1. What is email Marketing?

Marketing is a societal process that is needed to discern consumers' wants; focusing on a product/service to those wants, and to mould the consumers towards the products/services. Marketing is fundamental to any businesses growth. The marketing teams (Marketers) have the task to create the consumer awareness of the products/services through marketing techniques; if a business does not pay attention to their products/services and their consumers' demographics, the business would not be able to endure longevity.
Marketing tends to be seen as a creative industry, which includes advertising, distribution and selling. It is also concerned with anticipating the customers' future needs and wants, often through market research.

Its specialist areas include:

Advertising and Branding
Direct Marketing
International Marketing
Public Relations
Communications
Strategic Management
Market Research
Events Organisation
Database Marketing
Search Engine Marketing.

Marketing is the promotion of products or services via email.


2. What are the strategies of an effective marketing?

Defining Your Niche Market
Any marketer will tell you that when you know who are you are marketing to it's easy to determine where your marketing energy and dollars should be spent. By reading this article you will learn the importance of defining your niche market and what 5 questions will get you closer to that goal.Why Aren't You Earning More?
In a recent survey of independent professionals, almost 50% of the consultants, coaches, and other professionals declared that they were currently not earning enough to meet their expenses. Why is it that more than half of small business fail within the first year? In this week's guest article by C.J. Hayden explores why you aren't earning more.Publish or Perish
The phrase "publish or perish" reflects the common knowledge that people must know who you are to hire you, promote you, or fund your research. No matter what niche you do business in, experts agree that publishing your work accelerates your ability to gain clients. If you are like many people the idea of having your work published can seem daunting. In this guest article C.J. Hayden shares with you simple guidelines that will help you in getting published.An Action Step is Worth a Thousand Words
Brochures, sales letters, and websites are all excellent and effective marketing tools. Writing powerful and informative marketing copy is a useful skill to learn or hire out to a professional. Just don't let your marketing get put on hold because you haven't yet found the perfect words to use. Learn why an action step is worth at thousand words when it comes to marketing.Marketing Along the Path of Least Resistance
Do you find marketing to be a constant struggle? It doesn't have to be that way. The most successful marketers make it look easy because they have found a way to market themselves that is effortless. Perhaps you have tried to copy what those successful people were doing, and it didn't work for you. C.J. Hayden shows you why in this week's guest article.

3. What are do's and dont's of email marketing?

1. Make sure all your email recipients are opt in or double opt in. This means that they have subscribed to your ezine, newsletter, report or e-course.

2. Always provide an unsubscribe link

3. Always sign each email with your name, address, company (if any), telephone # and email address. This will ensure you are never accused of spam or at least you will be found innocent.

4. Keep the email short, with each paragraph 5-10 lines at most. People are in a hurry and they scan most email so make sure your email has the most important point in the first sentence of each paragraph.

5. Create a compelling or interesting subject line. You want your email opened at the least. Good headlines aren't hype of over-stated, simply what the benefit the reader will get for opening and reading your email.

6. Format every email to 60-65 lines. This ensures your email won't look like:

when you send an email

make sure its properly formatted with 60-65 characters per line with a 'hard return' so it
looks even and professional.
I use a great program called Ezine Fire that has a file and format that will scan your email for possible words that will trigger filters and insert a space, apostrophe...etc in text or html.

You can sign up for free at: http://www.ezinefire.com/Home/redirect.php?master=1364

7. I like to use P.S. in many of my email ads. People tend to scan and read the P.S. if nothing else.

8. Try to add your personality to the email text. People want to associate with those that seem real and sincere. Don't come across another salesman trying to sell them something.

Create good quality content and use a resource box that has your name, email address and a blurb about a product your pitching. The best way is to get them to subscribe or email for something free, related to the topic of your ezine.




Authored By: Lithel May E. Jimenez

ERNIE L. ALBURO
FELIPE VERALLO FOUNDATION COLLEGE
CLOTILDE HILLS, DAKIT, BOGO CITY, CEBU

1. Email Marketing

--is a form of direct marketing which uses electronic mail as a means of communicating commercial or fundraising messages to an audience. In its broadest sense, every email sent to a potential or current customer could be considered email marketing. However, the term is usually used to refer to:

Sending emails with the purpose of enhancing the relationship of a merchant with its current or old customers and to encourage customer loyalty and repeat business.
Sending emails with the purpose of acquiring new customers or convincing old customers to buy something immediately.
Adding advertisements in emails sent by other companies to their customers.

2. What are strategies of an effefctive email marketing?

-- Email Marketing Methods
Source: Managing a Small Business

Like many small business owners, I work with a small marketing budget. Okay, truth be told, I hate to spend money on advertising. Especially if I can get better exposure at a very low cost, sometimes even FREE!

During the past three years online, I've learned some great ways to do just that. Today I'd like to share them with you.

Don't worry, I'm not going to tell you to spend days and days at free classified sites or newsgroups. The methods I'll be sharing with you are much more powerful.

So how does the cost-conscious marketer get the best free and low-cost exposure? Simple. By utilizing various forms of the best free marketing tool ever invented... Email!

There are many ways to utilize email marketing. For the most part, email marketing can be broken down into two distinct categories... Targeted and Untargeted.

First I'll touch on the untargeted, just to show you why it is a waste of time.

UNTARGETED EMAIL MARKETING
Untargeted email marketing on the internet usually takes on the form of "Unsolicited Bulk Email". Whether you are doing it yourself or hiring one of the thousands of email blasting companies online, it makes no difference. Bulk email is NOT a smart way to market.

Let me explain exactly why...

"Spamming", or sending mass email to "unqualified" email addresses is considered bad "netiquette". If you send unsolicited email to addresses that do not want commercial email, not only do you risk the reputation of your business, you can get into more trouble than you would expect.

What kind of trouble? Well, since many ISP's do not allow this activity, they will discontinue your account as soon as the inevitable complaints start to trickle in.

If you want better results without the risk, consider the following alternatives...

TARGETED EMAIL MARKETING
Targeted email marketing works. Truly targeted email means getting your email to recipients that HAVE approved of it. Not only do your get better results, you won't have to worry about ISP cancellation and more importantly, the reputation of your business.

Here are the best targeted email marketing methods I've used. (Listed from most expensive to least expensive.)

- "Opt In" email list rental.
- Ezine advertising.
- Ezine publishing.
- Email Discussion group participation.

Here are details on how I utilize each...

"Opt In" email list rental

Did you know that you can actually rent email lists of people who have approved email about certain topics. (Just about any topic imaginable!)

This method is not the cheapest form of targeted email marketing, but it works! On average, you'll have to spend about ten to fifteen cents per address. The companies that rent the addresses even do the mailing for you. You just sit back and wait for the orders!

When I released my book, "Insider Internet Marketing", I used this method and sold a few thousand dollars worth of books in a two day span. The company I used is called Postmasterdirect .

Ezine advertising

I'm a big fan of Ezine advertising and regularly utilize this low budget technique. I'm not just saying that to drum up advertisers for my own newsletter, actually I have a waiting list of about a month just to get an ad in here. Why? Quite simply, email advertising works!

Take a look at the advertising section of your favorite email Ezine. The reason there are so many ads there is because the advertisers get results. Not only do you reach your target audience, you reach them by the thousands. Of all the online marketing methods available, Ezine advertising could be the most effective.

Many larger companies are just starting to realize this and are entering into this exciting new advertising medium. Compared with the high costs of web site banner advertising, Ezine advertising is a bargain.

Ezine publishing

One step better than "advertising" in ezines, is actually publishing your own. If you are not already publishing your own e-newsletter, I highly recommend you do so. It is much easier than you might imagine.

Your customers and prospects will constantly be "in touch" and your Ezine can keep them abreast of new products and services as you make them available. You can also generate income offering classified or sponsorship advertising if you wish.

Unlike traditional newsletters, there are no printing or postage costs. Since your own cost is zero, you can offer free subscriptions, thus insuring a steady flow of new prospects.

To get started publishing your own Ezine, you do not need to pay for list management. You can manage and deliver your Ezine yourself with a good email program like Qualcomm's Eudora or Pegasus Mail by David Harrris. These are the best email programs available on the internet and
they can be downloaded for free at the following URL's


Once you have your email program installed, practice mailing to a few people at once by using the BCC (blind carbon copy) feature. It's important to use the BCC field when mailing to a list. This insures that everyone on the list does not see other email addresses on the list. No one wants their email address publicized all over the net.

After you've perfected your emailing skills, all you need is some subscribers. That's easy, simply post a message announcing your newsletter to the "NewList Announcement List". Full details on posting
are here:

Email discussion group participation

An email discussion group is delivered via email like an email newsletter. But a discussion list differs from an email newsletter in one major way -- you are allowed to voice your opinion, usually through a moderator.

Discussion lists also allow you to ask for help from others with similar interests. What's more, you can assist people in need while your sig. File (the footer you include at the end of every email message you send) invites readers to your site. Discussion group marketing works because the posts are delivered directly TO a targeted audience. Once again, push marketing at it's finest! In addition to posting to discussion groups you should consider advertising if the group you join offers it.

No matter what you are marketing online, participating in discussion lists makes sense. Not only will you learn some valuable information, it's is a great way to soft-sell some of your wares.


Now that you are armed with the facts about email marketing, go out and start your email marketing campaign today! And remember, whatever email marketing method you choose, be sure that every single email you send out includes your URL and a brief description of exactly how YOU
can be of service to anyone who may be reading that email!

