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Say More Than Thank You Most Websites are gathering e-mail addresses. When you submit your e-mail address, you will be redirected to a thank you page. There is nothing wrong with it, but that page can do more than saying "thank you." Email Communication Gartner estimates that half of the 5.5 trillion emails sent in 2001 was business related. Attract New Subscribers With Magnetic Ads One of the most effective methods of advertising your e-zine is placing ads in OTHER e-zines! Guidelines For A New Sending Paradigm - Part 1 of 5 - Treat Email as a True Risk and Cost Center Sustainable email sending programs in an inherently hostile environment now require great care and planning. Before considering the technical complexities and the marketing tactics, email senders must adopt a basic paradigm shift. The five guidelines included in this series should become watchwords for ezine emailers as they incur the risk and responsibility of sending newsletters or any other repetitive type of email.Part 1 of 5: Treat Email as a True Risk and Cost CenterPart 2 of 5: Avoid Collateral DamagePart 3 of 5: Plan to Use Every Legitimate Tool and Tactic Available (M2M)Part 4 of 5: Build strong relationships (H2H)Part 5 of 5: Continuously evaluate messages, lists, and recipient populationsPart 1 of 5Treat Email as a True Risk and Cost Centernot as just an Internet infrastructure tagalongBecause it was "free", easy, and universally accessable online, email became the breeding ground for a vast number of experiments in communication and commerce. Ezines, newsletters, CRM programs and many other online publications are the product of some of those experiments. More pathological forms of information transfer also evolved in the same space, such as Spam and viruses. Today the Internet is trying to develop an immune system to fight those pathogens. Unfortunately, non-pathogen marketers and online communicators of all types have become the victims of this primitive new immune system's stumbling efforts.Many online publishers moved to email back when the costs were essentially limited to a computer, some bandwidth, and a lot of work. Well, email has changed since then in many ways, almost beyond recognition. As this guideline points out, the cost of email risk avoidance and email delivery assurance have now become significant, even when they are not direct out-of-pocket expenses.Senders need to catalog and understand the risks they face, and the costs to overcome these risks, as they adapt to the new hostile email environment.New Potential Legal Risks From Email Programs: Despite the prevailing opinion amoung newletter and ezine publishers that the recently enacted email legislation is directed only toward "Spammers", there is good reason to take these regulations rather seriously.Even if we assume that you only send permission-based email (that all of your recipients subscribed to your ezine), so by definition you are not a "Spammer", there are many other aspects of the email process that have now become regulated. Examples include email transmission practices, list records, operational control over complaints and unsubscribe requests, claims of false or misleading Subject Lines, and several other issues. Mistakes in these areas, even with clearly permission-based mail, can have legal implications. And in fact, precisely what constitutes "permission" is still being worked out in some cases.Online publishers should also be concerned about the motives and circumstances of some actions under the new laws. Targets may be chosen more for their ease of accessibility than for any serious infractions. It is much easier to find and go after a target you can see (such as an stable ezine) than it is to hunt down an elusive Spammer.Finally, there is a common assumption that the email laws of other countries are similar to those in the US, however in many important respects this is not true. The differences in these laws compels (at the least) strict controls be maintained for any lists that are not fully geographically targeted.See the Email PhD "Compliance" section to research the email regulatory environment further.New Service Access Risks From Email Programs:Impact on Your Personal CommunicationsSome online publishers assume that higher risk email programs, such as newsletters or promotional campaigns, are somehow naturally distinct or compartmentalized away from other types of personal email channels. Unless specifically designed as such, this is usually not true. It has come as an unpleasant surprise to many that blocking caused by, for example, an email marketing campaign can also cause the blocking of your email to friends and family. Blocking caused by a simple auto-response program at a minor Web site can disrupt your ability to communicate with anyone at a particular ISP.One basic response to this type of risk is to segment and isolate different types of sending streams so that a shut down in one area does not push your entire e-communications system offline.Recipient ISP DisruptionIt is usually easy to determine when communications are cut with a major ISP, potentially denying access to a large number of customers or subscribers. But blocking at any one of hundreds or thousands of smaller corporate and local networks can be robbing you of revenue, customer satisfaction, and name recognition without your even knowing it. Testing for these blocks can be a difficult and involved process.Direct blocking is not the only way in which email communication is disrupted at recipient ISPs. Having messages land in the Junk-bin rather than the In-box effectively eliminates that