Emailhead

Mini Hits Viral Jackpot

BMW's Mini division has hit on viral gold with a popular email campaign that lets users create personalized messages that can be emailed to their friends, MarketingVox reports.

Interactive agency Firstborn designed the campaign. Visitors to Mini's site can design their own Mini, which then drives across the screen and spells out a personalized message in its tire tracks. Visitors can email these messages to friends, DMNews reports. When creating the message, users can choose from four models of Minis and customize the color and the hood of the car. The user then types the message to be drawn out in tire tracks in the message's link.

"We wanted to get people to share the site with their friends, and then get them to actually visit the site," said Michael Ferdman, owner and president of Firstborn, New York. "As opposed to putting the message in the email, in which they may go to the site, or they may not."

The recipient will receive an email with a link to Mini's site, where they will be able to read the message.

Email Relevance More Than Creative Drives Sales

Marketers using email do not focus enough on relevance, although relevant email messages can lead to sales nearly as often as free, or discounted, shipping offers, according to Jupiter Research.

Roughly one in four marketers launch email campaigns without any targeting or differentiation, and 65 percent use limited personalization and limited segmentation, Jupiter Research VP and research director David Daniels told marketers at the ClickZ Specifics: Email Marketing conference in New York last week, writes ClickZ. Only 11 percent send targeted campaigns using a customer's purchase history, click-stream activity, or other data to send relevant, targeted offers, Daniels is quoted as saying.

The greater the degree of personalization or targeting, the greater the average open, click-through and conversion rates. At the low end of the spectrum, untargeted broadcast emails have, on average, open rates of 20 percent, click-through of 9.5 percent, and conversion of 1.1 percent - compared with, on the opposite end of the spectrum, email campaigns that integrate website click-stream data for targeting, with a 33 percent average open rate, 14 percent click-through rate, and 3.9 percent conversion rate.

Furthermore, a Jupiter survey found that 54 percent of respondents say they have clicked on a link in an email because the product or service interested them; 40 percent, because of the email copy; 35 percent, the subject line; 12 percent, a single large image; and 9 percent, because of several smaller images.

Email Addiction Growing

Email addiction is growing, with no cure in sight, according to eROI's September Email Addiction Survey.

Some 61 percent of survey respondents said they continue to check email even while on vacation, and 56 percent reported a high level of anxiety if they can't access email, Marketing VOX reports. Two out of three people surveyed said they read email every day of the week, 90 percent read email six days a week and 75 percent respond to emails six days a week.

Two-thirds of respondents expect to receive a response from their email the same day. More than 50 percent can't wake up or go to bed without once checking email.

Most resondents - 55 percent - admit that email takes up more time in their life than it should.

Email Direct Marketers Look at Self-Destructing Email

Self-destructing email is proving beneficial to lawyers who need to protect privacy, but there's talk that email direct marketers could benefit from the technology.

Lawyers are using Echoworx Corp.'s "secure send" option to remove time-sensitive e-mails from a recipient's inbox and to confirm that the right person opens a letter, DMNews reports (via MediaBuyerPlanner.com)

Some marketers think it could prove useful for EDM campaigns too. For example, a message for 15 percent off within the next week could disappear at the sale's end when the content is no longer relevant. Rather than having an inbox full of messages from one retailer, consumers would see only the latest one, giving the impression that the retailer isn't bombarding them with marketing promos.

Others disagree: "Destructible e-mail is counter to the objectives of most marketers, who want to engage a broad audience," said Luc Vezina, director of strategy and product management at e-mail services firm GOT Corp. "Destructible e-mail may come in handy for publishers who want to place restrictions on the number of people who receive e-mails. However, effective marketing campaigns encourage the sharing of emails."

Lyris: Email False Positives Still High for Big ESPs

False-positive filtering (emails incorrectly identified as spam) remains high among leading email service providers (ESPs), including Hotmail and Gmail.

The false-positive filtering rate for Gmail nevertheless improved dramatically in the second quarter, with only 2.97 percent of emails falsely identified as spam, compared with the previous quarter's 44 percent, according to a study (pdf) by email marketing solutions provider Lyris Technologies, MarketingVox reports. However, Hotmail's false-positive filtering, though improving, remains high - 18.2 percent in Q2, compared with 23.4 percent in Q1.

Nevertheless, U.S. ESPs' rates overall improved approximately 4 percent for both gross and inbox deliverability compared with Q1 rates. "While false positives are increasing among some ESPs, the industry as a whole is winning the fight to reduce the amount of spam," says Dave Dabbah, Director of Sales and Marketing, Lyris Technologies.

Users with addresses with one of the top 10 U.S. ESPs were 27 percent more likely to receive opt-in email in their inbox than those who used one of the bottom 10 providers: 97.8 percent versus 70.6 percent. Still, that rate for the bottom 10 is an improvement of 11.2 percentage points in deliverability compared with Q1.

False-positive spam filtering among European ISPs remains lower, achieving an average rate of only 0.075 percent compared with the U.S. average of 3.29 percent. This disparity is again due in part to excessive false-positive filtering at two ISPs - cs.com (Compuserve.com) and iwon.com - and U.S. ISPs' and ESPs' more stringent filtering of unsolicited emails.