3. THE DO/S AND DONT/S OF AN EFFECTIVE EMAIL MARKETING:


DO'S
1. Know Your Visitors.
Your site should be designed to fit their needs and wants. If you're selling, know the demographics of the people you're selling to. If you're just providing information, know who you are targeting. Rule of thumb: Know more about your audience than they know about you.
2. Know Your Product.
As strange as that may sound, people know when a site offers products or services that they themselves know little about. If you are letting someone else write the content for your site and that someone doesn't know the product, then your customers won't know it either. Anticipate questions from customers and answer them before they are asked.
3. Make Your Site Visually Pleasing.
Just because bright red and bright blue are your favorite colors doesn't mean that they should be the dominant colors on your site. Red and blue are at different ends of the spectrum and will give viewers a headache if viewed too long. You want to make viewers feel welcome, comfortable, and that they are able to trust you.
4. Outline the Concept of the Site Before It is Created.
Know the answers to those golden questions: who, what, when, where, why and how. While these questions apply to your demographics they are also helpful in deciding what information is truly important and what isn't. Pinning down your tacit knowledge is often a challenge, and not all tacit knowledge is valuable. What do you want the customers to know and what do the customers want to know?
5. Make Your Prices Readily Available.
Hide your prices and customers will wonder what else you are hiding. Don't wait until after you ask for their credit card information to tell them how much it costs. You don't make sales that way; what you do make is frustrated customers who tell other potential customers to stay away from your site.
6. Keep Your Site Credible.
Back up what you say with statistics or links to articles that support your claim. If you have experts in your company, highlight them. Show the customer that there are REAL people running the business. Update the content as often as possible - if updating the content isn't possible, add links to news articles and update those links. It is time consuming, but in the end it is worth the time and effort.
7. Ask for Input from People Who Know Nothing About Your Product/ Service/ Business.
This is the best way to get true feedback. People who know nothing about what you are doing can find the smallest error and ask the best questions. They can give you a fresh perspective on your site and sometimes your business. They don't know what you know, and they often see what you don't.
8. Use Images that Portray Confidence.
You want the customer to trust you right? Then show them that you believe enough in yourself and your product that there is no doubt that you are trustworthy. Dress for success. You wouldn't wear snow boots on a hot summer's day, would you? Then don't let your site wear images that could make you look cheap and untrustworthy.
9. Keep Your Site Translator-Friendly.
This can sometimes be challenging as we tend to use different terminology than other countries. What we would consider 'normal phrasing' may be considered 'odd' or offensive to someone else. Avoid slang and check your site with a translator. Check to see which words are translated and which ones aren't, then try to figure out why.
10. Be Consistent Throughout the Site.
Making each page of your site different can be entertaining to teenagers and new internet users, but most of your potential customers aren't new to the internet. If a viewer feels as though they're on a different site each time they click a link on your site, they are likely to go to another site. Consistency counts in site design and professionalism, and your customers will expect it.
DON'TS
1. Don't Guess at Who You're Trying to Reach With Your Site.
'Guesstimation' is for horse shoes and card games. If you don't know your demographics, then you might as well have thrown your site together.
2. Don't Get Too Technical.
Your customers are the ones reading your site, so it should be written for them. Sure, your competition might read your site as well, but they already know the business jargon. Besides, you aren't trying to sell to them anyway. Remember, other business owners may browse, but your customers are your buyers.
3. Don't Give Your Customers A Headache.
There are 256 colors available for site design. 216 of those are browser 'safe.' Just because there are an abundance of colors does not mean that they all should be used at once. Warm colors shouldn't be used with cool colors because of the conflicting hues. Meanwhile, bright colors make the eyes work harder to focus and after a few minutes will likely give your viewers a headache.
4. Don't Keep Content That Isn't Being Read.
Keeping track of what your customers are actually reading is very helpful. You want a customer to peruse your site as completely as possible. The more they know, the better your chances are that they will purchase or sign-up. If a page isn't being read then try something else. Rewrite it. Add psychological triggers. Rephrase. Find a way to make the page valuable.
5. Don't Repeat the Same Information on Every Page.
The viewer doesn't want to read the same material over and over. Give them new, fresh information on each page. If they want to go back and read the previous page, give them that option.
6. Don't Hide Contact Information.
You'll find conflicting information on this topic. Some designers will tell you to put your contact information on every page, but customers tend to find that redundant. One page with multiple ways to contact you is more effective even if the customer never visits the page. Just having the page there tells them that you can be reached and that you really are there for their convenience.
7. Don't Use Animations.
Some would say use animations to draw attention to your ad, product, 'new' idea/newsletter/etc. but by following that suggestion you frustrate the customer. Flashing, moving objects distract the eyes. A customer is there looking for information, if their eyes are distracted while reading, their comprehension decreases while their frustration rises. The use of colors such as yellow and orange become helpful in this area. Bolding or italicizing words is another way to emphasize phrases, or items you want the customer to notice.
8. Don't Use Multiple Fonts.
It only takes the eye seconds to adjust to a new font, but those seconds are distracting to the mind. Different sizes, styles, and colors are confusing. Choose one font and stick with it. Consistency is more important than creativity when it comes to text.
9. Don't Take Control Away From the Viewer.
Creative cursors, full screen browsers, and other 'entertaining' aspects of site design are great, if your target audience is teenagers or new internet users, but for a professional website they give the appearance of being cheap, second rate, and amateurish.
10. Don't 'Bunch Up' the Text.
Add spaces between paragraphs so customers don't feel overwhelmed with information. Placing a small picture pertaining to the content gives the eyes time to relax before reading further.

Manolo Lepaopao




1. What is e-mail marketing?


Ans.

E-mail marketing is a way to market products and services through electronic mail. Companies run e-mail marketing campaigns to communicate commercial or fundraising messages to an audience. E-mail marketing campaigns are carried out with an objective to attract old and new customers.



2. What are the strategies of effective email marketing?

Ans.


E-mail strategy is a lot like teaching someone to ride a bicycle: work directly with an eager student and a bike, and it's a can-do proposition. But ask me (or anyone else, for that matter) to write out directions students can use to teach themselves to ride a bike, well, that's a much greater challenge.
Here are the 10 steps you need to take to develop an effective e-mail strategy:
1. Identify qualitative goals.
2. Analyze the current situation.
3. Complete a competitive analysis.
4. Define the target audience.
5. Determine which types of e-mail meet your needs.
6. Develop a content strategy and a frequency and send schedule.
7. Design the e-mail template.
8. Create quantitative goals.
9. Compile budget and ROI (define) projections.
10. Evaluate results and tweak the strategy accordingly.


3. What are the do’s and don’t of email marketing?

Ans.

-mail has moved beyond its infancy and has proven to be a high-yield marketing channel, so much so that everyone is jumping on board. Separate your messages from the clutter by implementing these dos and avoiding these don’ts. David Letterman has his top 10s, now here are mine:
Do include a call to action. In fact, include it several times throughout the e-mail. Be specific and create a sense of urgency by including an expiration date. Include the first one in the subject line. Put the second at the top to display in the preview pane. Even if your recipients never scroll, they now have two opportunities to take action. Finally, always include a call to action at the end. If your recipients were interested enough to read the entire message, don’t make them scroll up.
Do make the e-mail unique to your company. Have a style unique to your brand or company and intertwine some flavor so it never gets old. Include an accurate logo that is clearly visible and clickable. If the link is to your Web site, ensure it functions properly. Train your recipients to recognize your brand and leave with a positive impression.
Do include an unsubscribe option. Always include the unsubscribe option. It’s not just a courtesy, it’s the law. CAN-SPAM dictates that every e-mail marketing message include the functional opt out and gives the marketer 10 days to suppress the opt out.
Do include white-listing instructions. Once readers become interested in your e-mails, they won’t want to miss any of them. Show them how to add you to their white list. This decreases your company’s chances of being marked as spam in future mailings. Also, recipients will connect and become familiar with your brand. Think of it as being on their VIP list.
Do consider using an e-mail service provider to send your campaigns. With ever-changing best practices, this is the most reliable, efficient way to manage your e-mail campaigns. It lets you track e-mails, measure campaign results and improve and modify your e-mail strategy while your ESP focuses on message hosting, best-practices consulting and delivery.
Don’t overwhelm the recipient’s inbox. Sending daily marketing e-mails can cause more harm than good to your campaign. It also damages your brand’s reputation. If messages are flooding inboxes, recipients are more likely to unsubscribe or mark your messages as junk.
Don’t get too wordy. Starting with the subject line, keep everything short and to the point. Paragraphs should be short but catchy enough to grab people’s attention. Use simple words and short phrases. Arrange the text so a quick scan can easily reveal the main message. Use bullet points wherever possible.
Don’t misspell words or use poor grammar. This is obvious, but nothing will turn people away faster than an e-mail filled with mistakes. It not only shows incompetence on your part, but it also reflects poorly on the quality and reputation of your brand. Take time to double and triple check your text, scrutinize the copy until you find nothing wrong with it, then have someone else check it again.
Don’t keep sending messages when there is no interest. If your open and click-through rates are plummeting, change your approach or stop sending to the recipient. Try sending a reminder e-mail — they may have opted in but forgotten why. If there is still no action by the recipient, clean your distribution list.
Don’t send e-mails without a clear purpose. Every e-mail should have a purpose, and it should be obvious. Have a specific goal you want to accomplish with each e-mail. Recipients should not be wondering why a certain message was delivered to their inbox. Instead, they will understand and appreciate it when your message caters to their interests. Know yourself and know your audience, too.
As the old saying goes, you have to learn to crawl before you can walk. Keep my top 10 dos and don’ts in mind for your next campaign, and you’ll be on your feet and running in no time.

ERNIE L. ALBURO
FELIPE VERALLO FOUNDATION COLLEGE
CLOTILDE HILLS, DAKIT, BOGO CITY, CEBU

1. Email Marketing

--is a form of direct marketing which uses electronic mail as a means of communicating commercial or fundraising messages to an audience. In its broadest sense, every email sent to a potential or current customer could be considered email marketing. However, the term is usually used to refer to:

Sending emails with the purpose of enhancing the relationship of a merchant with its current or old customers and to encourage customer loyalty and repeat business.
Sending emails with the purpose of acquiring new customers or convincing old customers to buy something immediately.
Adding advertisements in emails sent by other companies to their customers.

2. What are strategies of an effefctive email marketing?

-- Email Marketing Methods
Source: Managing a Small Business

Like many small business owners, I work with a small marketing budget. Okay, truth be told, I hate to spend money on advertising. Especially if I can get better exposure at a very low cost, sometimes even FREE!

During the past three years online, I've learned some great ways to do just that. Today I'd like to share them with you.

Don't worry, I'm not going to tell you to spend days and days at free classified sites or newsgroups. The methods I'll be sharing with you are much more powerful.

So how does the cost-conscious marketer get the best free and low-cost exposure? Simple. By utilizing various forms of the best free marketing tool ever invented... Email!

There are many ways to utilize email marketing. For the most part, email marketing can be broken down into two distinct categories... Targeted and Untargeted.

First I'll touch on the untargeted, just to show you why it is a waste of time.

UNTARGETED EMAIL MARKETING
Untargeted email marketing on the internet usually takes on the form of "Unsolicited Bulk Email". Whether you are doing it yourself or hiring one of the thousands of email blasting companies online, it makes no difference. Bulk email is NOT a smart way to market.

Let me explain exactly why...

"Spamming", or sending mass email to "unqualified" email addresses is considered bad "netiquette". If you send unsolicited email to addresses that do not want commercial email, not only do you risk the reputation of your business, you can get into more trouble than you would expect.

What kind of trouble? Well, since many ISP's do not allow this activity, they will discontinue your account as soon as the inevitable complaints start to trickle in.

If you want better results without the risk, consider the following alternatives...

TARGETED EMAIL MARKETING
Targeted email marketing works. Truly targeted email means getting your email to recipients that HAVE approved of it. Not only do your get better results, you won't have to worry about ISP cancellation and more importantly, the reputation of your business.

Here are the best targeted email marketing methods I've used. (Listed from most expensive to least expensive.)

- "Opt In" email list rental.
- Ezine advertising.
- Ezine publishing.
- Email Discussion group participation.

Here are details on how I utilize each...

"Opt In" email list rental

Did you know that you can actually rent email lists of people who have approved email about certain topics. (Just about any topic imaginable!)

This method is not the cheapest form of targeted email marketing, but it works! On average, you'll have to spend about ten to fifteen cents per address. The companies that rent the addresses even do the mailing for you. You just sit back and wait for the orders!

When I released my book, "Insider Internet Marketing", I used this method and sold a few thousand dollars worth of books in a two day span. The company I used is called Postmasterdirect .

Ezine advertising

I'm a big fan of Ezine advertising and regularly utilize this low budget technique. I'm not just saying that to drum up advertisers for my own newsletter, actually I have a waiting list of about a month just to get an ad in here. Why? Quite simply, email advertising works!

Take a look at the advertising section of your favorite email Ezine. The reason there are so many ads there is because the advertisers get results. Not only do you reach your target audience, you reach them by the thousands. Of all the online marketing methods available, Ezine advertising could be the most effective.

Many larger companies are just starting to realize this and are entering into this exciting new advertising medium. Compared with the high costs of web site banner advertising, Ezine advertising is a bargain.

Ezine publishing

One step better than "advertising" in ezines, is actually publishing your own. If you are not already publishing your own e-newsletter, I highly recommend you do so. It is much easier than you might imagine.

Your customers and prospects will constantly be "in touch" and your Ezine can keep them abreast of new products and services as you make them available. You can also generate income offering classified or sponsorship advertising if you wish.

Unlike traditional newsletters, there are no printing or postage costs. Since your own cost is zero, you can offer free subscriptions, thus insuring a steady flow of new prospects.

