Don't get me wrong. I love benchmark studies as much as the next person, and I am finalizing one as I write this column. Benchmark studies and data have value, but I find that many marketers use the data incorrectly.
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Are You Leveraging Your Metrics For Maximum Benefit? 
Posted by Loren McDonald on Dec 3, 3:23 PM
One of the greatest strengths of email marketing has always been its measurability, especially compared with other channels such as print, broadcast and direct mail. The breadth and depth of available email metrics, however, is something that a lot of email marketers don't take advantage of. Or, they simply don't delve much beyond the basic open, click and bounce metrics.
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Five Lessons Email Marketers Can Learn From @Sh*tMyDadSays 
Posted by Loren McDonald on Nov 19, 10:34 AM
If you track the Twitterverse, you've probably read about Justin Halpern, who converted his father's crusty, cranky and curse-laden commentary from a hot Twitter account into book and CBS sitcom deals. His success has energized millions of basement bloggers, but marketers and other communicators can also pick up pointers about creating highly focused, in-demand content, whether they occupy cubicles or spacious corner offices.
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Your No. 1 Upgrade For 2010: Lifecycle Marketing  
Posted by Loren McDonald on Nov 5, 2:52 PM
If you're already thinking about how to take your email-marketing program to the next level in the coming year, you should start by switching out your batch-and-blast program for one that uses lifecycle marketing to send highly targeted and relevant messages. Although it might be a challenge to persuade your upper management to invest time and money to upgrade your email program, this story of a company that boosted its conversion rate 40% using segmentation and targeted messaging might help loosen up the budget.

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Using Personality To Help Drive Engagement 
Posted by Loren McDonald on Oct 22, 12:28 PM
My previous column, where I shared personal experiences about assumptions others have made about my wife and me without knowing us, turned out to be the second most popular column I've written for Email Insider, as measured by the number of readers' comments. I intended the column to caution against assuming too much about your subscribers and customers. However, reader reaction confirmed my view that showing a human, personal side in email, blogs and other communications content will lead to greater engagement with your customers and subscribers.
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My Name Is Loren. BTW, I'm A 'He' 
Posted by Loren McDonald on Oct 8, 11:31 AM
Hi, I'm Loren McDonald, and I'm a "he." You might not know that, though, by looking at the mail in my mailbox and messages in my email inbox. While I've never done an actual audit of my mail, I'm guessing that when a gender is inferred (e.g., Mr. or Mrs. Loren McDonald), one-third to one-half of my mail assumes that Loren is a female. So, how can you avoid or minimize potentially embarrassing and costly mistakes by assuming the wrong things about your customers and subscribers? Here are a few tips.
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Email Share-to-Social: Not Just About The Links 
Posted by Loren McDonald on Sep 24, 3:15 PM
I agree with my industry colleague Chad White, who predicted in this space that marketer adoption of email social sharing -- referred to as "share-to-social" or "share with your network" -- will overtake "forward to a friend" usage, perhaps even as early as two years from now.
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Warning: Blasting May Be Harmful to 'Our' Health  
Posted by Loren McDonald on Sep 10, 12:21 PM
A bunch of self-proclaimed "email snobs" (myself included) have been heating up the Twitterverse, email discussion lists and the blogosphere with a debate over the merits (or lack of them) of the language we use as email-marketing practitioners. Some of us believe that seemingly harmless words, like "blast" to describe deploying an email message or campaign, or "buy" to describe list rental, are symptoms of marketer ignorance, both accidental and intentional. Others say efforts to obliterate these words from the marketer's lexicon waste everybody's time on inconsequential matters and distract us from the real issues we have to deal with in email marketing.
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