Making Your Emails Look Like a Microsite

The friendlier the voice is, the lower entry barrier and higher buying chances. Subconsciously, we all want cool friends, right? What if the brands that we like are our friends as well?

Introduction

At mailfloss we’re focused on helping email marketers get the most from their email marketing campaigns. We do this in a few different ways. First, we help email marketers improve their deliverability through the use of our email verification tool. Secondly, we work hard to educate email marketers on the various topics relating to running a successful email marketing campaign.

Today, mailfloss had the opportunity to chat with Dave Simeonov from MailBakery about his involvement in the email design and email marketing space.

Without further ado, let’s jump into the interview.

The Interview

Hello and thank you for joining us today Dave. We really appreciate you taking the time to chat with our blog readers today about your 10 years of experience in the email design/marketing space. Let's kick off the interview by having you tell us what attracted you towards email in the first place? What draws you in about email marketing and design more than other marketing and design channels like content, social, or paid?

Hey, thanks for having me on your blog! I’m excited to do this interview so let’s get the ball rolling. My career started as a front-end developer back in 2008 when I was developing websites for two-three years until MailBakery came to life and needed more hands to code emails. I was curious why emails are mainly built with tables and how to make them work across the email clients. Back in the days, we did 5-6 screenshots by hand on most used email clients, while now we have an automated process which gets screenshots on 40 email clients in a few seconds. It always has been, and probably will be, all about testing, tinkering, and trying new stuff from mobile-responsive to interactive/kinetic emails.

You have an interesting blog post where you talk about trends to expect in 2020. You touched briefly on the intersection where user-generated content and email marketing meet. How have you seen user-generated content successfully integrated into an email campaign? Any leaders in this space we should be aware of?

Yeah, user-generated content (UGC) in emails is something that has been talked about for a while ago now. We've seen more and more companies adopt that strategy to enforce their brand loyalty and trust.

Including UGC in your emails increases the confidence and chances of your subscribers making a purchase. After all who doesn’t want to buy something that has been proven by other subscribers?

One of a few examples for UGC is having top-selling products in your email. After all, these product recommendations are generated on previous customer purchases.

Another example for UGC is having testimonials in your emails. Showcasing your prospective customers what it is like to have your products, is a great way to help prospects gain more courage to make a purchase.

In the age of social media, being on Facebook, Instagram, and Snapchat is a way to drive more sales. Your website alone, as a point of sale, is not enough.

Let's take Instagram for example. Many big brands use brand ambassadors or paid “influencers” on Instagram to use, showcase, or rate their products.

How do we use that in email? If you’re a brand that uses Instagram, look for followers that have tagged your product or service on the social platform. Then, use the images to create a visually appealing email campaign to showcase how some of your customers have used your brand.

You offer a wide range of email marketing services, but let's jump in and talk about some nitty gritty email campaign design details. You obviously believe in the importance of using email to create a first great brand impression. Can you tell us a little bit more about how you use email to create those great first impressions? From a design standpoint, what have you seen work? What have you seen fail?

Well, usually when we start to work with a client their emails are very plain and basic. They usually just place in their logo, add their brand colors, and use a very basic template from their ESP. And this is pretty normal because our clients are not developers - they are usually marketers or business owners. So they started from somewhere, with some very basic templates and at some point, they want to upgrade their game and make an impression with their emails.

What we do is we look deeply into our clients’ branding and review what they have done in the past in terms of email marketing. There’s usually a lot of room for improvement in terms of design.

For example, nowadays, websites are full-width. We see sections having background colors or images taking the whole width of our monitors. Old emails are usually boxed within a 600px container and are pretty boring. So we first look if their websites are using any modern design techniques and try to mimic them in the email. Also, does their website use icons or other graphic shapes that we can incorporate? Last but not least - do they use any custom fonts on their websites? Can we use that font in the emails (even on the small number of email clients that would support them)? These are all things we need to think about.

In the end, their emails kinda look like microsites, just shrunk down to the most relevant information needed for an effective email marketing campaign.

You mention on your blog that understanding mobile is increasingly important for email marketers. Why is this?

Absolutely. I can’t stress enough how important it is for your emails to work properly on mobile devices and to be easily clickable and readable.

With more than 40% of emails being opened on mobile devices, it's a must-have for brands to have mobile-optimized emails.

If not, it is very likely their email marketing efforts will fail (or underperform) due to undelivered, marked as spam, blocked, or unsubscribed emails.

With today's user attention span, we have no more than 2-3 seconds to impress the subscriber and stand out from the rest of the emails in their inbox. If your emails don't look right, you're definitely looking at lower success rates.

Can you tell us a little bit more about the intersection where design and mobile intersect? What are some of the biggest mistakes you see email marketers make when it comes to mobile delivery? What can marketers do to avoid making those mistakes?

I think one of the biggest mistakes marketers still continue to make is having the desktop layout of their email not optimized for mobile. Or, to put it in other words - no mobile layout. A four-column layout on a 600px email shrank down to 320px for a mobile device will never look good. Nobody wants to pinch and zoom-in on emails anymore. They will just close, delete or worst - unsubscribe from your emails.

We are often in a situation where we have to educate our customers about email design best practices. This is like our unofficial mission at MailBakery, not only to design and code emails but to educate our customers on how their emails can look and work better.

You mention on a blog post that "we must resist the temptation to bombard them (subscribers) with emails at every turn. Emails should be limited to weekly touches, maybe two if you have something really compelling to share." Why is email sending frequency such an important aspect of email marketing?

It’s very simple. If you flood subscribers’ inbox it’s very likely that you’ll get the opposite result of what you’re looking for.

I experienced this inbox bombardment myself a few years ago and I hated it so much. With my busy schedule, I rarely have time to look at all my emails and I had left them to fill my inbox until one weekend I went to check what’s going on.

One of my hobbies is electronic music production and I had stumbled on a site that offered a free e-book on a topic that was interesting to me. However, after downloading the content my inbox started to flood with their emails. I thought it would be just 2-3 emails after they realized I’m not interested, but I continued to receive 3-4 emails/week from them for many months.

My advice to email marketers is very simple - empathy. The inbox is personal and sensitive. Try imaging what it is being on the receiving end of the email. What’s their persona? Also, emails are more and more personalized; don’t send general emails like you receive brochures from the local markets.

In your experience, what are the three biggest mistakes businesses make with their email marketing campaigns?

1. Not having a strategy.
2. Not testing their emails.
3. Not analyzing the performance of their emails and applying improvements.

Over the years I've seen a lot of changes with how companies approach the "voice" or "tone" of their emails. There seems to be a trend towards a more conversational tone. Do you notice this as well? What companies do you believe are doing a great job in terms of the voice they use in their email marketing campaigns?

Yeah, absolutely. The friendlier the voice is the lower entry barrier and higher buying chances. Subconsciously, we all want cool friends, right? What if the brands that we like are our friends as well?

I think that with easy access to the Internet nowadays, companies are trying to be closer to their customers - starting from the social networks and going to being the cool guys in the emails.

There’s probably a lot more brands, but three pop up in my head immediately when you mention “voice” and “tone”. These would be Mailchimp, Really Good Emails, and Morning Brew.

To give you an example of how cool the RGE team was, you can see what they did with their terms of use page on their previous website version - it was called “Legal Mumbo Jumbo”. When was the last time you read the TOS of a website? It’s usually pretty boring and too official. Well, RGE really breaks the ice and makes you smile and laugh. Instead of quoting stuff from their legal mumbo jumbo page, I’ll let you enjoy it yourself. And if you don’t smile or laugh at least once I’ll buy you a drink.

In your opinion how important is personalization within the world of email marketing? What are the most important parts of the email to personalize (i.e name, content, interest, etc)?

I think it is as equally important as having the emails optimized for mobile devices.

There’s a minimum level of personalization where you could just include your subscriber’s name in the intro of your email and subject line.

You can then take it to the next level by offering personalized content based on your subscriber’s interest.

Take Netflix and HBO’s emails - they always include your name, and the content of the email is specific to your interest. If you’ve watched “Finding Nemo” they would suggest you go and watch “Finding Dori” but not “Bad Boys or ”Lord of the rings”.

Another example is including products your subscribers have seen on your website but didn’t take any action on.

Let's say I saw some jeans and t-shirts on a website and I’m their client. I purchase the jeans but not the tee. In a follow-up email (which can be completely automated) I can be reminded about the tee. This offers a great opportunity for upselling and reminding customers about the products they have shown interest in.

Lastly, what email marketing strategies, technologies or trends do you see on the horizon that excite you the most?

