Open Rates and Click Rates Are Declining

July 29th, 2010 | By Anthony Schneider | View Comments

Recent studies show a clear and steady decline in email open rates and clickthroughs. According to MailerMailer’s metrics report released earlier this month, email open rates have dropped around 20% from over 14% in 2007 to just above 11% in 2009, while clickthrough rates have fallen 40% over the same period. Calamity? Marketing catastrophe? Not really.

Inevitable Evolution, Not Bad News

While we’d love to see research that shows open rates are increasing, the news that opens and clicks are declining is …

Posted in Industry News | clickthrough, decline, metrics, open rates, statistics

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Reminder Emails: Pros and Cons

July 22nd, 2010 | By Anthony Schneider | View Comments

Don’t Forget to Phone Your Aunt

Everyone likes a helpful reminder. We’re grateful when someone reminds us that it’s our sister’s birthday, or our favorite store is having a sale. But we’re not as keen on our mother’s imprecations to dress more warmly or phone Aunt Agatha. It’s the same with email: some reminders are useful and welcome, while others fall on deaf (aka unsubscribe-prone) ears.

We’ve found that good reminders yield high render and click rates and very few …

Posted in Tips & Best Practices | bestpractices, promotion, Reminder email, segmentation, series, strategy, subject line

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6 Non-Traditional Places to Collect Email Addresses

July 15th, 2010 | By Marla Chupack | View Comments

You’re Only As Good as Your List

Before you send out your next email marketing campaign, consider some non-traditional sources to collect new email addresses. Think about where your customer interaction is strongest and reach out there to make contact and build your email list. That may mean collecting email addresses at conferences, or retail checkout, using social media, or converting snail mail recipients to email opt-ins. Your bigger, better email list might be a smart phone app away.

1- During Face-to-Face Interactions

It makes sense that you want to capitalize on a …

Posted in Tips & Best Practices | blog, data collection, email signature, facebook, opt-in, permission, twitter

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Do Email Newsletters Impact Customer Retention?

July 8th, 2010 | By Adam Holden-Bache | View Comments

There’s nothing more valuable than your customers or clients. Keeping them interested and engaged with your brand is always a top priority.

Many businesses send email newsletters as a way to communicate with their client or customer base. It’s a key component of the customer retention strategy. But how effective are email newsletters? Do they really help with retention?

Perhaps the answer lies in the content. What works for some may not work for all, but there are some general best practices you should consider.

1- Deliver content that recipients will find interesting. …

Posted in Tips & Best Practices | newsletters, personalize, retention

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Measure for Measure

July 1st, 2010 | By Anthony Schneider | View Comments

Marketing Is Measurement

Measurement goes beyond tracking an email or counting website sessions. Measurement should tell you about your brand, product and audience. It is a yardstick and a guidebook. There are a lot of metrics out there. Using them correctly is what marketing is all about.

First, measure.

As we discuss in 6 Steps for Improved Measurement, the first step in measuring your marketing initiatives is to get the data and understand the data. You should be measuring email renders and …

Posted in Tips & Best Practices | metrics marketing email metrics clickthroughs conversions reach frequency SAME

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