Putting the Life Back in Your Customer Lifecycle

If you take the time to establish a customer lifecycle blueprint, you will be able to understand your consumers better and more effectively market to them.

In case you haven't heard, marketers - we have arrived! We now have the opportunity to develop sophisticated lifecycle marketing strategies that deploy the right message at the right time in the channel of choice for each and every consumer. Marketing is yielding greater influence over corporate budgets and IT initiatives, and we're leading the charge to deliver on heightened consumer expectations.

However, many marketers haven't had a chance to catch up with the rapid advancements in email and cross-channel marketing technology. To get there, they need to quickly navigate and prioritize opportunities and accelerate planning and execution.

No pressure, eh? Even with the abundance of available data and marketing solution capabilities, getting the gears in motion requires a clear focus on attainable goals and a tiered approach to climbing toward contextual marketing nirvana.

One important first step in this direction is to focus on the human beings at the receiving end - our customers. Take some time to carefully think about how the end consumer will experience the output of your combined marketing tech stack, analytics insights, strategies, and tactics. Examine your customer lifecycle with a lens toward injecting some life back into it!

This process begins with establishing a customer lifecycle blueprint and understanding how your consumers traverse it. Of course, lifecycles are business- and consumer-specific, and very non-linear these days. Many organizations, large or small, don't have a clear sense of the lifecycle experience their consumers receive. This is due to a variety of factors, the most prominent one being time - it simply takes time to stop and document a current state of any program or process, and time is a resource that is in short supply on many marketing teams.

However, taking that step back to document current lifecycle communication elements is a foundational investment that paves the way for future program optimization. This process is the only proven way to better understand the different communication touch points across the lifecycle process and how the consumer experiences the process, from initial acquisition to conversion through to various customer engagements: key milestones, transactions, and any other customer experience paths deployed across the lifecycle.

Just a warning - this process often gets very messy before it becomes clear. The ultimate goal here is to understand the current touch points and outline opportunities to add or optimize communications to drive better customer experiences (and business results).

Once you have a blueprint of your customer lifecycle in hand, you can begin to examine ways to craft a better design. Here are some of the types of questions you'll want to ask to begin to uncover insights and define opportunities:

• Is the customer lifecycle consistent and integrated across channels - email, mobile, social, display, in-store, and more?
• Are the programs aligned and customized to key segments and maximizing different lifecycle stages?
• Are there also programs dedicated to highly engaged individuals, as well as initiatives in place to re-engage disengaged audiences to improve their experience?
• Are communication touch points consistently deployed across the channels of choice?
• Is data organized to drive the right experience at the right time in the right channel?
• Are there obvious data points on hand that could be used to communicate more contextually with customers (location, likes, life-stage, device used, etc.)? 
• Conversely, are there data points that need to be gathered, or implied data that needs to be captured and put into action?
• At the beginning of the consumer relationship, are expectations being set clearly? And are new acquisitions being maximized early on, when they are most engaged?
• Do you understand your consumers' known attributes, activity levels, social influence, and other differentiators? 
• Are there gaps in your cross-channel communication strategy that result in missed opportunities to drive consumer action and conversion?
• Is testing and optimization taking place to drive stronger program performance?

I would venture a guess that almost every marketer out there would answer "no" to one or a few of these questions. The end goal of all this work is to come up with a list of amazing and innovative opportunities to act upon in order to generate stronger engagement and conversion - i.e. put life back into your customer lifecycle!

Once you have a foundational understanding of the current lifecycle experience and a "blue sky" list of optimization opportunities, the next step is prioritization. Prioritization should be based on the level of expected impact and the level of effort required. This prioritization exercise should lead to a clear, simple, and attainable strategic initiatives roadmap, including testing elements.

And then the fun really begins. So pivot your organization in the direction of your customer and put some life back into the lifecycle as you head into 2015!