Given the nature of my background, I’m more into the technical stuff. I’d love to see how the upcoming Dark Mode will get adopted and supported. Currently, like almost everything else in the email industry, it’s barely supported. Only a handful of email clients can switch to Dark Mode and like half of them can allow you to adjust your code so you can optimize the colors. Fingers crossed more email clients will start showing dark mode emails, and of course, the most important part will allow us, the developers, to fine-tune the dark side experience.

Thank you greatly for taking the time to chat with the mailfloss email marketing blog readers today Dave. We really appreciate you taking the time. To our audience, if you’d like to learn more about Dave and the work he does over at MailBakery, you can follow him on Twitter or head over to his website here.

The Intersection Where Buyer Personas and Email Marketing Meet

A buyer persona is a composite sketch of a target market based on validated commonalities that actively informs content strategy to drive productive buyer engagement.

Introduction

At mailfloss we’re focused on helping email marketers get the most from their email marketing campaigns. We do this in a few different ways. First, we help email marketers improve their deliverability through the use of our email list verification service. Secondly, we work hard to educate email marketers on the various topics relating to running a successful email marketing campaign.

Today, mailfloss had the opportunity to chat with Ardath Albee, a B2B marketing strategist with over 30 years of business management and marketing experience. She’s a strategist, storyteller, speaker, blogger, teacher, and content geek who is obsessed with helping companies become so damn relevant that buyers can’t help but choose to become customers and, once a customer, making sure they’d never think of leaving. Today, mailfloss was lucky enough to chat with Ardath about effective ways to use email marketing to reach (and convert) your target audience.

Without further ado, let’s jump into the interview.

The Interview

Hi Ardath and thanks for joining us today to talk about your experience in the marketing space. Today we have an interesting interview planned with you because a lot of the areas of focus do not deal specifically with email marketing but are interesting when looked at through that lens. So let’s kick off the interview by talking a little bit more about how understanding buyer personas has the potential to increase the impact and effectiveness of an email marketing campaign.

B2B buyer personas are actually integral to the effectiveness of an email marketing campaign. The purpose of sending a marketing email is to get a click. Period. The best way to get that click is with a message that resonates with your target audience. And the best way to create relevant content is to really know what your audience cares about. Buyer personas are the tool that informs your content strategy and messaging – including your email marketing campaigns.

To do a level set: “A buyer persona is a composite sketch of a target market based on validated commonalities that actively informs content strategy to drive productive buyer engagement.”

The keys to that definition are target audience and commonalities. Base your persona on role, not title. There can be many different titles for folks with the same responsibilities and objectives, so focus on role. Then identify the things they care about that they have in common. The objective of a buyer persona is to help you engage the widest swath of your target market by focusing on the things most relevant to as many of them as possible.

As you mention on your website, buyer personas help businesses create content that their target audience may relate to best. What low-fi, low-cost strategies can smaller startups use to help them build and better understand their buyer personas?

If you have a phone, you’ve got your low-fi, low-cost option at hand. The secret to buyer personas, that actively inform marketing strategy, is talking to your customers. It’s best to talk to those who have purchased within the last year to 18 months because you want them to remember their buying process – what questions they had, what resources they used, what the tipping point was that put them in market, etc.

I’ve found that it’s best to only ask for 30 minutes from each customer if you want to get your interviews scheduled quickly. Asking for more delays the process. And, they’re helping you out. Make sure you’re ready with the questions to ask and that you don’t waste time asking something you can learn from their LinkedIn profile, closed-end questions, or anything that isn’t actionable. For example, demographics, family situation, salary, lifestyle are not things you use in B2B marketing.

Some questions to include:

• Can you tell me about a day in your life – what are you responsible for and what are your top priorities?
  
• What happened that had you looking for a (your solution)?
  
• How did you go about researching your options? (What other things did they consider? It could be something other than your direct competitors – you want to know that)
  
• What did you need to learn – what questions did you have?
  
• Once you narrowed down the options, what did you do?
  
• What online resources did you use?
  
• Who else was involved in making the decision? (buying committee)
  
• Was there any push back from others you had to overcome to get to consensus?
  
• Why did you choose us over your other options?
  
  

The other thing you’ll want to do is talk to your sales reps and ask them who they engage with at prospect companies and what questions they’re being asked. Ask them why buyers in deals they lost chose an alternative. This helps validate what you’ve heard from customers. I recommend you do this before you build personas, so you know you’re building personas to attract the right prospects that your sales reps want to engage.

There is no substitute for talking to your customers. If you make up the buyer persona based on what you think, you’re not only introducing bias (you’re not the customer) but you’ll also lack the nuance that helps you differentiate your messaging from that of your competitors. There’s a reason your customers choose you over the competition. You need to know what that is.

Once they start better understanding their buyer persona, how should this impact the content contained within their email marketing campaign?

One of the most off-putting things about marketing content is when we use language that is ours, not that of our buyers. Research conducted with buyers shows they’re begging for relevance and for marketers to stop the fluff and overt sales pitches. The truth is, they don’t care about your products, they care about what outcomes they can get that they couldn’t without them. They want their problem solved.

Listen carefully to how your customers talk about their industry, the problem they were solving and the outcomes they were looking for. Use those words and phrases in your email messaging and marketing content. You’ll find much higher levels of engagement because your content will resonate with them naturally.

On your website, I really like how you say, “one-off content is not content marketing.” Would you also argue that one-off emails are not email marketing? Why / why not? How do you approach building a bigger strategy around content marketing?

One-off anything is a bad idea in marketing – in my opinion. The more connected the story you tell, the easier it is to gain and keep attention across the long haul.

For example, let’s say you create an email marketing campaign that has five touches and lasts for two months. If it takes prospects an average of six months to go through their buying process you’ve just cut them off at the knees when your campaign ends at the two-month mark. They’ve engaged. They’re interested. They’re following along…and then…nothing. But then you start your new campaign and they’re sitting there wondering what happened to the “story” they were interested in learning more about?

Buyer personas will help you understand what the entirety of the buying process entails so you can focus on building that story and moving them through it (and through their buying process) as it unfolds. The additional benefit you have is that taking a “serial storytelling” approach to your email marketing programs also helps them remember your brand. You’re the consistent one they can count on for more of the information they want and need. You’ve got staying power and consistency. A key part of the buying decision is how they feel about you as a vendor – not just your product. Showing them how comprehensive your expertise is to help them goes a long way.

And, in case you think running a continuous campaign is limiting, it’s not. Your personas will help you see that. Remember when you interviewed them and asked what they needed to learn about to make the buying decision? Answering those questions is one key to creating a compelling story with your buyer as the hero. And, the beauty is that as more questions come up, you can add them to the story and keep expanding it over time. No more reinventing the wheel for every campaign.

You also mention on your site that content marketing is an “orchestration of relevant ideas and concepts that resonate with all of the different perspectives on the buying committee”. Can you tell us a little bit more about what you mean by“orchestration”. What parts are at play here?

One of the things we’re not privy to as marketers are the conversations that go on internally with our customers. Depending on what types of companies you sell to, this can include 11 or more people – all with differing roles and perspectives. Our content needs to address those varying perspectives to help our buyer get them all on the same page. So think about the opportunity to send an email to your buyer with a message about how “this content” will help their (Director of X) understand the value of choosing (your product) to solve the problem. Here’s what’s in it for them…

As you point out on your site, buyers are “self-educating”. Can you tell us a little bit more about the intersection where education and email marketing meet? In your opinion, how important is education as an email marketing content type?

Education is critical. Think about it this way. Even if your prospect has purchased what you sell a few years back, chances are that there are new things to consider now. Think about how fast products evolve, technology most of all.

But take a step back from that. Your prospects likely have a way to do whatever it is that your solution solves for today. They may not even realize they have a problem. Or they may know they have a problem but don’t understand what they can gain by fixing it or the true cost of not fixing it.

Your audience is most likely to spend time engaging with your email if it teaches them something new or provides a new perspective to consider. Education comes in many forms. I’d argue that nearly all marketing is educational in some way. Why do your prospects read your case studies? I’d say it’s to learn how others, like them, solved the problem they’re facing by choosing your solution.

You also mention that content must serve as an enticement to push people to engage with your sales reps. You mention that “getting prospects in sales conversations is a primary objective of digital content strategy.” How does this play out as it relates to email content?

There are many ways to answer this question for B2B. The first is that the whole point of content marketing (and arguably email marketing) is to create engagement with customers and potential customers. If your messaging and the content you share are focused on addressing your audience’s needs in a way that’s relatable and helps them see themselves solving their problem, prospects will reach out to speak with sales as a result of that value provided.

Another way to answer this question is that if your nurturing program is well designed and engagement is high, then there can be several trigger points where sending an email asking them to request a demo or a conversation with your sales team is appropriate – and may just be the nudge the prospect needs because it comes at a time when they’re ready to take a next step.