Starbuck's Folly, Caribou's Gold Mine

Starbucks made a major mistake last week when they emailed a coupon for a free ice coffee to employees and told them to share it with friends and family members. As you might expect (and starbucks should have), the email went viral and was quickly sent beyond the original employees. Starbucks was surprised, as if the idea of email actually being forwarded was a new concept. One can only hope that the marketing team wasn't involved.

After the email went super-viral, Starbuck canceled the promotion, saying the redistribution had resulted in the offer's being modified beyond its intent. I'd like to know how successful - although that's probably not the word Starbuck's would use - it was. In any case, the first mistake was sending the promo. The bigger mistake was yanking it.

Caribou Coffee, a smaller chain looking for market share, quickly took advantage of Starbuck's short-sightedness and said it would honor the coupon that Starbucks had pulled. They put a stipulation on it - which Starbucks didn't do - saying they'd accept the coupon this coming Friday only, between noon and closing. The company also said it would provide a free-drink offer to its email subscribers - never leave your base out of a good deal.

This is a major PR coup for Caribou. It was covered by major press outlets - as was Starbuck's mistake. The PR alone will pay for the free drinks that Caribou will serve. The question is, why didn't Starbucks imagine this would happen? Why didn't they eat the mistake instead of providing an opening for the competition?

Email marketers spend their days thinking about ways to turn a campaign into a viral success. Obviously, offerring a free product is a pretty good start. That might not have been Starbucks intent, but it should have been forseen and accepted once the deal was done.

E-Cards Bring Top Results for CPA Marketer

While e-cards - emails sent to consumers to commemorate a birthday or holiday, for example - don't have the best reputation in the business, they can be downright successful when done correctly.

According to Melissa Rothchild, senior director, marketing communications for CPA2Biz, an e-card her company sent which offered a discount to CPAs on their fifth anniversary as customers saw an open rate of 50 percent (compared to the industry benchmark of 30 percent) and a 24 percent clickthrough rate. The campaign resulted in $66,000 in sales, writes Multichannel Merchant.

Rothchild said the key to a successful campaign is that the cards be sent when customers aren't expecting them.

The campaign was discussed during a panel discussion titled 50 DM Ideas in 50 Minutes at last week's List Vision conference. Other tips from the 50 ideas included trying outer envelopes which include the phrase "Do Not Bend" (though the content must actually contain something that shouldn't be bent) and making sure all marketing programs and materials look the same and are sending the same message.

Saturday Delivers Highest Open Rate and Click-Throughs

Saturdays had the highest open and click-through rates of any day of the week during the second quarter.

eROI says Saturdays had an e-mail open rate of 38.3 percent, and click-through of 5.4 percent, MediaPost reports. Sundays also had a good open rate at 37.1 percent, while click-throughs reached 5.2 percent for three days - Sunday, Monday, and Thursday. Fridays performed the worst for both open-rates and click-throughs.

When asked which day they would like to receive e-mail, recipients of business messages chose Monday and Tuesday more than any other day of the week. For personal e-mail, the most popular day was Friday - even though Friday performed worst for open and click-throughs - followed by Wednesday.

37% of Consumers Unsubscribe via Spam Button

More than on in three consumers use the spam button on their email client to unsubscribe from email lists they have voluntarily joined.

In a recent Return Path survey, nearly 79 percent of consumers admitted that they have hit the "spam" or "junk" email button to get rid of email they don't want. And nearly 37 percent do it as a way to unsubscribe from things they had asked to receive.

This number is up slightly from a January Return Path survey that had 34 percent of consumers reporting marketing emails to be spam just because they did not want to receive the emails any longer.

Such a number points to the need for well-planned campaigns that engage consumers quickly with useful information.

One reason often cited is that consumers are simply overwhelmed with the amount of email they receive: Most consumers get at least 100 emails a week (with 35 percent getting more than 500) - half of which tends to be commercial.

Dr-411 Owner Faces 55 Years for Stealing Email Addresses

William Bailey, Jr, of Charlotte, North Carolina, faces a maximum possible sentence of 55 years in jail and $2,750,000 in fines if found guilty of illegally accessing the database and downloading contact details of 80,000 members of the American College of Physicians (ACP) in Philadelphia.

Bailey runs a website called dr-411.com, which sells professional organization member databases, including addresses and email addresses for doctors, dentists, lawyers and real estate agents, according to Sophos, a threat management company.

"Criminal spammers are supported by the unethical email list providers who have sprung up like mushrooms around them. Spammers need long lists of qualified email addresses to send their unwanted marketing messages to, and so are always on the lookout for unscrupulous agencies who may assist them," said Graham Cluley, senior technology consultant for Sophos. "Those people who are prepared to work with spammers carry the stench of spam around with them, and if found guilty should be punished appropriately. The public demands firm action from the authorities to investigate cases like this."

Saturn Rolls Direct Mail, Email for New Models

Saturn is turning to direct mail and email to promote its 2007 Aura sedan, Vue Green Line Hybrid SUV and Outlook SUV.

The mailings, which will continue through the end of the year, use leads from Saturn events and dealer drop-ins, where interested consumers are asked to fill out cards, Brandweek reports. So far, 300,000 direct mail pieces have been sent and even more e-mails for the Sky, Aura, Outlook and Vue campaign, according to a rep from Carlson Marketing Group, the agency leading the campaign.

The direct mail pieces look like coffee table books in the form of large, colorful mailers.

The mailing is another phase of the broad campaign developed by Goodby, Silverstein & Partners, San Francisco.