Source : http://www.clickz.com/clickz/column/2374901/putting-the-life-back-in-your-customer-lifecycle

Tags : email marketing, email blast, edm software, email marketing software, email marketing company, email marketing service, email marketing malaysia

How to Use Email Marketing to Increase Sales This Holiday Season.

So what can businesses and marketers do to make sure their emails will be opened and clicked on before Christmas day? Dozens of email marketing experts share 12 can't-miss tips for making your email marketing deliver for the holidays.

1. Try different subject lines -- and be creative. "Do A/B testing of subject lines right up until the very end of the season," says Alyssa Nahatis, the director of Deliverability for Adobe Campaign. "There is always time to make it better."

For example, "test subject lines that include [the customer's] name," says Ben Meyer, email campaign manager, Cleverbridge, a global ecommerce provider.

"The more individualized an email is, the more likely consumers will respond to it," says Christopher S. Penn, vice president, Marketing Technology, SHIFT Communications.

"I recommend that brands try to be as specific as possible with subject lines, to grab the target audience's attention," says Steve Warren, vice president & general manager, Teradata Interactive, a provider of data-driven marketing solutions. "For example, try: Top Electronics for the Men on Your List; 10 Toys Kids Want under the Tree; Gift Ideas for Animal Lovers; or Gifts Under $25 They Won't Return."

Also, "use words like new, free, sale, now, holiday and save in your subject lines," suggests Connie Sung Moyle, head of Public Relations at VerticalResponse, an email marketing provider. "VerticalResponse recently analyzed 10,000 email campaigns sent over the holidays in 2013, and these words generated the highest open rates."

2. But go easy on using Cyber Monday. "We found including the words Cyber Monday in the subject line of an email sent on Cyber Monday 2013 actually decreased open rates," says Christopher Lester, vice president of sales, Emma, which provides email marketing services. That's because people "are bombarded with Cyber Monday messages." Instead, "get creative [with your subject lines, to] stand out from the crowd."


One last thing to keep in mind: "according to an email marketing benchmark report from eMarketer published in 2013, shorter subject lines had higher open rates, but longer ones had higher click[through] rates," notes Meyer.

3. Put the most important information in the first two sentences of your email. "Many ISPs and email providers display a line or two of text after the subject line," referred to as the "preheader," says Ramesh Bulusu, CEO of MyUS.com, a packaging consolidation service. "So [inserting] a call to action, attention-grabbing copy or teaser into the valuable preheader space is a great way to keep your subject lines short but still emphasize special offers, create urgency and, most importantly, encourage recipients to open your email."

4. Use photos, especially ones that evoke the holiday spirit -- but don't forget about your copy! "People are inspired by photos," says Lysa Miller, lead designer & Web strategist at Ladybugz Interactive. "If you are selling a product or offering a service, offer a visual that appeals to your market to make them want to click on your offer. For example, if you are selling pajamas or nighties, have pictures of those products in a holiday setting or holiday theme," she suggests. Even better: "have a photo of someone opening a gift with the product."

That said, "don't rely solely on graphical elements," says Janelle Johnson, director of demand generation at Act-On Software, a provider of marketing automation software. "Yes, images make an email beautiful, but many email clients strip out [or don't display] images. So your copy must be engaging to provide recipients a reason to enable images," she says. Therefore write the copy first and ask yourself: "If all someone saw was the text, would they be interested? Once you have the copy spot-on, add graphics and visuals to enhance the email," she says. Finally, "don't forget to test to see how your email will render across multiple email platforms."

5. Don't forget a call to action! Tell people what it is you want them to do. And "if you're selling something, include a direct link to that service or product," says Mario Mirabella, founder & creative director, MSM DesignZ. "Even if you aren't selling or promoting anything, you should always add a link to your company's website to the email with a call to action such as 'For more details' or 'Learn more at,' to encourage clicks to your website."

6. Notify customers of delivery deadlines. "Be sure that your email messages provide clear and concise instructions to ensure gifts ship and arrive on time," says Warren. "You can create a sense of urgency with strong reminders to buy now, rather than waiting until shipping costs go up and guaranteed delivery is unavailable." Also, as this is information customers consider very important, consider putting it in the subject line as well as in the body copy.

