ATTN: SMALL BIZ OWNERS. Email Marketing

Is Low Cost, Targeted, Measurable, Effective.

EMarketing blog: http://helpamericaspeople.com/EWP/

 

The mission of this blog, started by the Founders of www.helpamericaspeople.com, is to raise awareness of the most cost-effective marketing tool for Small Business owners like you >>>  EMAIL MARKETING

 

 This blog will introduce you to 13 terms you need to know to expand your knowledge of  email marketing.   See the blog posting dated April 17th to learn about the following terms:  Above the Fold, Click-Through/Click-Through Rate, Deliverability and Email Service Providers (ESPs).

 

The email marketing terms covered today are: House List, HTML vs. Text Email, List Hygiene, Opt-in, Personalization.

 

House List

 Your  house list is your company’s list of customers and prospects that, hopefully, you’ve been building since you started your business.  Whether you’re using Excel or a user-friendly, low cost database like ACT, your house list is arguably your most valuable asset.

A house list is often referred to as a permission-based list because you’ve asked each customer and prospect for permission to communicate with them via email.  If you send emails to addresses that haven’t given you permission, you take a risk of being reported as a Spammer.

Develop an email marketing strategy to maintain an ongoing dialog with your house list that includes relevant, informative content and special offers.  Remember, it costs 5 times as much to acquire a new customer vs. selling to an existing customer.

 

HTML vs Text Emails

You may not know what HTML stands for, but this type of email is easily recognizable and, undoubtedly, you’ve seen many in your Inbox.  These emails are very professional (and promotional) looking – usually in 4-color with creative graphics like images, photos, logos, and formatting techniques, including underlining, bold, hyperlinks  and fancy fonts.  They look like small magazine ads or promotional postcards you receive in the mail.  Not only do they quickly attract the attention of recipients, code is embedded in HTML emails that provides you with tracking information.

Some disadvantages of HTML are:

• they look like ads, so recipients may delete them quickly
• not everyone can view HTML
• they can be slow to load
• you need a professional designer

A text email is just what it says — text only.  You receive as many as hundreds a day from your friends and family.  As an email marketer, you can think of a text email, if well-written, as a sales letter.  The advantages to sending text emails include every recipient can view it properly, it’s easy to produce and mobile devices can read it easily.  Some of the disadvantages include:

• you can’t hyperlink words – you must include the entire address in the email
• no formatting options, i.e., underlining, centering, bold, color
• can’t track the open rate

 List Hygiene

The importance of keeping your house list “clean” cannot be overstated.  If possible, your house list should be cleaned at least once a week.  This means deleting bounces and unsubcribes from your list.  Also, when someone wants to be added to your mailing list or become a subscriber to your enewsletter, try to add them within 24 hours and be sure to send them a Thank You/Confirmation email in return.

Try to avoid someone sending you a second email to request addition, deletion or an updated email address; answer questions and comments as soon as possible.  A quick response shows professionalism, respect and involvement with your audience.

Opt-In (Permission-Based)

 To be a legitimate and ethical email marketer, you must gain permission to send your emails.  Email marketing is often referred to as permission-based or opt-in email marketing.  The potential recipient must give you permission to send them emails.   And, you must also assure them that you won’t sell or share their email address with third-party marketers and that they can unsubscribe to your mailing list at any time.

Additionally, as part of your email marketing strategy, you will need to decide how long you will keep an unresponsive email address on your list before deleting it; the same is true for bounces. Remember, your ultimate goal is to have a quality list not a quantity list.

There are two types of Opt-In Emails: “single” opt-in and “double” opt-in.

A “single” opt-in list is usually created by inviting members to join via a web form or by sending an email message to a “subscriber” email address.  Once readers send the form or the email message, they are subscribed to your list.

A “double” opt-in list, also called a “confirmed” opt-in list, requires the subscriber to reply to a confirmation message to activate the subscription.

The advantage of the “single” opt-in method is that your list will grow faster. However, there are some pitfalls, like the fact that people may subscribe friends or family, who may not want to receive your messages and who could, in the worse case scenario, accuse you of spam.

The advantage of the “double” opt-in method is that you will have a higher quality list (since only interested readers will take the time to go through your confirmation process.

 Important Tip:  If you have a website, include a link for site visitors to join your mailing list or to subscribe to your email campaigns or monthly email newsletter.  Place the link “above the fold” on each web page.  This method is the most cost-effective  (FREE!)  list-building technique in the internet world.

 

Next Post:  More Email Marketing Terms

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