message for many recipients who automatically delete those messages without looking at them.Every recipient ISP has the right to interfere with communications it judges to be inappropriate for its network. Unfortunately, a small number of Spam complaints, an appearance on a Blacklist, or just the perception of that system's administrator may cause breakdowns that can be very difficult to detect and resolve.Unless you are an email wizard yourself, one of the most effective ways to begin to track down your delivery profile is through a delivery testing company. See the Email PhD "Data and Tracking" section for more information on this type of resource. Unfortunately, this type of service also represents a new cost for online publishers.Hosting ISP DisruptionEven more directly, publishers are sometimes surprised to find that their own ISPs or NSPs can, and will, kick them off the service based upon email sending history.It is amazing to realize that despite the sales cost and effort of acquiring new customers, and the service and support cost of retaining satisfied customers, most ISPs have placed the decision as to whether you can keep your service into the hands of a small group of "abuse" administrators. By declaring a violation of the contractual Acceptable Use Policies or similar provisions, these administrators have suspended many email and Internet accounts. Sometimes this can occur without notice, and often without recourse. Even very low levels or ratios of complaints can force you to scramble for new sources of Internet service.See the Email PhD "Sending Signature Management" section for more information on avoiding basic disruptions within your email service chain.Customer Affinity Risks From Email Programs:Changing Consumer PerceptionsIt is not unusual for a recipient to sign up for an email list on one day, and to report that email as Spam the next. The reasons why this happens are numerous, but unless a companies' email program is well managed and controlled there is a risk that a few recipients can do a lot of harm."Everyone knows" that Spam is a potentially dangerous pervasive evil online, and that any email they don't immediately recognize or want to receive at that moment is Spam (as incorrect as that definition is). The news media, recipient ISPs, and companies selling anti-Spam products are also training recipients that they need to actively suspect every email they get.Online publishers have to adapt rapidly to provide assurance and reminders to recipients that they actively requested to receive that email, and to embed relevant and high interest content in all of their sends.Negative Brand ImpactsBeyond the risk of turning off individual recipients with ineffective email programs is the broader risk of reputation loss within the general online community. Highly compliant, carefully managed email programs are their own reward when it comes to avoiding uncomplimentary PR outbreaks or having your name posted on the anti-Spam activist boards.See the Email PhD "Content Controls" section to further research customer perception management issues.Increasing Costs Within the New Email EnvironmentBy all accounts commercial email can no longer be treated as if it were free. Whether for increasing internal control time and costs, or external service costs, you need to allocate the resources necessary to operate a sustainable and effective email program.Increasing need for technical and strategic expertiseMore than ever before, email has become a domain requiring a broad mix of different types of expertise. Because this knowledge can be highly specialized, or require access to proprietary data, this expertise often needs to be acquired from outside the sending organization.Costs of outside service providersIt is frequently the case that an external Email Service Provider can better handle certain types of email sending. And there are obvious advantages to off-loading infrastructure risks and to increasing the embedded expertise (such as in ISP relations) by using ESPs. The trouble is that they cost money. The range of pricing among ESPs is extreme, as are the levels and types of services offered. Check out potential service providers carefully, and comparison shop - it is well worth the trouble.Additional costs for administration and controlsCompliance elements and rising recipient expectations require more time and better records, and the need to track and respond to all complaints from numerous sources has added new manpower requirements. Of course, the costs of defensive records and permission audit trails are also growing. While these costs pale beside potential costs of non-compliance or customer erosion, in many cases they represent new and unfamiliar budget items.Costs from distributed bandwidth and sending system architectureThe need to segment and distribute outbound email streams can increase both bandwidth and technical administration costs. The need to capture and retain more extensive records, or to access sending, delivery, response, unsubscribe, and complaint information in a timely fashion may require additional investment in computing hardware. Updated sending and tracking software purchases may also be needed.Performance Benefits That Offset CostsSimply put, you may have to absorb many of these costs to maintain effective, deliverable, and sustainable email programs. It is very likely that without this investment the efficiency of your email program will continue to slide, at the same time that the risks of uncontrolled programs are increasing.Conclusions:Over all, email sending programs have moved significantly away from the simple question of what "can" be