7. Make customers feel as though you are giving them something. "Create an offer that your audience can't resist," suggests Miller. Whether it's "free shipping, by one get one free, [or whatever], make the holiday offer your holiday gift to your customers."

8. Employ limited-time offers. Another good strategy is to "offer something that has a deadline," she adds. "Offer a specific deal to targeted customers, which has to be redeemed by a specific date. Then send a follow-up email a day or two before the offer expires."

For loyal customers, "give [them] advance notice on planned promotions," says Nahatis. "Announce your offer two to three weeks in advance, and then send a reminder the week of the offer."

9. Make sure your email is mobile friendly. "A significant number of people use their phone to check their email," says Chris Apaliski, social media director, Magic Logix, an integrated marketing agency. So "if you aren't properly optimizing your emails for mobile, you run the risk of running customers off.

"Make it as easy as possible for them [to interact with you]. So they can open an email from their phone, cruise on to your site and make a purchase without ever leaving the comfort of their surroundings."

10. Target your email. "Segment your lists so that you can send targeted emails to groups of subscribers based on interests, purchase history and/or how often they've engaged with your past emails," says Sung Moyle. "The more targeted the email content and subject line, the more likely your subscribers will open it. For example, if you're a winery, send a holiday promotion for red wines to subscribers who've purchased a red wine in the past."

11. Remember that timing is (almost) everything. "Outbrain found that Americans are more likely to click on holiday content on the weekend," says Lester. So create "an automated email series scheduled to send each Saturday [through] December." Just keep in mind that "overall engagement with holiday emails starts to steadily decline after the second week of December, so focus your holiday email marketing on [earlier in the month], while people are still paying attention."

Another tip, for when you do want to send email during the week: "For B2C email campaigns, sending around lunchtime or after work is best since that's when most people will check their email for leisure," says Mirabella. "For B2B campaigns, send early, before work, or in the early afternoon after lunch."

Remember, "folks are usually busy during the holidays and even more so during the days and evenings," says Sharif Kalil, content manager, Neesh, a digital marketing agency. "If they get your email during their busy hours, they'll quickly close and forget they ever saw it [or outright delete it]," he says. So "sending email during the early morning means you'll have a better chance of grabbing their attention."

12. Create a seamless experience. "Create a seamless experience from the moment people open your email through their website visit," advises Bruce Ernst, vice president of Product Development at Monetate, which provides cloud-based testing, email optimization and in-the-moment personalization software. "Something about your brand's email caused the customer to click." So make sure your messaging and branding is consistent, from your website, to your email marketing campaigns, to your social media and other channels.

Source : http://www.cio.com/article/2846176/email-marketing/how-to-use-email-marketing-to-increase-sales-this-holiday-season.html

Tags : email marketing, email blast, edm software, email marketing software, email marketing company, email marketing service, email marketing malaysia

3 Keys To Effective Email Marketing

Email marketing is becoming a popular tool for many small and home based businesses around the world.

Email marketing allows businesses to eliminate expenses for things like paper, ink/toner, envelopes, postage, etc., and these savings make it a very attractive method of promotion.

Done properly, email marketing can be very effective. Unfortunately, too many businesses let the excitement of a low-cost marketing campaign overshadow their business sense.

Done improperly, your email marketing campaign becomes nothing more than a mess of sending the wrong message to the wrong market.

There are just a few key elements to launching and managing a successful email marketing campaign.

They are . . .
The list (your database).
The offer.
The follow-up.
Start With the Right Email Marketing List

The temptation is to rush out and purchase a list from brokers or leads suppliers. The harsh reality is that most of these lists are simply harvested email addresses from search engines. The so-called "savings" of purchasing a list of email addresses can be effectively wiped out when email addresses begin bouncing and recipients begin complaining to your Email Service Provider for sending Unsolicited Commercial Email (or "spam").

