Are you getting the best email-marketing results you can? Likely no, if you’re not incorporating the nine following items into your email-marketing campaigns:

1. Developing a successful concept — One of the most important elements of a successful email-marketing campaign is your concept. Figure out whom you’re going to send it to and why. What is your call to action, and what will you need to convince someone to take that next step and click through to the landing page? What supporting information do you need to include to build trust in you to take the next step? And what is your offer or incentive, and what will drive some sort of sense of urgency? Remember, you have a tough enough time getting a response without any offers or sense of urgency (e.g., offer good through Friday at midnight, the first 50 respondents get something extra). Add these, and you’ll give your campaign a fighting chance.
2. Segmenting your list — Many email marketers tend to send to a single segment. One of the best ways to improve response to your email campaigns is by dividing your list into segments and then varying your message and offer to be specific for each of them. Many of the bulk email software tools provide dynamic content functionality that will automatically drop in certain paragraphs based upon an attribute that describes the individual (e.g., cat lovers get the offer for cat food, while dog lovers get the offer for dog food). If you need help finding the right tool, FulcrumTech can help. There are so many ways to segment a list. Be creative, and test your results.
3. Writing your copy to get the click — Be clear, concise, and get to the point. Remember, the most important goal of your copy is to get the click. Provide a clear subject line (this is like the envelope of a direct mail piece). Use informative headings and build trust to convince recipients that your company is the one they should buy from. Test the inclusion of such components as a video or a countdown, and you may just see your click-through rates blast off. Writing the copy is definitely NOT what email software can do for you.
4. Designing the email to optimize conversions — Design goes hand in hand with copy, so you’ll likely need to tweak your copy as you get into the design work. Designing for email is not straightforward. And many mistakes can be made. Think about the eye path: Don’t break up the design with heavy horizontal lines or blocks or copy that are set apart and get in the way of building your case. One of the reasons that text emails can outperform HTML-designed versions is simply that the designer of the HTML version put too many roadblocks up for the reader. Remember, recipients will glance at the email for about a second to get a sense of what it’s about and if it’s of interest. Make sure your headings pop and that your call to action is very clear. And be sure that your design will work in a mobile environment. For example, are your calls to action big enough to see on an iPhone screen?
5. Coding the email correctly — There are so many errors made at this stage that can hurt the rendering of your emails. Be sure you’re familiar with the email coding standards and abide by them. Many templates that email software companies (also known as email service providers) provide are not coded well or violate email best practices for coding.
6. Testing the rendering of your email — Don’t forget to test across all major email clients to be sure your email is rendering properly. Many of the best email-distribution software tools have built-in testing capabilities for rendering. Or use a tool like Litmus, which works great for render testing.
7. Reviewing your analytics — Be sure that the email tool you use will provide you with analytics that show open rates, click-through rates, unsubscribes, bounces (by hard and soft bounce type), opens by domain, etc.
8. Optimizing your email for continual improvement — Assume that your email is never as good as it can be. You can always find something that can make it better. So, based upon your analytics, figure out what types of A/B split tests or other tests you can run next time. Test subject lines, headings, images, and more. This is where email-marketing masters strut their stuff.
9. Knowing if you have any deliverability issues — Many times, email marketers may have issues with their emails getting to the intended recipients. If you haven’t checked, be sure to watch your bounces by domain, as well as opens by domain. Either could uncover a potential problem. Feel free to contact us about our Email Deliverability Essentials if you suspect any deliverability problems. We’ve helped many email marketers out of hot water.

Going beyond the items above, you may also consider automating the integration with your customer relationship management (CRM) or other back-end systems to take advantage of even more data for segmentation. Or use the integration to prompt emails based upon events (e.g., someone requests a white paper or purchases a product).

So, yes, email marketing is so much more than a Constant Contact or other email-distribution tool. There’s so much that goes into preparing an email campaign to make it successful. Unfortunately, the tool by itself won’t get the most from your email-marketing channel.

Not sure how to get more out of your email-marketing campaigns? Contact us or give us a call at 215-489-9336. We love helping companies grow!

You can use the information you obtain from A/B split testing to fine tune subsequent email campaigns, while continuing to test additional variables. In this way, you’ll achieve steady improvements in the results from your email-marketing campaigns, one test a time.

Here we provide seven steps essential for implementing an effective A/B split test to help improve your email-marketing return on investment:

1. Choose what you want to test. There are countless variables within an email campaign that, with a seemingly small change, can make a big impact on your results. The following give you an idea of some email campaign variables you may want to test:
   • Email subject lines
   • From lines
   • Calls to action (e.g., location, size, color, copy)
   • Headlines
   • Message layouts
   • Design
   • Images
   • Offers and incentives
   • Adding a video
   • Fonts (type, colors, and sizes)
   • Personalization
   • Best weekdays to send
   • Time tests (e.g., morning versus late afternoon)
2. Choose what measure of success you’ll use to determine the winner. Success measurements for email campaigns include:
   • Open rates
   • Click-through rates
   • Conversion rates
   • Revenue.