done to a much heavier emphasis on what "should" be done, based upon increasing legal and recipient perception risks. The cost of sustaining effective programs is growing. Fortunately, so is the differential advantage of maintaining a working email communications channel.Copyright © by Email Ph.D. All Rights Reserved. How Autoresonders Can Put Your Business On Autopilot Owning your own online business is a lot of work.Don't let anyone tell you that it's not. 11 Creative Ways You Can Use Autoresponders 1. Pick 4 or more articles you've written that have a common theme and put them in an autoresponder series. Announce it on your site as an e-mail course on the go. How To Build Your Greatest Opt-In List I get e-mails all the time from people on my list asking about how to build their lists. This is the most important part of your business. The more subscribers you have, the more joint venture offers you'll get, the more money you'll make, and the more people you'll connect with. The best tip I have on this is at: http://www.nmmastery.com/freereports/fastestlist.shtml 10 Netiquette New Years Resolutions Happy New Year! New attitude? New habits? How about 10 Little New Year's Netiquette Resolutions? Improve Email Deliverability: 15 Tips for Email Marketing Success Delivering email newsletters and sales messages to opt-in subscribers and customers is getting more exasperating-and more expensive-by the day. Delivery rates for email have gone through the virtual floor. According to MarketingSherpa, one out of every six people who asked to be on your mailing list won't receive your email newsletter or marketing message because a spam filter blocks it by mistake. 5 Quick Tips to Get Your Ezine Rolling in the Right Direction Publishing your own ezine is critical to establishing a long term and successful Internet presence for you and your business. Creating Effective Opt-in E-Mail Campaigns It's been said before, but important to re-emphasize, e-mail is the "killer application" of the information age. According to the latest Forrester Research numbers, the permission based e-mail industry is projected to grow from $164M (USD) in 1999 to $7.3B by 2005. E-mail is also rapidly moving from a textual communications process to one that is rich in multimedia content via server-based streaming audio or video. Virtually anyone, even those with extremely low bandwidth, can now view compelling content. How to Build Your Mailing List 1. USE POP-UPSPop-ups are one of the most common methods you can use to capture email addresses and build your email list quickly and with ease. Simply construct a web page containing code for a form and set the page to open (pop up) when visitors ENTER OR EXIT your site.Make sure the pop-up offer is something that`s valuable enough to motivate visitors to take time to give you their contact information. Your offer can be a complimentary report, download, or ebook that arrives instantly through your autoresponder to their email inbox when they give you their email. Using Mirror Pages Effectively Thought I would share with you a very effective technique for adding new customers to your mailing list. These are individuals who would not otherwise discover your products or services - because they did not come to the internet specifically looking for your products or services. This is through using what some call a mirror site or mirror pages. Email Marketing: How Much is Too Much? I have a special new email address. It's in addition to my primary email address and it's where I tell online marketers who want my business, to send their mailings. An E-mail Promotion Internet Marketing Strategy Works E-mail promotion Internet marketing can help your home-based business expand and attract customers that are interested in goods and services like yours. Once you have determined who is your target market, drawing them into your circle of customers requires some effort. Using an e-mail promotion, Internet marketing can be very lucrative to your business. How NOT To Appear Like A Spammer Unless you use the Internet only for surfing and never use your email address you've probably received something that is called spam. Combating List Building Frenzy: Take The Time To Promote It is an accepted fact among the experts now that online marketing succeeds only with a quality, highly targeted permission email list in place. As a result, the multi-level marketers have pounced on this and everywhere you look another "matrix" lead generating system springs up. Is Your Autoresponder Truly Promoting Your Company? Getting other people to promote your web site is one of the most popular Internet marketing methods around, today. Affiliate relationships are all the rave with people who have web sites. Web marketers worldwide are trading links everyday, in hopes of driving each other's traffic to their respective sites. This is certainly something any hard-working Internet business owner should do, but it may be a bit overrated. While using affiliate advertising is a strong marketing ploy, effective use of multiple e-mail lists and an autoresponder is one of the most powerful, multi-faceted marketing tools available today. Why Are People Cheesed Off With the Internet? Having been connected to the "net" now for about eight years I can't help but notice the amount of deception that goes on. And it seems to be getting worse. It has got to the point where almost everything you read has to be viewed with a healthy degree of suspicion. Spam! Whats the Real Problem Most people now know the official definition of spam- Unsolicited Commercial Email (UCE for short). |
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