Saturn spent $1,012 on advertising per vehicle sold last year, per TNS, over twice as much as Honda and Toyota.

Most email-sending IPs Have Bad Reputation

The reputations of 97 out of 100 email-sending IP addresses are bad enough that email providers would likely block their messages, according to an email study.

A mere 0.9 percent of IP addresses score high enough to ensure that emails they send would likely be delivered, according to a study by email deliverability services firm Return Path, Directmag.com reports (via MarketingVox). Luckily, most commercial marketers' IP addresses are within that 0.9 percent. However, their "Sender Score," as monitored by Return Path, tends to be closer to the borderline 70 than the highest-level 100.

Return Path uses six criteria (e.g., complaint rates, email volume sent, unknown-user rates) to assign each address a 1-100 score. Senders with scores above 70 would likely have their email delivered; those below 30 likely wouldn't. The highest-scoring IP addresses tend to be corporate accounts that don't send much email and don't spam.

"Most marketers are between 60 and 80," George Bilbrey, general manager of Return Path's delivery assurance solutions unit, is quoted as saying. "Most marketers are in the gray area. The question is: How gray are you and how can you get yourself to a lighter shade of gray?" The answer lies more in reputation and less in email content, he says.

Unsubscribe Link Only Universally Adopted Email Best Practice

Email marketers have yet to adopt widely accepted best practices -except those required by the CAN-SPAM Act, according to an EmailLabs study (PDF). Inclusion of a working unsubscribe link, required by the CAN-SPAM Act, was the only best practice to be universally adopted.

The company analyzed whether emails incorporated best practices, such as a design that takes into account the preview pane and blocked images, and whether or not they included a link to a profile update, a link to a privacy policy and a forward-to-a-friend button, among others. The top three most widely ignored practices involved including a subscription or administration center, providing a site-search function in the email itself, and including a forward-to-a-friend link.

By industry, travel companies - including airlines, hotels and booking agents - had the highest adoption rates of the 18 best practices considered in the audit, scoring six top ratings and none of the lowest ratings. Financial marketers like credit card companies, mortgage brokers and banks - who rely on trustworthy emails to be delivered to the recipient's inbox - performed the worst of all market segments.

Other adoption trends among the market segments:

-- Travel marketers are increasingly using the subscription link function, allowing customers to easily update their email and personal information.

-- Publishers increasingly optimize their messages for preview panes and blocked images, and incorporate a subscribe link in the email to make it easy for people who've received the original email from a friend to subscribe.

-- The financial services market adopted the least best practices of all the industry segments audited.

Lyris: U.S. Email Deliverability Rates Lag Europe's

Gross deliverability rates of permission-based email marketing messages for European internet and email service providers were better than for U.S. ISPs and ESPs in the first quarter of the year, according to J.L. Halsey subsidiary and email marketing solutions provider Lyris Technologies. European ISPs achieved an impressive 94 percent, while U.S. ISPs' average gross deliverability went down 6 percentage points from the previous quarter, to 86 percent.

U.S. ISPs and ESPs fared even worse in terms of inbox delivery - 82 percent, compared with European inbox delivery rates of 94 percent. The incidence of false-positive spam filtering is also higher in the U.S., with 7.7 percent of valid messages getting blocked, compared with 3.5 percent in Europe.

Lyris also found that users with email addresses with one of the top 10 U.S. providers were 38 percent more likely to receive their opt-in email in their inbox than those who used one of the bottom 10 providers: 97.4 versus 59.4 percent. At 97.1 percent, inbox deliverability for the top 10 European providers was comparable to that of U.S. providers.

False-positive filtering remains high at Gmail and Hotmail. Gmail had reduced its false-positive filtering over the course of 2005, but rates underwent a dramatic increase in Q1, with 44 percent of emails filtered. Hotmail's false positive filtering also increased, from 15.7 in Q4 to 23.4 in Q1.

The term "gross deliverability" refers to the total number of messages delivered to the email inbox and bulk folders, combined, divided by the total number of messages sent. The term "inbox deliverability" refers to the total number of messages delivered specifically to the inbox, divided by the total number of messages sent.

AllRecipes.com Sells WOM to Moms

Here's another post from WOMMA by Jennifer Nastu, a partner at Fast Trike and one of the offical bloggers at the Word of Mouth Marketing Associations conference in San Fran this week.

Challenge:
When Sara Lee wanted to launch a new bread, Soft & Smooth Whole Grain Wheat Bread, in order to appeal to the growing group of people who wanted to feed their children healthier foods and more whole grains, the company turned to AllRecipes.com for a partnership.

"Moms have no control when kids are out of their sight, except for sack lunches," says Esmee Williams, VP of Marketing for AllRecipes.com. That food, she acknowledges, may be eaten, or it may end up in trashcans. Nonetheless, Sara Lee wanted to influence sack lunches.

Campaign:
So the team began an "online taste test panel" just before a new school year began.

An invitation was advertised in areas of the site "where we tend to find influencers," Esmee explains. (To the team implementing the campaign, an influencer was someone on the site who tends to submit content and offer opinions.) They were asked to fill out a survey. Those who fit the target profile (moms with school age children) were given coupons for 70% off a loaf of the bread. Others were given a coupon for 40% off.

Those who agreed to be on the "taste test" panel were given a microsite where they could talk about the product, tell what they thought about it, submit recipes using the product, or tell a friend. They were also asked to come back and participate in a survey.