A third way is to create email sequences for your sales reps to send out to the prospects they’re pursuing, offering valuable insights in exchange for a conversation. By helping create this sequence, you have a better shot at having the story your sales reps are sharing match the story marketing is sharing so you have a consistent narrative across the buying cycle. There’s nothing worse than a prospect thinking they know “you” and then receiving an email from a sales rep that’s completely out of left field given the content they’ve been viewing.

You also believe it’s content that will set a company apart from its competition. What do you mean by this and how would you respond to people who would disagree with you and say it's primarily the product that separates one company from another?

Nobody cares about your product. Period. No one. What they care about is what the product can do for them that they couldn’t do without it. They care about what’s in it for them (WIIFM) which generally means solving a problem that’s keeping them from meeting objectives.

In a B2B complex purchase, there’s a lot of inherent risk. People get fired for making the wrong choices. A B2B complex purchase is a major change management initiative. It usually means that people are going to have to change to adopt the new solution. People don’t like change – including your buyers. There are two things that I’ve seen become primary reasons why purchases result in no decision or a lost deal.

1. The buying committee can’t reach consensus because they can’t deconflict all the various information each person on the buying committee brought back. Because they can’t agree on which perspective to believe, they end up not choosing to change and stick with the status quo. Let’s hope that’s not based on solution brochures from your company that misrepresent your product!
   
2. The second reason is that they felt the vendor wasn’t a good cultural fit and the product they were buying was pretty much the same across the final vendors they were evaluating (the buyer’s perspective). Prospects see most products today as commodities and are looking for that something special from a vendor that has them feel like a partner. It’s called trust.

To apply this to email marketing, it’s important to consider the emotional component of your emails. How does your audience feel when your email hits their inbox? Do they snarl, think ‘you, again’ and hit delete? Or do they open it with anticipation to see what helpful information you’re sharing today? Those are pretty much your choices. Obviously, you want the latter response. What drives that is the content and messaging.

In answer to the first reason above, provide clear information focused on adding value to your prospect’s search for an answer to their challenge. In answer to the second, exhibit the qualities that builds a predisposition to trust you based on the quality of the information your email deliver. If your sales team exhibits this same care and value, the consistency of experience will keep your prospects predisposed to choosing your solution – as long as the product delivers what they need.

Lastly, let us throw a hypothetical scenario at you. You’re offered a new job at a small startup with no formal marketing department. You’re given one week on the job to implement the three most important systems or processes that will help this company grow in the long run. What are the three things you work on this week and how do you get them off the ground?

The three things I’d implement are:

1. Buyer personas
   
2. New positioning and messaging on the website
   
3. Launch a blog

I made several assumptions and one week isn’t a lot of time. I assumed that the website was passable, but not really showcasing a kick-butt, buyer-driven story. In order to change this, I’d need to talk to customers quickly to discover the story that will stick and pull others in. If I can get 10, 30-minute phone calls with customers, I can do this – or at least a phase 1 buyer persona – enough to get started. Quick chats with the sales reps and founders will give me additional insight I can gather quickly that will help to ensure alignment between the company and its target market.

The other assumption I made is that the startup needs awareness and content for the sales team. A blog can help with both. Buyer personas will identify the questions your prospects have and what they need to learn to buy your product. Answering those questions gives you an editorial calendar for the blog.

Once you have those things, you can do a lot to have marketing contributing to the startup. And, it’s important to consider that in a startup, marketing must wear a lot of hats. Sales enablement is one of them.

Thank you greatly for taking the time to chat with the mailfloss email marketing blog readers today Ardath. We really appreciate you taking the time. To our audience, if you’d like to learn more about Ardath and the work she does, you can follow her on Twitter or head over to her website here.

The Intersection Where Email Marketing & Conversion Rate Optimization Meet

The best-performing lead magnets are those that solve a specific problem for their audience. Meaning, that when someone signs up for your lead magnet, they walk away with actionable, specific details on how to solve a challenge they're facing.

Introduction

At mailfloss we’re focused on helping email marketers get the most from their email marketing campaigns. We do this in a few different ways. First, we help email marketers improve their deliverability through the use of our email list verification service. Secondly, we work hard to educate email marketers on the various topics relating to running a successful email marketing campaign.

Today, mailfloss had the opportunity to chat with Talia Wolf, the founder of GetUplift, a conversion rate optimization agency. In the interview below, we pick Talia’s brain and ask questions about CRO as it relates to strategies within the world of email marketing.

Without further ado, let’s jump into the interview.

The Interview

Hello and thank you for joining us today to talk about your involvement in the CRO space. Today we're going to ask a lot of questions about the relationship between CRO and email marketing. But before we do that let's talk about what drew you into the CRO niche in the first place? What is it about this industry that sucked you in and lever let you go?

Before founding my own conversion optimization agency, I worked in a social media agency. I ran paid campaigns on Twitter, Facebook, Linkedin, and other social platforms for our clients. I spent a lot of my time trying to figure out how to optimize my campaigns and landing pages we were working with. Endless Googling, reading, and researching would lead to making different changes on these pages and trying out new ideas that would hopefully drive conversions. It was through that research that I discovered the CRO niche. Back then everyone focused on driving traffic to their website, and conversion optimization wasn't something businesses put any focus on. The more I read, the more I fell in love with it and worked hard on getting better at it. It was in that agency that I met my future biz partners. They were just setting up a new CRO agency, and I wanted all in.

Now, when a lot of people think about CRO they think about increasing the number of people they convert into paying customers. A lot of people have a very two dimensional perspective about CRO. They associate CRO with doing things like changing the color of their add-to-cart button or adding social proof to their checkout pages. While that is part of the CRO process, it's only one small part of the process. In your experience, what are the three biggest mistakes that entrepreneurs make when they first approach CRO?

Through many failed and semi-successful experiences, I learned that conversion optimization isn't about changing elements on the page.

If I wanted to truly make a difference and create a high-converting experience, I would have to dive deeper and understand how people make decisions. I devoured books about psychology, decision-making, psychological triggers, and emotions. I run hundreds of AB tests and analyzed thousands of high-converting landing pages, emails, and websites. I quickly learned that conversion optimization is about solving people's problems. When you understand the motivations behind people's actions, the emotions that drive their decisions, you can create a high-converting experience that focuses on them.

The biggest mistakes I see are:

1. Not getting to know the people behind the screens - many marketers can breakdown the behavioral aspects of their prospects: their age, geographical location, the browsers they're using, and the devices. However, the only way to create truly high-converting experiences is to get to know the person behind the screen - their pains, challenges, fears, and dreams.
   
   
2. Testing random elements on the page, instead of hypotheses - Most people change the colour of the call to action button, reduce the fields in their form or "add some social proof" and believe that's where optimization starts and ends. Thing is, that optimization isn't about changing elements on a page, it's about solving your people's problems. Once you find a leak in Google Analytics, and identify that something needs optimizing, it's not enough to just make cosmetic changes on a page (changes that come from reading "best practices" or blog posts that promise 1000% increase in conversions by making one change), you need a hypothesis, you need to understand why this problem is happening, what's causing it, and do research to understand the strategic elements missing. Only then can you move in to fix the leak, by providing a meaningful change on the page.
   
   
3. Being features and product-focused - The most common answer to: "why do people buy from you?" is -"our product / our features/ our pricing/ we have the best tech" etc. Very product-focused. However, with hundreds of competitors out there, all offering similar solutions as your own, you won't stand out by talking about your product. We live in a world where we get pitched to dozens of times a day, and the only way to stand out in people's timelines or inbox is to make it about them. When you focus your message around your audience's desires, the challenges they go through, and their desired outcomes, when you make it about them, people care, they stop, they read and they convert. Brands that make their customer the hero, are the ones that stand out in that sea of sameness and win loyal, lasting customers/clients.

Where do you start when you first look at a website? In your experience, what has generally been the lowest hanging fruit for increasing website CR?

We run an extensive conversion optimization audit that starts at the heart of it all - customer research. After diving into behavioral analysis using Google Analytics, heatmaps, and other tools that tell us what people are doing on the website locates the biggest growth opportunities and show us what needs fixing, we move into the most crucial part: Customer research. Identifying how people make decisions, what drives them to action, surveying, interviewing, profiling, comparing and analyzing who our customer or client is beyond the raw data of age, geographical location, or browser. Our goal is to understand the emotions that drive people's decisions and then combine all this data to create better websites, funnels, landing pages, or emails that people connect with on an emotional level.

What are your biggest struggles or points of friction as a CRO company when working on client sites?

Sometimes it's a challenge to convince our clients to move away from being product-led, and helping them become more customer-led. Especially with very big organizations, branding is important, and they have very specific conceptions of what people need to know about them, and the solution they're providing. However, this is where the research comes in. We're able to easily show them what we learned, what people are saying, how they're behaving, and to pair our recommendations with the data that supports it.

