• The Quest For The Perfect Loyalty Program Email Experience
    On a recent work project, I was tasked with defining the "perfect" loyalty program email experience. After reviewing over 150 awards/loyalty program emails, I can safely say that no one company does it perfectly. Based on my observations, here are some tips to help you design a loyalty program email strategy that will cultivate the relationship and strengthen a profitable alliance.
  • 7 Tactics for Driving Traffic To Stores With Email
    Recently an Email Experience Council member asked me whether retailers should drive sales online or offline with their email marketing. Having a very subscriber-centric view of the world, I answered that, in general, retailers should not try to force customers into particular channels, that they should try to be channel-agnostic. That said, there are a few reasons to inject some occasional channel bias into your email marketing. So here are some ways to drive traffic to your stores.
  • IPhone Vs. BlackBerry: Marketers Win Either Way
    According to Gartner's recent publication "Market Share: Smartphones, Worldwide, 1Q08," the BlackBerry led U,S. market share with 42% of the market. Only one year after the initial release of the iPhone, Apple climbed to the second slot with 20% of the U.S. smartphone market. As these two juggernauts fight for control of the smartphone market, email has become the primary battleground.
  • The New Reality Of Email Inbox(es)
    Consumers are being deluged by email -- personal, commercial and business -- and they're doing something to manage the flow. We don't need just to stand out in the inbox, we need to get subscribers to access their "inbound only" accounts. To do this, email marketers, we must dedicate ourselves to providing Value to our subscribers. Let's stop worrying about this or that minor element to test and think big picture:
  • Helping A Small Nonprofit To Use Email
    There must be thousands of small, local nonprofit organizations that haven't yet embraced the benefits of email. The primary reason is probably a lack of understanding of the key role email plays in today's society and how email can be used to build donor relationships and advocacy, and thus increase support for the organization's mission. The secondary reason is a lack of personnel skilled in the creation and maintenance of email programs. Over the past year I assisted one such agency to enter the world of email. The following summary of the effort involved may help you in working with …
  • The Best Time To Send An Email
    Naturally, the perfect answer to the question is: It depends. But to give a more specific answer, from the subscribers' perspective, the perfect time to send is just before they would like to view your emails. Here are four ways ways to create a simplified time-of-delivery scheme.
  • Email: Why It Isn't Digital Direct Mail
    Email is not direct mail. "Duh," you might be saying if you are an experienced email marketer. But I've noticed a continuing increase of marketers with direct mail or other offline backgrounds entering the email world, and who seem to be surprised at the differences.
  • ABCs of Email Rendering
    A reader wanted to know a basic definition of "image supression, optimizing HTML tex, alt tags and pre-header text. The Email Diva is here to help.
  • Doing Email The Small Business Way
    At times, I lose sight of how simple email marketing is, how inexpensive it can be--and have to rationalize how email can really support a small business. Going back to the core helps keep you honest and realistic. The key for a small business is to use email as a bridge to your business, events and staying connected.
  • The Value Of Rendered Email
    In the Email Experience Council's most recent survey, the Retail Email Rendering Benchmark Study , we estimated that email's ROI would jump to $52.69 for every dollar spent on it from the current DMA-estimated $48.29 if all marketers optimized their emails for image blocking. That's a pretty compelling 9.1% improvement -- and we felt that it was a pretty conservative estimate.
« Previous Entries