The best (and only truly safe) way to build your database is to market effectively. This can be done both online and offline. Traditional methods such as collecting business cards in a drawing and offering free information in exchange for contact information still work very well.

Additionally, Search Engine Optimization strategies can be very effective. The key is to get prospects to visit a "capture page" that is designed to entice them to give their contact information in exchange for something you are offering, such as a free report or free download.

As your list begins to grow, if you have targeted your market effectively, you will find yourself with a considerable database of motivated and targeted prospects.

The Offer

Email marketing is about getting your offer out in front of your database. Yes, they have joined your list voluntarily but keep in mind that you are competing with hundreds of other email messages they may be receiving that day.

Your job is to make sure your email marketing message is opened and read by your prospects.

The key is to create a compelling subject line. Where possible, use the prospect's name in the subject line. Most recipients are much more likely to open an email addressed to them by name.

Once your message is opened, the copy must create a compelling interest so that the reader will want to learn more.

The key here is to think like your prospects. They all have the same question on their mind when they open their email:

What's in it for me?"

Answer that question in your copy and your email marketing campaign could be a huge success. Focus on telling prospects about the benefits of your offer. What will it do for them? What can they expect if they order from you? How will it help them save time, increase revenues, lose weight, feel more attractive, etc.?

The Follow-up

The next step is to follow up with your prospects. Studies have proven that prospects need to see your message over and over again before they make a decision to purchase. Using an AutoResponder to follow up with prospects can dramatically increase the response rate of any email marketing campaign.

The ability to follow up with prospects over time is critical to your success.

Your follow-up letters should essentially repeat your original message. Maybe each follow-up message can stress a particular feature and continue to reinforce the benefits to your prospects.

The idea behind an effective email marketing campaign is to ...

... Tell them.
... Tell them again.
... Tell them what you just told them.

Attention spans are short. Competition is high.

Keep your messages to the point and focus on benefits, benefits, benefits.

Make your prospects WANT to buy from you by consistently keeping your email marketing message in front of them.

The reward for a job well done will be increased revenues and customer loyalty.

Source : http://www.trafficwave.net/articles/email_marketing.html

Tags : email marketing, singapore email marketing, email marketing singapore

Email Marketing Campaigns: 4 Great All-Around Tips

Email marketing how-to lists and tip sheets often focus on one topic. How to improve delivery. How to craft a good subject line. How to boost your open rates. But we're doing something different. We're taking the top four general email marketing tips that we've seen work time and again, and we're passing them on to you. Here they are:

Use Google Analytics to get the big picture

If you've been on the Internet for some time, you've heard about Google Analytics. Even though it seems a bit intimidating to add something like this to your campaigns, you need to do it so you can see what happens after customers click through on a link in your email. With Google Analytics, you can track your subscribers well beyond your email. You can see which pages they visited, what they bought, whether they abandoned their shopping carts or even which pages are causing dead ends on your site. While email click-through rates are good data to see who's doing what, don't forget that many of your clients are probably viewing their emails through a preview pane, which automatically counts as an open rate. With Google Analytics, you can take things a step further by analyzing your actual click throughs to see who's doing what.

Check your send address frequently

It's easy to create your campaign, set it up to send, and get caught up in analyzing the data from your returns. But what about responses to your email or HTML newsletter? Keep in mind that while the campaign is over for you, it's not for your recipients. Quite often recipients will use your send email address to bounce back an email asking for more product info. They might even use that email address to bury an unsubscribe request in some other text. Are you checking your send email frequently? Make sure you do to field any and all requests that come back from your campaigns. And don't forget that if even one unsubscribe slips under the radar, you might get a spam complaint.

Segment your emails and up-sell based on customer activity

When you use Google Analytics (see above) with your campaigns, it not only helps you figure out who bought something on your site or checked out a certain product, it gives you an entire new segment to your list. Once you know who your most active recipients are, you can create a list segment and an email that caters to them. For instance, if a customers go to your site and either purchase a certain product or spend time frequenting the pages featuring that product, you can use this list segment to create a new campaign that up-sells an entirely new but related product in your next campaign. Remember – recent data shows that most people unsubscribe to email campaigns because they don't feel they're relevant to them. By segmenting your list this way, you're making absolutely certain that each email is relevant to your active openers.

