send out just a small one line sentance in the form of a question. It would be something like, "We have are having a special on corporate e-learning sites, is this something you are interested in?" and we find that this doesn't look like marketing but when sent out to your clients you would be supprised the responses you get.

How about you, any tips? Should you use graphics? HTML?

HTML all the way. BCentral.com for small busines.... big business should talk to comapnies like Forgemarketing.com ....

Short, sweet, to the point. Personalized. Relevant. Ok, time for bed

When we send out an email campaign, we use HTML as well. I find that if I make it look quite similar to our website in a newsletter type format, people recognise it as more relevent that regular advertising and the response is higher.

We have a program called E2 at http://www.equat.com/custom/marketing_list_acquisition.html and it is quite unique and very powerful, I really do not mean to plug equat but if you are looking around it is definatly worth checking out... not cheap but profoundly effective and the plethora of options makes it a breeeze!

After hearing a lot people talk about how much they dislike spam, do you ever feel that e-mail marketing has a negative effect?

sure spam has negative implications and all that but the truth of the matter is that it works very well for those people who know how to use it effectively.

Until technology is dramatically improved to properly cut off spam at the source, it creates a dilemma where people think that if they don't spam they will lose out because everyone else is doing it. I'm tired of people saying that spam doesn't work because it does work very well. Why else would spammers keep on spamming so much if it didn't work? You'd think that they would catch on after like a few years or something. well they aren't dumb. they are making money at your expense.

permission email marketing is negatively effected by spam, but well targetted and personalized opt-in email messages have amazing results that can be 10 times more cost effective than traditional marketing efforts like direct mail.

I'll let you in on a little secret. I have been carefully spamming for a few years now and made a lot of money in the process. Am I bad? I think I'm more of a survivor than a criminal. If everyone else is doing it why shouldn't I do it as well?

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On 12/20/2002 5:09:20 PM

After hearing a lot people talk about how much they dislike spam, do you ever feel that e-mail marketing has a negative effect?
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Email marketing works very well for companies who do it properly. The key to success is not only permission, but relevance. Take the time to get to know the what kind of information your audience is interested in receiving and send them nothing else.

You are correct in that Spam has become a huge annoyance. As an outsource solutions for email marketers, we work with our clients to ensure their requested communications make it through Spam filters. Many of the filters out there have been programmed to trash more than just Spam messages unfortunately.

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On 12/5/2002 8:16:16 PM

What tool do you use for your e-mail marketing?

I know a lot of people make the mistake of using a blind carbon copy that is usually blocked by most companies e-mail servers. The most effective e-mail marketing we have done is to send out just a small one line sentance in the form of a question. It would be something like, "We have are having a special on corporate e-learning sites, is this something you are interested in?" and we find that this doesn't look like marketing but when sent out to your clients you would be supprised the responses you get.

How about you, any tips? Should you use graphics? HTML?
----------------

Html is much more effective in most instances! I recommend using an email deployment engine that makes use of MIME Technology. This way, your Html message will automatically be converted to text or AOL should you reach such email browsers.[;)]

Ive been using e-mail marketing since 1998 and it's a great way of promoting something as well as just to get a name of a company into someone's head. For example, HiGo. I've received over 50 e-mails from them in the last 3 years and I still do not know what they are trying to sell for I've never read the e-mail obdy, but seem the SUBJECT line 50 times and so I know they are called HiGo. And so if I was in a store or somewhere and I saw their name, I'd check them out!

Wierd how mind control works right? LOL

Any kind of marketing scheme works if it's targeting the right audience, even spams. I agree with a lot of what's been said already. I have never really bought anything because of an e-mail, but that's just 'cause I wouldn't be buying viagra, online porn or university degrees anyway. But if someone sends me advertising on a good deal for a laser printer, for example, I don't see why I wouldn't consider it. (I wanna buy a laser printer in the near future)

I'm just curious from a legal stand point... I consider spams as unsolicited, "mass" e-mails. What if I send an unsolicited e-mail advertisement to just one person. Is that still spam?