The campaign also included:
-ads on the AllRecipe.com website
-TV ads
-FSI coupons
-store displays

Results:
"We looked at the community section of our site and really thought through how many influencers we thought we could get and we thought we could get 5,000 people to sign up," says Julie Dey, Director of Advertising Services for AllRecipes.com.

In fact, they got well over 15,000 people to participate, most in their target market.

Seventy percent of the audience downloaded the coupon, and 40 percent redeemed it. "We project that we reached over 100,000 people just through WOM alone, and on average each participant told 6.6 others about the program," Julie explains.

Ultimately, the popularity of the bread was so great that Sara Lee extended the product into an entire line.

15 Golden Rules for Blogging

Jennifer Nastu, a partner at Fast Trike, was one of the offical bloggers at the Word of Mouth Marketing Associations conference in San Fran this week - we handle their blogs/newsletters. Here's one of her posts from the conference on the 15 golden rules for blogging:

The companies that are going to be the most successful are the ones who are able to "unlock content" and the blog is the best way to do that.

It's important to understand that there are a lot of flavors of blogs. There are event blogs, CEO blogs, blogs about the news, crisis management blogs.

Marc Schiller of Electric Artists offered 15 Golden Rules for blogging:
#1. Recognize that every client has a different set of business objectives
An A&E blog he launched around tattooing to reach a specific niche, while a blog for Starwood Hotels was launched to increase loyalty and drive ecommerce.
#2. Don't focus on the results.
Document the process. The best blogs let you peek behind the curtain of the company.
#3. Don't try to force someone to be a blogger.
#4. Copywriters can't be bloggers. The worst blogs are over-written.
#5. Center editorial around advice and recommendations.
#6. It's okay to enter a crowded marketplace, but you must be best in class.
#7. No stealth blogs, no character blogs.
#8. Get the lawyers and PR team invovled early.
#9. Don't let your branding and advertising compete with the content.
#10. Let bloggers publish early.
#11. Update every day or you won't hit critical mass.
#12. Develop themes and obsessions that will get people coming back for next session.
#13. Keep content eclectic.
#14. Make sure bloggers can respond to legal side.
#15. Be benevolent.

Email Open Rates Double with Authenticity Icons

Email messages marked with an icon indicating its authenticity are twice as likely, on average, to be opened than unmarked messages, according to research from email identification company Iconix, writes ClickZ (via MarketingVox). Emails from online auction companies, which are frequent targets of phishing attacks, benefited most, with the open rate increasing 404 percent.

Open rates least affected were for online retail emails (a 40 percent increase) and those regarding news/information services (a 26 percent increase).

Open rates increased significantly for e-cards (192 percent), travel services (189 percent), social networks (115 percent), and dating sites (107 percent); phishing-susceptible financial institutions' and online payment services' open rates increased 70 percent and 68 percent, respectively.

VerticalResponse: Small Email Lists Have High Open Rates

When it comes to email marketing, smaller is better. Retailers' email campaigns using lists of 100 addresses had the highest open rate (38.78 percent) but the third-highest click-through rate (10.67 percent), according to the VerticalResponse Q1 2006 Email Trends Report, Internet Retailer writes (via MarketingVOX). Campaigns using 100,000 addresses had the lowest open rate (14.41 percent) and the second-lowest click-through rate (4.05 percent). Retailers using lists of 250 email addresses had the highest click-through rate (14.7 percent); lists of 1 million produced the lowest rate (3.09 percent).

AOL Confirms Ads in Email; Subscribers Annoyed

AOL has confirmed that it is indeed testing ads within AOL Mail, a move considered unusual because, while both Yahoo and MSN Hotmail run ads on their front email pages, AOL is a paid service and subscribers who pay generally expect the service to be ad-free, writes DM News (via MediaBuyerPlanner.)

The media company said that it has been testing banner ads at the bottom of the Read Mail screen for the past several weeks. Ads do not appear within emails, and are not targeted in such a way that they appear alongside relevant emails (as they do in Google's Gmail). Ads are served from AOL's general ad rotation, the company disclosed, but it declined to say how many advertisers are participating in the test.

At least one subscriber posting on an AOL message board is unhappy with the ads, writing, "I have flashing banner ads at the bottom of individual emails now, and they are incredibly annoying! They're like having spam inserted directly into my emails!"

AOL has seen substantial subscriber losses recently - losing 835,000 U.S. subscribers from Q4 2005 to Q1 2006 - as email subscribers switch to other, free email services. To combat the loss of revenue, it has been seeking new marketing and media partnerships.

Don't Piss Off the Customer

Good Email Insider article today that discusses the shift from simple systems centered on the "authentication" of email marketers' IP addresses to an email marketer's "reputation" now being the chief determinant of whether their emails will get through.

My favorite common sense opinion in the article comes from George Bilbrey, general manager of deliverability services for Return Path: "In the end, if you treat your customer right, you'll have a good reputation." And the requirements are pretty simple, he went on: "If you're using authentication and sender ID, and you keep your complaints low and you're not getting spam traffic queries... you'll be okay... Anyone who is using authentication and has developed a good reputation will have their mail delivered."