Archive your emails after you've sent them

An email archive is more than just a place where your customers can go to view past emails, it's a static page that anyone can find in a search engine. The key to taking advantage of this is using a one-two punch. The first step is to put your sent emails – even if they're old -- online. Even old emails give a good picture of what your company does, how things are done, and what type of products you tend to sell. The second step is to place a newsletter sign-up box, also known as an email Signup Form, on your main archive page. This gives you the great chance to sign up new email subscribers on the chance that they parachute into your archive via a keyword search.

Source : http://www.benchmarkemail.com/resources/email-marketing-articles/4-great-email-campaign-tips

Tags : email marketing, email blast, edm software, email marketing software, email marketing company, email marketing service, email marketing malaysia

SEO Basics: 8 Essentials When Optimizing Your Site

Basic search engine optimization (SEO) is fundamental. And essential. SEO will help you position your website properly to be found at the most critical points in the buying process or when people need your site.

What are search engines looking for? How can you build your website in a way that will please both your visitors/customers, as well as Google, Bing, and other search engines? Most importantly, how can SEO help your web presence become more profitable?

During the Introduction to SEO session at SES New York, Carolyn Shelby (@CShel), Director of SEO, Chicago Tribune/435 Digital, fully explained the extreme value SEO can deliver to a site, and stressed the importance of basic SEO using the following analogy:

"Skipping the basics and spending all your time and money on social and 'fancy stuff' is the same as skipping brushing your teeth and showering, but buying white strips and wearing expensive cologne," Shelby said.

Although the Introduction to SEO session was intended for industry newcomers, Shelby's tips offer important reminders for even experienced SEO professionals who have been optimizing sites for years.

What is SEO, Exactly?

The goal of foundational SEO isn't to cheat or "game" the search engines. The purpose of SEO is to:

• Create a great, seamless user experience.
  
• Communicate to the search engines your intentions so they can recommend your website for relevant searches.

1. Your Website is Like a Cake

Your links, paid search, and social media acts as the icing, but your content, information architecture, content management system, and infrastructure act as the sugar and makes the cake. Without it, your cake is tasteless, boring, and gets thrown in the trash.

2. What Search Engines Are Looking For

Search engines want to do their jobs as best as possible by referring users to websites and content that is the most relevant to what the user is looking for. So how is relevancy determined?

• Content: Is determined by the theme that is being given, the text on the page, and the titles and descriptions that are given.
  
• Performance: How fast is your site and does it work properly?

• Authority: Does your site have good enough content to link to or do other authoritative sites use your website as a reference or cite the information that's available?
  
• User Experience: How does the site look? Is it easy to navigate around? Does it look safe? Does it have a high bounce rate?

3. What Search Engines Are NOT Looking For

Search engine spiders only have a certain amount of data storage, so if you're performing shady tactics or trying to trick them, chances are you're going to hurt yourself in the long run. Items the search engines don't want are:

• Keyword Stuffing: Overuse of keywords on your pages.
  
• Purchased Links: Buying links will get you nowhere when it comes to SEO, so be warned.
  
• Poor User Experience: Make it easy for the user to get around. Too many ads and making it too difficult for people to find content they're looking for will only increase your bounce rate. If you know your bounce rate it will help determine other information about your site. For example, if it's 80 percent or higher and you have content on your website, chances are something is wrong.

4. Know Your Business Model

While this is pretty obvious, so many people tend to not sit down and just focus on what their main goals are. Some questions you need to ask yourself are:

• What defines a conversion for you?
  
• Are you selling eyeballs (impressions) or what people click on?
  
• What are your goals?
  
• Do you know your assets and liabilities?