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On 2/5/2003 1:23:13 AM

Any kind of marketing scheme works if it's targeting the right audience, even spams. I agree with a lot of what's been said already. I have never really bought anything because of an e-mail, but that's just 'cause I wouldn't be buying viagra, online porn or university degrees anyway. But if someone sends me advertising on a good deal for a laser printer, for example, I don't see why I wouldn't consider it. (I wanna buy a laser printer in the near future)

I'm just curious from a legal stand point... I consider spams as unsolicited, "mass" e-mails. What if I send an unsolicited e-mail advertisement to just one person. Is that still spam?
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To that one person it would be....although whether one person gets it, or many, I would consider it spam just the same. to one person it would be called "mini spaming".[;)]

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On 12/2/2002 12:23:21 PM

Just wondering how many of you use email as a marketing tool in your business. Have you used it to take over the communication and sales process to facilitate accountibility and reduce paper costs?

Are you using it to market back to existing customers and potential ones?


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I use email as part of my "IR" (investor relations). But considering that the company I am with is a "Internet based loyalty card program provider", I would think that the two are somewhat related?

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On 12/20/2002 5:09:20 PM

After hearing a lot people talk about how much they dislike spam, do you ever feel that e-mail marketing has a negative effect?
----------------

Just my thoughts....

Any marketing, if not researched enough, or if not presented properly, or if directed to the wrong audience,can/will be negative. You never know what you've got until you start getting the results.

I feel that proper Market Research among other things...has a lot to do with the positive or negative results one may receive. One needs to know what exactly is the message that they are sending. How would you feel about it from the other end?

One would possible want to put themselves into the "email marketing receivers" shoes and try it from that view.[;)]

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On 12/27/2002 11:21:29 AM

Ive been using e-mail marketing since 1998 and it's a great way of promoting something as well as just to get a name of a company into someone's head. For example, HiGo. I've received over 50 e-mails from them in the last 3 years and I still do not know what they are trying to sell for I've never read the e-mail obdy, but seem the SUBJECT line 50 times and so I know they are called HiGo. And so if I was in a store or somewhere and I saw their name, I'd check them out!

Wierd how mind control works right? LOL
----------------

They say that it takes at least three (3) "gross impressions" of a product/service for a consumer just to remember a name. We are so bombarded with advertising that people tend to shut their minds down to avoid, or filter any/all advertising. But I do think that if one combines "good humour" as a "hook" with their advertising, it will entice viewers/listners etc. to pay more attention, and get more than a name out of it. We all love a joke....most of us anyway.[;)]

Email Marketing is important although suffering somewhat from all the darn spammers out there.

We use a program called PromaSoft. Though it has its limitations, it is excellent program for small business. We are in the process of looking for something a bit more robust.

Some advice:
- Plan your email blast - take in to account what SPAM filters will catch. Even legit email gets caught. Those buggers!

- Send to opt-in only, even double opt-in if your solution allows it. Anti-SPAM laws are getting tougher and you don't want to be black-listed either.

- Have good dialogue with your ISP to make sure you are doing everything right. Some ISP limit the amount of emails you send out in a day - depends on your ISP solution.

- The general rule is to send an email blast early in the day, and on Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday. Monday people are bombarded with email from the weekend, and noone wants extra email on a Friday when all they are thinking about is the weekend.

- Leads can be gathered from anywhere - tradeshows, conferences, general contacts, etc. as long as they understand they will be receiving company information from you. Legitimate targeted lists can be purchased - it all depends on your budget.

email marketing is just a nice word for spam. yea yea i know it's not spam if you buy the list or they sign up for it. Bull cookies. It is still spam and if you send it to me that it snap ill go nuts.

hey sebastianb don't get me on a blacklist alright :)
Not nice to do that to your host :)

Email marketing is an effective marketing tool if it is targeted to a specific target group. The successful ones use it to cultivate customer relationship. To run a successful campaign, your target group should be opt-in and willing to receive your emails. See articles below from Nua Internet marketing surveys on why email marketing is effective.

