This document provides an overview of email marketing best practices. It discusses the current email marketing landscape, the business benefits of email marketing like low cost and detailed reporting. It covers how to create an email marketing plan by growing an email list, segmenting audiences, and testing content. It also discusses email design, deliverability, legal requirements, and offers resources for further learning. The key takeaways are that email marketing can provide good ROI, integration with other channels is important, and testing is key to improving campaigns over time.

1. Grow your Business with
Email Marketing
22 November 2011
Sponsored by Birketts llp

2. Introductions

3. Greg Allan

4. Us

5. Who we work with

6. You?

7. What we’re going to cover today
• The current landscape • Creative campaigns
• The business benefits • Deliverability
• Setting a plan • Testing
• Growing your list • The legals
• Structure, design & content • The 10 email commandments
• The pitfalls of Outlook • Questions

8. The current email marketing landscape

9. Industry stats
Email
480 million
Facebook & Twitter
250 million
ROI
£42.08 for New accounts 480m email
every £1 2010 users

10. Best practice
What it can be used for: What it shouldn’t be used for:
• Communication • Bulk mailing
• Sales • One-way communication
• Re-engagement • Scattergunning
• Cross selling • Sending irrelevant, untargeted
information
• Research

11. The business benefits
What’s in it for you?

12. Benefits
Cost Reporting
Integration

13. 1. Cost comparison
¼ page advert Press release Event SEO & PPC Email
in Business in (room hire & marketing
East Anglia refreshments)
£450 £250-£450 £200 From £200 a £45 a year*
month
No stats No stats Stats Stats Stats
*Based on little green plane’s PAYG scheme with free template sending up to 200 emails a month

14. 2. Reporting

15. 3. Integration
CASE STUDY
Legal firm in Norwich
Objective:
Increase enquiries to its employment
law service by 15% in 12 months
Tactics:
• Creation of an employment
services guide
• Free event
• Press release
• Email marketing

16. Integration continued
CASE STUDY
Increase enquiries to its employment
law service by 15% in 12 months
‘Book now’ ‘Thanks for
Press email for attending’ e-
release, free event shot with
launch of Event takes links to
E-shot place slides and
the guide
asking for Press 10% offer
input into release to ‘One week
the guide E-shot with publicise to go’ email Post event
‘what would link to new event using press ‘Sorry we
you like to guide as stats on release with missed you’
see?’ PDF on popularity of photo e-shot with
website - the slides and
tracking hits downloaded 10% offer
guide

17. Creating a plan

18. Aspects of your plan
How regular are you Who will be
planning to send responsible for
your email your e-shots?
campaigns?
What tone will
Can you segment you use?
your audience?
What content/ How will you
incentives will you grow your
offer in your database?
emails?

19. Understanding your audiences
• Content – What are they interested in
• Tone – What tone to use for your communication
• Creative - How can they be influenced by creative
• Incentives - What incentives to try
• Purchase – Where are they in the buying cycle
Persona task…

20. Personas - John
Personal:
• Aged 45, married 20 years to Emily
• Enjoys golf and camping
• Risk adverse, logical thinker
Work:
• Role: HR Director in engineering firm
• Vast understanding of industry
• Involved in strategic decisions and employment law policies
Issues:
• Dealing with changing regulations to agency workers
• Ensuring his firm keeps up with changes
• Meeting KPIs
Key Messages:
• Needs as-it-happens info on new Agency Workers regs
• Need top line information only (but access to detail)
• Accreditations and quality standard mean a lot

21. Personas - Louise
Personal:
• Aged 24, single
• Heavy web and user
• Bright, bubbly individual who participates in everything
Career:
• Newly qualified lawyer looking for employment
• Has applied to the graduate scheme of our law firm
Issues:
• Wants more information about law firm
• Looking to network with relevant partners
Key Messages:
• Messaging can be more laid back / informal
• Thriving and innovative

22. Growing your list
• Data is king • Publicise on email signature
• Organic rather than bought • Business cards
• Use Forward to Friend
• Issue an opt-in to existing list
• Networking – LinkedIn – request
• Incentive – perceived value
• Speaker events – form
• Keep sign-up simple
• Social media (Facebook tab,
• Sign up form on website – home Twitter automated DM)
page, checkbox on contact us,
pop up • QR codes – presentations and
events

23. Pop-up

24. Social media
Facebook fan page tab Twitter auto message

25. QR codes

26. Flyers at events

27. BREAK

28. The structure
• From: relationship entity
• To: only one recipient
• Subject: direct and below 49
characters
• Address the reader
• Above the fold: call to action
• 3 snippets max – links back to
site
• Send to a Friend
• Social media integration
• Unsubscribe function