5. Don't Forget to Optimize for Multi-Channels

Keyword strategy is not only important to implement on-site, but should extend to other off-site platforms, which is why you should also be thinking about multi-channel optimization. These multi-channel platforms include:

• Facebook
  
• Twitter
  
• LinkedIn
  
• Email
  
• Offline, such as radio and TV ads

Being consistent with keyword phrases within these platforms will not only help your branding efforts, but also train users to use specific phrases you're optimizing for.

6. Be Consistent With Domain Names

Domain naming is so important to your overall foundation, so as a best practice you're better off using sub-directory root domains (example.com/awesome) versus sub-domains (awesome.example.com). Some other best practices with domain names are:

Consistent Domains: If you type in www.example.com, but then your type in just example.com and the "www" does not redirect to www.example.com, that means the search engines are seeing two different sites. This isn't effective for your overall SEO efforts as it will dilute your inbound links, as external sites will be linking to www.example.com and example.com.

Keep it Old School: Old domains are better than new ones, but if you're buying an old domain, make sure that the previous owner didn't do anything shady to cause the domain to get penalized.
Keywords in URL: Having keywords you're trying to rank for in your domain will only help your overall efforts.

7. Optimizing for Different Types of Results

In addition to optimizing for the desktop experience, make sure to focus on mobile and tablet optimization as well as other media.

Create rich media content like video, as it's easier to get a video to rank on the first page than it is to get a plain text page to rank.

Optimize your non-text content so search engines can see it. If your site uses Flash or PDFs, make sure you read up on the latest best practices so search engines can crawl that content and give your site credit for it.

8. Focus on Your Meta Data Too

Your content on your site should have title tags and meta descriptions.

Meta keywords are pretty much ignored by search engines nowadays, but if you still use them, make sure it talks specifically to that page and that it is also formatted correctly.
Your meta description should be unique and also speak to that specific page. Duplicate meta descriptions from page to page will not get you anywhere.
Title tags should also be unique! Think your title as a 4-8 word ad, so do your best to entice the reader so they want to click and read more.

Summary

You should always keep SEO in the forefront of your mind, and always follow best practices. Skipping the basics of SEO will only leave your site's foundation a mess and prevent you from fully maximizing revenue opportunities.

Source: http://searchenginewatch.com/article/2259693/SEO-Basics-8-Essentials-When-Optimizing-Your-Site

Tags : seo malaysia, search engine optimization, malaysia seo company

2 Industry Organizations Every Email Marketer Should Join

A look at two organizations that will help email marketers stay connected and involved in the email marketing community.

One thing I love about the email marketing industry is the comradery. I was reminded of this again last week while I was in New York on business. I was lucky enough to connect with fellow ClickZ columnist Stephanie Miller and a few other industry friends for dinner. I've had similar dinners in Atlanta, Kansas City, London, Washington, D.C., and many other places.

If you're an email marketer and you aren't linked into this community, you're missing out. So I thought I would write today about two organizations that are near and dear to my heart - and which I highly encourage you to join if you're looking to build a career in email marketing. They are the Email Experience Council (EEC) and Only Influencers (OI).

The Email Experience Council was founded by industry friend and fellow ClickZ columnist Jeanniey Mullen in 2005; in 2008 it was acquired by the Direct Marketing Association (DMA).

Their annual conference, usually held in Miami in January or February, is always a highlight of my year. The sessions are great - industry thought-leaders and brand-side marketers providing practical advice on what's working now in email and online marketing. So is the networking - if you're looking to make connections with key people in the space, this is the conference for you.
The EEC has also begun hosting local off-line meet-ups - this is a relatively new initiative but it seems very promising. They also sponsor annual awards for email marketing professionals; you don't have to be a member to win but you do need to be a member to nominate someone. I was on the award committee last year and am currently serving on the nominations committee, which matches interested members with committee assignments and leadership roles within the organization.
In addition, the EEC provides webinars, resources, and information to help marketers improve their email programs - one thing that stands out about EEC members is their willingness to share their expertise and help elevate the industry as a whole. Check out their blog for free advice from industry thought-leaders and then consider joining. Individual memberships are less than $400 per year. And well worth the price.

