Email Newsletters: How to get the Best Results

Sending email newsletters seems like an easy idea, but most marketers are doing it incorrectly. The effectiveness of the newsletter relies heavily on the frequency in which they are sent. Most marketers send email newsletters when they feel it is wise or necessary. However, you should be sending newsletters to your readers when they want to read them.

Here are a few suggestions from the KobeMail team on how to send more effective email newsletters:

Inquire Within: Your email recipients should be very valuable to you. You should focus on getting to know your audience, and in turn, understanding how often they want to receive your email newsletters. You can offer them a preference option, or you can include a form for them to fill out indicating their preferences.

Segmentation: After you follow the first step of inquiring the recipients' preferences, you can implement their suggestions into segmenting your newsletters. Depending on your audiences' preferences, you may be inclined to send emails daily, weekly, or monthly, but at least you will be assured that it is to their liking.

Test: Setup your mailing campaigns according to frequency preferences. See how many of your contacts fall under each specified "preference." Gauge reporting based n the open rate and click through rates by each designated frequency.

Adjust: After sufficient testing, it is time to check the results. While you should keep your newsletter content somewhat consistent through out mailings, changing it around once in a while based on feedback is a good idea. Make sure not to overload your newsletters with too much content as it may force your readers to disregard future mailings.

Follow Up: Check up on how successful your new segmentation based on frequency preferences is. Have you received any feedback? Make sure to make changes based on user comments and experiences.

You need to find out how often your subscribers want to receive your email newsletters. If you can figure that out first, then developing content will be much easier. Allow your users to have control and options!

Author: Peter Schirripa

Editor: Courtney Dillsworth

How to Grow and Maintain your Email List

According to the Email Experience Council, “email marketers lose roughly one-third of their email addresses to bounces, unsubscribes, or spam complaints.” Growing clean email lists must be a top priority for email marketers. After years of analysis, we at KobeMail have identified a few key techniques to building a larger, clean list of email addresses:

Offer substantial incentives for tell-a-friend campaigns. Most readers enjoy sharing good content, but will be more inclined if they receive something in return for doing so. Reward your readers with something fun if they willing to pass your message along.

Identify what your readers want. Surveys are effective for finding out what sort of content your readers truly want to receive. Some of your readers may want information while others may just want coupons. Make sure to segment your email list based on their preferences to avoid spam complaints or unsubscribes.

Enhance sign up opportunities. Make sure to include sign up links everywhere you can. Your website, newsletters and social media accounts should all host sign up links to your mailing list.

Allow subscribers to manage their preferences. You should offer your readers some sort of login option where they can manage their preferences. Whether it be a new email address change, preferred email frequency, or an option to choose specific content, your readers should have the ability to manage their account. You can also give your readers the ability to offer their demographic information, which will help you segment your campaigns as well as track recipient information.

We understand that keeping a clean, large mailing list is not very easy. However, if you follow the aforementioned steps, you should be well on your way to a successful campaign. Happy mailing!

Author: Peter Schirripa

Editor: Courtney Dillsworth

2011: New Email Marketing Challenges

Email marketers constantly face challenges when it comes to reaching the inbox at a proficient rate. While the existing challenges are poised to remain, we at KobeMail foresee additional challenges to come about starting this year.

Email addresses will change. As mentioned in one of our previous entries, facebook announced the roll out of its own messaging system, which could possibly engage its 500 million + users. There is a chance that we will see users changing their primary email address, thus leaving us cut off. Incentives and initiatives to keep email addresses up to date will be essential.

Increased Email Filtering. The newly introduced Gmail Priority Inbox, paired with the soon to be released Facebook Social Inbox, will result in mail ending up in folders that are rarely reviewed. This can lead to a negative effect on open rates and related performance metrics.

Social Network Integration. Most users, if they are not already, will be extremely active on social networks. Email campaigns must be equipped for instant social media integration. Sharing, liking, linking, and posting are features that are essential to successful future campaigns.

Mobile. Being that emails are increasingly being read on mobile devices, you must make sure that your creative renders well to be read on that medium. Content and images need to be tested on mobile devices and tablets prior to being sent out.

With the help of KobeMail, 2011 can be a very successful year for your email marketing strategy. Follow these tips above and keep a look out for upcoming articles!

Author: Peter Schirripa

Editor: Courtney Dillsworth