email marketing 101

EMAIL MARKETING 101

Anish shah Class @ parisoma

1/27/2014

WHO AM I?

Anish  Shah  Principal  Consultant  Purveyor  of  Growth  

bringruckus.com  @anish_shah  anish@bringruckus.com      

WHO AM I?

DOZEN TOPICS COVERED TODAY ü  Definitions ü  Other Channels

ü  Best Practices ü  Myths

ü  Deliverability

ü  Tools ü  Performance Metrics

ü  Segmentation ü  Goals

ü  Testing Plans ü  Creative Testing

ü  Mobile

DISCLAIMER

Lots of my personal opinions inside these walls. So…

Why do companies send emails? Why do companies over-abuse the email channel? Why is your inbox so overflowed? Why do Junk Mail boxes exist? Why are you interested in learning more about Email Marketing right now?

EMAIL MARKETING IS THE CHANNEL WITH THE HIGHEST ROI.

WHY ARE WE HERE?

BASIC DEFINITIONS CAMPAIGN

Data (list)

Data (analysis)

Outreach designed to bring about a result §  A campaign can be 1 email or 1 year’s worth of work depending on how it is

defined internally

All available information on your users & customers

The performance of your users & customers

database

The physical entity that stores all information on your users & customers

BASIC DEFINITIONS CREATIVE

copy

design

HTML

BASIC DEFINITIONS

DELIVERABILITY

ESP

ISP

FEEDBACK LOOP

BASIC DEFINITIONS Subject Line

From Name

Reply-to address

Sub-domain

OTHER DIGITAL CHANNELS

OTHER DIGITAL MARKETING CHANNELS

PAID SEARCH

ADS

AFFILIATES

MEDIA OUTLETS

SOCIAL MEDIA

SPONSORSHIPS

BLOGS

BASIC DIFFERENCES VS. OTHER MARKETING CHANNELS

These other marketing channels:

BASIC DIFFERENCES VS. OTHER MARKETING CHANNELS OTHER MARKETING CHANNELS thrive and have their livelihoods depend on the generosity of Marketers.

BASIC DIFFERENCES VS. OTHER MARKETING CHANNELS OTHER MARKETING CHANNELS thrive and have their livelihoods depend on the generosity of Marketers.

BASIC DIFFERENCES VS. OTHER MARKETING CHANNELS These other marketing channels are quick to execute and able to iterate with many versions

BASIC DIFFERENCES VS. OTHER MARKETING CHANNELS THESE OTHER MARKETING CHANNELS ARE mistake-proof

   Pause  -­‐>  Fix  -­‐>  Re-­‐launch  with  liDle  damage  done  

   Almost  impossible  to  reverse  or  fix.  

BEST PRACTICES & MYTHS

BEST PRACTICES

= The Safest Route

Note: Best Practices were made to be broken.

I’ve personally broken each of these rules multiple times.

BEST PRACTICES (AND WHY TO BREAK THEM)

§  Don’t mail anybody with no activity for 6 months

§  Include an equal ratio of text:images

§  Email width should be 600px

§  Always include a plain-text version

§  Don’t blast the same email to everyone

§  Send emails when your users are most likely to read them

§  Keep subject line under 55 characters

MYTHS: CONTENT BLOCKING

§  Unless the content of your emails include the word porn, Viagra, or something else equally offensive, do not pay attention to content SPAM checkers. *

§  85% of blocked emails are due to reputation, not content.

§  The rest are due to content are from outdated, dying corporate security firewalls.

* Many disagree with me here.

MYTHS: CLICK, CLICKS, CLICKS!!

Clicks are everything.

They matter, but look deeper.

MYTHS: TECH OWNERSHIP

Building in-house offers more stability, technological control, and ability to be nimble.

DELIVERABILITY

Repeat it!

WHAT IS DELIVERABILITY?

Success: INBOX

Setback: JUNK MAIL

Failure: BLOCKED

The art and science of delivering emails to the inbox

WHY SHOULD YOU CARE ABOUT DELIVERABILITY?

1 in 5 legitimate commercial emails do not make it to the inbox. And this number gets worse every year.

DELIVERABILITY: WHY EMAILS DON’T GET THROUGH

§  High SPAM Complaints Rate q  (SPAM Complaints/Total Emails Sent)

§  Spamtraps/Blacklists

§  Too many emails sent too quickly (no warmup)

§  ISPs are overloaded (Graylisting) q  More prevalent in holiday season

DELIVERABILITY: PREVENTING PROBLEMS §  Warm up IP Address and get Whitelisted

§  Keep the quantity of “low value” email recipients a low % of total emails sent

§  Make it very easy to unsubscribe

§  Mail only people on your list (NEVER BUY LISTS!)