To get started publishing your own Ezine, you do not need to pay for list management. You can manage and deliver your Ezine yourself with a good email program like Qualcomm's Eudora or Pegasus Mail by David Harrris. These are the best email programs available on the internet and
they can be downloaded for free at the following URL's


Once you have your email program installed, practice mailing to a few people at once by using the BCC (blind carbon copy) feature. It's important to use the BCC field when mailing to a list. This insures that everyone on the list does not see other email addresses on the list. No one wants their email address publicized all over the net.

After you've perfected your emailing skills, all you need is some subscribers. That's easy, simply post a message announcing your newsletter to the "NewList Announcement List". Full details on posting
are here:

Email discussion group participation

An email discussion group is delivered via email like an email newsletter. But a discussion list differs from an email newsletter in one major way -- you are allowed to voice your opinion, usually through a moderator.

Discussion lists also allow you to ask for help from others with similar interests. What's more, you can assist people in need while your sig. File (the footer you include at the end of every email message you send) invites readers to your site. Discussion group marketing works because the posts are delivered directly TO a targeted audience. Once again, push marketing at it's finest! In addition to posting to discussion groups you should consider advertising if the group you join offers it.

No matter what you are marketing online, participating in discussion lists makes sense. Not only will you learn some valuable information, it's is a great way to soft-sell some of your wares.


Now that you are armed with the facts about email marketing, go out and start your email marketing campaign today! And remember, whatever email marketing method you choose, be sure that every single email you send out includes your URL and a brief description of exactly how YOU
can be of service to anyone who may be reading that email!

3. THE DO/S AND DONT/S OF AN EFFECTIVE EMAIL MARKETING:


DO'S
1. Know Your Visitors.
Your site should be designed to fit their needs and wants. If you're selling, know the demographics of the people you're selling to. If you're just providing information, know who you are targeting. Rule of thumb: Know more about your audience than they know about you.
2. Know Your Product.
As strange as that may sound, people know when a site offers products or services that they themselves know little about. If you are letting someone else write the content for your site and that someone doesn't know the product, then your customers won't know it either. Anticipate questions from customers and answer them before they are asked.
3. Make Your Site Visually Pleasing.
Just because bright red and bright blue are your favorite colors doesn't mean that they should be the dominant colors on your site. Red and blue are at different ends of the spectrum and will give viewers a headache if viewed too long. You want to make viewers feel welcome, comfortable, and that they are able to trust you.
4. Outline the Concept of the Site Before It is Created.
Know the answers to those golden questions: who, what, when, where, why and how. While these questions apply to your demographics they are also helpful in deciding what information is truly important and what isn't. Pinning down your tacit knowledge is often a challenge, and not all tacit knowledge is valuable. What do you want the customers to know and what do the customers want to know?
5. Make Your Prices Readily Available.
Hide your prices and customers will wonder what else you are hiding. Don't wait until after you ask for their credit card information to tell them how much it costs. You don't make sales that way; what you do make is frustrated customers who tell other potential customers to stay away from your site.
6. Keep Your Site Credible.
Back up what you say with statistics or links to articles that support your claim. If you have experts in your company, highlight them. Show the customer that there are REAL people running the business. Update the content as often as possible - if updating the content isn't possible, add links to news articles and update those links. It is time consuming, but in the end it is worth the time and effort.
7. Ask for Input from People Who Know Nothing About Your Product/ Service/ Business.
This is the best way to get true feedback. People who know nothing about what you are doing can find the smallest error and ask the best questions. They can give you a fresh perspective on your site and sometimes your business. They don't know what you know, and they often see what you don't.
8. Use Images that Portray Confidence.
You want the customer to trust you right? Then show them that you believe enough in yourself and your product that there is no doubt that you are trustworthy. Dress for success. You wouldn't wear snow boots on a hot summer's day, would you? Then don't let your site wear images that could make you look cheap and untrustworthy.
9. Keep Your Site Translator-Friendly.
This can sometimes be challenging as we tend to use different terminology than other countries. What we would consider 'normal phrasing' may be considered 'odd' or offensive to someone else. Avoid slang and check your site with a translator. Check to see which words are translated and which ones aren't, then try to figure out why.
10. Be Consistent Throughout the Site.
Making each page of your site different can be entertaining to teenagers and new internet users, but most of your potential customers aren't new to the internet. If a viewer feels as though they're on a different site each time they click a link on your site, they are likely to go to another site. Consistency counts in site design and professionalism, and your customers will expect it.
DON'TS
1. Don't Guess at Who You're Trying to Reach With Your Site.
'Guesstimation' is for horse shoes and card games. If you don't know your demographics, then you might as well have thrown your site together.
2. Don't Get Too Technical.
Your customers are the ones reading your site, so it should be written for them. Sure, your competition might read your site as well, but they already know the business jargon. Besides, you aren't trying to sell to them anyway. Remember, other business owners may browse, but your customers are your buyers.
3. Don't Give Your Customers A Headache.
There are 256 colors available for site design. 216 of those are browser 'safe.' Just because there are an abundance of colors does not mean that they all should be used at once. Warm colors shouldn't be used with cool colors because of the conflicting hues. Meanwhile, bright colors make the eyes work harder to focus and after a few minutes will likely give your viewers a headache.
4. Don't Keep Content That Isn't Being Read.
Keeping track of what your customers are actually reading is very helpful. You want a customer to peruse your site as completely as possible. The more they know, the better your chances are that they will purchase or sign-up. If a page isn't being read then try something else. Rewrite it. Add psychological triggers. Rephrase. Find a way to make the page valuable.
5. Don't Repeat the Same Information on Every Page.
The viewer doesn't want to read the same material over and over. Give them new, fresh information on each page. If they want to go back and read the previous page, give them that option.
6. Don't Hide Contact Information.
You'll find conflicting information on this topic. Some designers will tell you to put your contact information on every page, but customers tend to find that redundant. One page with multiple ways to contact you is more effective even if the customer never visits the page. Just having the page there tells them that you can be reached and that you really are there for their convenience.
7. Don't Use Animations.
Some would say use animations to draw attention to your ad, product, 'new' idea/newsletter/etc. but by following that suggestion you frustrate the customer. Flashing, moving objects distract the eyes. A customer is there looking for information, if their eyes are distracted while reading, their comprehension decreases while their frustration rises. The use of colors such as yellow and orange become helpful in this area. Bolding or italicizing words is another way to emphasize phrases, or items you want the customer to notice.
8. Don't Use Multiple Fonts.
It only takes the eye seconds to adjust to a new font, but those seconds are distracting to the mind. Different sizes, styles, and colors are confusing. Choose one font and stick with it. Consistency is more important than creativity when it comes to text.
9. Don't Take Control Away From the Viewer.
Creative cursors, full screen browsers, and other 'entertaining' aspects of site design are great, if your target audience is teenagers or new internet users, but for a professional website they give the appearance of being cheap, second rate, and amateurish.
10. Don't 'Bunch Up' the Text.
Add spaces between paragraphs so customers don't feel overwhelmed with information. Placing a small picture pertaining to the content gives the eyes time to relax before reading further.

1.) Email marketing is a form of direct marketing which uses electronic mail as a means of communicating commercial or fundraising messages to an audience. In its broadest sense, every email sent to a potential or current customer could be considered email marketing. However, the term is usually used to refer to:

Sending emails with the purpose of enhancing the relationship of a merchant with its current or old customers and to encourage customer loyalty and repeat business.
Sending emails with the purpose of acquiring new customers or convincing old customers to buy something immediately.
Adding advertisements in emails sent by other companies to their customers.
Emails that are being sent on the Internet (Email did and does exist outside the Internet, Network Email, FIDO etc.)

2.)Strategy is one of the most important, and the most overlooked, elements of a successful e-mail marketing campaign. It's possible to practice e-mail marketing for years without a formal strategy. But there comes a time when you need one to take your efforts to the next level. Here's how.

I'd been creating e-mail strategies for years, but I never gave the develop process a lot of thought until I had to write a chapter about it for my book. That the publisher is giving this chapter away as a sample to sell the book tells me it's good; but it was the most difficult one to write.

E-mail strategy is a lot like teaching someone to ride a bicycle: work directly with an eager student and a bike, and it's a can-do proposition. But ask me (or anyone else, for that matter) to write out directions students can use to teach themselves to ride a bike, well, that's a much greater challenge.

Here are the 10 steps you need to take to develop an effective e-mail strategy:

Identify qualitative goals.


Analyze the current situation.


Complete a competitive analysis.


Define the target audience.


Determine which types of e-mail meet your needs.


Develop a content strategy and a frequency and send schedule.


Design the e-mail template.


Create quantitative goals.


Compile budget and ROI (define) projections.


Evaluate results and tweak the strategy accordingly.
I'll cover the first two in this column, and we'll tackle the rest in subsequent columns. That gives me adequate space for each step and provides you time to work on your own plan, bit by bit, as we go. If you keep up, you'll have a full plan in eight weeks. Then you can begin to implement it.

Identify Qualitative Goals

This is a just a fancy way of asking what you want an e-mail program to do for your organization. We're not talking numbers here, just simple prose. Things like:

Sell my products.


Deliver qualified leads for my services.


Entice people to register for my events.


Drive repeat traffic to my Web site.


Generate revenue via advertising.


Build my reputation as an expert in my field.


Keep my company top of mind with prospects.
There are a million ways to express qualitative goals. Use language you're comfortable with. That said, all qualitative goals tend to revolve around one of two things:

Acquiring new customers and/or revenue


Retaining or renewing existing customers and/or revenue
Your industry may use "clients," "members," "donors," "subscribers," "advertisers," or another term in place of "customers." Whatever you call them, it's all about acquisition and retention.

Analyze the Current Situation

This isn't nearly as involved as it sounds. You probably have most of the information in your head right now. You just need to get it down on paper so you can use it more effectively. Another plus to putting it in writing: it's easier to share with superiors, peers, and subordinates and helps assure that everyone is, literally, on the same page.

This will be an easier and quicker exercise if you focus. Get away from the ringing phone, close your door, or post your "do not disturb" sign on your cubicle. Don't look at e-mail or IM. It's hard to focus when you're being interrupted.

Start with brainstorming and writing down the basics:

House list


How many e-mail addresses do you have?


How did you acquire them?


What's your monthly growth rate?


What are your best sources of new names?


How much, on average, does it cost to acquire a new e-mail address?


What else do you know about your house list?


Current e-mail campaigns


How frequently do you mail?


What do you mail? Include campaigns and one-offs.


What's your current e-mail marketing budget?


How much does it cost you, on average, to send 1,000 e-mail messages?


How does your e-mail perform?


Deliverability, opens, and clicks


Conversions and bottom-line success measures, like leads, sales, renewals, and revenue


Any other performance metrics relevant to your qualitative goals


What else do you know about your current e-mail campaigns?


Other marketing


What other online marketing are you doing related to your qualitative goals?


How well do they perform?


Are they related to e-mail marketing efforts?


Offline marketing


How well do these perform?


Are they related to e-mail marketing efforts?


What else do you know about your other current marketing campaigns?


Other aspects of your current e-mail situation


What staff or outside expertise on e-mail and your industry do you have access to?


How well does your current e-mail technology solution meet your needs?


What's the process for developing an e-mail from scratch?


How do you determine what gets sent to whom, when, and how often?
Keep looking over what you've written and add to it. Don't worry about organization or structure now, just dive in and keep jotting down the things you know about your current program.

It may be easier to do this in a room with a whiteboard (I love whiteboards!) and a small team of people who are responsible for e-mail. Do whatever it takes to get it all out of your head (or heads) and down on paper for posterity.

Once you've got it all down, look at it. This is where strategy becomes like a puzzle. All the pieces are there in what you've written, you just need to put them together in a logical way that provides a snapshot of your program.