Only Influencers was founded by industry friend Bill McCloskey. Bill is a natural born connector - after years of managing a free discussion list for email marketing professionals, he expanded the offerings and turned it into a paid membership organization.

Recent topics on the discussion list included a request for samples of B2B and B2C email welcome series creative, a discussion about the new CASL regulations (see my friend Matt Vernhout's take here), and the value of an email marketing professional pursuing an MBA.

OI also offers local "meet-ups" - a chance for email marketers to gather offline and chat, usually over drinks and some food. Recent meet-ups have occurred in Amsterdam, Atlanta, Kansas City, London, and New York.

There's also an OI blog where members (including myself) have the chance to share our experience, offer practical tips on improving email marketing programs, and sound-off on industry issues.
The connections I've made through OI have invaluable. It really is a community and there's an instant comradery when you meet someone whose posts you've been reading for years. No matter what your email marketing issue, you'll find others willing to provide their thoughts on the OI list. Some of the most valuable discussions are those where members are on opposite sides of an issue - while we don't all always agree, Bill keeps the discussion cordial and constructive.

OI membership is $200 a year; a small price to pay for the connections you make and the guidance you'll receive from the community. There's also a monthly subscription, for $20, if you want to test drive before you commit for the longer term.

Source: http://www.clickz.com/clickz/column/2351380/2-industry-organizations-every-email-marketer-should-join

Tags: email marketing, email blast, edm software, email marketing software, email marketing malaysia, email database

21 Ways to Improve Email Deliverability

Most of us have had at least one experience of losing something in the postal mail. Hopefully yours was something small, like a postcard, not something like a mortgage payment or a rent check.

But despite how much we all complain about the post office, its delivery rates positively sparkle compared to email messages. Just last week, Return Path, the email certification service, reported that one in six emails never makes it to the inbox.

One in six is a lot. What if one in six of your customer-service emails went missing, or one in six order confirmations? Even with all the other demands on your time, to track sales, to create more content, to manage your social media accounts, when one in six of your email messages is getting lost, it’s time to do something about it. Just cutting that rate in half, from one in six to one in twelve, will give your entire email marketing program a 10 percent lift.

One in six is a lot. What if one in six of your customer-service emails went missing, or one in six order confirmations?

The good news is it’s not all that hard to improve deliverability rates. And, if your deliverability rates are already good, it’s not too hard to preserve them. Here are 21 simple techniques for increasing your list’s deliverability rates, or for keeping the healthy deliverability rates you’ve got. And there’s enough time before the holiday rush to see results if you make these changes now.

1. Use Double Opt-in, Not Single Opt-in

The difference between double and single opt-in is that with double opt-in (also called “confirmed opt-in”), people get a confirmation email after they’ve entered their email address into your form and clicked submit. They’re not subscribed until they click a link in the confirmation email.

Deliverability rates for lists that use double opt-in are significantly higher than for single opt-in lists. Their unsubscribe rates are also lower, and their open and click through rates are higher. Double opt-in crushes single opt-in on just about every metric, with one exception — you’ll get about 20 percent fewer subscribers on the front end with double opt-in. However, that small loss up front will translate into big rewards long term. Use double opt-in.

2. Purge Hard Bounces after One Bounce

A hard bounce is when an email message is sent to an email account that is closed or no longer exists. The major ISPs (Gmail, Yahoo, Hotmail) keep track of these bounces, and will start to suppress delivery of all your emails if you trigger too many hard bounces. So keep your list up to date and remove hard bounces fast. Most email service providers make this easy.

3. Purge Soft Bounces after Multiple Attempts

Soft bounces occur when an email message is sent to an email account that is full, or temporarily unavailable for some reason — the server is down, for example. Soft bounces are less of a problem than hard bounces, but it’s still a good idea to clean them up. After 3 to 4 soft bounces to an email address, it’s time to take it off your list.