Repeat it!

DELIVERABILITY: SCOLDING AND PUNISHMENT honeypot

Email address posted on forums, websites, and random online destinations. If emailed, anti-SPAM activists know you’re stealing

Recycled spam trap

ISP de-activates an email address that has been inactive for a long time. Any activity with that email address is punished. blacklist

Activist anti-spam organizations maintain “blacklists” of bad email marketers. ISPs use these lists to block emails

spamhaus

The most well-known, unapologetic anti-spam organization and blacklist maintainer

DELIVERABILITY: I’M IN TROUBLE. NOW WHAT?

§  Send emails only to the most responsive subscribers

§  Keep send volumes low and frequent

§  Watch the offending domains closely for improvement

§  Over time and very slowly, grow your send volumes back to normal

§  If in a blacklist, send an email pleading

CAN-SPAM ACT OF 2003

§  Focused on content, not on permissions

§  UK laws are stricter and require permission

Rules:

o  Functioning Unsubscribe link.

o  All unsubscribe requests must be processed within 10 days.

o  Official company name and address must be visible

Rules

TOOLS

TOOLS – EMAIL SERVICE PROVIDER

High-end

Rankings:  hDp://assets.exacDarget.com/pdf/wave_email_markeIng_vendors_q1_2012.pdf  

§  Advanced reporting and campaign customizations w/o engineering

§  Better feature set for triggered campaigns and advanced targeting

§  Query full database with any combination of data

§  Can handle larger sets of data

High end

TOOLS – EMAIL SERVICE PROVIDER

Mid-tier §  Most features of high-end, with ~25% less cost.

§  Advanced campaigns, with fewer options for targeting.

§  Reports allow for less customizability. More focus on standard reports.

§  More errors when working with larger datasets

§  Fewer dedicated account and support staff

mid-tier

TOOLS – EMAIL SERVICE PROVIDER

SMB §  Very low price under $1K per month normally

§  Able to launch ad-hoc campaigns with easy-to-use tools

§  Little ability for deep targeting, reporting, or triggered messages

§  Canned reporting with basic metrics

smb

TOOLS – EMAIL SERVICE PROVIDER B2B §  Usually cheaper than B2C tools

§  Focused on simple tools for Sales team to use personalized templates

§  Focused on automated messaging instead of ad-hoc campaigns

§  Better for for connecting to a CRM like Salesforce and tracking lead funnel

§  Less exciting creative and segmentation tools for campaigns

b2b

Sales automation

ESP OR IN-HOUSE? §  Will your emails provide ROI?

§  Would you like any complexity to your emails beyond 1-off launches?

§  Are your development resources very busy?

§  Developers too busy to resolve every issue within 48 hours?

§  Developers focused on building your company’s products?

YES to all of the above? Go ESP!

TOOLS – DELIVERABILITY §  The last man standing

§  2 useful services: q  Uses seed lists and sample inboxes to give

insight into inbox placement

q  Offers whitelisting to major domains like Hotmail, Yahoo!, Comcast, etc.

Inbox placement

TOOLS – CREATIVE Inbox Shows what your email looks like in various:

q  ISPs (Gmail, etc.)

q  Browsers (Firefox, etc.) q  Platforms (iPad, Desktop, etc.)

Inbox rendering

GOALS

GOAL-SETTING The specific goals of your email marketing program will vary depending on:

§  The type of business you operate

§  What your business model is

§  How far along your business is

EXAMPLE OF GOALS Well-funded startup

Matured user base

Popular b2b company

Most companies

Every company thinks they fall into that last bucket, but there are normally deeper business goals

§  Before building or optimizing your email marketing program, lay out very specific goals and business problems

§  Make sure that every campaign is aligned with those goals.

…BUT BUT BUT …..