The goal is to identify your current e-mail program's strengths and weaknesses. These should be things under your control, not factors outside your organization's sphere of influence. We'll include these in a strengths-weaknesses-opportunities-threats (SWOT) analysis later, but don't worry about that right now. You're looking for good things you can further leverage (strengths) as well as shortcomings you have the means to either improve or compensate for (weaknesses).

Strengths might include things like:

We have industry thought-leaders on our advisory board who are willing to contribute articles to any e-mail newsletters we publish, free of charge.


There are over 10,000 e-mail addresses on our house e-mail list we can communicate with, and it's growing 3 percent every month.


Our Web site has an effective online order process in place.
Weaknesses might include things like:

Our in-house e-mail marketing expertise and experience are limited.


We're using an outdated e-mail system that doesn't provide adequate tracking and reporting.


The turnaround time for producing a single e-mail is so long that the information's no longer timely.

3.) E-mail has moved beyond its infancy and has proven to be a high-yield marketing channel, so much so that everyone is jumping on board. Separate your messages from the clutter by implementing these dos and avoiding these don’ts. David Letterman has his top 10s, now here are mine:

Do include a call to action. In fact, include it several times throughout the e-mail. Be specific and create a sense of urgency by including an expiration date. Include the first one in the subject line. Put the second at the top to display in the preview pane. Even if your recipients never scroll, they now have two opportunities to take action. Finally, always include a call to action at the end. If your recipients were interested enough to read the entire message, don’t make them scroll up.

Do make the e-mail unique to your company. Have a style unique to your brand or company and intertwine some flavor so it never gets old. Include an accurate logo that is clearly visible and clickable. If the link is to your Web site, ensure it functions properly. Train your recipients to recognize your brand and leave with a positive impression.

Do include an unsubscribe option. Always include the unsubscribe option. It’s not just a courtesy, it’s the law. CAN-SPAM dictates that every e-mail marketing message include the functional opt out and gives the marketer 10 days to suppress the opt out.

Do include white-listing instructions. Once readers become interested in your e-mails, they won’t want to miss any of them. Show them how to add you to their white list. This decreases your company’s chances of being marked as spam in future mailings. Also, recipients will connect and become familiar with your brand. Think of it as being on their VIP list.

Do consider using an e-mail service provider to send your campaigns. With ever-changing best practices, this is the most reliable, efficient way to manage your e-mail campaigns. It lets you track e-mails, measure campaign results and improve and modify your e-mail strategy while your ESP focuses on message hosting, best-practices consulting and delivery.

Don’t overwhelm the recipient’s inbox. Sending daily marketing e-mails can cause more harm than good to your campaign. It also damages your brand’s reputation. If messages are flooding inboxes, recipients are more likely to unsubscribe or mark your messages as junk.

Don’t get too wordy. Starting with the subject line, keep everything short and to the point. Paragraphs should be short but catchy enough to grab people’s attention. Use simple words and short phrases. Arrange the text so a quick scan can easily reveal the main message. Use bullet points wherever possible.

Don’t misspell words or use poor grammar. This is obvious, but nothing will turn people away faster than an e-mail filled with mistakes. It not only shows incompetence on your part, but it also reflects poorly on the quality and reputation of your brand. Take time to double and triple check your text, scrutinize the copy until you find nothing wrong with it, then have someone else check it again.

Don’t keep sending messages when there is no interest. If your open and click-through rates are plummeting, change your approach or stop sending to the recipient. Try sending a reminder e-mail — they may have opted in but forgotten why. If there is still no action by the recipient, clean your distribution list.

Don’t send e-mails without a clear purpose. Every e-mail should have a purpose, and it should be obvious. Have a specific goal you want to accomplish with each e-mail. Recipients should not be wondering why a certain message was delivered to their inbox. Instead, they will understand and appreciate it when your message caters to their interests. Know yourself and know your audience, too.

As the old saying goes, you have to learn to crawl before you can walk. Keep my top 10 dos and don’ts in mind for your next campaign, and you’ll be on your feet and running in no time.

1.what is e-mail marketing?
-is a form of direct marketing w/c uses electronic mail as a means of communicating commercial or fundraising message to an audience.

2.what are the strategies of an effective marketing?
-it is the strategic directions and tactical plans that marketing teams must implement to support their company's overall business objectives and contains a number of important decisions about product offerings, pricing, communications, and distribution channels.

3.what are thr do's and dont's of email marketing?
A. Make sure all your email recipients are opt in or double opt in. This means that they have subscribed to your ezine, newsletter, report or e-course.
B. Always provide an unsubscribe link
C.Always sign each email with your name, address, company (if any), telephone # and email address. This will ensure you are never accused of spam or at least you will be found innocent.
D.Keep the email short, with each paragraph 5-10 lines at most. People are in a hurry and they scan most email so make sure your email has the most important point in the first sentence of each paragraph.

E. Create a compelling or interesting subject line. You want your email opened at the least. Good headlines aren't hype of over-stated, simply what the benefit the reader will get for opening and reading your email.

F. Format every email to 60-65 lines. This ensures your email won't look like:
when you send an emai
make sure its properly
formatted with 60-65 character

per line

with a 'hard return' so it

looks even and professional.
I use a great program called Ezine Fire that has a file and format that will scan your email for possible words that will trigger filters and insert a space, apostrophe...etc in text or html.

G. I like to use P.S. in many of my email ads. People tend to scan and read the P.S. if nothing else.

H. Try to add your personality to the email text. People want to associate with those that seem real and sincere. Don't come across another salesman trying to sell them something.

Create good quality content and use a resource box that has your name, email address and a blurb about a product your pitching. The best way is to get them to subscribe or email for something free, related to the topic of your ezine.


Authored by:
Jessa Balangawan

1.What is e-email Marketing?

Email marketing is a form of direct marketing which uses electronic mail as a means of communicating commercial or fundraising messages to an audience. In its broadest sense, every email sent to a potential or current customer could be considered email marketing.

2.What are the strategies of an effective e-mail marketing?
Here are the 10 steps you need to take to develop an effective e-mail strategy:

1.Identify qualitative goals.
2.Analyze the current situation.
3.Complete a competitive analysis.
4.Define the target audience.
5.Determine which types of e-mail meet your needs.
6.Develop a content strategy and a frequency and send schedule.
7.Design the e-mail template.
8.Create quantitative goals.
9.Compile budget and ROI (define) projections.
10.Evaluate results and tweak the strategy accordingly.

3.What are the Do's and Don'ts of e-mail marketing?

Do include a call to action. In fact, include it several times throughout the e-mail. Be specific and create a sense of urgency by including an expiration date. Include the first one in the subject line. Put the second at the top to display in the preview pane. Even if your recipients never scroll, they now have two opportunities to take action. Finally, always include a call to action at the end. If your recipients were interested enough to read the entire message, don’t make them scroll up.

Don’t overwhelm the recipient’s inbox. Sending daily marketing e-mails can cause more harm than good to your campaign. It also damages your brand’s reputation. If messages are flooding inboxes, recipients are more likely to unsubscribe or mark your messages as junk.

nay-r

A.WHAT IS E-MAIL MARKETING?

Email marketing is, as the name suggests, the use of email in marketing communications.

Email marketing is a form of direct marketing which uses electronic mail as a means of communicating commercial or fundraising messages to an audience. In its broadest sense, every email sent to a potential or current customer could be considered email marketing.

B.WHAT ARE THE STRATEGIES OF AN EFFECTIVE E-MAIL MARKETING?

Here are the 10 steps you need to take to develop an effective e-mail strategy:
1.Identify qualitative goals.
2.nalyze the current situation.
3.Complete a competitive analysis.
4.Define the target audience.
5.Determine which types of e-mail meet your needs.
6.Develop a content strategy and a frequency and send schedule.
7.Design the e-mail template.
8.Create quantitative goals.
9.Compile budget and ROI (define) projections.
10.Evaluate results and tweak the strategy accordingly.

C.WHAT ARE THE DO’S AND DON’T’S OF EMAIL MARKETING?

*Do include a call to action. In fact, include it several times throughout the e-mail. Be specific and create a sense of urgency by including an expiration date. Include the first one in the subject line. Put the second at the top to display in the preview pane. Even if your recipients never scroll, they now have two opportunities to take action. Finally, always include a call to action at the end. If your recipients were interested enough to read the entire message, don’t make them scroll up.
*Do make the e-mail unique to your company. Have a style unique to your brand or company and intertwine some flavor so it never gets old. Include an accurate logo that is clearly visible and clickable. If the link is to your Web site, ensure it functions properly. Train your recipients to recognize your brand and leave with a positive impression.
*Do include an unsubscribe option. Always include the unsubscribe option. It’s not just a courtesy, it’s the law. CAN-SPAM dictates that every e-mail marketing message include the functional opt out and gives the marketer 10 days to suppress the opt out.
*Do include white-listing instructions. Once readers become interested in your e-mails, they won’t want to miss any of them. Show them how to add you to their white list. This decreases your company’s chances of being marked as spam in future mailings. Also, recipients will connect and become familiar with your brand. Think of it as being on their VIP list.
*Do consider using an e-mail service provider to send your campaigns. With ever-changing best practices, this is the most reliable, efficient way to manage your e-mail campaigns. It lets you track e-mails, measure campaign results and improve and modify your e-mail strategy while your ESP focuses on message hosting, best-practices consulting and delivery.
*Don’t overwhelm the recipient’s inbox. Sending daily marketing e-mails can cause more harm than good to your campaign. It also damages your brand’s reputation. If messages are flooding inboxes, recipients are more likely to unsubscribe or mark your messages as junk.
*Don’t get too wordy. Starting with the subject line, keep everything short and to the point. Paragraphs should be short but catchy enough to grab people’s attention. Use simple words and short phrases. Arrange the text so a quick scan can easily reveal the main message. Use bullet points wherever possible.
*Don’t misspell words or use poor grammar. This is obvious, but nothing will turn people away faster than an e-mail filled with mistakes. It not only shows incompetence on your part, but it also reflects poorly on the quality and reputation of your brand. Take time to double and triple check your text, scrutinize the copy until you find nothing wrong with it, then have someone else check it again.
*Don’t keep sending messages when there is no interest. If your open and click-through rates are plummeting, change your approach or stop sending to the recipient. Try sending a reminder e-mail — they may have opted in but forgotten why. If there is still no action by the recipient, clean your distribution list.
*Don’t send e-mails without a clear purpose. Every e-mail should have a purpose, and it should be obvious. Have a specific goal you want to accomplish with each e-mail. Recipients should not be wondering why a certain message was delivered to their inbox. Instead, they will understand and appreciate it when your message caters to their interests. Know yourself and know your audience, too.
As the old saying goes, you have to learn to crawl before you can walk. Keep my top 10 dos and don’ts in mind for your next campaign, and you’ll be on your feet and running in no time.

1. What is e-mail marketing?


Ans.
E-Mail Marketing
Definition: Marketing via e-mail, usually through the use of sales letters or customer newsletters

When e-mail marketing first became popular, it was seen as the ultimate marketing tool--inexpensive, instantaneous and 100 percent measurable. Click-through rates were the only numbers that mattered, and people were willing to open--and read--just about every e-mail they received.
Nowadays, most of the talk is about spam, how e-mail marketing can hurt your business, and why click-through rates are a fraction of what they used to be. Yet there are still companies that, despite all the pitfalls, manage to generate high profits every year using e-mail marketing.
That's because e-mail marketing is still a very effective and efficient way to get the word out to your prospects. Mailings to opt-in lists yield higher results than direct mail--and at a lower cost. Everyone's looking for that magic formula--the perfect message that will electrify opt-in campaigns. But the proliferation of e-mail makes it tough to stand out. Here are eight tips for writing e-mails that produce top results:



2. What are the strategies of effective email marketing?

Ans.