   When choosing this measure, be sure to consider what results you’re really interested in getting. Let’s say you’re testing subject lines, for example, and lead generation is the primary goal of your email campaign. One subject line may result in higher open rates, yet the other may actually produce more qualified leads.

3. Develop a research question to test. This is a good way to help you stay focused on the outcome of your A/B split test. Some examples of research questions include:
   • Which call to action produces the highest conversion rates?
   • Which version provides a higher click-through rate — with a video or without a video?
   • Which day will generate a higher open rate — Monday or Tuesday?
   • Which headline results in the highest click-through rate?
4. Be sure to test only one variable at a time. For accurate results, be sure you’re testing only one variable at a time. In other words, if you’re testing subject lines and you send version A to one group in the morning and version B to a group in the afternoon, you won’t know whether it’s the time of day or the subject line that had the biggest effect on the open rates.
5. Randomly divide your list into two equal segments. Although it would be ideal if your two test groups had similar demographics, behavioral segmentation, income, age, gender, etc., you can still get valid results by simply dividing your list randomly.
6. Be sure your sample size is large enough to make a statistically valid decision. How big should your sample sizes be? It all depends on how large your email list is. If you have a very large list, you may be able to use only 10% of your list for testing. But if you have a small list, you may have to use the entire list to get statistically valid results on an A/B split test. If statistics isn’t your thing, don’t spend too much time trying to figure it out. Leverage help from online tools, such as the Split Test A/B Test Marketing Calculator. Or contact the experts at FulcrumTech for help.
7. Make A/B split testing faster and easier by using readily available testing tools. Many email service providers (ESPs) offer useful tools for running A/B split tests on emails and websites today. Some examples of what these tools can do include:
   • Randomly select your two samples.
   • Track results and generate a report with a side-by-side comparison of the results.
   • Select the winning version and automatically send it to the rest of the sample.

   If you have questions about finding and choosing the right tools to use, FulcrumTech can help in this area, too.

Email Marketing A/B Split Test Example

The following is a good example of a typical A/B split test for an email campaign. Let’s say you want to test the effectiveness of two different subject lines. So your research question would be:

Which subject line will deliver a better open rate — version A or B?

Then you would:

1. Create a control email (Email #1) with version A of the subject line.
2. Create a second test email (Email #2) with version B of the subject line.
3. Send each email to an equally sized, random sample from your total list of 50,000 subscribers, on the same day and time.

Results:

• Email #1 — Subject line A
  Sent to 5,000 subscribers
  Open rate = 20%
• Email #2 — Subject line B
  Sent to 5,000 subscribers
  Open rate = 23%

In this case, open rate is being used to measure success. When the results for the two open rates are analyzed for statistical significance, you determine the improvement obtained using subject line B versus subject line A is indeed statistically significant, with a 95% level of confidence. At that point, send the email with the winning subject line to the rest of your email-marketing list.

Need help in developing a more effective online marketing strategy for your organization? Email us or give us a call at 215-489-9336 and the email-marketing experts at FulcrumTech will get you started today.

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Thompson Toyota Email Grade: C

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4/19/12 — The primary goal of this email sent by the Doylestown, PA-based car dealership Thompson Toyota is to build the company’s Facebook fan base. Sent to customers, the email starts off with a strong subject line that is likely to drive a high open rate, especially among Facebook users: “Like Us on Facebook for a Chance to Win.” Recipients don’t know what they may win, but given that it’s sent from a car dealership, their curiosity is likely piqued. Could it be a car?

Once the email is opened, however, you quickly see that the prize is a $100 gas card. This is still a pretty great incentive to push a “like” button on Facebook, especially given today’s high gas prices. The eye path is effective, leading from the company logo, to the offer, to the call to action: “To enter, just like us on Facebook by 5/31/12.” This deadline adds a sense of urgency; however, the email was sent in mid-April, so recipients aren’t that compelled to take immediate action.

The actual call-to-action button is not very clear: Recipients must click the small Facebook like icon, which takes them to Thompson Toyota’s Facebook page, where they can “like” Thompson Toyota. It might have been more effective to add another link to the Facebook page, such as on the line “Enter to Win a $100 Gas Card Just for Becoming a Follower.”

When it comes to the clarity of message, there’s a problem with the terminology. Companies on Facebook have fans, not followers. In two places in this email, however, Thompson Toyota incorrectly uses the phrase “just for becoming a follower.” And because Twitter has followers, and a Twitter icon is also included in this email, some recipients may question whether the contest involves Twitter, too.

There’s an inherent credibility in this email in that Thompson Toyota has built a trusted relationship and brand loyalty with their current customers. But there’s some question as to the validity of the contest described in this email. Typically, in contests associated with growing a Facebook fan base, people are asked to share contact information, such as name and an email address, once they have liked the page. Plus, they are notified that they have successfully entered the drawing. In this case, nothing happens after clicking on the Thompson Toyota’s Facebook like button. It leaves the user wondering how the contest will be administered and how the winner will be contacted.

The biggest problem with this email – as reflected in our rating for the preview pane – is that it was sent with embedded images. In the original email, there are four attachments for the embedded images. Because spam filters can be tripped more readily with attachments, deliverability may have suffered as a result of using embedded images rather than linked images.

