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Secrets of Successful Email Marketing Presented by:

Don Mennig

dmennig@asicentral.com

800-546-1350 ext. 3866

ASI Education

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Goal & Overview

•

Introductions•

Email essentials

•

Secrets to success•

Useful Web sites

To make you comfortable with the basics of email marketing.Be able to send an effective email with RatePoint.com.

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A little about us …•

Don Mennig–

ASI’s Executive Director of Marketing•

Started with ASI in 2004 heading up the ESP Online marketing program

–

15+ years marketing experience

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Tom Serani–

Co-founder RatePoint

and VP of Worldwide Sales

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15 years of sales management experience at established and startup technology companies

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Email essentials

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What’s the purpose?–

Drive leads, increase sales, educate/inform•

Web and/or landing page traffic•

Email & phone

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Formats–

Text (RTF)•

More personal when used intermittently

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HTML•

HTML has images/ fonts/ layout & design

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Anatomy of an email

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General flow for an email…–

Email opens on a computer (Outlook, Entourage)–

Email has compelling content/ offer–

Email links to landing page–

Thank you/ acknowledgement page –

link to main site, other products etc…

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Every click to your point of action hurts

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Secret 1: It’s still about your Web site!•

Make sure your site looks great!–

The recipient is already online or mobile–

Consistent look and feel with email–

Done well your Web site distinguishes you•

Done poorly it makes your competitors look better•

Look at your

customer’s Web sites… that is what they are accustomed to seeing

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Secret 2 –

Don’t try this at home …•

Visit www.ratepoint.com/asi

for a free trial

•

Spend 30 minutes playing with the program and familiarizing yourself with the tools. They are great for design, analytics, managing lists and SPAM.

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Secret 3 –

Garbage in. Garbage out.•

Your database is a major key to success–

Create a contact database in Excel•

Export from outlook or other program•

First/last name, company, email address minimum•

.csv

file

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List building/ acquisition•

Ask your contacts for referrals

–

Read the paper, local business journals•

Start a personal correspondence first when possible

–

Do not purchase lists (third party)•

Expensive/ lower results

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Secret 4 –

Compelling Communications•

Have a reason for emailing–

Clearly state ‘What’s in it for Betty!”–

Make sure it is compelling–

Be consistent with your brand image

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Subject lines–

50/35 characters? 3 words? Subject line = email?

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Personalization backlash?–

First names must also be included in body copy•

Improve open rates by 5%•

Not included in body copy decreases by 8%!

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The sender relationship is key

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Spam•

“Don, ASI announces enhancements to ESP Online”

–

Avoid other terms you see in SPAM: discount, ALL CAPS, !, (Free)

Secret 5 - It’s all Subjective

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Secret 6 –

Forget everything you know about print design

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Body copy/ Design–

Keep vital information and offers above the ‘fold’•

Like a newspaper story your first paragraph should include all vital information

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In general, shorter is better

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Use relevant images –

photography is best–

Flash, audio, .exe etc… are all stripped out by email servers

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Animated .jpgs

work•

‘Fake’ video works

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64% on mobile devices (text left, image right)

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Secret 6 –

Forget everything you know about print design (continued)

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Personalize your email body copy–

First name, company name, industry

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Give them one thing to do (if you’re trying to land sales/ leads)–

Put offers at the top, as links in the copy, and at the bottom.

–

Make sure your offer is close to the strongest visual image on the email

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The more the merrier?•

Think PONG

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Syndicate your emails–

Email marketing providers like RatePoint

work with social media tools such as Twitter (www.twitter.com)

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Allows you to post your emails to your Twitter account

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Benefits of syndication–

Increased visibility: Displays emails somewhere other than your customers’ inboxes

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Viral effect: share email campaigns with followers/ peers on Twitter

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Secret 7 –

Email is getting social

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Best Practice 1: Determine your ROI•

What to track–

Open rates (Successful sends / unique opens)–

CTR (unique opens / unique clicks)•

Soft leads

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Conversions (unique clicks / action)•

Hard leads

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Delivery/ bounce/ SPAM complaints

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Best Practice 2: Testing

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A/B splits–

What should you test?•

Subject lines•

Sender (From)•

Content•

Offers•

Day of week/ hour•

Landing pages

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Best Practice 3: When to drop?•

Best days/ times to send–

It depends …–

Monday = highest open and clicks•

Sunday = high open but low clicks–

Only 3% of all email traffic

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Friday has lowest metrics

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Test your audience

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You’ll know in 96 hours how well your email has done! –

Typically we can predict the total number of leads an email will provide within one hour of its drop

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Best Practice 4: Customer Reviews•

Using Feedback to Your Advantage–

Growing Your Business•

Proactively manage feedback to strengthen valuable customer relationships

•

Boost sales and consumer confidence with testimonials

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How it Relates to Email Marketing•

Use email marketing as launching pad to request reviews•

Promote reviews/testimonials through email–

Differentiate your business–

Customer endorsements motivate consumers to take action

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Industry Statistics•

77% of online shoppers use reviews and ratings when purchasing•

68% of consumers trust "people like me" first for product advice

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Exclusive -

New Affiliate Benefit!•

Ratepoint–

ASI discount approx. 17%•

30 day free trial•

500 contact rate–

$8.46/ month or $84.26/ year–

Compared to Constant Contact = $15/ month

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1000 contact rate–

$15.26/ month or $151.99/ year–

Compared to Constant Contact = $30/ month

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ASI will be building industry templates over the next several months

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Most important secrets to remember

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Don’t do it yourself•

Email is the means, sales are the goal

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Your content as well as your website has to be impressive

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Email is becoming the new Pong•

Measure & track results

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Resources

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RatePoint–

www.ratepoint.com/asi

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Research–

www.marketingsherpa.com–

www.mediapost.com

(email insider)

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Analytics–

Anlaytics.google.com