LOOK FOR PATTERNS

BUSINESS PROBLEM 1 Both slump right after the 60 day mark

# of Days between 1st and 2nd purchase (value of 1=20 days)

# of Days after registration (value of 1=20 days)

Average lifetime orders

Dollar amount spent

LTV= lifetime revenue LTR = lifetime margins

BUSINESS PROBLEM 2

0  

2000  

4000  

6000  

8000  

10000  

12000  

0   38  

76  

114  

152  

190  

228  

266  

304  

342  

380  

418  

456  

494  

532  

570  

608  

646  

684  

722  

760  

798  

836  

874  

912  

950  

988  

Popula'on  Count  –    Days  between  First  Purchase  Date  and  Registra'on  Date  

Total  

§  Drop-offs in first purchasers 15, 30, 60, and 180 days after registrations

§  Big jump in first purchases after 365 days

Population count – Days between first purchase date and registration date

PERFORMANCE METRICS

PERFORMANCE METRICS

Basic email response metrics

PERFORMANCE METRICS advanced email response metrics

PERFORMANCE METRICS Basic Email Profitability Metrics

Basic email profitability metrics

PERFORMANCE METRICS

User activity/health metrics

SEGMENTATION

SEGMENTING

splitting up users based on available data

Most people segment based on RFM.

I like RFMA – recency, frequency, monetization, activity.

What is segmenting?

SEGMENTING Build Specific programs around specific target segments

SEGMENTING

Somebody bought something! Hooray!

Now what?

SEGMENTING: CROSS-SELL/UPSELL

Catering  and  Chef  2nd  requests  2nd  requests      Total  Grand  Total   xxx  DJ   214  xxx   74  Photography   71  Catering  and  Chef   35  Wedding  Photography   35  Entertainment   23  House  Cleaning   23  

SEGMENTING: CROSS-SELL/UPSELL

SEGMENTING

If somebody orders a birth announcement, what do you know about them?

SEGMENTING: LIFESTAGE

SEGMENTING

How do you get customers to buy more than they normally would?

SEGMENTING: VIP/LOYALTY

SEGMENTING

Our customers have bailed on us. Now what?

SEGMENTING: RE-ENGAGEMENT

SEGMENTING: RE-ENGAGEMENT

SEGMENTING: WELCOME

 Breadth      

DifferenIators  

Targeted  recommendaIons  

Brand  and  Excitement  

Real-­‐life  examples  

Conversion  Goal:  xxx  CommunicaIon  Goal:  EducaIon,  Excitement,  etc.  

Week 1

Week 2

Week 3

Week 4

SEGMENTING: WELCOME

SEGMENTING: WELCOME

SEGMENTING: WELCOME

SEGMENTING: WELCOME

THE 4-HOUR STARTUP

TESTING PLAN

EMAIL TESTING PLAN

1)  Make it actionable!

2)  Testing over multiple days can muddy results

3)  Record all results.

4)  Re-do major tests

Actionable = Leads to planned implementations moving forward.

EMAIL TESTING PLAN

COPY AND SUBJECT LINE TESTING

§  Switch one word or phrase in the SL

§  Add an extra element to the SL

§  Order of call-to-action placement

CREATIVE TESTING

§  CTAs

CREATIVE TESTING

§  CTAs

•  16% more clicks •  11% more conversions

CREATIVE TESTING §  Length

•  V1: Normal Template •  V2: Normal Template with 3 extra tiles

CREATIVE TESTING

•  Longer template got 15% more clicks. •  Shorter template had the best conversion rate •  Shorter template made the featured tile perform

better

§  Length

•  V1: Normal Template •  V2: Normal Template with 3 extra tiles

CREATIVE TESTING §  Style

•  V1: Short tiles •  V1: Long tiles

CREATIVE TESTING §  Style

V1: Short tiles V1: Long tiles

•  8% more clicks •  Slightly higher conversion

CREATIVE TESTING §  Related vs. Un-related content

V1: Related V2: Unrelated

CREATIVE TESTING §  Related vs. Un-related content

19% more clicks

V1: Related V2: Unrelated

MOBILE DESIGN

MOBILE DESIGN: TIMES CHANGE

MOBILE DESIGN: DOMINANCE May 2013 december 2013

+3%

-6%

+5%

+3%

0%

+1%

-3%

+1%

0%

N/A

MOBILE DESIGN: REMEMBER

§  Every platform, browser, and ISP has their own individual quirks to account for with design+HTML

§  Keep design simple and scalable. What looks great in web, may look terrible is certain email ISPs.

§  Assume mobile clicks and make sure your landing pages are mobile friendly.

MOBILE DESIGN: TABLETS TOO.

RECAP §  Definitions

§  Other Channels

§  Deliverability

§  Tools

§  Performance Metrics

§  Segmentation

§  Best Practices

§  Myths

§  Goals

§  Testing Plans

§  Creative Testing

§  Mobile

Questions?

THANK YOU.