Email Marketing Strategy
Many email marketing programs grow organically. An idea is born, an email is sent, it works, another email is sent, and so on. While there's nothing wrong with this approach, you can often accomplish more in a shorter time frame by putting a strategic plan into place.
In this article, which is an excerpt from my SitePoint publication, The Email Marketing Kit, we'll look at what's involved in developing a plan for an effective email strategy, be it your first email marketing campaign or an existing campaign that you want to take to the next level. Writing such a plan takes considerable time and effort, and may seem a bit daunting at first, but don't let this deter you. Not only is a plan necessary for the long-term success of your campaign, it's also critical for keeping you on track in the short term. Consider it a creative endeavor, and you'll soon discover that writing a strategic plan is actually quite a lot of fun once you get the hang of it!
The Kit is a comprehensive guide to planning, creating, implementing and improving email marketing campaigns. It covers all aspects of email marketing, from the different types of email, the task of crafting effective opt-in messages, and the challenge of formulating great subject lines, from addresses and message content, to the topics of optimizing deliverability, viral marketing techniques, and the use of third-party lists. For the full details, see the Table of Contents, and don't forget that you can download your copy of this article in PDF format, so you can read it anywhere, any time.
But now, let's get started developing your email marketing strategy!
A strategic plan is an evolving document. As your knowledge of, and experience with, email marketing grows, you'll want to chop and change your plan to incorporate the new ideas that you've learned, and remove those that aren't meeting your expectations. Even the most comprehensive plans will need tweaking with time, so don't hesitate to do this -- it's normal and it's smart.
In this chapter, we'll be developing an email strategy for a fictitious publishing company called Congressional Publications, whose main competitor, the equally fictitious Digest of Congress, already has an effective email marketing campaign in place.
The process we'll move through in order to create an email marketing strategy for Congressional Publications involves a generally appropriate set of steps that you can use in your own email marketing campaigns. This process involves the following tasks:
1. Undertake a competitive analysis.
2. Answer some key questions about your offerings, audiences, content, mailing schedule, goals, and budget.
3. Set quantitative goals for the strategy.
4. Set and allocate the budget.
To begin, though, let's look at why we should develop a strategy in the first place.
Why Develop an Email Strategy?
Why do we use a road map when we're driving? So that we don't get lost. Good directions will save us time, gas, and money, and provide us with a stress-free journey.
Similarly, an email marketing strategy is your map to success. It will point you in the right direction, keep you from veering off course, and identify the quickest routes by which you can reach your business goals. Like good directions, a good strategic plan will save you time, help you to budget accordingly, ensure that your email efforts are synchronized with your company's goals, and allow you to plan ahead so that you don't miss opportunities.
As with all good things, the task of preparing a comprehensive strategic plan takes time. While it may seem like a lengthy process, having a plan in place will actually save you time in the future -- it's a foolproof way to ensure that you produce the best results with the resources that you have available.
Now that we're committed to the idea of preparing a strategy, let's begin!
Conducting a Competitive Analysis
Before you dive into drafting up your own email strategy, don your detective hat and starting sleuthing to find out what your competitors are doing. Conducting a competitive analysis helps you to understand what you're up against, gives you the chance to gather ideas for your own campaigns from those of your competitors, and work out what will give you the edge to make your communications more effective.
Naturally, you'll want to focus on your competitors' marketing efforts -- specifically, email marketing. Let's spend a little time talking about this now. If your competitors don't use email, feel free to skip ahead to the next section.
Getting on your Competitors' Lists
The first step in a comprehensive competitive analysis is to subscribe to the mailing lists and email newsletters of your competitors. I recommend that you use an email address that doesn't give away too much information about you or your business, as companies have been known to blacklist the email addresses of their competitors.
Keeping Tabs
In analyzing your competitors' mailouts, you should consider a number of points. Keep track of the types of emails your competitors send, when they send them, and who the emails are sent to. Like me, you might also like to keep a copy of each email on file for future reference. Are the emails transactional or relationship-building? Which products and services do they mention? How are different market segments approached? After a month or so, you'll develop a good feel for their basic programs, and you can use this knowledge to help shape your own campaign.
Table 3.1 summarizes a review I carried out on the email marketing campaign of the Digest of Congress, the major competitor of Congressional Publications. The review shows that during the month of June the Digest of Congress sent out weekly newsletters and weekly promotional emails in which the company's product line was rotated. Every fourth promotional send was a catalog that included all of the publisher's products. In June, two emails were sent each week (one was promotional; the other was a newsletter). The Digest of Congress may decide to introduce more newsletters during the weeks in which significant events take place, or to reduce its weekly emails when Congress is on break.
Table 3.1. Competitive overview of Digest of Congress's email marketing
1561_table1 (click to view image)
Since we've established the frequency and timing of the Digest of Congress's emails, let's take a closer look at the content of each email. I spent some time assessing the different types of content (articles, interviews, surveys, etc.) the organization used in its emails, and where that content came from. I asked myself a number of questions. Did the content appear to have been professionally written? Did it seem likely to have been purchased? Was the content written specifically for the Digest of Congress, or was it generic?
Can you see any patterns in Example 3.1? Every email has the same feature area. News blurbs are used as a marketing tool -- readers can't get the full story unless they sign up. The opinion pieces include bite-sized morsels of proprietary content designed to tempt users to subscribe. The Tip of the Week and Quote of the Week incorporate short-form editorial content, and reader-submitted content has been developed by allowing readers to participate in polls, the results of which are published. Last, but not least, an advertisement for the Digest of Congress's products is also included.
Example 3.1. Assessing the content of Digest of Congress's newsletter emails
7 June
• news blurbs from last week (link to full text for subscribers)
• opinion piece on what to expect this week
• tip of the week for following Congress
• quote of the week (representative)
• poll: will nominee be confirmed?
• results from last week's poll: will the energy bill become law?
• ad for weekly magazine
14 June
• news blurbs from last week (link to full text for subscribers)
• opinion piece on what to expect this week
• tip of the week for following Congress
• quote of the week (representative)
• poll: what will happen with Social Security?
• results from last week's poll: will nominee be confirmed?
• ad for weekly magazine
21 June
• news blurbs from last week (link to full text for subscribers)
• opinion piece on what to expect this week
• tip of the week for following Congress
• quote of the week (representative)
• poll: is the Social Security bill dead for this year?
• results from last week's poll: what will happen with social security?
• ad for weekly magazine
28 June
• news blurbs from last week (link to full text for subscribers)
• opinion piece on what to expect this week
• tip of the week for following Congress
• quote of the week (representative)
• poll: will Mark Felt, a.k.a. "Deep Throat" be remembered as a hero or a villain?
• results from last week's poll: is the Social Security bill dead for this year?
• ad for weekly magazine
All the content has a congressional or political bent to it, and there's nothing on this list that the Digest of Congress would find particularly difficult to develop in-house -- after all, it's a publishing company. The business would easily be able to repurpose items from paid publications for the newsletters' opinion pieces and news blurbs -- the same content that paying subscribers received a week ago!
Since we've got all of this information at hand, let's carry out a quick SWOT analysis of the Digest of Congress's email content. SWOT stands for strengths, weaknesses, opportunities, and threats.
strengths
Strengths are the internal factors that make the email newsletter good. I know, "good" could mean anything, and indeed its definition in this context is broad. Look for elements of the newsletter that strike you in a positive way, such as topics that are especially relevant, writing styles that are easy to read, and so on.
weaknesses
These are the internal factors that make the email newsletter bad. Look out for weaknesses such as superficially covered topics, irrelevant articles, jargon-filled content full of unnecessary information, and self-promotional content.
opportunities
Opportunities identify the ways in which you can match or transcend your competitor. Has the company missed any relevant topics that you could cover? What other types of content would readers like? What else could you do to improve the experience you provide to your audience?
threats
Threats are the aspects of your competitors' performance with which you'll find it very difficult to compete: the flawlessly covered topics, or the brilliantly written articles to which yours just won't match up, no matter how hard you try. It's important to make a list of these threats so that you don't risk your dignity and credibility by challenging your competitors to a game that you can't play.
You can use your SWOT analysis to give your newsletter an edge over competitors. For example, if Congressional Publications compiled a calendar of upcoming votes and key committee meetings, this content could be used in the newsletter, filling the void left by the Digest of Congress. I also notice that, other than the quote of the week, the Digest of Congress's newsletter doesn't provide much content from outside sources. We could include interviews with key Congress members or top lobbyists in our newsletter, which would provide interesting reading for our audience, and differentiate our newsletter from that of the Digest of Congress. Finally, I like the idea of polls and the response that they receive, so I think we should include a "Question of the Day" segment in our newsletter.
The more email marketing campaigns you monitor, the more good ideas you'll gather. With a fresh twist, you may be able to use some of these ideas to suit your own email newsletter and readership.
Addressing Key Questions
Now that we've completed our competitive review, and conducted a SWOT analysis, it's time to think about what we want to achieve through the newsletter. Rather than considering this very broad question, let's break it down into a series of smaller questions that address specific issues.
What Products or Services will you Promote?
If you already have this information in your head, now's the time to put it all down on paper. Include as much detail as you can about your offerings: your products or services, the features available, the benefits you provide over your competition, the special deals you have on offer, and anything else that's relevant. I've prepared the following product description for Congressional Publications:
Example 3.2. Description of Congressional Publication's offerings
The journalists at Congressional Publications report on the daily happenings of Congress. As the first media outlet to focus solely on Congress, we have established the reputation of being a fair and non-partisan publication, and have won numerous awards for our coverage. Our publications are released in three formats: a weekly print publication, a daily print publication, and a purchased-subscription content web site.
A subscription to our weekly print publication, Congress This Week, costs $100 per year. The publication provides highlights of weekly congressional activities, such as updates on the status of key legislation -- who's supporting it and why, who's not, and an expert opinion on the chance that the legislation will become law, and so on. In this instance, our advantage is editorial -- our journalists have many years of experience in watching Congress, and numerous contacts who are able to provide valuable insight from within the chambers.
Subscriptions to our daily print publication, Congress Today, costs $250 per year. This product includes schedules for daily congressional activities such as committee meetings, bills to be presented, votes, and so forth. While it doesn't cover issues in as much depth as Congress This Week, Congress Today does provide a comprehensive review of each day's activities -- a feature that no other organization currently delivers.
A subscription to Congress Online, our paid content web site, costs $500 per a year and includes information from both Congress This Week and Congress Today. In addition, Congress Online also provides the full text of all bills that are currently under consideration, and complete archives of publications and events dating back ten years -- further than any other online service that currently covers Congress.
Who Do you Want to Reach?
Next, it's time to think about readership: who are we trying to target with our email strategy?
Existing Customers
If you target your existing customers, you have the advantage of knowing a little bit about them already. It's a good idea to create detailed customer profiles, so that you have a clear picture of the people to whom you're trying to talk. Try to include the following information:
demographic information
Include pertinent personal information about customers, such as their ages, locations, educational backgrounds, hobbies, and other necessary details. If your customers are mostly businesses, include the duration for which each business has been in operation, an approximation of its annual revenue, and its staff numbers.
features, benefits, and advantages
What features do your products and services provide? What benefits and advantages do customers receive when they choose your products over those of your competitors? Be sure to distinguish between features, benefits, and advantages -- these are not the same!
For example, as the publisher of an industry magazine, I might advertise: "Our magazine provides the latest industry news." In this case, the benefit for my customers is: "As a reader of our magazine, you're always up to date with what's going on in your industry, and knowledgeable about issues that may affect your organization or career." The advantage over my competitors? "Since we publish daily, our readers are always a step ahead of those reading the contending magazine, which is published weekly."
elements of the buying decision
What steps are required to purchase the product or service that you're marketing? What logical and emotional elements are part of the decision-making process? Is purchasing your product an impulse buy, or one that requires research? As well as understanding the underlying needs, benefits, and advantages of a purchase decision, it's also important to grasp the process itself. By defining this, you'll gain insight into how you can influence, and even change, this process to your advantage.
Gather as much information as you can using your own experiences, as well as other sources. The Web is a great resource: look for census data, survey results, research, and articles relating to the needs and desires of your target audience.
Prospective Customers
Create customer profiles for prospective customers just as you did for your current customers. In this case, though, you'll be creating profiles for a certain type of customer rather than for specific customers, so your profiles will be more generic. It's natural for these profiles to look like ones that you've created for your existing client base -- if a particular group of people have been great customers, you'll want to find more of them!
You may also be looking to expand your customer base by targeting a completely different market segment. That's fine, as long as you do your research so that you can write a detailed description of who the Chosen Ones are, why they need the services you're offering, and what benefits and advantages they'll gain from doing business with you.
Be as specific as you can. It's all too easy to leave out that bit of detail that's "not very important," but avoid the temptation to define your audience broadly. The more detailed your description, the more effectively you'll be able to develop your email marketing strategy to reach -- and communicate successfully with -- this audience.
The Press
Create press profiles that specify the members of the media (reporters, editors, and publishers) with whom you want to communicate. Can you guess what I'm going to say next? That's right: include as much detail as you can! Remember, detail in your strategy is the key to creating and running a successful email marketing campaign that gives you the best possible return-on-investment.
Think about what you're marketing, and who might be interested in it. If you sell technology services, look for publications, web sites, bloggers, reporters, and others who cover the subject, and hone your profiles for optimal results. If you're selling DSL services, targeting bloggers who write about DSL and high-speed Internet issues will be more advantageous than targeting general technology bloggers who focus on gadgets and aren't particularly interested in what you're offering.
As you can probably tell, you could segment a group of members of the press based on many aspects: the niche areas they cover, the industries they reach, or their geographic locations; again, the segments will depend on the products and services you're offering.
Let's look at the target audience profile we've developed for Congressional Publications:
Example 3.3. Definition of Congressional Publications' target audience
In the broadest sense, the customers and prospective customers of Congressional Publications are both members of the general public and members of Congress who are interested in congressional news. Currently, we serve the three different market segments:
media outlets
We focus on small- to medium-sized regional newspapers that don't have the budget to hire a full-time reporter for Congress coverage. Instead, they turn to us for up-to-date information on legislation of importance, which we provide at a very affordable price. They may use this content as background for stories, or reprint our stories and vote reports verbatim.