Now let's jump in and talk about the intersection where CRO and email marketing intersect. You have a great post on your blog where you talk about the importance of lead magnets. Now optimizing for opt-ins is important because the more people you have on your list, the more people you can market your services to. How much A/B testing have you done with regards to lead magnets for your own (or clients') sites? What are some of the best converting lead magnets you've seen?

I see lead magnets as one of the best ways to form a strong relationship with your target audience. When you provide high-value content to your readers, you show your readers that you care about them, that you have relevant information for them, and when it comes time to sell something, they're more open to it because they know you're genuine.

The best-performing lead magnets are those that solve a specific problem for their audience. Meaning, that when someone signs up for your lead magnet, they walk away with actionable, specific details on how to solve a challenge they're facing. The specific type of lead magnet doesn't really matter (a guide, a quiz, a checklist, a worksheet, etc.), what matters is that people can immediately see the value of downloading it and how it will solve a crucial pain in their lives.

Now in terms of lead magnet placement and opt-in CR, what are some of the most important placements and design considerations? (i.e. pop up, exit popups, full-page popup, sidebar, etc). How much testing have you done around this?

We've ran extensive AB tests on this, both on our own site and our clients', and without a doubt, the most high-performing lead magnets are those that are configured to show up according to specific behavior. While an exit pop up may work well on some audiences, on others, a slide-in pop up might work better. The key to success is triggering these pop-ups according to specific behavior on the site or page, the more segmented it is, the more relevant it will be to people. We've had pop-ups configured to cover an entire screen after someone had visited the site 4+ times, scrolled more than 70% of a page and viewed at least 3 pages in one session, these kinds of pop-ups appear at the best time to our visitors with the most relevant offer and drive many sign-ups.

After signing up for a lead magnet, users are often sent a series of emails as part of a drip campaign. What's your advice to entrepreneurs who don't yet have a drip campaign in place? What are some email sequences you've seen work well?

My best tip is to analyze all the emails you've ever sent to your audience and find the most high-converting emails you've sent. The ones that have the most click-through rate, the ones you've gotten the most feedback on and analyze them. What worked? Why did it work? What principles drive this email? Then you can create similar emails or even create a welcome sequence that's assembled from your most successful emails.

Your end goal is to create an email sequence that connects with your prospects, builds relationships, and reminds people over and over again that you are a person/company worth listening to. Don't be afraid to write long emails (some of my most successful emails are over 1000 words long), don't be afraid to be yourself, use your own words, tone, and personality. Remember that it's all about connecting and creating trust.

When it comes to A/B testing emails, what are some of the most important elements to test?

• Subject lines - subject lines aren't just about getting people to open your email, in some cases you'll get less open rates but more CTR.
• Content - experiment with the type of content you send: formal, vs. personal, many links in your email vs. just one, long-form email, vs. one paragraph, and so on.
• Design - our go-to at GetUplift is plain-text emails, the ones that look as close as can be to a regular Gmail email. We strip those emails down to the basics and now and then add a gif... other than that, no design. It's definitely worth testing!

In another one of your blog posts, you say that the magic behind sending emails that convert is to provide value. Can you tell us a little bit more about what you mean by this and provide some suggestions or examples?

Our inboxes are overflowing with offers. hundreds of emails hit our inbox weekly promoting some sort of offer or another. If you want to stand out in the crowded inbox and grab people's attention so they open your email, you have to show them, it's worth their while. Your goal is to provide the value your people subscribed for. When someone joins your email list, they're doing it for a reason, for a promise you made, they're doing it to solve a problem that you just convinced them you can help them with. Now you've got to prove it.

Sometimes that means offering a paid offer, yes. Your solution may very well be the best one to solve their problem, however in order for them to trust you, believe you and convert, they need to see that every single email you send is about them, their journey, and you keeping that promise.

Thank you greatly for taking the time to chat with the mailfloss email marketing blog readers today Talia. We really appreciate you taking the time. To our audience, if you’d like to learn more about Talia and the work she does, you can follow her on Twitter or head over to her website here.

Sharing, Conversation, and Emotionally Connected Content Will Be the Ads of the Future

Instead of thinking in terms of "Convince and Convert," start thinking in terms of "Converse and Convert." Helpful content gives your customers reasons to stay engaged—not just react—and also increases brand advocacy.

Introduction

At mailfloss we’re focused on helping email marketers get the most from their email marketing campaigns. We do this in a few different ways. First, we help email marketers improve their deliverability through the use of our email list verification tool. Secondly, we work hard to educate email marketers on the various topics relating to running a successful email marketing campaign.

Today, mailfloss had the opportunity to chat with Ted Rubin, a leading Social Marketing Strategist, Author, Speaker, and Provocateur, about how he uses the concept known as Return on Relationship™ as the driving force behind his marketing strategies (including email marketing).

We have a really exciting interview planned for you today, so without further ado, let’s jump into the discussion.

The Interview

Hello Ted and thanks for speaking with our blog readers today. In 2009 you started evangelizing the term ROR, Return on Relationship™. I love this. You also wear a shirt on your social media profiles that says "be good to people". Your focus on building positive relationships in a digital age is paying off. You have over 500K twitter followers. Okay, let's kick off the interview by asking the question on everyone's mind... How did you build up such a huge social following? What are some actionable tips you can give to others who have similar ambitions?

Hard work, persistence, valuing engagement and relationships, and leveraging early entry to a number of platforms, particularly Twitter.

BE Authentic, don't just ACT it. This might seem obvious... but authenticity is on the verge of becoming just another buzzword in the social/content marketing world.TRUE authenticity (not just using that word often in your tweets and posts) will set your brand (product or personal) apart in today's highly competitive market. Followers/Advocates are attracted to REAL, and can sniff out fake in a heartbeat.

REAL trumps PERFECT because REAL creates TRUST.

Syndicate, syndicate, syndicate... share your content via all social channels always including Twitter, Facebook, and LinkedIn, which also makes it easy for others to share. And don't be afraid to do it more than once periodically sharing old posts via your social channels, especially those that were well received.

What tools, technologies, systems, or processes did you need to have in place to keep your audience engaged while continuing to grow?

For me it is not about tools, but about strategy, and execution. My most important social media tools are...

1 – My personality.

2 – My passion.

3 – My obsessiveness with being connected.

You do a lot of work in the world of social media, but how do your relationship-building principles apply to the world of email marketing?

Growing your list is not simply about numbers... it's about adding value to what you do. In order to ensure that happens, the following are important parts of the process...

1. Permission is a privilege, not a right: Consumers do not owe us their attention, and they certainly do not owe us their permission. We need to EARN their permission, and that's not done by a gimmick or a flashy set of ads. Permission is earned through quality content and offers, genuine interest in and deep understanding of consumer preferences/needs, and a consistent track record that builds trust. Keep the trust, keep the permission, keep the follower.

2. Relevance is king: We all hear daily that content is king – so let's take that one level further and point out that it's not just the volume or brilliance of content that matters to your followers, it is how that content relates to them. If content is not relevant to them, it is nothing more than a waste of your time and a reason for the follower/consumer to take away permission for ongoing interaction with you.

3. It's all about relationships: People must come first – in your growth strategies, in your marketing plans, and in every interaction that you have. When you place highest priority on people, you take the time to do all those hugely important things that build relationships:

• You operate from a mindset of SERVICE
• You think about what you can GIVE TO your followers, rather than take from them.
• You ask them questions, listen to and clarify their answers, and get to know their pain points and what delights them.
• You base your innovations on what they actually need and want.

And the result? You get and keep your permission to continue and build a relationship with them. In other words, permission is your ROR, #RonR (Return on Relationship).

Remember that Permission is a two-way street, and the traffic signals are controlled by your followers. Be their Green Light... not their stop sign!

What have been some of your most successful campaigns (or campaigns you're most proud of) where you’ve used email as the main (or one of the main) channels for building up relationships? Why do you think this campaign was so successful?

At e.l.f. cosmetics, in 2008-2010 my responsibilities included communicating with and building e.l.f.'s client base (membership increased from a few hundred thousand to in excess of 2.4MM during my tenure), leveraging brand equity through strategic marketing programs (with many major brands and publishers), and creating/developing/managing a major thrust into social media initiatives and partnerships, leveraging the outreach of email with the connectivity of social media platforms, and building the most highly respected social media presence in the cosmetics industry at the time.

This was so successful because it merged traditional PR, email's immediacy, and the ability of social media to create/spread PR and sales opportunities. This was a first for many companies and something which many are yet to understand how to leverage and coordinate.

In your book "Return on Relationship" you talk about the importance of going from “convince and convert” to “converse and convert”. What do you mean by this?