'Email marketing encourages online purchases'
http://www.nua.ie/surveys/index.cgi?f=VS&art_id=905358505&rel=true

'Good email marketing wins over consumers'
http://www.nua.ie/surveys/index.cgi?f=VS&art_id=905358457&rel=true


However email marketing is just one of many tools available for successful online marketing.

By the way, if you need to know more, there is an Internet Marketing Seminar event coming to Vancouver, Canada. More information :
http://tinyurl.com/8mw2

From the site, it mentioned that you would learn successful online strategies from top Internet Marketing experts, whom are currently making 5-figures every single month online.

They will reveal to you everything you need
to create your own successful online business.
http://tinyurl.com/8mw2

My latest intiative is having huge financial rewards. Spam Does work. You won't believe how many units we've shipped in the past 48 hours.

What we sent out:
Get the Iraqi 'Most-Wanted' Deck of Playing Cards Only $5.95 a Set! You've seen these cards on the nightly news. They've been featured in newspapers worldwide. Now you can own the one true collector's item from Operation Iraqi Freedom. This is the same 55-card deck given to Coalition soldiers featuring the Iraq's 52 "Most-Wanted" leaders.

This went to around 92,000,000 names so far. A 9% open rate, around a 2% click rate, then a .09% purchase rate and you are looking at around 1490 sales made in 48 hours. Around 4 dollars in margin means $6k US profit in two days and sales keep coming in as I type this. I'm tired of people telling me that spam doesn't work. Face it folks you are wrong.

I was reading in the National post yesterday that three internet heavy weights, Yahoo, AOL, and Google (did I get these right), will be collaborating to help stop spam. It is great to see competitors working together for the benefit of the whole industry.

Steve. I don't think people are saying that spam doesn't work at making you money. If you factor in the negative externalities you are basically hurting others for your personal benefit. Is that how you want to be known / remembered? Perhaps you can put you knowledge to good use and provide some positive change for this world instead.

I think we can all agree mass email to people who have not specifically opted-in is unethical. That said, if you can stomach the stigma, there is money to be made in spam. Here are two articles I recently encountered on /. on spam:

http://yro.slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=03/05/11/1648253&mode=thread&tid=126&tid=111

and

http://slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=02/11/22/1658256&mode=thread

You're probably all familiar with the latter story of spamming millionaire Alan Ralsky. In a fantastic illustration of poetic justice, the folks at Slashdot signed Mr. Ralsky up for every snail-mail promotion they could find. Hilarity ensued as Mr. Ralsky received (literally, apparently) tons of mail to his front door.

Interestingly, most spammers don't actually offer a product, they're only interested in mining more email addresses. This article (http://www.wired.com/news/infostructure/0,1377,57613,00.html) in Wired illustrates this point:

'[Only] seventeen percent of the replies to requests for more information gave rise to what appeared to be "legitimate" offers: people with a real product to sell who were actually interested in selling it.'

I think we may be turning the corner on the spam nightmare. My spam-killing software is running about 95-98% effective, with very few false positives. Jon Udell was recently seeing some execellent results as well: http://weblog.infoworld.com/udell/2003/05/12.html#a686.

Cheers. DB.

http://www.darrenbarefoot.com
Words. Words. Words.

From the REALTIME BLACKHOLE LIST
http://mail-abuse.org/rbl/candidacy.html

Blackholing Due to Spam Origination
Recently, legitimate and respected businesses have stumbled into the spamming business. It is even more important to address UBE from the Fortune 500 than it is to challenge UBE promoting multi-level marketing schemes.

When well-respected companies begin using UBE as part of their direct marketing campaigns, it is almost always the result of the mistaken attempt to apply direct mail and telephone marketing principles to e-mail. MAPSSM is a fervent advocate of the commercial use of e-mail, but we also insist that such use begins from the principle that all communications must be consensual.