The budgets of these newspapers are very limited. While most are happy to spend $100 per year to purchase our weekly print publication, very few are willing to subscribe to our online service that costs $500 per year. Due to the tight budgets on which these newspapers operate, our renewals in this market are generally lower than those of our other constituencies -- if a newspaper suffers a budget cut, our publications are often the first to get the flick.
Securing a new customer in this market can take between three and six months. We normally provide a free trial and then follow up with a phone call during which we answer any questions the prospect may have, offer helpful suggestions, and take orders.
congressional offices
Congressional offices are currently our strongest market segment -- every office in the region subscribes to at least one of our products. With our publications, they're able to keep up with developments in various committees, and learn who's supporting a given piece of legislation and why. We provide them with vital information and save them valuable time that they would otherwise be using to gather the information themselves.
Most offices purchase both the weekly and daily print publications for $100 and $250 per year, respectively; many get more than one copy of each product. As with the newspapers, few offices have the budget to subscribe to our online service.
Fortunately, our publications are considered to be a necessity by this particular market segment. This sees our orders soar during significant events such as the election of a new congress member. Subscriptions are rarely discontinued, but for those that are, the main reason given is that the member of that office has left Congress.
The sales cycle is quick, and not much needs to be done on our part to gain or keep the business. However, as this audience is finite, there's little room for growth.
lobbyists
Lobbyists are our newest audience, and one that we've found to be very profitable. We target Fortune 500 companies that are devoted to government affairs -- large associations looking to influence Congress on behalf of their members, and large lobbying firms.
Such organizations need to keep abreast of congressional happenings that may affect their businesses, or the businesses of their members and clients. We're a trusted source of this information. Our online service is very popular in this market, as the organizations require access to the archives to track past legislations.
Congressional Publications is also looking to expand its prospects by marketing to a new segment: universities that offer political science degrees. Students enrolled in such degrees are inclined to have an interest in current congressional activity. Our publications could serve as additional teaching aids and illustrate the legislative process. Marketing to universities also allows us to introduce our products to future customers outside of universities, as many of these students will go on to work in the market segments that we currently serve.
Our research has shown that these universities don't have extensive budgets, so our weekly print publication would likely suit them best. Ideally, our marketing campaign would be launched around September, as this is when most universities spend their annual publication budgets. Key contacts for sales will be those people who work within the universities' political science departments, as well as university librarians.
Targeted Groups
In some situations, it may make sense to divide your customer base into smaller segments so that you can market specific products to specific groups. If you're selling a variety of products or targeting more than one group, it makes sense to divide your customer base into smaller segments so that you can market specific products to specific groups, or word your emails differently to suit the characteristics of the different segments.
You can achieve this easily without busting your marketing budget. For example, let's say that you're the creator and distributor of financial software. Some of your customers use the software to manage their personal finances, while others use it to run their businesses. To tailor your marketing messages to meet the specific needs of both types of users, you'll need to separate your customer base into two groups: "home" and "business." This way, you won't bore the home users with tales about the benefits of your payroll component, while the business users won't think less of you for talking about balancing the household budget.
So, how do you divide the client base? Let your customers do it for you! Ask them what you need to know, and create the groups based on this information. When users register the financial software, ask them whether they needed it for home use or whether they needed it for business use. If we wanted to further target specific industries within the business group, we could ask those users to provide us with more details about the industries in which their businesses operate.
Once you have this information, add it to your audience profiles so that you have a clear idea of how the segments, and your communications with them, will differ.
What are your Goals for the Target Audience?
Right. You've defined your target audience, now let's set some goals for them. I'm going to stress this point again: make your plans detailed! Simply stating that you want your customers to buy from you is not enough. You need to look at the target groups you defined earlier, and set specific goals for each.
Let's start by stating some common marketing objectives for current customers. Then, we'll consider the other audience groups.
Objectives for Current Customers
renewals
We can use email marketing as a retention tool to encourage customers to re-subscribe. Rather than sending your customers an email that says "Hey, where's my money?" use the email to build customer loyalty so that when the renewal notice is delivered, customers are encouraged to make payments without a second thought.
upsells
Email marketing can be used to promote enhanced versions of a product to an existing client base. For example, a company providing online music streaming offers two services: a basic service for $9.95 per month, for which subscribers are able to listen to preprogrammed radio stations, and a premium service for $19.95 per month, which allows users to select specific artists, albums, and songs that they want to hear. After snaring a few customers with the initial marketing campaign for the basic service, the company might use the same campaign with a modified email message to encourage users to upgrade to the premium service.
cross-sells
You can use email marketing to promote related products to an existing client base -- in fact, this is a strategy telecommunications companies often use. These companies offer customers who are already using their telephone services additional products, such as long distance services, Internet connections, and mobile phone packages.
referrals
We can also use email marketing to encourage advertising via word-of-mouth. We all know that a recommendation from a trusted friend or business acquaintance holds a lot of weight. In many ways, this is the best form of marketing because it's earned, not bought.
You can set as many goals for your customers as you like, and those objectives can be as refined or specific as you want. You may have different goals for different segments of customers. Take our little online music business, for example. When it sends out renewal emails, it also offers customers using the basic service an upsell to the premium service. Customers that are already using the premium service only receive the (convincing!) renewal email.
Prospective Customers
At this point you're probably wondering why I'm asking about your goals for prospective customers. You want them to become less "prospective" and more "customer," of course! This goes without saying. However, in order to build a strategy that enables you to achieve this goal, you'll need to think about how exactly it's going to happen.
direct purchase
Email marketing can generate direct sales. If your products are reasonably priced and the purchasing process is simple, you can use email to give prospective customers the ability to make a direct purchase. If the product is something they desire, most prospects will jump at the chance of an immediate, hassle-free purchase.
lead generation
Generating interest is another valid objective. If you're marketing a complex product for which the sales procedure is not quite so simple, such as applying for a credit card, you can use email initially to get prospects interested in the product. Once the product's caught their interest, a sales representative can work with them personally to seal the deal. This tactic is very different from direct marketing: rather than providing your prospects with details on how to purchase the product, you're presenting them with information that will encourage them to contact you.
brand awareness
You can use email marketing to generate awareness for a brand. Maybe your objective isn't to sell at all -- perhaps you just want to use email to get your name out there, so that people recognize your brand and understand what your company does. While leads and sales may arise as a result of brand awareness, this is a much softer approach than those we discussed above. Many companies will begin their campaigns with an awareness strategy, introducing products or services that are new to the market. Only after the brand has been established will they switch to lead-generation or direct-response mode.
As with current customers, you can mix and match these prospective customer strategies to create one that works for you. You'll need to understand the sales cycle that customers move through as they consider the products or services that you market, so do your research thoroughly.
The Press
Your ultimate goal with the press is to gain free publicity. You want them to write an article that puts your company in a shining light, perhaps quoting your CEO as an expert in the industry, or stating your business to be the leader in its field. Ensure that you understand the nature of the coverage your press list can give, so that you can package your information to suit their publications.
That's it! Let's look at the goals for the Congressional Publications target audiences.
Example 3.4. Congressional Publications' target audience goals
media outlets and prospective media outlets
First and foremost, our goal here is retention: we want existing customers to renew their current subscriptions. As most of our media outlet customers purchase the weekly publication, our secondary goal is to cross-sell them the daily publication. For prospects in this market, our goal is to direct-sell them our weekly publication.
congressional offices and prospective congressional offices
Again, our goal here is retention -- getting the offices to renew their existing subscriptions. As they're likely to have subscribed to both print publications, our secondary goal is to upsell them to our online service. Prospects in this market are virtually non-existent, as most offices in the region subscribe to one or more of our publications already. However, if one did arise, our goal would be to direct-sell them the weekly publication.
lobbyists and prospective lobbyists
As most of our existing customers in this group have subscribed to our high-end product -- the online service -- our goal at this stage is to ensure that they retain those subscriptions. While this is a relatively new market, we've established that it is a viable one. We want to direct-sell our weekly subscription to prospective lobbyists first to get them on board. If the response is positive, we'll launch a campaign that encourages them to upgrade to the online service a little later.
prospective universities
Currently, we don't have any customers within this market. Our initial goal is to make ourselves known within this community, but ultimately, we want the universities to purchase our weekly publication. To do this, we'll need first to create brand awareness, then follow this with a direct-sale campaign. Ideally, this campaign will kick off around September, as this is the time when most universities spend their annual publication budgets.
What Type of Email is Best?
Now that we've defined our audiences, and we know what we want to achieve with each, it's time to match an email type to each objective we've set.
Transactional Invoice Emails
These types of email are best used for retention or customer renewals.
We don't ask for much from a renewal email. As long as it reminds customers of their upcoming subscription expirations, and asks them to pay for new ones, we're happy. An email invoice providing payment instructions (a hyperlink to pay online, or a phone number to pay via phone) is sufficient for this purpose. Many organizations use a "renewal series" of email invoices, sending emails during specific points in the renewal process: two months prior to the due date, one month prior, two weeks prior, right up to -- and beyond -- the due date.
However, not many of your customers will be inspired to continue their subscriptions by the invoice alone. Remember that your competitors are always lurking, waiting for you to drop customers that they can catch. During the renewal process, it's vital that you consistently (at least once a month, but not more) make a positive impression on your customers by highlighting the benefits and advantages that your business provides.
For ultimate retention power, combine your transaction invoice email with the very versatile relationship email.
Relationship Emails
Relationship emails are ideal for:
• retention or customer renewals
• upsells and cross-sells
• lead generation
• brand awareness
• customer referrals
The extremely versatile relationship email can be used to fulfill a number of different goals, and work particularly well when they're combined with other email formats (such as postcard emails or transactional invoices). Relationship emails can contain anything, from short-form editorials to email newsletters, and are most effective when sent on a regular basis.
For example, consider the renewal process for an online magazine subscription. If you're using a series of renewal emails, every so often an invoice will land in the customers' inboxes, reminding them that they owe you money. Now, an invoice never makes for happy customers. But if, a day or two later, they get a relationship email containing an article on a topic they're particularly interested in, their focus will shift from the monetary aspect of the magazine to how much they enjoy it. When the time comes to renew their subscriptions, these customers won't think twice about making the payment.
Relationship emails also make convincing upsellers and cross-sellers when used in conjunction with postcard emails. You could use them gradually to communicate a number of reasons why customers should upgrade their products. Including case studies and top-ten lists (top ten reasons to upgrade, top ten signs that you need to upgrade, top ten awesome things about this kit ... you get the idea) are useful not only for convincing individual customers, but also for providing them with a solid case, should they need to seek approval for the upgrade.
Relationship emails are vital for generating leads. They allow prospective customers to get to know you before they deal with a sales representative, and they require a lower level of commitment than some other formats. Relationship emails allow prospects to get an understanding of the products you offer, and learn why other companies have decided to work with you. They're a cost-effective way to position your organization as an expert in the field, and keep that idea at the forefront of your readers' minds.
Last, but not least, relationship emails are your key to customer referrals. Customers are more likely to forward emails containing interesting content to their family and friends than they are to forward promotional postcard emails. As well as making others aware of your business, these emails may also result in additional subscriptions to your email newsletter, providing you with more prospects.
Postcard Emails
Postcard emails are useful for:
• customer upsells and cross-sells
• direct purchase
• lead generation
• brand awareness
An effective postcard email will generally do the trick when it comes to the direct purchase or upsell of a particular product or service. If you've released a new product and want to do nothing more than say, "Hey, I'm out now! Buy me -- you know you want to!" a postcard email is all you need. A meticulously created postcard email can have a great impact, generating brand awareness, leads, and direct purchases.
As we saw earlier, postcard emails can also be used in conjunction with relationship emails to achieve various goals.
Communicative Emails
Use communicative emails for emails to the press.
To cut corners, many organizations send their promotional or relationship emails to the press. In the previous chapter, we saw that, while all these emails may contain the same information, their goals are very different. You'll have better luck getting your article published if you take the time and effort to send an actual press release via a communicative email.
Table 3.2, "Email plan for Congressional Publishing's existing customers" and Table 3.3, "Email plan for Congressional Publishing's prospects" show sample email plans for Congressional Publishing's existing and prospective customers, respectively.
Table 3.2. Email plan for Congressional Publishing's existing customers
1561_table2 (click to view image)
Table 3.3. Email plan for Congressional Publishing's prospects
1561_table3 (click to view image)
Where will you Source your Content?
We know whom we want to mail, and what we want to convince those recipients to do. But just look at all those emails we want to send. Where will we find all that content?
With purely promotional emails, it's easy: it's all about the features, benefits, and advantages of the products and services that you offer, so you can repurpose existing marketing copy, or create new copy that suits the types of emails that you send, and the audiences you approach. Transactional and communicative emails aren't difficult, either. You know what it is that you want to say, you just need to write the copy that will get your message across.
Things get a little more complicated when it comes to relationship-building emails. The key here is to strike a balance between editorial and promotional material. I often use the 60/40 rule as a guideline -- that is, I include 60% editorial or non-promotional content, and 40% promotional content, in the email. Why 60/40? This isn't a hard-and-fast rule, but in my experience, a higher ratio of editorial content often means more work, but little, if any, additional gain; on the other hand, including more than about 40% promotional content takes the relationship edge off the email, which can lead to the impression that you're interested only in promoting yourself, rather than serving your recipients' needs or providing value.
The biggest obstacle most companies face when they launch an email newsletter is to identify and nurture sustainable sources of editorial content. Let's get a head start on this issue, First, we'll talk about the topics that you might cover in your newsletter; then, we'll answer the question of how you'll source the content.