That about sums it up. We can complicate the issue with other declarations: ask for permission, authenticate, don’t send too many emails, give customers something of value, etc. But here’s the Business 101 point of view: don’t piss off your customers.

eROI: Email Open and Click Rates Soared in Q1, Peaked on Weekends

In the first quarter of 2006, the best email open and click rates were on weekends, according to online marketing firm eROI's most recent, Q1 2006 email study, reports MarketingVox. Moreover, open and click rates increased significantly in the first quarter (40 percent and 60 percent increases, respectively), compared with rates for Q4 2005, when open and click rates decreased 29 percent and 21 percent, respectively, from the previous quarter.

The highest click rates in the first quarter were on Sundays - 6.6 percent - when the open rates were 25.9 percent, the second-highest open rate for the week. Tuesdays had the highest open rates at 26.4 percent, and the second-highest click rate, at 6.2 percent.

According to eRoi's April 2006 survey of email marketers (a fairly even distribution of B2B, B2C and hybrid approach - 38, 28 and 34 percent, respectively), email marketing lists are growing. Some- 83 percent of marketers see a significant increase in their lists from this time last year. Only 34 percent of email marketers use behavioral data for segmentation and targeting, whereas 66 percent use demographic information to position their offers and newsletters.

The Q1 2006 study also breaks down the open and click rates by mailer size: Micro-mailers (fewer than 5,000 recipients); small senders (5,000 to 24,999 recipients); medium-sized (25,000-99,999); and large mailers (100,000+). Large mailers - unlike their polar opposite small mailers - see poor statistics on the weekend.

But eRoi points out that the "important takeaway here is not what day is best for both opens and reads but finding which day is best for the goal of your email."

Spammers Try Free-Verse Poetry - Or Vice Versa

Some interesting Spam came in over the transom today. It opened in the preview pane and I couldn't help but notice that instead of the usual long paragraphs of type, this one employs some sort of poetic free-verse form. Maybe it's an attempt to somehow beat the filters - or a jaded poet who's turned to more lucrative employment. The bet is that someone will take notice and we'll see a few permission-based free-verse email marketing messages. You know, just to test it out.

AOL Adopts Goodmail, 15 ESPs Follow

Goodmail Systems on Monday announced that 15 major email service providers have agreed to use its email accreditation service after AOL quietly launched Goodmail's CertifiedEmail last week after months of controversy, DM News reports (via MediaBuyerPlanner.com). More are likely to get on the bandwagon since 15 of the 25 major players, such as Epsilon Interactive and ExactTarget, have already signed up.

The ESPs that have signed up to offer Goodmail's CertifiedEmail to their corporate customers include BlueStreak, Acxiom Digital, e-Dialog, Epsilon Interactive, ExactTarget, Exmplar, Harte-Hanks Postfuture, Premiere Global Services, Responsys, Silverpop, SmartDM, TailoredMail, Yesmail, Whatcounts, and Zustek.

Those ESPs account for 50 billion email messages a year, according to John Ouren, SVP of sales and business development for Goodmail. "We've got what we estimate to be 70 percent of the leading full-service providers. And in terms of the top 25, we're in discussions with everyone else," he said.

The CertifiedEmail system consists of two components. First, an accreditation and reputation monitoring service validates that senders are legitimate corporations managing the best opt-in email practices with the lowest consumer complaint rates. Second, approved senders have their messages individually stamped with a unique cryptographically secure token that ensures consumers that the messages are from the represented sender.

Email Comes of Age, Officially

If you're a parent, you're probably familiar with the Nick Jr. show Blue's Clues. One of the main songs in the show happens at mail time when the host goes to the mailbox and gets a letter from a child. Having two young children who've watched the show for years, I know it by heart: "We just got a letter, we just got a letter, we just got a letter, I wonder who it's from!"

I haven't seen the show in a while, but today I walked in the room where they were watching and noticed that the words have changed: "We just got an email, we just got an email, we just got an email, I wonder who it's from!"

The show targets young kids, maybe three or four years old. Why the switch? I'm sure helping kids understand technology had something to do with it, but it also creates a pretty cool advertising tie-in for Nick Jr. When you visit the main page for Blue's Clues, there's a nifty little place to send an email card, just like in the show, to a friend. When you receive the email card, it has an advertisement : For great Games and Activities go to NickJr.

Email Summit Wrap-up

Marketing Sherpa's Email Summit in Chicago just wrapped up and the company posted an interesting article on the latest trends marketers were discussing. "After three years of non-stop 'search marketing rocks' focus, seems like the marketing world is taking a second look at its old pal email. And in 2006 email response rates are looking darned good," according to the article.

Return Path Bows 'Sender Score,' Hopes to Improve Deliverability

Return Path has launched a reputation management product for email marketers that gives companies a "credit score" - based on data from email receivers that is then analyzed by the company's proprietary technology - for their email campaigns, in order to help in their deliverability efforts, writes DM News (via MediaBuyerPlanner.com).

"Delivery has long been about reputation. If you have a good one, your email gets delivered. If not, the inbox can be an extremely hard destination to reach. Trouble is, figuring out your email reputation has been hard to do - until now," writes George Bilbrey, vp and gm delivery assurance solutions for Return Path.

Sender Score looks at 60 data points including complaint rates, unknown user rates, security practices, identity stability and unsubscribe function from several major ISPs and filtering companies.

Deliverability remains a huge challenge, with 82 percent of marketers saying e-mail deliverability is a problem for them, according to a study released Thursday by EmailLabs, BtoB reports.