29. Design & content basics
• Subject lines – 49 characters (10 to be really good)
• Keep it short – max three snippets
• Clear call to action
• Consistent structure and prioritise content
• 600 pixels wide
• Follow corporate guidelines
• Equal image to text ratio

30. Image only emails
Creative design First impressions

31. Getting it right
ALT TAG
ALT TAGS

32. Designing for mobile
• Chunkier call to action buttons
• Just include the essentials
• Single column- smartphone screens are 300 – 400px wide
• Keep images small to minimise download time
• Social media sharing

33. Which clients are you sending to?

34. Designing for email clients

35. Why Microsoft Outlook should be outlawed
The benefits of using a professional service over
Outlook

36. Avoiding Outlook
• Less reporting
• No testing before send
• Going into the spam folder
• Problems with larger volumes
• Risk of being blacklisted
• No method of managing unsubscribes
• No corporate branding
• Duplications

37. Creative campaigns
Making it work for you

38. RAF Museum
Brief:
• Re-engage users
• User-friendly system
• Increased deliverability, open
rates and click-through results
Strategy: Starter Pack
Results
• 2,000 click throughs
• 26 immediate donations
• 40% open rate (avg 20%)
• Re-ignited enthusiasm from
disengaged users (80 emails)
• Knock-on effect with the pick up
of museum visitors
• People still using and sharing
the email three weeks later

39. LinkedIn
Doing well at..?
Could improve on..?

40. Coca-Cola
Doing well at..?
Could improve on..?

41. Deliverability
Avoiding the spam folder

42. Deliverability
Emails Spam filters Inbox Website

43. 1. ISP
Deliverability spam filter
4 levels of spam filtering 2. Company
spam filter
3. Email client
spam filter
4. Human
spam filter

44. Deliverability tips
• Good content and data
• Use pre-send spam tests provided by your ESP – Spam Assassin
• Use pre-send screenshot tests
• Send preview emails & set up test list
• Remove hard bounces
• Add an unsubscribe mechanism
• Review delivery stats

45. Spam – things to avoid
• Phrases like "Click here!" or "Once in a lifetime opportunity!“
• Repeats
• Exclamation marks!!!!!!
• USING ALL CAPS, WHICH IS LIKE YELLING IN EMAIL
• Colouring fonts bright red, or green
• Sloppy HTML coding
• One big image, with little or no text
• Using a noreply@ email address

46. Testing
Learning and improving

47. Things you can test
• Demographics (age, sex, location)
• Time (hour, day, month, seasons,
holidays)
• Personalisation
• Subject line (questions, facts,
commands)
• Design (length, layout, call to action
location)
• Offer (type, time frame, % off versus
cash)
• From names and address (sex,
seniority, info@ versus real person)

48. The legals

49. The legals
Data Protection Act 1998
(Privacy and Electronic Communications Regulations)
• Any commercial motives must not be hidden
• You must provide a valid unsubscribe mechanism
• You must list your company details on your emails
• You must not use competitions to gather email lists unless
participants have also said they are happy to receive updates
• If you are collecting data you must explain how you will handle it
AND provide user access, ideally in a Privacy Policy

50. The legals – forward to a friend
• Forward on to relevant/interested parties only
• You will be liable if people who haven’t opt-in
complain
• You cannot ask for other people's email
addresses due to the Data Protection Act (and
little green plane will not give you data on this
feature)
FULL GUIDE FOR MARKETERS

51. 10 email marketing commandments
Ones to remember

52. 10 email marketing commandments
• Thou shalt use an opt-in
• Thou shalt cultivate an organic data list
• Thou shalt use email marketing to listen as well as talk
• Thou shalt tie into other marketing initiatives
• Thou shalt test and evaluate
• Thou shalt not spam
• Thou shalt keep it short
• Thou shalt be regular
• Thou shalt cleanse your data
• Thou shalt give value to your subscribers

53. Actions from today
TRY IT OUT WITH CHRISTMAS
• Christmas opening hours
• Christmas/December sales offers or incentives
• Festive greeting

54. Actions from today
TRY IT OUT WITH CHRISTMAS
• £295
• 2,500 emails
• Pick a Christmas template
• Supply logo, list, copy
• We’ll send it and provide a report
• (£100 charity)

55. Actions from today
OR… TRY IT FOR FREE WITH
OUR SPECIAL SEMINAR OFFER
• 2,500 free emails
• Pick a template
• Create
• Upload your list
• Spam testing
• Report
• Email stuart.bonsall@littlegreenplane.com

56. Resources
Email marketing guide
Blog www.littlegreenplane.com/blog
E-newsletter www.littlegreenplane.com/milehighclub

57. Questions
rechenda.smith@littlegreenplane.com
www.littlegreenplane.com
@lgplane