In practice, this means that businesses should never presume to shift the costs of their advertising onto their customers until they have been given explicit permission to do so. Would any respectable marketer even dream of using collect phone calls or postage due mailings to reach potential customers?

Marketers wishing to use e-mail should consider the foregoing question carefully when preparing their campaigns. Advertising based on permission marketing principles have proven to be extremely successful. Opt-in is a win-win strategy for both marketers and consumers.

On the other hand, marketers who wish to insist on a so-called opt-out strategy -- in which they take it upon themselves to send as much promotional material as they want to someone's e-mailbox until asked to stop -- are eligible for listing on the RBLSM The opt-out approach violates our fundamental principle: all communications must be consensual.

This fundamental principle is sometimes violated by mailing lists with inadequate confirmation or verification steps. Mailing lists lacking a subscription confirmation step can be used to send unsolicited mass e-mail to unwilling recipients. A mailing list should include only those who have explicitly indicated an interest in receiving messages from the list.

Prudent mailing list management mandates verification of all subscription requests before mailings commence. Many well-meaning list managers have found themselves in the spamming business when they don't confirm subscriptions. Please review Basic Mailing List Management Principles for Preventing Abuse for additional expectations and best current practices regarding proper mailing list management.

Another article that describes the (unfortunate) success of spam campaigns from Wired News.
http://www.wired.com/news/business/0,1367,59907,00.html

quote: pbmoore
"In practice, this means that businesses should never presume to shift the costs of their advertising onto their customers until they have been given explicit permission to do so. Would any respectable marketer even dream of using collect phone calls or postage due mailings to reach potential customers?"


Recieving an email is not like recieving a collect phone call. You are just saying that if I want my email then its like a collect call that I don't mind... if I don't want then it is like a collect call I do mind....

How is it the case that I can't just compare spamming to telemarketing. If my brokerage buys leads off of a telemarketing company then I've avoid all the improprieties of "advertising" and I am just going after people that want my product.

I would rather not have to see my city spangled with advertisments. How is that any different from sending me spam? It's ugly in mass quantities, its inconvenient, sure but that isn't the nature of spam. If there is a good cheap product or service out there that would convenience me, I want to know about it. How can I say though that for everything that I don't want people should know better than to assume that I want it and inconvenience me by marketing it to me. Doesn't this point of view seem a little arbitrary??

pfunk: "Recieving an email is not like recieving a collect phone call. You are just saying that if I want my email then its like a collect call that I don't mind... if I don't want then it is like a collect call I do mind...."

spam emails cost my company thousands of dollars a year. We have 400 employees and we pay alot for our IT people and equipment. Completely wasted on spam.

Right on the money Basil...

Unless you are a sys admin or the like, and deal with spam on a daily basis, you will never appreciate how much of a pain in the ass it is. We filter 6000 or so messages per month. All of them complete waste of bandwidth. I personally blacklisted 5-10 domains per week. I spend a least 2-3 hours a day on this. So...do you still think spam is just a minor inconvienience?

Microsoft is suing 15 of the worst spammers in the US as we speak. The suit alleges MILLIONS of dollars in lost revenue due to the man hours spent combatting spammers. If MS wins that suit, you will see a lot less spam out there. (from the US at least).

I guess if you like porn, or Viagra, or need a "Low Rate Mortgage"...then you may like getting spam too!

G.

I haven't read the first page or many of the links provided so please excuse me if this has been asked but:

When we click on unsubscribe and then enter our email addy and hit remove then does it really remove us or have we just subscribed to many more lists ......

Thanks
Sandman9

NEVER click "unsubscribe" or enter your email anywhere. All you are doing is telling the spammer that they were successful in reaching you, and you probably read the message they sent. You could also very well be giving your address away to some mailing list.

G.

I have also seen these sites use your information to sign you up for casino's and other stuff to get money as affiliates.

I will repeat what was said.

NEVER click unsubscribe.