AOL Blocks CertifiedEmail Critics' Emails

AOL on Thursday apparently began bouncing emails containing the "Dearaol.com" URL - which is for a petition against AOL's controversial certified-email program - according to nonprofit MoveOn.org (as well as the Electronic Frontier Foundation), CNET reports (via MarketingVox). Dearaol.com contains an open letter and a petition that calls on people to protest what it calls an "email tax" being imposed by AOL.

AOL spokesman Nicholas Graham said late Thursday that AOL emails containing "Dearaol.com" would be delivered as normal. He said a software glitch had "affected dozens of web links in messages," including Dearaol.com.

That site was set up by a coalition against AOL's adoption of GoodMail's CertifiedEmail, which allows requires marketers to pay in order to circumvent spam filters and ensure delivery of their email messages.

Triple-Digit Growth for Blog, Podcast and RSS Advertising

Combined blog, podcast and RSS ad spend by the end of 2005 totaled $20.4 million, a 198.4 percent increase over the 2004 levels for user-generated online media - and is projected to climb 144.9 percent in 2006, reaching $49.8 million, according to a new report, "Blog, Podcast & RSS Advertising Outlook," from PQ Media,
arketingVOX reports (via MediaBuyerPlanner). Total spending on user-generated online media is forecast to grow at a compound annual rate of 106.1 percent from 2005 to 2010, reaching $757.0 million in 2010.

The blog ad market is the largest of the three, at $16.6 million accounting for 81.4 percent of total advertising in 2005, followed by podcast advertising at $3.1 million and RSS at $650,000.

The blog market is expected to remain the largest of the three user-generated media in 2006, climbing 117.8 percent to $36.2 million. By 2010, however, blog ad spend is projected to account for 39.7 percent (at $300.4 million), behind podcast ad spend, which is expected to total $327.0 million, or 43.2 percent; RSS ad spend is projected to reach $129.6 million in 2010.

Technology, automobile and media brands have spent the most in user-generated media ad spend, $11.1 million, accounting for a combined 54.5 percent in 2005; food & beverage and apparel round out the top five categories, with 19.0 percent. Tech was the largest category in ad spend in 2005, at $4.0 million; auto was second with $3.9 million; media was third with $3.2 million.

Ad insertions through advertising networks (e.g., Pajamas Media and Federated Media for blogs; PodShow and PodTrac for podcasts; and Pheedo and FeedBurner for RSS feeds) and cost-per-click ads (e.g., Google AdSense) are the top two advertising methods, having generated $8.0 million and $7.8 million, respectively, in 2005. Advertising networks are the largest ad insertion method, accounting for 39.2 percent, or $8.0 million, of user-generated media spending in 2005, followed closely by click-through insertions at $7.8 million, or a 38.2 percent share.

However, affinity programs (such as LinkShare and Shareasale), which offer website publishers payment when a consumer purchases an advertised product online, are expected to be the fastest growing method from 2005-2010, growing at a compound annual rate of 130.8 percent.

National advertising dominates user-generated online media, accounting for 98.1 percent of total spending in 2005 at $20.0 million, but as more local content is created and the importance of local search increases, its share of ad spend is projected to grow to 9.3 percent in 2010.

Email Disaster Recovery

Have you ever sent out an email that you wish you could pull back from your customers' inboxes? Unfortunately, you can't. But there are steps you can take to mitigate problems that arise from problems like misspellings or promotional errors in emails. Here are a few tips from a Mediapost article.

1. Assign a disaster team. Convene immediately to discuss the error and outline potential courses of action. Don't wait until your vice president, who is seeded on the list, sends a note down the chain.

2. Minimize impact. If you see that there is an error and all the e-mails have NOT been sent, many ESPs have the ability to cancel the e-mails in the queue.

3. Why did it happen? 99 percent of the errors we see are due to teams sacrificing good process for urgency. Was it a system error? A human error? Did you sacrifice what you know is right to get it out quickly?

4. An error doesn't always justify a response. Spare your customers from a slew of meaningless apology e-mails. Discuss what constitutes an apology and who should receive it, and if you should reward the consumer.

5. Develop a protocol for apology e-mails. Use them for marketing and loyalty purposes. You'll get a higher response, so use this as an opportunity to let them know how important they are to your business.

Of course, the first step is to always proof your emails by as many people on your in-house and outsourced teams possible. Most errors come about because people didn't look closely at the email before hitting send.

Kids' No-Email Bill Killed

The Georgia bill that would have established a kid's do-not-email registry died last week, writes Multichannel Merchant (via Mediabuyerplanner.com). Similar bills in Connecticut, Iowa, Wisconsin, Hawaii and Illinois have been killed as well.

Current bills in Michigan and Utah have established children's do-not-email list and threaten email that contains legal adult content. They let parents and guardians register minors' "contact points" and email addressed as off limits to adult material. The bills also allow parents to sue, scaring away marketers in those states from making pitches containing product references such as automobiles and airplane glue.

ISPs Block One In Five E-mails

About one in five marketing e-mails didn't get delivered in the second half of last year, according to a new report by Return Path, Mediapost reports.

Excite filtered our 42.9 percent of messages, while Gmail filtered 40.4 percent, Lycos didn't deliver 33.8 percent, and Adelphia failed to deliver 31 percent of messages. On the other end of the spectrum, EarthLink filtered out just 7.8 percent of e-mails, while Mac.com, Compuserve, and USA.net all filtered out less than 10 percent. AOL didn't deliver 12.4 percent of messages.