Things ARE changing. Traditional advertising certainly isn't extinct, but there is simply too much noise out there, and people are sick of it. They're shutting out the blast advertising that has crept into every aspect of their lives and centering in on the things they truly care about—friends, family, personal interests and needs, and social connections. You need to take a step back and study this shift in order to take advantage of it.

For brands, that doesn't mean you can simply move your blast advertising campaigns into social channels. You actually have to make real conversation with real people and help them get what they want. That means knowing your prospects well enough to understand what they want. It also means creating content that's helpful, entertaining, educational, or all of the above—content that helps them make a decision; content they want to share with friends.

Smart brands have noticed that we're moving to a "connection economy," and they are producing ongoing content that meets the new search "relevancy" standards. They've studied their audiences, listened to their social conversations, and have developed plans to use that content in their social profiles to emotionally connect to their audiences and encourage conversation. When it resonates, it gets shared and receives comments and likes, which makes that brand more visible.

What it all boils down to is that in the new world of content marketing, the Content "IS" the Ad. Sharing, conversation, and emotionally connected content will be the ads of the future. Instead of thinking in terms of "Convince and Convert," start thinking in terms of "Converse and Convert." Helpful content gives your customers reasons to stay engaged—not just react—and also increases brand advocacy.

So start thinking like a publisher because the more relevant, helpful content you create, the better you can drive engagement. And as my Return on Relationship (‪#‎RonR‬) formula illustrates...

Content drives Engagement, Engagement drives Advocacy, and Advocacy correlates directly to Increased Sales.

In your experience what are the three most common problems that stop being from seeing the dramatic results they desire?

1 - Looking back too much. Not learning from your mistakes, while trying not to second guess yourself too much.

2 - Worrying about the perfect plan. Try things and get immediate feedback (which you can do easily these days through social media).

*3 - Giving up too soon and letting too much time go by before trying again.

You're also a big believer in the importance of building thriving and engaged communities. What are some practical tips you can give our audience members who might just be starting out building their own communities and want to see them grow? What are some strategies or techniques you've seen used well to help scale the size of these communities?

A Network gives you Reach, BUT a Community gives you Power!

Networks Connect... Communities Care

A small, passionate community of like-minded people can often accomplish far more than a larger, less-connected group working on the same challenge. Building a dedicated community takes effort, but it's one of the most effective ways to build your brand, your business, your home. The power of relationships scales up when you create opportunities for passionate people to connect.

So don't get hung up on the size of your network. Instead, whether it's around a cause, a topic of interest, or developing your next product or service... work on ways to connect that network into, and empower/enable, vibrant communities. Networks are just a series of nodes, communities support each other, look out for each other, and have lifeblood. Don't underestimate the power of the "collective."

1. Be Adaptable

Although you'll approach any community with content, social, and problem-solving methods and tactics, you should not apply cookie-cutter solutions to a unique community. To build a valuable community you need to be able to quickly understand and grasp the unique nature, concerns, desires, and values of each group.

2. Follow Up... Engage, Interact, Be Present

One of the most important elements of being an effective community builder is fostering genuine relationships with your community. Following up means building trust, and this is the foundation of a strong relationship and hopefully, a future brand, personal, or group advocate.

*3. You Really Need to Care About It

Here's the big difference between a 'community builder' and a 'social media manager': if you're going to successfully build communities, you really have to care about what you're doing, because this means being an active participant in the community as well.

4. Learn How to Listen.

Listening, in general, is an underrated skill. Too often, however, listening is the first thing to go when we're pressed for time. Keep creating great content and conversation, but be sure to stay involved in the conversation always.

Do you focus more on paid or organic relationship building? When is there a time for one over the other?

I am strictly focused on organic relationship building. I believe for personal branding it is the only way to go, and even at a corporate branding level, use paid media to bring people to the table, but then empowering employees to build these relationships is what will result in long-term value.

In another book of yours, "How to Look People in the Eye Digitally", you mention that "we've let social and mobile technologies hold us back". What do you mean by this? What can we do to overcome this obstacle?

The last few decades have made us lazy communicators. Most often we don't even pay attention to who we are talking to other than via the data we collect (and even that's a maybe). In order to fix this and really start to benefit from social relationships (both as individuals and as companies), we need to start "looking people in the eye digitally." We don't need to fit our world to digital, we need to fit digital to our world.

It's time to stop making excuses, and start bringing in-person social skills to the digital world. All of the positive benefits are out there waiting, and it's up to us to make the effort to realize them.

Over the years I've been asked by a lot of people how they can be more successful in building relationships on social channels. And the one thing that keeps coming to the surface is the importance of being "present" when you're talking to someone.

You know how it is when you meet someone at a conference or in a networking situation and they're constantly looking around the room to see who else is there, or they're looking at their watch, or anywhere except at you? Those signals mean they aren't really "present" in the conversation, so there is no true connection.

The same principles apply to online relationships, so I'm a big proponent of doing what I call... Looking People in the Eye Digitally, as well as personally. Introductions and ongoing relationships in social platforms require the same personal attention as the human touch and eye contact in a physical relationship, so here are 12 tips for making that happen:

1. Always address them by name (even if you have to dig a little).

Sometimes it can be hard to figure out a person's first name by their Twitter, Facebook or Instagram handle. However, the human need to be addressed by their given name is still important. When you're thanking someone for a re-tweet or a share, make sure you mention them by name. You might have to look at their profile to find it, but do it!

2. Find something in their bio and make mention of it.

The need for recognition goes beyond just names. When someone takes the time to look at your bio, picks up on something there and mentions it to you or asks you about it, you can't help but respond favorably. Make a habit of looking at other people's bios when you're opening up conversation.

3. Show them that you're listening to what they're saying (reference conversations, etc.).

Listening is every bit as important digitally as it is personally. Stop thinking about what you're going to say next and REALLY listen to what the other person is saying. Reference something they said in an online conversation and ask them about it. Read their blog—take a look at their website, and look for ways you can connect based on what you've learned.

4. Make it personal and authentic.

Look for possible connections to what you like, places you've been–would like to go–kids, etc. When you're looking at a person's bio (or Blog or About Page on their website), look for inter-personal connection points where your lives might intersect. "Oh, I see you live in Park City, Utah—I love to take my kids skiing..." Make sure it's an authentic connection. If you're not a skier, don't say you are.

5. Find them on all possible channels and link up–not just one.

If you meet someone on Twitter, look for other platforms they frequent. You might have to dig a little and go to their website or do a search for them on Facebook or LinkedIn, but make the effort to connect with them on different channels. You never know where the next conversation might crop up that will spark an opportunity.

6. Give them an online recommendation (such as LinkedIn).

Giving a recommendation or testimonial spontaneously demonstrates thoughtfulness. People get notifications via email or on the platform that you've reached out, and this effort won't go unnoticed. However, recommendations should be authentic and based on your knowledge of their business or interactions with them—not empty platitudes. And don't do this with the intention of getting a recommendation in return. Give it as a genuine gift without expectation.

7. Send a note with a helpful link or photo "just because".

Before the Internet, a common practice in business networking was to clip out a 3rd-party article (not your own stuff), put a note on it and mail it to someone you thought could benefit (Amy, I thought of you when I saw this!). Do the same thing via social messaging, but it should be on an individual basis. Reference an article link, a video or send a photo—use their name and tell them why you sent it!

8. Put them in a list so their social interactions don't get lost in the stream.

Most platforms have list options, so use them wisely to keep track of those you want to interact with regularly. As social streams get crowded, it becomes more important to segment your feeds and keep track of people. The old adage "out of sight, out of mind" really is true, both online and off.

9. Ask a question to get their opinion (not a poll).

Asking someone for their individual opinion shows them that you care about what they have to say. Look for those opportunities to deepen conversation.

10. Pick them out in a crowd.

Do you participate in Google Hangouts or Twitter Chats? Look for familiar handles/names and make a point to say hi individually. Here again, personal recognition is a key in keeping those relationship fires burning.

11. Wish them a happy birthday and make it unique.

When you get an opportunity to wish someone a Happy Birthday, as with Facebook's birthday reminder, make it a point to make it personal rather than just a generic wish. Find a good birthday quote—add a picture—mention something unique about them... and use their name.

12. Take it off-line.

Make it regular practice to offer yourself publicly for a short telephone one-on-one to find out more about someone or just catch up. Ask how you can network or refer them business. Most importantly, make it about THEM. Asking "How can I help you?" builds great rapport.

Thank you greatly for taking the time to chat with the mailfloss email marketing blog readers today Ted. This has been a really insightful interview. To our audience, if you’d like to learn more about Ted and the work he does, you can follow him on Twitter or head over to his website here.