4. Avoid Over-mailing

One marketer’s definition of over-mailing can be another’s everyday practice. But generally, if you’re mailing more than once a day, you may be over-mailing. Over-mailing is also a little trickier to blame for poor deliverability rates, because when you send more emails, people tend to respond less — i.e., you can’t just send twice as many emails and get twice as many responses. Those suppressed response rates can also contribute to reduced overall deliverability, which brings us to the next point.

5. Purge Subscribers Who Haven’t Opened or Clicked in Awhile

“Awhile” can be a year, or six months. Whatever time frame you pick is up to you, but you have to draw the line somewhere. If people aren’t opening or clicking on your emails, culling them from your list might hurt, but it will help the deliverability rates for the people you’ll keep.

6. Avoid Spam Traps

A spam trap is an email address that has not been used by a real person for a long time, like 18 months, and has since been taken over by an ISP or by an anti-spam organization. That email address is now called a spam trap because if any emails get sent to it, the sender will be flagged as a spammer. There are reports of a mailer sending just one email to a spam trap and having its Sender Score drop by 20 points. That’s a severe example, but it drives the point home: Mailing to even one spam trap can hurt you.

The top way to get a spam trap on your list is to buy an email list. But if you want to know some of the other, less common ways that even good email marketers can end up with spam traps on their lists, see “Email Spam Traps and How to Avoid Them,” my article on that topic.

7. Use a Consistent, Recognizable Sender Name and Email Address

In other words, don’t have your email messages be from a free email account (like Hotmail or Gmail). Use the name of your company or brand as the “from” name.

The image below shows why this is important. Your sender name is actually more prominent in some email clients that the email subject line is.

The sender name on your email messages is often just as visible as the email subject line.
The sender name on your email messages is often just as visible as the email subject line.
8. Send from a Consistent IP Address with a Good Sender Score

Not sure if you’re doing this? Ask your email service provider.

9. Use Clear Email Subject Lines

“Deceptive” is the term the ISPs use, when subject lines are intentionally misleading. It can sound a little harsh, but here are some examples of what they mean: Don’t mention a sale or a coupon in the email subject line and then not offer it in the email. Basically, don’t promise anything in the subject line that your email doesn’t back up.

10. Do Not Include Attachments

Never, ever include an attachment for the emails you send to subscribers. Got a PDF or some other file you want them to have? Include a link to download it in the email.

11. Do Not Use Fancy Coding Languages

Avoid Dynamic HTML, frames, PHP, JavaScript, Java, ActiveX, ASP, and “cache busters.” Just keep it simple, okay?

12. Avoid Known Spam Words

This is actually far more complicated than it sounds. Search on Google for “spam word lists” and look around. If you removed every word that appears on every spam word list from your emails, you’d have to communicate by images — there wouldn’t be any words left. That said, if you have to use a few spam words (and you will) try to use them as little as possible. For example, don’t open your email with “FREE FREE FREE FREE.”

13. Avoid Embedded Videos

This is too bad, because videos increase email engagement by a lot. But unfortunately, they can also suppress deliverability. If you still want to send something like a video, send an image that looks like a video, and link it to a page that automatically plays the video. Most of your subscribers won’t notice the difference.

14. Keep Message Size to 40KB or Less

That doesn’t mean you can’t ever send an email over 40KB, but try to keep most of your emails under that size. This may mean you have to take an extra step and reduce the size of any images in your email. It is extra work, but it’s worth it.

15. Use a Spam Screening Tool

Almost every email service provider will have one of these tools built into the interface where you create your emails, but if they don’t, head over to SpamScoreChecker.com or any one of the free spam tools, and run your email through their process. It takes less than 5 minutes. To ensure a good deliverability rate, your email should have a SpamAssassin spam score of less than 5.0. If your email rates higher than that, the tool will definitely let you know.

Source : http://webmarketingtoday.com/articles/113607-21-Ways-to-Improve-Email-Deliverability/

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