Instead notify your network admin or hosting company. Most of them have the tools necessary to ensure you don't get spam from that particular person again.

it doesn't matter if you click unsubscribe or not. Most spam messages send out have tracking codes built into them so they know who opens which emails. As someone mentioned in this thread, spammers make a lot of money on building and refining their lists over time. They can find out your viewing behaviours (open rates, click through rates etc.) without them telling them who you are. They already know...

The "unsubscribe here" links are meant to make you less likely to report them as spammers that is all. In the past before the intelligent tracking they would harvest those unsubscribe lists and resell them for more (as they are confirmed as legitimate emails)... that doesn't matter any more.

When you are deleting spam messages in the morning be sure not to preview any of the messages that come in. Everytime you preview them, you send a message back to the spammer saying "yes I'm here". Just use CNTROL + CLICK to highlight them all, then DELETE.

Cheers!
mike

These spammers are disgustipating. I didnt know that even freakin previewing a spam would let them know who I am...

Wouldnt my email program have to send them some sort of confirmation message though? I'm sure the network at work has some sort of block... or could get one...

The technology isn't very hard you just send a 1 x 1 transparent image.

You call it something like spam.gif

Then you assign a unique id to that email.

When you send it out you ensure that the spam.gif?id=333d03S02 is sent and then you can track from your logs if they viewed the image.

How do you stop this? use a text email program, delete them before previewing them, buy a spam filter software or demand that your hosting company provide you with one.

Man, insidious. Would preventing my outlook from loading images stop them from seeing that I opened the email? Is there a way to do this? I never really want to see them anyways.

Also there's "companies" out there who compile lists and sell them to telemarketing firms ..... these lists start at 3-5 thousand dollars a list.

I think spy ware's a big contributor to this aswell. It's funny how no one wants to have spyware in their comp's but they insist on having Kazaa!!?!?!

Sandman9

Well, since Kazaa doesn't sell anything, I don't feel guilty about using Kazaa Lite or K++. Kazaa Lite is a hacked no ad/spy ware version of Kazaa, and K++ is a version of Kazaa Lite that will get you to the highest participation level. There are also quite a few good spyware and adware detectors out there... netzero is one I have heard good things about. There are also firewalls that will analyse any packets going out of your computer thereby letting you know when an application is trying to communicate your doings to some server somewhere.

So your saying that unlike kazaa you can take the spyware out of kazaa lite and it will still work?

Do you have a link where I can download this? Also I'm a bit confused as to what you mean by K++ ..... is this a different program all together or do you install it along side kazaa etc ....

That info would be much appreciated
Thanks
Sandman9

When you install the regular Kazaa, it puts all the adware and spyware onto your system and that stuff doesn't deinstall when you dump Kazaa. The idea is to dump kazaa, purge your system of adware, and then to reinstall the clean version of Kazaa.

What you have to do is uninstall Kazaa, get some freeware or trial version of an adware remover to remove all Kazaa's junkware, and then download Kazaa lite or K++ (http://www.k-lite.tk/ is the site I got it from, but I think it's freeware).

I don't have any good links for removing adware and I don't have much time to look (I'm dashing this off while working) so if someone else has something they suggest, please post it.

thanks Basil

Sandman9

Speaking of spam... [;)]

re: the use of Mime technology or multipart emails (html for some, text to others).

How do you test if your email can be viewed by people with only text email readers?

I use Outlook but I can't turn off html for incoming messages. (only outgoing)

Is there another email client that lets you view text only?

Yes, Email Sentinel Pro, I use it for converting incoming emails to plain text. It works with Outlook, Outlook Express and with any POP3 email account. I saw it on TechTV.

See http://www.emailaddressmanager.com/email_sentinel.html

Depending on the field and target audience we have found that direct person to person marketing is by far the most effective, efficient and profitable. Most experts agree that closing a sale depends in majority on establishing a personal rapport/relationship even if the interaction only lasts 30 seconds.

i.e. you can actually discern a warm smile on the other hand of the telephone line, and we could not overemphasise the importance of body language during face to face marketing.

