As marketers, we've put a lot of focus on building mobile programs over the past few years. We've learned that 80% of smartphone users won't leave home without their smartphones, creating an abundance of opportunity for us to reach subscribers anytime, anywhere. However, we also know that 86% of smartphone users are multitasking when they're on their phones (rather than giving their undivided attention to our carefully crafted marketing campaigns). People are inundated with information every day but can only process so much of it. They're consciously and unconsciously prioritizing the information coming at them. How does our brand fit ...» 1 Comments
Post-Mother's Day, and we made it through. While not quite the holiday retail rush that the last quarter of the year brings, it was still a ubiquitous time of gift-giving. As we build marketing programs and aspire to build customer engagements that promote repeated purchase habits, we have to continually question the way we do things.» 2 Comments
As a parent, I recognized from day 1 that everyone has an opinion about how to care for my children (and discipline them, and dress them and cut their hair -- ugh). Thankfully, I also recognized that I can choose to internalize the advice (or not) and apply it, alter it accordingly or disregard it completely - based on my unique situation. And that's exactly the same frame of mind all email marketers should take with the advice they receive about their programs.» 1 Comments
Over the last few years, spam has become a "largely solved" problem. The average consumer sees very little spam in the inbox (although there is *a lot* of spam at the gateway). Many of the criminals that had been focused on spam have moved on to phishing. Volumes of phishing attacks are up more than 150% year over year, according to RSA and the Anti-Phishing Working Group. Just as spam had a very negative impact on email marketers - inboxes crowed with spam drive lower response rates - phishing has a very negative impact on email effectiveness. According to surveys, ...» 1 Comments
When you read the latest email statistic as it comes through your news feed each day, it conjures up an image of the consumer behavior the data point depicts. For example, when you read that 70% of big brands' opens in March occurred on mobile devices, is it not inevitable that your mind creates an image of a person (dressed exactly the way you picture your ideal customer) peering intently at a mobile phone with the very expression that your last message was crafted to elicit? Also, he's standing. My imaginary mobile consumers are always standing.» 5 Comments
I always say, I get more done before 9 a.m. than I do the rest of the day. But with email, it's a continual stream: it's the first thing many check before they brush their teeth, have coffee, or breakfast.» 0 Comments
The beginning of an email marketing relationship is the most important. Not only are subscribers more engaged and more likely to convert, but optimizing the experience of a subscriber's first month or so on your list can extend the overall time they remain engaged with your brand via email.» 1 Comments
For many companies, revenue or conversion activity mirrors something similar to the 80/20 rule, with 20% of their customers/subscribers contributing 80% of revenue. No matter whether your company sees 90% of your revenue coming from 10% of customers or 70/30, a small percentage of your database is likely doing all the work. What implications does this have for your email-marketing program? If you are like a lot of marketers, you focus on filling the top of the funnel in an economical manner and increasing your mailing frequency to your entire database. Why not? This approach works to deliver more revenue. ...» 1 Comments
Mobile-enabled email has truly been the topic du jour for 2013 so far. A recent article says it best in its title: "Mobile Email Opens Now 41% & on Pace to Surpass PC by End of 2013." Whoa, that's huge!. So that's the "why" of using mobile email; now let's focus on the "how." There are three components that marketers should consider when creating mobile emails:» 1 Comments