As for corporate filters, MessageLabs didn't deliver 30.5 percent of messages, Postini failed to send 24 percent, and Brightmail blocked 21.5 percent.

Why Winning Campaigns get the Shaft

Have you ever run great email campaign or promotion that just works time and time again until one day when someone - usually not a marketer - decides it's getting boring? The analytics don't back up this hunch, but all the same, the promotion gets the axe. Anne Holland from Marketing Sherpa has an interesting article on her blog about this phenomenon.

Holland sees three reasons why this happens:

#1. Boredom -- the marketing department is bored of the creative, the offer, whatever and figure newer is always better.

#2. Ego/Salary justification -- a new marketer, agency, or president has come on board and they want to put their personal stamp on the campaign.

#3. Politics -- power has changed hands somewhere internally and whoever now has it wants to make changes for pet projects/pet peeves.

E-Mailers Cool Down on Goodmail, Lawmakers Heat Up

Though the controversy over AOL’s use of Goodmail CertifiedEmail has subsided in the e-mail industry, nonprofit and advocacy groups — as well as a state lawmaker in California — continue to express concerns, DMNews reports.

The latest opposition came last week from California state Sen. Dean Florez, who called for a closer look at the program.

“It seems to me that AOL is setting a horrible precedent here,” said Florez, a Democrat. “The whole idea of Net Neutrality gets wiped away, and we are left with an Internet of haves and have-nots.”

Florez told DM News that he wants Yahoo and AOL technical experts to explain how Goodmail and its fees will work at a March 28 hearing. He also wants AOL to explain the program before it rolls out in April. Yahoo plans to implement a CertifiedEmail program in a few months as well.

Anti-Spam Gadget Debuts

One of the first anti-spam hardware appliances for individuals (and the only one that requires no monthly fee) debuts in two weeks, writes the New York Times (via MarketingVOX). Spam Cube, a plastic cube four inches on a side and available in white, black, silver, pink or yellow, sells for $150 and is installed between an Internet connection and router or computer. It intercepts all incoming email and compares it with a constantly evolving database of spam knowledge.

SpamCube developers say unlike anti-spam software or web-based applications, Spam Cube won't slow down PCs, and there's no software to install, troubleshoot or update. Spam Cube's artificial-intelligence circuitry will, over time, allow it to fine-tune its database to counter evolving spammer tactics.

The company says that, at the outset, the Spam Cube ought to achieve 90-95 percent accuracy and over time accuracy will improve to 98 percent.

Email Best Practices Exist, not Followed

According to a recent study completed by Multichannel Merchant and Direct magazines, 61 percent of business-to-business marketers have formal permission practices for collecting email addresses, while 93 percent of consumer marketers say they have formal practices in place, eMarketer reports (via MediaBuyerPlanner).

Sixty percent of the consumer marketers surveyed reported using a single opt-in method of gathering email addresses, while 7 percent used a double opt-in method - whereby registrants send a confirmation reply to remain on the list. Of the business marketers surveyed, 26 percent used single opt-in methods, and just three percent used the double opt-in method.

According to a Jupiter report, email customer service is worsening as response times have decreased, with 39 percent of sites taking three days or more to reply. Jupiter's David Schatsky pointed out that "failure to resolve requests via email is driving continued use of cost-intensive telephone work, negating any potential cost savings from handling inquiries via email."

"Managing opt-outs has always been a tricky issue for marketers," said Bill Nussey, CEO of Silverpop, concerning the results of his company's "Retail Email Marketing" study. The study encourages marketers to consider "implementing a re-engagement component to their opt-out process." Nussey added, "If you ask appropriately and remind recipients of the value of being on your list, you may find that enough customers will stay to make it well worth asking - failing that, you should try to get as much information as you can before the customer is gone for good."

How Email Can Lower Acquisition Costs

Here's an interesting article that discusses in detail how smart management of your email list can lower the cost of acquisitions to zero.

Spitzer Sues Gratis for Selling Email Addresses

New York Attorney General Eliot Spitzer sued Gratis Internet Thursday for selling - despite a promise of confidentiality - email addresses obtained from millions of consumers, in what may be the largest deliberate breach of Internet privacy yet, reports the Associated Press (via MediaBuyerPlanner). Consumers thought they were registering to see a site offering free iPods or DVD movies and videogames, Spitzer spokesman Brad Maione said. On sign-up pages, Gratis promised it "does not...sell/rent e-mails."

Earlier in the month, Datran Media agreed to pay a $1.1 million settlement to the New York Attorney General's office stemming from charges that Datran bought e-mail lists from Gratis that it knew to be in breach of the originating sites' privacy policies

Gratis is accused of selling access to the email information to three independent email marketers, resulting in hundreds of millions of email solicitations being sent out. A Gratis spokesman, George Thompson, said the allegations "are completely untrue."

Five Simple Steps to Increase B2B Sales with e-Newsletters

E-newsletters are a great way for B2B companies to increase quality leads for sales teams and give a boost to viral, word of mouth, and referral marketing programs. Here are 5 simple steps to create an e-newsletter your sales team will love.

#1 Keep it helpful
It's often repeated and often forgotten. But it's the kind of truism that's, well, true. If they don't read the newsletter, forget about capturing them as customers. Keep it short, informative and helpful. Unless your contact list consists solely of employees' mothers, subscribers don't want to read company press releases, long sales copy, or big clumps of text announcing your good fortune. What they want are quick tips that will increase their bottom line or at least make life easier.