Think about Your First Email like You Would Your First Handshake or Eye Contact

If you were to meet your customers in real life, how important is that first greeting, that first handshake, that first eye contact? Is talking about your company important? Yes! That's why that first email matters.

Introduction

At mailfloss we’re focused on helping email marketers get the most from their email marketing campaigns. We do this in a few different ways. First, we help email marketers improve their deliverability through the use of our email list verification tool. Secondly, we work hard to educate email marketers on the various topics relating to running a successful email marketing campaign.

Today, mailfloss had the opportunity to chat with Ryan Phelan, the co-founder of the email marketing agency Origin Email. Ryan has two decades of experience working within the world of email marketing, so we’re excited to have him with us today to share his insights with us.

So without further ado, let’s jump into the discussion.

The Interview

Hi Ryan and thank you for joining us today to talk about your involvement in the email marketing space. You have almost two decades of experience in this niche! Let's jump in and have you tell us what drew you specifically towards email as a marketing channel early on in your career? 

I've been in email marketing for more than 20 years. I started off in the digital space running affiliate and email marketing programs for a start-up business in Omaha, and I ran email on an app on my computer. Ah, the good old days!

What drove me to concentrate on email marketing was that it showed more promise than affiliate marketing, even in those early days. It wasn't just the free flow of information in that first era of email. It was that the innovation arc for email is very long. The up side for me was the ability to get messages into the user's inbox at their invitation, to see our messages in the same place as valued personal email.

I loved the flexibility of email and what email could do. The pace of innovation is changing email, but email is also changing and accelerating the pace of innovation. Try to find a mobile app that doesn't have email as the primary or secondary connection to the user.

Well, that and the huge mROI keep me in email!

You also run Origin Email Agency, which is an agency that helps mid-market and enterprise companies with email marketing. You help with overarching strategies, comprehensive modeling and segmentation to name only a few services. Let's start with strategy. What are the biggest mistakes you see email marketers make when it comes to email marketing strategy? How can they overcome these mistakes? 

The biggest mistake is that email marketers don't spend enough time on strategy. Marketers focus too much on tactics. They don't take a step back and look at why someone reads their emails instead of how they read them. From promotional to triggered emails, from welcome messages to cart abandonment, any kind of email message you can think needs to have a strategy, a "why" behind it.

That's the theme I see at company after company that I've worked with. The first thing I do when I start working with a new company is to ask them about their email strategy and then wait for the crickets while they try to come up with something.

After that, I dive into helping them create a strategy, and that defines the path forward in their program. I can teach them about strategy, walk them through a strategic brief and help them understand why it's different from a creative brief. I've learned that when people are trained properly, they can do a strategy session in 30 minutes and end up saving time down the road.

Let's talk a little about overarching strategy and strategy design. Now a lot of small teams have a challenging time putting together a month's worth of email content. How do small business entrepreneurs balance the need for an overarching email strategy while working within the confines limited resources? 

These claims about limited resources – they're just excuses for not doing the work. Every business owner has a business plan that took time to create because it's important to the success of the business. Entrepreneurs who say they don't have time to map out email strategy are missing the boat, and I question their leadership abilities.

You don't have to plan out a strategy a year in advance, or even a month. That can be a monumental goal for some people. Maybe you plan on Friday for the week ahead. You don't have to map out each point in your strategy either. Take the time to figure out the general themes and direction, and then fill in the details as the campaign gets closer.

You can always change your direction. Just don't make up excuses about why you can't do it.

Can you tell us a little bit more about what "modeling" is and how email marketers should approach their own email modeling strategies? What are some techniques you've seen successfully used when it comes to email modeling? 

Modeling is something everybody should be doing. It's an upgrade from segmentation. Here's how it fits in:

• Batch-and-blast is one email to everybody on your list.
• Segmentation is differentiating among groups based on one customer variable.
• Modeling brings in other pieces of data that paint a picture of your customers, and you use it to enhance your targeting. It uses groups of like characteristics to predict behavior.

Modeling is a great technique for companies with large amounts of data and data scientists to come up with formulas for creating useful buckets of customers. With modeling, you can run it against new customer behavior and then run it again to look for changes in behavior. Customer behavior changes all the time. As a customer, just because I have an interaction at one point in time with a brand, but I'm not that same customer for all eternity.

Models can help you find the most common and lucrative groups of people and present them for unique marketing opportunities. Then you come back for a strategy to market to these groups that meets their needs.

These can be basic, like purchasing, or attitudinal, or incorporating various third-party data that shows interests, browse behavior on other sites, preferences for things like sports and hobbies and spending patterns.

A model by definition does not have to be vast in its inclusion of data. You can build a model on a couple of data types and use it to say, "This is the type of people I'm looking for." From that, the goal is to predict action and mirror your marketing to support that prediction.

In your experience what are some of the most overlooked marketing automation systems that companies fail to put in place early on? In your experience, which of these automation systems end up having the biggest impact on the bottom line? 

Companies generally send a comparatively small number of emails in automations, like order and ship confirmations, welcome emails, behavioral triggers and indicators of interest.

These numbers might be small, but they add up to 50% or more of ecommerce revenue. That's because one thing that doesn't change about email is that relevance is king. If you send relevant info, whether to B2B or B2C users, they'll convert.

Marketing automation looks for micro-moments of customer intent and serves up messaging around them. Suppose I buy a new washer and dryer but not the pedestals that most people buy. A marketing automation will wait seven days and then send me an email suggesting I buy those pedestals because I might already be tired of leaning down to put laundry in or take it out.

Marketing automation recognizes that micro-moment and sends me a message that supports it. And it usually pays off.

You have to find your micro-moments and serve them with appropriate emails. It could be an abandoned cart reminder or a next-logical product or something else. The problem is that many people ignore these messages because they take time to set up, or they don't want to analyze the data that tells them what kinds of messages to create.

The other issue with marketing automation is that people let their messages get outdated because they aren't looking at them every day or testing them for success.

If you do go back and check on your automated messages, you could find it's time to change things up. One client moved an abandoned-cart email back by one week. That change took 5 seconds to make but it boosted their conversion rate.

If you were to walk into a small bootstrapped startup today and take control of their marketing for the day, what three things would you do (or systems would you put in place), to help with sales? 

Well, first, I would need a 12-hour day. But I could make it work.

For the first couple of hours, I would learn everything I could about the company: its programs, offers, sales, customer service and customer types. I wouldn't just talk to the executives; I'd go visit the front-line employees. I would want to learn the big motivators, the reason to believe in that brand.

Next, I would spend a couple hours working up a marketing strategy, looking for efficiencies, opportunities and directions and prioritizing them. Do we need to create marketing automations? Bring the website up to date? What's the low-hanging fruit that will get us big wins right away? After that we can look at projects that will take longer to execute on.

Finally, I would spend the rest of my day writing strategy briefs, reviewing copy, teaching marketing strategy and making sure the marketing team is aligned on our goals.

One thing I would not do: Come in with a silver-bullet plan that will fix everything all at once. That doesn't exist. You have to put in the hours and do the work.

Let's talk a little bit more about email sequencing. What advice would you give to a company who is just starting their email campaign regarding the spacing of their sales focused emails? For example, should companies send two, three or five value focused email first before sending a sales focused email? How do you approach this ratio? 

My answer to any question on frequency or timing is this: What does your end user want to see? You have to define who your end users are and create messaging that makes sense to them. Should you send one welcome email, or two? Three? 10? There's no single standard or right answer.

Think about what your end user wants, and deliver on that.

I've talked a lot about the self-justification of email messaging. Does your end user really want to see that message, or are you sending email just to send an email? Often you'll find the answer in testing. Test different series, different numbers and timing. The answers can depend on whether you're a new or established company.

That's why I'm not going to say that you must send your abandoned-cart reminders at 24 hours, one day and three days after abandonment. Those are starting points. They'll be different for each company. So you start, and then you test. To develop a good abandoned-cart program you might have to spend six months planning it, testing all the variables and then fine-tuning it.

Tell us a little bit more about some of the best first emails that a company can send out. Why is the first email so important? 

To answer this question, I'll ask another one: If you were to meet your customers in real life, how important is that first greeting, that first handshake, that first eye contact? Is talking about your company important? Yes! That's why that first email matters.

Your welcome email sets the relationship. It tells your end users who you are and what they can expect from your emails. Don't drone on about yourself forever; make it short, sweet and to the point. If you can't sum up your company in three bullet points you need to rethink it!

Lastly, if you were tasked with growing the email list of a bootstrapped company from 100 to 1000, what are three strategies you would use to help you achieve that goal without breaking the bank? 

None of these will be easy to do. So, relax and enjoy slow growth to 1000.

First: Look at every prospect or subscriber touch point and have lead collection there for your email program. A lot of companies miss this basic step to capture people's information.

Next: Look at your email communications and be sure you are delivering value to your end users.