Email reaches millions but proportionaly, direct marketing is more profitable.

In terms of existting custoimers, again personal visits are the most effective means or at least a phone call.

speaking of email marketing, we just launched our new http://forms.techvibes.com product last month. Sign up for a 14 day free trial and check it out. You can build powerful database driven forums, capture data, send personalized email blasts... the coolest part is the tracking features where you can not just see how many people opened and clicked, but actually WHO clicked on what... You can send out in text & HTML at the same time so only the best version is seen by the user (based on what they accept).

I am finding a major decline in CTR industry wide over the past 12 months though... and I think a lot of that is related to improved spam filters, and the MS Outlook 2003 that doesn't allow downloading of photos unless you right click accept each time.

It is getting much harder to reach people online with email... in 5 years you'll probably need to have a authorization form for each member with the government doing random spot checks on people blasting out - with heavy penalties without permission...

To me the best success in email marketing is in relevant content. I'm a Print Broker and Graphic Designer so I am always trying to give ideas on how they can target their audence better, ways to advertise on a tight budget, secrets to advertise with the appropriate colors for their audience etc.

I usually use a SMALL - SMALL section to advertise a current special, otherwise they wont want to read my next email. To me its all about valuable content. When they are ready to buy they will remember me.

Oh, and I always use "Opt In" emails, and usually get my list through face-to-face networking.

Watch those HTML tags in email marketing - most of the anti-spam solutions provide for auto junking of HTML emails.

Here is a simple, good article from www.score.org regarding e-mail marketing (which you can find posted at my Message Board at www.giftedwriting.com):

http://www.magnetmail.net/actions/email_web_version.cfm?recipient_id=7898172&message_id=64651&user_id=SCORE

Cordially,
Nina M. Sherwood
www.giftedwriting.com
www.websitewrite.com

nice link.

thanks

I use it quite often. As an Account executive i need to get in touch with as many people as i can and as fast as possible

We have been buildign a data base since we opened our store www.theeverydaygourmet.ca
We have only sent out emails to those that requested our news letter. To date it is working quite well, we do not mass market, but treat it as more of a personal service.

Hi Mike..I just wanted to let you know that I enjoyed your presentation today at the show. I had a chance to have a chat with you at the end of your presentation about my site and we are the company that does Content Management Solutions and my web site is www.snaptech.ca. You mentioned that you would make available the power point presentation but I was not able to find it. Once you have a chance to catch your breath could you please email it to octavio@snaptech.ca.

Thank you very much!!

I use it all the time! Most of my pre-meeting correspondence is done via email! It's a great way to keep in touch with customer's without inturrupting their busy day... People have the opportunity to reply to you when they have the time. [:)]

As they say... It is all about pitching/selling the right product to the right customer at the right place at the right time.

Analysis based email marketing can really help because that is personalised and the communication is more collaborated on the basis of customer intelligence.

Well to tell U:
CRM is not just customer interaction but it is but customer interaction with customer intelligence.

e.g. if an email is sent to a male promoting a lipstick, I am sure it will not help until he is married. It will be annoying to the customer and waste of money as well. But if one knows these things, then it becomes easy and we land up sending less and valuable mails.

I hope it does add value to the conversation.

Contact me for more details.
best,
Shaily

Hello,

I use email all the time for business. I do a lot of gift consulting with potential clients, from all over the world, through email, before we decide to talk over the telephone, to finalize a corporate or personal order. I send customers receipts through email, when they choose to checkout over the telephone, instead of on my website. I send them photos of different items that I am proposing to them to use in their completed gift baskets, and I send them pictures of their Build Your Own Gift baskets after they have shipped to their recipients.

I find wholesale vendors through the internet, and then I use email to ask them for their wholesale policies and procedures, catalogs, etc., too.

About three times a year I will send out an email telling everyone of my customers, or potential customers that we are having a sale, but otherwise, I just do all of my other business through email that I mentioned above.