#2 Make it interactive
Readers love to share their opinions. Give them an opportunity. At its best, a newsletter begins an ongoing dialog between you and your customers and potential customers. Ask them to submit stories. Get them to take part in a survey. Make it about something that will help them in their business and then share the results. Soon, you'll see a community forming with your business at the center.

#3 Advertise your business
While the stories in your newsletter should help your readers, fill other areas with advertisements about your services. Use creative links and copy to drive traffic to your site and to forms where you collect contact information. Between meatier stories try a short two- or three-line ad that will get people to explore your services further. Advertise white papers, live demos, webinars, and free consultations -- anything that will put them in contact with sales.

#4 Offer incentives
If you want people to forward your newsletter to colleagues or give referrals, offer something in return. Prepare a number of different white papers and offer them at different points in the subscription cycle. When someone subscribes to the newsletter, give them a white paper. If they forward the newsletter, offer another.

#5 Measure results
Don't forget the importance of tracking the results of your e-newsletters. You have to know who's opening it and who's not, as well as what they're clicking on. You can also track activity from the newsletter through your site. If your readers are a good representation of your customer pool, you'll know what your customers care about--and what holds no interest. Share results with the sales team and base subsequent sales initiatives and customer contacts on the results.

Email Earns Highest ROI

Marketers use a wide variety of techniques to improve response in their retention and acquisition email programs, with varying results, according to a MarketingProfs survey, the results of which are analyzed (premium article) by Return Path, which also offers recommendations, MarketingVox reports. Among respondents who measure their campaigns, 40 percent say email earns the (via MediaBuyerPlanner) highest ROI, followed by search (28 percent) and direct mail (18 percent). Revenue per campaign is the most-utilized email-marketing success metric, used by 39.8 percent; file size is a close second with 38.3 percent keeping tabs; and revenue per email third at 25.8 percent. Some 35 percent do not set clear success metrics.

Some 50-70 percent of respondents say they manipulate various response elements in every email campaign, primarily the offer, the call to action, and the subject line; however, 5-40 percent do not at all adjust the various elements.

Some 50 percent of respondents segment their email file to boost response, saying they do so consistently and reporting that segments based on purchase/response drive the highest success; demographic targeting is used by 70 percent of that half, with mixed results.

Only 35 percent of respondents use email as part of a multi-channel effort, and 60 percent of those consider the impact of multiple channels with every campaign; the most common efforts were combinations of direct (post office) mail and offline events combined with email.

The 2005 Email Marketing Survey was conducted by MarketingProfs in November 2005 and includes responses from 1,033 marketers, 68 percent of them in the US or Canada. About 73 percent of respondents are corporate marketers. Roughly 50 percent are B2B, 23 percent are B2C, another 19 percent market to both.

Automating CRM with Email

This article from Inc. Magazine makes some interesting points about automating sites to reach the highest level of CRM. Email can be a big part of automation.

By segmenting lists you can target your opt-in list better. For instance, if a sporting goods store surveys email recipients and asks what sports they're interested in, giving football, tennis, soccer, or swimming as the four possible responses. When the store creates email promotions or newsletters in the future, they can develop four separate versions based on these interests. Better targeting equals more loyal customers and better conversions.

The same e-commerce company can also create and set up triggered emails that go out depending on a person's actions in a Website or email. For instance, if the survey discussed above is placed in an email newsletter, the promotion for tennis can be automated to be sent out as soon as an email recipient submits the survey with tennis as a response. Or the tennis promotion can be sent out at a specific time in the future - say 48-hours after the survey is submitted. In any case, whatever the person clicks on, one of four possible email promotions is automatically triggered and sent.

The article mentions a great idea. An e-commerce company, can produce an RSS feed -- a constantly updated list of news-like items -- highlighting its latest promotions. which the “inner circle” of a customer base can place on their personal home pages.

They'd have to be a pretty dedicated customer to put this on their homepage but it could be worth looking into. How would you find out if customers want this? Ask them.

Worried about Deliverability? Test to AOL, Yahoo & Hotmail Accounts

When it comes to deliverability, here's something you can do to make sure your emails get through. Set up accounts with the major ISPs such as AOL, Yahoo and Hotmail. Before you send out your email, send a test of the blast to these accounts. Send it the same way you plan to send the blast - same subject line, from address, etc. If they don't get through, it could be due to a number of factors including content, design, and how you send the emails - is the delivery vendor reputable and does it put a lot of resources towards ISP relations?

Yahoo, Hotmail, and AOL remain as the predominant delivery channels for opt-in commercial email communications, according to a study by Lyris. Twenty-six percent of American Internet users are receiving opt-in commercial emails via Yahoo, 21 percent via Hotmail, and 13 percent via AOL. In contrast, only 8 percent of American Internet users are receiving opt-in commercial emails via their work email accounts.

Don't Spam your House List

Here's an interesting article about abusing the relationship with your customers who opt-in to receive email marketing. Just because people opt-in doesn't mean they want to receive messages every day - or every week for that matter. How to avoid this? When people opt-in give them a choice about how often they want to be contacted by you. Also ask what kind of messages they want to get. Newsletters? Promotions?  Press releases?

You've worked hard to build up an in-house list - don't blow it by abusing the relationship.