Archive for April, 2011

Four ideas to reactivate your subscribers

Tuesday, April 19th, 2011

Keeping a conversation with the subscribers and the more interactions you get from them is better for an efficient email marketing campaign. But what can you do when it seems like your subscribers seem to have lost interest, they are no longer active and they don’t open your newsletters? You need to find some solutions to reactive them.

A good reactivation starts with the segmenting process. You should create separate segments for those that never answered your messages, those who did answer before, but know they don’t anymore or the ones that answered very few times. Maybe the subscribers that answered before found your newsletters interesting, but they don’t anymore, and the ones that answered once subscribed just for one time specific offer. According to these segments, these subscribers can be approached differently for a reactivation.

  1. A special offer or discount – this tactic has many chances to succeed but on the long term can be harmful if you reactivate your subscribers with offers and you can’t find anything else interesting for them.
  2. Change the frequency - it’s possible that the interest of your subscribers to have fallen because of the frequency of the emails. You can reduce the frequency and make a selection of the information you send based on relevance. You can also offer the possibility for your subscribers to set how often they want to get an email from you.
  3. A survey – give your subscribers the chance to express their preferences. This way you get new information that will help you to develop new campaigns and also you get to show them you care about their opinions.
  4. Ask for a confirmation - some inactive subscribers may have lost interest on your emails for reasons that have nothing to do with what you are sending. Maybe they were interested in the information at the moment they subscribed and they aren’t anymore. You can ask for a confirmation of their wish to be subscribed to your newsletter. This can be a good way to clean your list.

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5 solutions to have a better call to action

Friday, April 15th, 2011

What is a call-to-action and why is so important?

In email marketing the call to action is that element of the email that invites the readers to have a certain reaction – that’s usually the object of that email. The call-to-action is not necessarily a link, it can be an image, a button or some design which calls the attention and determines the subscriber to respond.

Why is the call to action so important?

Since every email sent have a purpose – getting an action from the receiver – the call-to-action is the way used to attract the user and encourage him to make the action you expect. Is one of the elements that have most influence on the click rate and the conversion rate.

If you don’t have a call to action, your subscriber can’t answer to what are you asking for. For example, if you send a newsletter with information about a product to get more sales, you nedd to have a link or button that will lead the subscriber to the product. That link or button needs to have a message, a call-to-action. If that link does not exist, that will mean for your subscriber to seak for himself your product, this is highly unlikely to happen very often.

When you need a better call-to-action?

To see if a call-to-action is efficient you need to look into the click rate of your messages. If it’s low, it is needed to rethink the calls-to-action of your newsletters, make them more appealing for the subscribers. The most common calls-to-action are “click here”. It’s a very short and clear message but it doesn’t say anything about a benefit.

Optimization solutions

  1. Give them a reason why to click – show your subscribers a benefit they will gain following your call to action. If you say “Click here” or “Find out more” you don’t give any information about their advantage. For example, “Save 25%, buy now” is a message that shows a benefit.
  2. Personalize – you want your subscribers to take action? Get them involved. “Andrew, join us!” is a message that will make the user feel that the call-to-action is addressing to him.
  3. Give a deadline – you can encourage the purchasing by hurrying up the subscribers. “Two more days left” is such a message.
  4. Ask – you can have a question as a call-to-action: “Want to find out more?”. This kind of call-to-action makes the subscribers feel in control that he has a choice.
  5. Tease – you can have a call-to-action that will make them curious – e.g. “Discover our offer”

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How to write good subject lines

Sunday, April 3rd, 2011

The subject line is a key element for the email newsletter. The “From” tab and the subject line are the first contact of a subscriber with your email, it will have a big influence on his further actions: to open it or not.

First impression is very important in this case. 50 characters stand between you and your subscriber – this is the length of a subject line, it’s all you have to make him attracted to your information, make him curious and get him to open your message. The few characters of a subject line have a big impact on your whole campaign.

Writing good subject lines

1. Be specific

The subject line must describe the content of the email very clearly. An email with a vague subject line does not give to many reasons why to open it.

2. Be original

In order to get the attention and curiosity from your subscriber you have to be original, stand out from the crowd. Don’t use similar subjects with the ones used before just because they worked, repeating them will make the subscriber reject them. You can use successful elements of previous campaigns, but adapt them.

3. Avoid Anti-spam filters

When you are writing the subject line of an email newsletter you have take into account how spam filters work. The subject is an indicator with great influence on them. For example, it’s good to avoid writing some words in capital letters or using the capital words at the beginning of every word. It’s the same for the words “for free” or “promotion”, exclamation points and percentages.

4. Don’t mislead

The subject of an email is setting the expectations of the ones who get it, it will make them open it or not. That’s why you shouldn’t lie about what’s really the content of the email. Don’t give the idea that they will find something else. You will lose their trust and get reported as spam.

5. Test

No matter what kind of subject you use for your emails, testing is the best method to see if they work. You can test on a certain list to see the results you get. Also, how good or not are some subject lines you can establish by evaluating carefully previous campaigns.

It is no known recipe to write a good subject line, what worked for some campaigns may not work for another. You have to find always a way to bring something different, to make your email stand out and get the attention that deserves.

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