I think you asked if we do it to save paper, and cut down on cost. I don't do it to save paper. I do it, to save time, and to not have to go to someone's office and have a meeting. We can have the meeting through email, instead, and/or over the phone. I, also, send receipts through email, because it takes more time to print up the receipt, fold it, address an envelope, put the receipt into the envelope, put a stamp on it, and then remember to put it in the mail. So, I use the email for business to save time, and remember time is money. [:)]

One of the best tools I have found to send newsletters and market an opt-in list is an Open Source application called PHPList.

Not very many companies or organizations are familiar with Open Source, but it is a very valuable resource to save on overpriced software that can be licensed for free.

You can find out more information on our website which outlines some of the most important features here.

I do use Email Marketing - including autoresponders and followup messages. It really is the easiest way to get customers to give you more of their money. Ok, I might be a bit one-sided - I wrote a book about it:

www.EmailMarketingMadeEasy.com

here are some interesting stats I just got from my autoresponder service: (check out how many people still prefer text messages)

-- Real World Newsletter Statistics:

12,561 subscribers in an average customer opt-in newsletter list.


4 minutes and 24 seconds is the average amount of time between when a
customer queues a newsletter and when AWeber completes delivery.


94% of newsletter broadcasts are finished sending within 5 minutes of
when they are scheduled.


98.4% of newsletter broadcasts are finished sending within 30 minutes
of when they are scheduled.


99.34% of all email was delivered successfully in the last 30 days.


0.66% of all email was undeliverable in the last 30 days. (mailbox
closed, non-existent user, etc.)


Average open rate of HTML and Text/HTML newsletters is 29.7% over the
past 30 days.


Sunday generates the highest average open rate of 41.1%, followed by
Saturday at 36.7% for newsletter sent date.

Average Open Rate by Sent Date: (higher is better)

Sunday 41.1%
Saturday 36.7%
Wednesday 34.0%
Friday 32.8%
Tuesday 29.6%
Thursday 24.6%
Monday 23.2%


Sunday generates the fewest undeliverable bounces at 0.36% for
newsletters sent on that date.

Average Undeliverable Rate by Sent Date: (lower is better)

Sunday 0.36%
Saturday 0.45%
Friday 0.47%
Thursday 0.56%
Wednesday 0.77%
Tuesday 0.83%
Monday 0.88%


Monday is the most popular day of the week for customers to send
their newsletters with 17.1% of newsletters being sent.

Percent of newsletters being sent by customers weekly:

Monday 17.1%
Tuesday 17.0%
Thursday 16.2%
Wednesday 15.8%
Friday 14.5%
Saturday 10.3%
Sunday 9.0%


An 8:00 AM EST send time generates the highest open rate of 50.6%.
Interestingly sending at 9:00 AM EST has a significantly lower open
rate of 33.7% with the worst time to send being 3-4 AM at only 19%
open rate.


Plain text messages are the most popular format of sending newsletters
with 65.9% of all newsletters sent. Mime format Text/HTML messages
follow at 23.8% and a remaining 10.2% of customers still send HTML
only messages even though it is strongly recommended to always include
a plain text version.


Plain text messages generate the fewest undeliverable bounces at
0.46%. Mime format Text/HTML follows at 0.56% and HTML only messages
have a whopping 1.09% undeliverable rate. This is a significant reason
behind our recommendation to always send a plain text alternative with
HTML formatted messages.


Subject line personalization using the date generated an average open
rate of 51.4% compared to personalization using the subscriber's first
name generating 40.9% open rate. Newsletters sent without
personalization of any type in the subject line generated average open
rates of 28.9%.


17% of customer newsletter subject lines sent in the last 30 days
contained date personalization while 19% used the subscriber's first
name. 56.3% of subject lines did not contain any type of
personalization. Interestingly, using the subscriber's full name or
last name generated lower average open rates at 20%.

Hi All, first post here.