Finally: Look at your opt outs. How many subscribers have stopped interacting with you? Plug those holes. Make sure you are not losing people for no apparent reason. It's easier to keep them than to replace them and then acquire more to keep growing. Acquisition is about quality,

Thank you greatly for taking the time to chat with mailfloss’s email marketing blog readers today Ted. This has been a really insightful interview. To our audience, if you’d like to learn more about Ryan and the work he does, you can follow him on Twitter or head over to his website here.

Most Content Marketing Programs Take Well over a Year to Bear Fruit

You don't have to convince marketers about content marketing anymore...at least to try it. You have to convince them that it takes time and patience for it to work.

Introduction

At mailfloss we’re focused on helping email marketers get the most from their email marketing campaigns. We do this in a few different ways. First, we help email marketers improve their deliverability through the use of our email list verification service. Secondly, we work hard to educate email marketers on the various topics relating to running a successful email marketing campaign.

Today, mailfloss had the opportunity to chat with Joe Pulizzi, the founder of Content Marketing Institute, about trends in the content marketing space and how these trends could have an impact within the world of email marketing.

Without further ado, let’s jump into the interview.

The Interview

Hi Joe and thank you for joining us today to talk about your experience in the marketing space. To say you are a leader in this space is an understatement. You're a best selling author and the founder of Content Marketing Institute, a leading global content marketing and education company. Let's have you jump in and tell us what it was about content marketing that pulled you in early on and never let you go?

I've had a special place for the practice of content marketing since the year 2000. That was the first year I knew something like content marketing was actually a thing. I fell in love with the idea that we could deliver communications to our customers and prospects that actually made their lives better (regardless if they bought the product or service). That you could actually help and teach people, and by doing so, they were more likely to buy your offerings.

You were WAY ahead of the trend when it came to seeing the power of content as a marketing and sales tool. Why did you have such faith in content as a form of marketing before others saw the potential? Did you have a particular positive business experience that made you realize "wow this is an area I need to double down on"? If so, what was that experience?

First of all, content marketing has been around for hundreds of years, even though the term is relatively new (a little over 10 years). I believed in it because I saw it work first hand. I sold content marketing services to large business-to-business companies and saw that it was helping them build amazing relationships through email newsletters, custom magazines and then later into blogs and social media.

After selling it to customers for seven years, I went "all in" on the practice to eventually create Content Marketing Institute. I saw so much potential but there was very little information available for marketers on how they could do it right. Shortly after CMI was created, we knew that an event was critical to the industry's growth. So we launched Content Marketing World. Today, the content marketing community comprises the most amazing people I have ever met.

In your very early days, what were the biggest doubts and criticisms you heard about content marketing? How big of a challenge was it to get businesses to see the potential you saw in content marketing?

There were many. How do I sell it internally? How do I know it will work? Where can I find budget for something like this? How do I integrate it with the rest of my marketing? These are all reasonable questions that happen from anything new.

The challenge was that 15 years ago there were not many case studies available. Then Red Bull came along. Then BlendTec. And then a hundred more. Once the large enterprises, like Microsoft, started to dabble in it, we became confident that we were on the right track.

Today, how have those doubts changed? When you hear people doubt content marketing as an effective marketing tool today, what are their common objections? How do you respond to these doubts or rejections?

You don't have to convince marketers about content marketing anymore...at least to try it. You have to convince them that it takes time and patience for it to work. Most content marketing programs take well over a year to bear fruit. This is a challenge since most enterprise marketers have the patience of a gnat. Content marketing programs are generally killed, not because of lack of results, but because the executive team either loses faith in the program or doesn't understand what the content marketing team is trying to do.

That's why, right from the beginning, you have to tell the marketing executive team not to expect anything for nine to 12 months. Now, you may reap benefits before that, but you need to keep expectations in line. It takes time to build quality relationships with customers.

How have you seen content marketing strategy shift in the last 5 years? Are there any interesting content marketing trends you're seeing as being unusually effective?

The biggest shift I see happening right now is that large brands are starting to consider buying distressed media assets instead of just building internally. I believe this is a huge opportunity for brands out there who want to shorten the cycle of building loyal relationships. Also, with all the privacy regulations going on right now, first-party data is critical...so purchasing first-party databases is incredibly smart. I just wrote an article about how media companies are selling to their advertisers.

If you had to give a percentage for the amount of revenue that content drives for your company (or client companies you've worked with), what would you say the % of revenue that content drives in most cases?

That's a tough question. When I was at CMI, 99% of our revenue came from content marketing initiatives because that's all we did to market. Also, content marketing programs should work with your advertising and PR programs (not separately). That said, in most innovative companies you are seeing at least one or two touch points that lead to a sale come from content marketing approaches. This could be an article they find in a search engine. A subscription to an email newsletter or magazine. Listening to a podcast. Watching a webinar, etc.

You previously talked about buying distressed media properties. If you had to acquire a web property to help Content Marketing Institute, what type of property would you be looking for? What traits would you want your acquired web property to have and what role would you want it to play in your portfolio?

I would be looking for the leading education brand in an industry. This could be led by a podcast or a YouTube series or an event. I'm most interested in the first-party database. Is it growing? What's the open rate like? How are unsubscribes? What's the purchasing power of the audience? I would also want to know if they are monetizing the content brand in multiple ways - advertising/sponsorship plus direct sales or more.

You're deeply involved in the world of email marketing as well. As a content marketing specialist, you bring a unique perspective to the world of email marketing. Do you think your background in content marketing heavily influences the work you do with your email marketing campaigns? If so how?

I believe that email marketing is the cornerstone of any content marketing approach. I fully believe in growing subscribers, and the best way to do that (today) is through email. I don't see this changing anytime soon.

Thank you greatly for taking the time to chat with the mailfloss email marketing blog readers today Joe. We really appreciate you taking the time. To our audience, if you’d like to learn more about Joe and the work he does, you can follow him on Twitter or head over to his website here.

A Strong Email List Is the Missing Piece of the Puzzle for Most Marketers

Building an engaged email list can be one of the most profitable marketing initiatives you could put in place.

Introduction

At mailfloss we’re focused on helping email marketers get the most from their email marketing campaigns. We do this in a few different ways. First, we help email marketers improve their deliverability through the use of our email list verification service. Secondly, we work hard to educate email marketers on the various topics relating to running a successful email marketing campaign.

Today, mailfloss had the opportunity to chat with Yosef Silver, founder of Fusion Inbound, a digital marketing agency, to talk about how he approaches email marketing for maximum gain.

Without further ado, let’s jump into the interview.

The Interview

You take a cross channel approach when working on marketing campaigns for your clients. In your experience what channels provide the best opportunity for sales conversions? What channels do you generally see as the lowest risk / highest reward?

A strong email list is the missing piece of the digital marketing channel for so many brands. Taking a cross-channel approach to building an engaged email list can be one of the most profitable marketing initiatives you could put in place. This doesn't mean buying email lists — never buy an email list — but think about what you can do within your funnel to have people opt in to your content.

You have extensive knowledge of both marketing automation and email marketing. Tell us a little bit more about your experience where these two worlds intersect. What are some of the most successful email marketing automation strategies that you've deployed and why do you feel like they were so successful?

This depends very much on your niche and the way you approach email and automation. I have found that many people send coupons or discounts, and focus so much on their own brand. When I think of successful email and automation, they have one thing in common. They speak to the value they are adding for the customer. If your content leads with "we" or "us" take another look at the content. It's not "we put this on sale" it's "you can benefit from sale pricing".

Let's talk a little bit more about email opt-in optimization. What type of lead magnets, as well as magnet placements, have you seen used successfully to help increase the opt-in conversion rate of an email newsletter?

Not all opt-ins are equal. Start your segmentation early and tailor the emails to the opt-in. Does the language match the landing page? Does the lead magnet match the ad copy — I know, this sounds obvious but I've seen mistakes happen more often than you'd think. I also recommend refreshing your content frequently. If there are seasonalities in your industry, a lead magnet that works well in spring might not work well in winter.

Generally speaking, once a subscriber joins up for a mailing list, what is a good first email to send within the sequence? In your opinion, what should the goal of the first email in an email sequence be?

I think of the first email as your chance to fulfill a promise. Give the user what they are looking for. Be direct, and create a good first impression. If you promised them a checklist, deliver it. Don't hide it behind another video or another signup process.

Let's talk a little bit more about email marketing and sending frequency. How do you approach email sending frequency for your clients?

You need to really know your audience and provide value with every email. I believe in creating content that will resonate and provide value to the user rather than creating content dictated by the calendar. At the end of the day, the more value you offer, the better it will perform. There's a balance to be found to make sure you have ongoing engagement and interaction too.

In terms of engagement (i.e. opens/clicks) what types of email content have you seen perform best?