3. What are the do’s and don’t of email marketing?

Ans.

The Top 10 Do’s and Don’ts of E-Mail Marketing
Tuesday, August 14, 2007


The best practices and biggest mistakes magazine marketers make when it comes to e-mail.

There was a time when e-mail marketing was virtually fool-proof—send out 50,000 e-mails to your database and watch the responses roll in. Some marketers even thought direct mail would become obsolete. But they were wrong. Soon came the world of CAN-SPAM laws, Junk folders, bounce backs and the surfacing of consumers who had become Web savvy enough to create fake e-mail accounts. Marketers had to be smarter—and more importantly, more targeted—with their e-mail efforts.

How do you do it? Follow these top tips to ensure your e-mail gets past SPAM blockers and actually opened by the recipient.

1. DO test creative ideas, offers, subject lines and frequency, constantly. There is no golden rule to frequency, but just because e-mail costs less than direct mail, doesn’t mean you can get carried away. Marketers often violate the permission consumers are granting for contact and end up on SPAM lists.

2. DON’T use the “throw it up against the wall to see what sticks” theory. “Use targeted e-mail marketing efforts. Know your audience and make sure your e-mail copy is relevant and moves them to action,” says Jodi Svenson, director of audience development at MeisterMedia Worldwide.

3. DO make sure your e-mail service provider is coming through on the deliverability rate they guaranteed you when you first chose them as your provider. “As circulators we fold our hands and say, ‘I did my part’ and we just assume that the company and e-mail support staff are doing theirs,” says Bobbie Macy, circulation director at October Research Corporation. “Circulators don’t worry about whether the message is being sent out with a shared IP address or the reputation of the IP address. All the hard work you do to capture e-mail addresses and other creative marketing strategies are all for naught if the e-mail address you have now are not being delivered.”

4. DON’T assume that more bells and whistles means you will see better results. Test both HTML and text e-mails to keep efforts fresh. “I am planning on a test to see if women in our market respond better to HTML than men,” says Macy. “It might give me a boost in response but we’ll have to see.”

5. DO use HTML if you want to instill brand recognition with recipients. This way you can insert logos and familiarize your audience with your brand.

6. DON’T use excessive copy bolding, all caps, the word “free” in the subject line or too many color font changes. All of these are instant-SPAM red flags, says Svenson.

7. DO know the privacy laws like the back of your hand. Use targeted lists and make sure your message is relevant to your audience.

8. DON’T make e-mail messages too long or require too much action from the recipient. “The most successful campaigns we have done were messages that were short and simple and didn’t require the subscriber to do a whole lot,” says Macy. “A simple, ‘Yes, I’m interested’ and reply works best.”

9. DO look into services like Return Path, Pivotal Vericity and Habeus to help you manage your SPAM messages. Try creating decoy e-mail addresses at the different ISP’s to see how they interpret and deliver your message.

10. DON’T forget to keep your file clean. Reputation is a huge factor in deliverability. If a sender does not clean their lists, they can actually negatively impact their reputation which in turn negatively impacts their deliverability. “Get rid of e-mail addresses that are hard bounces, bad domains and user-not-founds,” says Svenson.

I. What is e-mail marketing?

E-mail marketing is a way to market products and services through electronic mail. Companies run e-mail marketing campaigns to communicate commercial or fundraising messages to an audience. E-mail marketing campaigns are carried out with an objective to attract old and new customers

E-mail marketing is a form of direct marketing which uses electronic mail as a means of communicating commercial or fundraising messages to an audience. In its broadest sense, every e-mail sent to a potential or current customer could be considered e-mail marketing. ...

II. What are the strategies of an effective email marketing?

1.Identify qualitative goals.
2.Analyze the current situation.
3.Complete a competitive analysis.
4.Define the target audience.
5.Determine which types of e-mail meet your needs.
6.Develop a content strategy and a frequency and send schedule.
7.Design the e-mail template.
8.Create quantitative goals.
9.Compile budget and ROI (define) projections.
10.Evaluate results and tweak the strategy accordingly.

III. What are the Do's and Don'ts of email marketing?
*Do include a call to action. In fact, include it several times throughout the e-mail. Be specific and create a sense of urgency by including an expiration date. Include the first one in the subject line. Put the second at the top to display in the preview pane. Even if your recipients never scroll, they now have two opportunities to take action. Finally, always include a call to action at the end. If your recipients were interested enough to read the entire message, don’t make them scroll up.
*Do make the e-mail unique to your company. Have a style unique to your brand or company and intertwine some flavor so it never gets old. Include an accurate logo that is clearly visible and clickable. If the link is to your Web site, ensure it functions properly. Train your recipients to recognize your brand and leave with a positive impression.
*Do include an unsubscribe option. Always include the unsubscribe option. It’s not just a courtesy, it’s the law. CAN-SPAM dictates that every e-mail marketing message include the functional opt out and gives the marketer 10 days to suppress the opt out.
*Do include white-listing instructions. Once readers become interested in your e-mails, they won’t want to miss any of them. Show them how to add you to their white list. This decreases your company’s chances of being marked as spam in future mailings. Also, recipients will connect and become familiar with your brand. Think of it as being on their VIP list.
*Do consider using an e-mail service provider to send your campaigns. With ever-changing best practices, this is the most reliable, efficient way to manage your e-mail campaigns. It lets you track e-mails, measure campaign results and improve and modify your e-mail strategy while your ESP focuses on message hosting, best-practices consulting and delivery.
*Don’t overwhelm the recipient’s inbox. Sending daily marketing e-mails can cause more harm than good to your campaign. It also damages your brand’s reputation. If messages are flooding inboxes, recipients are more likely to unsubscribe or mark your messages as junk.
*Don’t get too wordy. Starting with the subject line, keep everything short and to the point. Paragraphs should be short but catchy enough to grab people’s attention. Use simple words and short phrases. Arrange the text so a quick scan can easily reveal the main message. Use bullet points wherever possible.
*Don’t misspell words or use poor grammar. This is obvious, but nothing will turn people away faster than an e-mail filled with mistakes. It not only shows incompetence on your part, but it also reflects poorly on the quality and reputation of your brand. Take time to double and triple check your text, scrutinize the copy until you find nothing wrong with it, then have someone else check it again.
*Don’t keep sending messages when there is no interest. If your open and click-through rates are plummeting, change your approach or stop sending to the recipient. Try sending a reminder e-mail — they may have opted in but forgotten why. If there is still no action by the recipient, clean your distribution list.
*Don’t send e-mails without a clear purpose. Every e-mail should have a purpose, and it should be obvious. Have a specific goal you want to accomplish with each e-mail. Recipients should not be wondering why a certain message was delivered to their inbox. Instead, they will understand and appreciate it when your message caters to their interests. Know yourself and know your audience, too.

1.What is email Marketing?

E-mail marketing is a way to market products and services through electronic mail. Companies run e-mail marketing campaigns to communicate commercial or fundraising messages to an audience. E-mail marketing campaigns are carried out with an objective to attract old and new customers.

