The New Rules of Email Marketing

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Could it be true in the world of cell phone, TV advertisements, blogs, forums, RSS feeds and pod casts that 90% of Internet users and 56% of all Americans still rely on email as their main way of communicating with other individuals. Americans send over 2.4 trillion emails a year. Still, if you use emailing as a marketing tool, you are fighting a battle that may do more harm to your business than good if you are not diligent in following the new rules of email marketing.

In this article, I discuss the ways email marketing has changed, as well as how important it is to engage your customer. You will learn how to actually help your customers benefit from your emails and avoid hammering them over the head to use your products or services.

Point: Over 50% of consumers define SPAM as, "I once gave my permission but I no longer wish to receive emails."

Did you know that the average ROI (Return On Investment) on most email campaign averages about 4%? Open rates have dipped to all time lows, and email recipients are all too ready to push the "report as spam" button. Why is this happening? Why this animosity towards email? Americans are inundated and frustrated with being "talked at" and "sold to". Today's consumer is exceptionally savvy when it comes to marketing. The average US consumer spends 14 hours of week watching TV and then another 14 hours a week surfing the web. For your emails to impact this audience, they have to be engaging and beneficial.

Engagement allows the consumer to take an active role; it's about a two-way dialogue. Engagement allows other customers to interact with other customers, and with you. It allows you to interact with you on their terms not your company's terms. One way we do this is by including discussion links in our emails. This link takes the customer to a forum where they can express their opinions whether it is about the company; the product or whatever is on their mind. This gives the customer an important voice, as well as makes them an integral part of the decision making process. This form of discussion teaches you how your customers want to be approached and how you can fulfill their needs by providing them with valuable resources.

Too many companies focus on building their list. They are consumed with the number of individuals they have on their email list. The reasoning is, the more customers I have on my list, the more people I can sell to. The reasoning seems to make sense, but more numbers does not covert into more sales. ISP Service providers do not like large amounts of emails to be sent out. Companies such as AOL block about 75% of the 2 billion emails it receives daily. Companies need to focus on building a reliable reputation and sending out quality emails. Make sure that you populate your list with individuals that have expressed interest in your products or services – even with this, make sure that they are added to your email list via an opt-in confirmation.

Use a reputable email service such as Constant Contact. Companies such as Constant Contact have many beneficial tools that enable you to monitor your email campaigns. These features include detail reporting on bounces, click-throughs, unsubscribe, links clicked etc. Another very positive opportunity is to watch you web logs for spikes to see when your site consistently has the most traffic. Begin to send out your emails on those days. Using a company like Constant Contact will enable you to automate your email experience and allow you to focus on excellent content.

Another great service that most email services provide is the ability to segment your lists into groups. If you sell multiple products, you do not want to send an email over and over to your entire email list when many of them may have already purchased your product. Segment your email lists into groups and then focus on sending them relevant content. Researches have found that by segmenting groups, there was a 7x increase in open rates and a 14x increase in click through rates. If you are not segmenting your list currently, you may want to start.

An email marketer's nightmare is to make it easy to unsubscribe from their mailing list, but this must be done. Make unsubscribing easy, it is much better than upsetting them and having them report your email as SPAM. Provide you customers with the tools they need to have a positive experience with your company. If they report your email as SPAM, you will most likely have lost the customer for good.

Creativity never hurts, unless your not. Many email companies allow you to send both text and HTML formatted emails. HTML formatting allows you to create some very powerful presentations, simply by including images, audio or video. Researchers have found that well designed emails can increase response rate by up to 75%. The main thing is to get you reader involved in the email and to make your email interactive and unique. Retailers such as Barnes and Nobles and Borders bookstores are perfect examples of advertising done right. Their emails include book reviews, introduction to new books as well as discount coupons. Their emails are informative, engaging, and they have a "call to action". They physically get you to click on a link and print a coupon to take to the store.

By applying some of the new tactics and guidelines above, your emails will not only be read, they will engage the customer in a beneficial way. I wish you great success in your emailing endeavors.

Copyright 2008 FMWebschool Inc. http://www.fmwebschool.com Written by Stephen Knight