I have found that a highly targeted, detailed, and easy to understand abandoned cart email series can have outstanding open rates and drive tremendous conversions. And with the right copy, my testing has proved that you don't need to offer a coupon or discount to convert these abandoned carts into sales.

Lastly, if you could go back in time and give a younger version of yourself three pieces of advice with regards to creating the best email titles, what would those three pieces of advice be?

Don't neglect the importance of spending time writing the perfect subject line. The subject line can be as important as the copy in the email itself.

Know when to offer a coupon or discount, and when to educate and portray value. You don't want your entire customer base to expect a discount every time you email them.

Don't be lazy when it comes to segmentation, use the data available to send emails that will resonate with your audience.

Thank you greatly for taking the time to chat with mailfloss’s email marketing blog readers today Yosef. We really appreciate you taking the time. To our audience, if you’d like to learn more about Yosef and the work he does, you can follow him on Twitter or head over to his website here.

Email Marketers: Email Voice Consistency Is Crucial for Hooking Readers

I think consistency is probably one of the biggest factors that hooks readers. It’s like when you’re having a conversation with your best friend—if they talk to you differently every time you meet them for a coffee, you’re going to feel a little weird about them!

Introduction

At mailfloss we’re focused on helping email marketers get the most from their email marketing campaigns. We do this in a few different ways. First, we help email marketers improve their deliverability through the use of our email list verification tool. Secondly, we work hard to educate email marketers on the various topics relating to running a successful email marketing campaign by publishing in-depth educational articles on our email marketing blog.

Today, mailfloss had the opportunity to chat with Jaina Mistry, an email marketer whose specialties include; email copywriting, email design & build, testing, deployment, reporting, and email campaign development.

Without further ado, let’s jump into the interview.

The Interview

Hi Jaina and thanks for joining us today. It's a pleasure to have the opportunity to pick your brain about your experience in the email marketing niche. You have over 8 years of experience as an email marketer. Can you tell me a little bit more about how you got your start in email marketing? What was it about the industry that grabbed your attention and hasn't let go?

Like a lot of folks who currently work in email marketing, I actually just fell into email marketing. My first exposure of email was over 10 years ago while I was working as a web producer. As well as web design and development, I spent the other part of my days knee-deep in email—designing, developing, deploying—all the D’s! If I’m totally honest, I don’t think there was anything specific about the industry that really grabbed me back then, I think it was more of a case of me having a skill that was in demand, than anything else. A couple of jobs later, I’d stepped out of full-time positions and into contracting and freelancing. With my background and skill set as a web designer and developer, I was getting contacted more and more about email specific positions. That was when I was really grabbed by the industry—on the design and development side, it was the problem-solving aspect that I loved. Often, folks complain about the limitations that email design and development presents and that it limits them to be creative. But those are the very things that forced me to be more creative.

From there, it was the opportunity to learn almost instantly about the performance of my email designs—what worked and what failed catastrophically. I guess it’s that instant gratification that we, as humans, tend to love but in my case it was the instant learnings.

You focus on the A to Z's of email marketing from email conceptualization to email performance analytics. Let's talk about conceptualization a little bit more. What are some of the most innovative email campaigns you've seen come out recently? What makes these campaigns so interesting to you? Is it their effectiveness, their voice or something else?

Can I gush about my own team here? Because I am really proud of what we were able to accomplish for our newsletter last October. It all came about very organically. We knew we wanted to add some level of seasonality to the email and also wanted to feature the hot topic of Dark Mode, too. And being Litmus, we wanted to push the boundaries of what we can do with email. What made this campaign truly effective was the expertise we drew in for it—email development, email design, content marketing. But you wouldn’t necessarily know this looking at the email as a subscriber—everything from the subject line to the look and feel feels seamless. And that’s part of the magic of a great campaign.

Let's talk about "voice" a little bit more. Who are some companies you think other email marketers should study to learn more about email marketing "voice". What is it about these voices that hook readers?

I’m a big fan of inVision’s weekly newsletter, Inside Design. Everything from their subject line through to the copy used on their CTAs tells the reader exactly who they are. And they’re consistent! That’s challenging, but it pays off.

While I’ve never purchased anything from Chubbies, their emails do something similar to Inside Design—have a strong, consistent tone of voice that’s fun. And that sense of fun draws readers into the emails.

I think consistency is probably one of the biggest factors that hooks readers. It’s like when you’re having a conversation with your best friend—if they talk to you differently every time you meet them for a coffee, you’re going to feel a little weird about them!

So while the fun, playful aspect of Inside Design and Chubbie’s voice is most excellent, it’s their consistency that’s key.

On your website, you mention that you like mapping out email campaigns. Over the course of your career, what are some of the biggest takeaways about email mapping / sequencing that you've learned? Any actionable tips for other email marketers out there who are just getting started and looking for a good sequence?

Don’t be afraid to totally change up your approach based on what you’re seeing in your email campaigns’ results. Email marketing is all about learning from what you’re doing. As email marketers, we don’t know the right thing to do all the time. And even when we think we’ve got things figured out, something changes and we have to start all over again. And that’s okay!

One thing I will suggest email marketers out there do is check in on their automated onboarding emails flows regularly. Add those check-ins to a calendar, schedule them in, do whatever you need to do to review what you have running on a regular basis. It’s incredibly easy to set things running and forget about them. I’ve done that in my career because there’s always so much to do!

Oh, another thing—make friends with everyone! From engineers to the data team, designers to leadership. Email touches so many parts of a business, it’s important for you as an email marketer to give email at your organization a voice.

Let's talk about analyzing and reporting now. First, what are some of the most common traits of emails that have the most impressive performance analytics?

The teams involved. Email marketing is a channel of its own, but a great email campaign requires the expertise of folks from different teams. At Litmus, we rely heavily on our content team to help us create the monthly newsletter. Our content team knows which content performs best and understands what our audience wants to read. So we leverage their expertise to build our newsletters.

Email is a team sport!

Where do you stand within the debate around email tracking? Some email marketers avoid it because they notice a reduction in deliverability. How do you personally balance deliverability with performance tracking?

Hate to answer a question with another question but … I’m going to—how can you accurately monitor your deliverability without performance tracking? Even the most basic performance metrics can give you an insight into the health of your email program. And for that reason alone, they’re a necessity for me.

While many email marketers are narrow in their focus (often just concentrated on marketing one web property), you're the opposite and instead get to work with multiple companies in different niches. What are some of the most important lessons you've learned from working in a wide range of niches? Surely, there are strategies or concepts that you've seen work well in once niche that you've been able to extract and use within another niche.

It’s the different perspectives that working in different niches gives you that’s been invaluable to me. Those learnings and techniques you pick up working for one niche can be applied to another.

One thing that ecommerce organisations had cracked before other businesses was the need for highly modular and templated emails. This was a necessity to build highly-personalized emails at scale. In the last 5 years, there’s been a huge need for this across various types of businesses but for a somewhat different reason—the need for non-email specific teams to be able to create an email. The need boils down to the same thing—the need to scale and produce email fast. But now that’s not just an ecommerce email need.

Creating email for international audiences taught me that subscribers interpret things differently. Creating email for audiences based in Spain, UK, Portugal, Germany, it wasn’t just the language that had to be different but how the message was communicated. And the same could be said even if your entire audience is English because they may be at different points in the customer cycle and it’s more effective speaking to them slightly differently.

Where do you think email marketing is going in the next 3 to 5 years? Do you see any interesting changes, trends or technologies on the horizon that we should be aware of?

It’s hard to talk about the future and not talk about AMP for Email. Since it was announced, email marketers have been buzzing about it. It’s got the potential to really change how the email channel is positioned. Right now, email’s primary objective is to push readers to take an action—usually a click to a landing page—where they can take further action. (This is very generally speaking!) With AMP for Email, readers can skip an entire step and make all the actions they want to take from the email itself. I have to admit, I’m a little skeptical about AMP for Email. It requires a whole new MIME type and scripting language and that new MIME type needs to be supported by ESPs. And right now, I can count how many ESPs support AMP for Email on one hand. Without widespread adoption by ESPs, it’s hard for the average email markets to cash-in.

I also see email marketing coming out of its silo. But that’s probably more of a general thing all of the different aspects of marketing. Marketing is at its most effective when every channel works together. And to be an effective email marketer, you may need to dip your toe into product, growth, retention, content, and social media marketing to create the best email campaigns.

And I think 5 years from now, we’ll be asking the same thing of ourselves and may even have the same answers!

Thank you greatly for taking the time to chat with the mailfloss email marketing blog readers today, Jaina. We really appreciate you taking the time. To our audience, if you’d like to learn more about Jaina and the work she does, you can follow her on Twitter or head over to her website here.