E-mail marketing is a form of direct marketing which uses electronic mail as a means of communicating commercial or fundraising messages to an audience. In its broadest sense, every e-mail sent to a potential or current customer could be considered e-mail marketing. ...

Email marketing is a form of direct marketing which uses electronic mail as a means of communicating commercial or fundraising messages to an audience. In its broadest sense, every email sent to a potential or current customer could be considered email marketing.

2.What are the strategies of an effective e-mail marketing?

Strategy is one of the most important, and the most overlooked, elements of a successful e-mail marketing campaign. It's possible to practice e-mail marketing for years without a formal strategy. But there comes a time when you need one to take your efforts to the next level. Here's how.

I'd been creating e-mail strategies for years, but I never gave the develop process a lot of thought until I had to write a chapter about it for my book. That the publisher is giving this chapter away as a sample to sell the book tells me it's good; but it was the most difficult one to write.

E-mail strategy is a lot like teaching someone to ride a bicycle: work directly with an eager student and a bike, and it's a can-do proposition. But ask me (or anyone else, for that matter) to write out directions students can use to teach themselves to ride a bike, well, that's a much greater challenge.


3. What are the Do's and Don'ts of e-mail marketing?

List of Do's
If possible, ask customers their interest at the time of subscribing to your service. It helps in knowing your prospective customer's taste and your newsletter could be send accordingly.
If possible, ask your opt-in customer the most suitable time they would like to receive your newsletter.
If possible, ask opt-in customers whether they would like to receive newsletter everyday, bi-weekly, weekly or monthly.
If possible, ask opt-in customers whether they would like to receive newsletter everyday, bi-weekly, weekly or monthly.
Develop in-house customers' email list, you are sure about its source and authenticity.
Write for your customer not for your marketing people.
Keep your subject-line clean and simple, hinting about your newsletter matter.
Provide your address and contact number somewhere in the email newsletter. It gives legitimacy to your email.
Assure your customer and develop their trust towards you.
Be Can-Spam compliant.
Feedback is the most important aspect of any communication process, be sure to provide an option to get back to you.
Provide with the workable option of opt-out, so that the customer can unsubscribe if they do not find the matter worthwhile.
Ensure the security of customer data.
Monitor blacklists to make sure your IP addresses are not listed.


List of Don'ts

Do not harvest email addresses taking help of software available
Do not swap email addresses from other business associates and do not buy your email list from illegitimate vendors.
Do not email customers who never opted-in or confirmed of doing so.
Do not email customers after they opt-out from your promotional service.
Do not send irrelevant content.
Do not send email through dubious sender address.
Do not deluge email addresses of your prospective customer or the one who never asked for you.
Do not make misleading or incorrect statements in your newsletter.
Do not play the trick of email spoofing.
Do not try strategies to break spam filters.
Do not break rules or laws.
Do not apply tricks taken from a spammer's notebook. Avoid what they do.
Do not use open relay to send your emails.
Do not share your customers' information with others.

1. The promotion of products or services via email.

2. Use Your Emails To Build good customer relations.

Use your emails to answer customer questions, and overcome objections to buying from you.

Use Your Email Signature EVERYWHERE.

Send Greeting Cards.

Hold a Contest.

Create your own newsletter, online course, or ezine.

3. Do include a call to action.

Do make the e-mail unique to your company.

Do include an unsubscribe option.

Do include white-listing instructions.

Do consider using an e-mail service provider to send your campaigns.

Don’t overwhelm the recipient’s inbox.

Don’t get too wordy.

Don’t misspell words or use poor grammar.

Don’t keep sending messages when there is no interest.

Don’t send e-mails without a clear purpose.

Answer:::

A. Email marketing is a form of direct marketing which uses electronic mail as a means of communicating commercial or fundraising messages to an audience. In its broadest sense, every email sent to a potential or current customer could be considered email marketing.

B. 10 steps you need to take to develop an effective e-mail strategy:

1.Identify qualitative goals.


2.Analyze the current situation.


3.Complete a competitive analysis.


4.Define the target audience.


5.Determine which types of e-mail meet your needs.


6.Develop a content strategy and a frequency and send schedule.


7.Design the e-mail template.


8.Create quantitative goals.


9.Compile budget and ROI (define) projections.


10.Evaluate results and tweak the strategy accordingly.



C.The Do's:
Do include a call to action
Do make the e-mail unique to your company
Do include an unsubscribe option
Do include white-listing instructions
Do consider using an e-mail service provider to send your campaigns

The Don'ts:
Don’t overwhelm the recipient’s inbox
Don’t get too wordy
Don’t misspell words or use poor grammar
Don’t keep sending messages when there is no interest
Don’t send e-mails without a clear purpose

MANOLO LEPAOPAO


1.What is Search Engine Optimization?

Ans..
Search engine optimization, in a nutshell, is the process of overseeing the development or re-development of a website, so that it will naturally attract traffic by securing top ranking on the major search engines/directories for selected search terms and phrases..




2.How to do search engine optimization?

ANS:
Faults of big commercial sites:
Some big sites that are product catalogs may require significant link popularity to get indexed. Also if you are dealing with thousands and thousands and thousands of pages it can be hard to make them unique enough to stay indexed as search algorithms continue to advance. Search engines are getting better at comparing pages and sites. If the only difference across most pages of your many thousand page site are a few part numbers then many pages may be considered duplicate content.

Benefits of a small site:
If a site is small that makes it easy to concentrate your internal link popularity on the most important issues, ideas, and keywords. Small hyper targeted sites also work well at being able to dominate those niche markets. You can create a site name based on the vertical and use the domain name to your advantage.

If you are trying to tackle insurance then a small site is not going to get you anywhere unless you are targeting niche types of insurance.

I tend to be a bit verbose (which is perhaps why I wrote an ebook ;) but I also do not buy that adding pages to a commercial site makes a site less professional. Web pages are just a bunch of bits, but those bits are your salesmen.

Which site would YOU trust more:

Get the lead or sale or the prospective client can screw off. If they want anything they must pay first.

Offers substantial information about the products they sell. Also builds credibility with FAQ section, answering common questions along the buying cycle with content focused on the issues that people tend to think are important before making a purchase.
If you hype it enough, have a high price point and get affiliates pushing it hard enough #1 may win, but in most markets most of the time site #2 will win.

If their site is exceptionally small then adding a few pages with about us and frequently asked questions should allow you to build credibility and target new traffic streams.

If competing sites have a huge brand that you can't afford to compete with one of the best ways to chip away at them is to create useful content, tools, and ideas that solve market problems that have not yet been solved.

If your content is great then it may garner some natural citations, but you need to build at least a few links for search engines to trust your site enough to where others will find it.

Some webmasters are also afraid to link out to relevant resources. I think that most good websites link out to at least a few decent resources. Don't be afraid to link at relevant .gov or .edu pages, industry trade organizations, local chamber of commerce sites and other sites that make sense to reference.


3. What are the Do's and Don'ts of search engine optimization?

ANS:
It is important to build up on your customer base. Try these search engine optimization techniques to get your site seen when it matters the most, when your potential customers are all looking for you.

- Never stuff your site with keywords. In the past, stuffing your website text with the same keywords over and over again was one of the best ways to get a good ranking. But times have changed! If you use this technique nowadays your site may be considered spam by the search engines and banned from the results entirely. If this happens, your site will not show up on the results pages at all. Don”t risk it!

- Include a DTD statement. A Document Type Definition (DTD) statement is the first line of most web page and is designed to tell website browser’’s what version of HTML the page uses. An example DTD statement is “”. Although there is no concrete evidence, some people have reported that not having a DTD statement at the beginning of your HTML may prevent new sites from getting anything other than the homepage indexed. It’’s a good idea to ensure that every page of your site has one.

- Add more content, no matter what the focus of your site is. Even if you sell a product, you can benefit from including lots of related content on your site. Not only do the search engines love it but you”ll also create a more useful resource for potential customers and get links from others who enjoyed your site. A few ways to add relevant content are to publish product reviews, include detailed descriptions of your products, allow customers to post their comments/reviews, write instructions on how to use your products or write related articles that help educate people on your industry.

As you write your content, input the relevant keyword phrases into your article, press release or any other type of content material. Input those keyword phrases at least three or four times into your content. This helps in the way “search engine robots” find your site.

Take a few minutes to think about how the tips above can help you to increase the value of your website to potential customers. For one thing, when you implement these simple techniques your site will almost immediately become more visible to the search engines. Best of all, there is no cost for this optimization other than a bit of your time.


4. Give at least 10 related sites that discuss about SEO.

ANS:
1. http://www.seochat.com/
2. http://www.wordtracker.com/
3. http://www.highrankings.com/
4. http://www.submitexpress.com/
5. http://www.addme.com/
6. http://www.seoinc.com/
7. http://www.submitexpress.com/
8. http://seo.zunch.com/
9. http://www.addme.com/
10. http://www.technorati.com/

1. What is email Marketing?

E-mail marketing is a form of direct marketing which uses electronic mail as a means of communicating commercial or fundraising messages to an audience. In its broadest sense, every e-mail sent to a potential or current customer could be considered e-mail marketing. However, the term is usually used to refer to:

Sending e-mails with the purpose of enhancing the relationship of a merchant with its current or old customers and to encourage customer loyalty and repeat business.
Sending e-mails with the purpose of acquiring new customers or convincing old customers to buy something immediately.
Adding advertisements in e-mails sent by other companies to their customers.
E-mails that are being sent on the Internet (E-mail did and does exist outside the Internet, Network E-mail, FIDO etc.)

2. What are the strategies of an effective marketing?

Identify qualitative goals.


Analyze the current situation.


Complete a competitive analysis.


Define the target audience.


Determine which types of e-mail meet your needs.


Develop a content strategy and a frequency and send schedule.


Design the e-mail template.


Create quantitative goals.


Compile budget and ROI (define) projections.


Evaluate results and tweak the strategy accordingly

3. What are do's and dont's of email marketing?

List of Do's
If possible, ask customers their interest at the time of subscribing to your service. It helps in knowing your prospective customer's taste and your newsletter could be send accordingly.
If possible, ask your opt-in customer the most suitable time they would like to receive your newsletter.
If possible, ask opt-in customers whether they would like to receive newsletter everyday, bi-weekly, weekly or monthly.
If possible, ask opt-in customers whether they would like to receive newsletter everyday, bi-weekly, weekly or monthly.
Develop in-house customers' email list, you are sure about its source and authenticity.
Write for your customer not for your marketing people.
Keep your subject-line clean and simple, hinting about your newsletter matter.
Provide your address and contact number somewhere in the email newsletter. It gives legitimacy to your email.
Assure your customer and develop their trust towards you.
Be Can-Spam compliant.
Feedback is the most important aspect of any communication process, be sure to provide an option to get back to you.
Provide with the workable option of opt-out, so that the customer can unsubscribe if they do not find the matter worthwhile.
Ensure the security of customer data.
Monitor blacklists to make sure your IP addresses are not listed.


List of Don'ts
Do not harvest email addresses taking help of software available
Do not swap email addresses from other business associates and do not buy your email list from illegitimate vendors.
Do not email customers who never opted-in or confirmed of doing so.
Do not email customers after they opt-out from your promotional service.
Do not send irrelevant content.
Do not send email through dubious sender address.
Do not deluge email addresses of your prospective customer or the one who never asked for you.
Do not make misleading or incorrect statements in your newsletter.
Do not play the trick of email spoofing.
Do not try strategies to break spam filters.
Do not break rules or laws.
Do not apply tricks taken from a spammer's notebook. Avoid what they do.
Do not use open relay to send your emails.
Do not share your customers' information with others.

For email marketing we should be good strategy ...

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