Disclaimer: FulcrumTech does not have access to the performance data relating to this promotional email, so any tests performed on this email can’t be reflected in FulcrumTech’s commentary.

In our ongoing Get the Click series, we rate and review promotional emails from a wide variety of companies to provide examples about what’s done right — and what could be done better — to “get the click” (the only goal of ALL emails) and ultimately drive conversions.

Does Gilt get the click? Find out!

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Rue La La Email Grade: B+

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3/20/12 — Rue La La is an invitation-only shopping (www.ruelala.com) where members can buy from “private sale boutiques” that are open for a short time and offer top brands in fashion, travel, home, gourmet food, wine, and more. We recently reviewed a welcome email from a similar shopping website – Gilt. Compared to Gilt’s welcome email, this one does a better job of introducing the membership benefits to ultimately drive conversions.

Similar to the Gilt email, Rue La La opens with a fitting subject line for its new members, who are expecting a welcome email: “Welcome. So glad you’re here.” But unlike in the Gilt welcome email, both the eye path and clarity of Rue La La’s email message are very strong. Starting at the Rue La La logo, the reader’s eye is effectively led to the fun headline “Hello, Style!” positioned next to a stylish young couple, to a few tips for members before they start shopping, and finally to a prominent primary call to action: “Now Start Shopping.” In addition, the $10 credit incentive to “invite your friends” is presented as a secondary call to action, as it should be in a welcome email.

Another special offer is described in this email: Once shoppers pay $9.95, they’ll get free shipping for 30 days. This offer is tactically included both in the heading and in the tips. To help drive additional conversions, we suggest Rue La La follow up with a trigger email that reminds members not to miss out on the great opportunity to save on shipping costs.

The sense of urgency isn’t strong in this email; however, it’s really not an issue since the purpose of this welcome email is to introduce the benefits of the shopping website to new members. Credibility also isn’t a high priority in a welcome email as it is being sent to people who have already signed up.

For this email, the preview pane without images is the only area that isn’t as effective as it could be. This is especially true in the short preview pane: Because the headline is in such a large font, recipients must scroll down to read the messages that are in tiny print.

Overall, this is a great example of a stylish, well-designed welcome email that successfully communicates how to shop at the website, as well as the advantages and offers associated with membership.

Disclaimer: FulcrumTech does not have access to the performance data relating to this promotional email, so any tests performed on this email can’t be reflected in FulcrumTech’s commentary.

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Gilt Groupe Email Grade: C+

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Sense of Urgency
Credibility

3/20/12 — Gilt Groupe is a members-only shopping website (www.gilt.com) that gives access to top designer labels at up to 60% off the retail price. In this welcome email, Gilt starts off effectively with a strong subject line: “Get Started with Gilt.” Sent to new members within minutes of signing up, recipients are looking forward to finding out more about Gilt.

The preview pane – both with and without images – continues to be effective with “Welcome to Gilt,” the $25 offer, and the “Shop Now” call to action prominent. In addition, the captions for the offers are clear and well organized.

When it comes to the eye path, however, this email loses some of its luster. The reader’s eye is drawn to the “Shop Now” and “Invite Friends” calls to action, while the features of membership are in smaller type at the bottom of the email. New members would normally expect to learn about how the membership works in the welcome email before they actually started shopping or inviting their friends to join. So from both a strategic and design perspective, the organization of this welcome email is backwards.

The clarity of this message suffers from the same challenge. The focus of the email is split between two strong and competing calls to action: “Shop Now” and “Invite Friends.” The offer is a good one for the target audience of designer fashion shoppers – members will get $25 if the friends they invite become members and make a purchase. But there’s no sense of urgency associated with the $25 offer to invite friends. If the focus of the email was shifted to the “Shop Now” call to action, however, the sense of urgency would be high because the sales listed in the email are good only for that day. Gilt might do well to consider leading with this in their welcome email and promote sharing with friends after establishing a stronger relationship with a new member.

Credibility is not an issue with this email – it’s a well-known brand for the target audience. In other words, Gilt doesn’t need to build value in this email because the new members are already sold. The goal here is to confirm to recipients that they’ve made a good decision to sign up for membership, which this welcome email accomplishes.

Disclaimer: FulcrumTech does not have access to the performance data relating to this promotional email, so any tests performed on this email can’t be reflected in FulcrumTech’s commentary.

For those of you who have tried to calculate email ROI, you know how challenging it can be to accurately identify all the components that make up the cost of your email-marketing campaigns. At FulcrumTech, we’ve identified four major categories of factors that have the most significant effect on email ROI:

• The size and quality of your email list
• Email list attrition, including bounces, spam complaints, and unsubscribes
• Email costs, from copy and design to delivery
• Email performance, including open, click-through and conversion rates, as well as revenue per conversion.

See the article I recently wrote for iMedia Connection that talks about these key drivers of email ROI, as well as how to measure and improve your email ROI.

Plus, be sure to check out FulcrumTech’s new web-based email ROI calculator – ROI Goalsetter – for an easy and accurate way to help you assess both your current and future email campaigns.