Everyone seems to mention that email is an effective marketing tool, however, I assume that you are all comparing that to it's cost? Sure when you think that your email marketing is FREE then yeah, it is effective. However, we have found that our email marketing is only effective when followed up with a phone call. We only email our existing clients, in order to bring certain specials or promotions to their attention. If we just send out an email, we find that the reponse is rather light, however, once we call the customer, the response goes through the roof.

Is it possible that people are becoming acustomed to tuning out email ads, unless they are specifically looking for them?

Does anyone know of any research done on this, and does anyone have any suggestions on how we can improve the reception and response to our emails?

Thanks,
Phil

Hi Phil,

> We only email our existing clients, in order to bring certain specials or promotions to their attention.

I always recommend my clients to package the specials into an information-based email.

I've also found that email is effective with commodities, but hard to sell premium services. Most CEOs don't read email with due attention (or the gatekeeper filters the email out). I prefer direct mail to reach top dogs.

> If we just send out an email, we find that the reponse is rather light,

I've found that too with clients. When they become so predictable that they send out only offers they get low response. Most people expect valuable information not more pitches. So, we send out valuable information that educates but doesn't try to sell. People read the stuff, realise the mistakes they're making and hire the client.

Thoughts?

Cheers

Tom





Is it possible that people are becoming acustomed to tuning out email ads, unless they are specifically looking for them?

Does anyone know of any research done on this, and does anyone have any suggestions on how we can improve the reception and response to our emails?

Thanks,
Phil

You should use HTML nowadays. Most people allow Javascript / HTML in their emails now. In the past, you would have to worry about people disabling these features for fear of viruses, trojans, etc. Of course, there are still people who do this and it's also a good idea to put a "if you do not see this page, click here" somewhere on the page.

What you should not do is send an attachments. There are companies that automatically send emails with attachments to the delete bin. The company where I work at detects attachments and sends emails with zip, jpg, html, etc to the delete bin.

Also, don't send your email from the same mail server as your company's mail server. Recipients can also configure their mail server to delete emails coming from certain domains / IP addresses. They treat it as spam.

I would agree, email marketing is spam.

The only way it isn't is if you are composing a fully personalized mail and adding a (fully relational, desired) little blurb on the bottom of it for one of your new products etc. or a link to your website advert. And DEFINITELY not HTML or JAVA. << Horrible.

There is way too much advertising as it is. Companies should concentrate on better / more constructive & interesting advertising.

6S Marketing at www.6smarketing.com is a Vancouver based company that provides email marketing services that can integrate with CRM tools such as Salesforce.com

I've been doing email blasts for companies for years. I've had to come up with ways to accomodate everyone.

Basically I've been very succesfull with our campaigns and they continue to grow. In the past I've seen open rates of less than 5% but now, on a typical blast I get more than 20%.. My last one was over 50% open rate.

We blast only to folks who have subscribed - NO SPAM

We blast only information that is relavant. Changes to our site, changes to the user experience, important information for the client, promos etc.

We do not blast frequently. We cut down the number of blasts to a client as not to become a nuisance.

We track (very succesfully), open rates, where they've clicked back to our site "from", frequency of clicks etc....

I've had a pretty good experience with this. I believe the "nay-sayers" of email campaigns are using the SPAM arguement to convince people that this is not good.

True receiving SPAM is not good, but computers and emial aren't going anywhere.. People will continue to use email and other messaging mechanisms. So, this is here to stay..

It's up to responsible people to use this properly.

Cheers....

/W

well... indeed... it is much cheaper to use email marketing but then we have to be aware of the risks involved... that is the huge chance of our email to be directed as spam and either sent to the bulk mail or instantly deleted...

so long as the consent of the custoimer was obtained, there is no need to worry for the mail to become unsolicited in a way...

that's why we have to take precautions... you can check out EMAILREACH.com as this aids in the prevention of so-to-speak "lost" emails... [:)]

How many of you use email as a retention tool to keep existing customers..