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Gmail deliverability is always a challenge for marketers.  The lack of standard tools such as a Feedback Loop makes the analysis of statistics a challenge.  This already difficult ISP was made much tougher about a month ago when Gmail changed the way their filters sorted mail.  We have seen an increase in bulking with many of our customers.  The missing complaints and feedback from the Gmail team means senders are forced to do more trial and error testing with Gmail than with other ISP's.

This has been a busy month on the Gmail side.  They have rolled out a new feature that explains the reason email was routed to the Spam folder.  This is from the Gmail newsletter outlining these changes:

Many of our users say the accuracy of our spam filter is one of the key reasons they love Gmail. And while we think you should never have to look in your spam folder, we know some of you may want to know why the messages there were marked as spam.

So starting today, we'll be showing a brief explanation at the top of each of your spam messages. Simply look at any message in your spam folder and now you can find out why it was put there and learn about any potentially harmful content within the message.

While we believe this is a step in the right direction, we don't think many of you will find this information very helpful.  In a check of Spam folders, the common message we see is this.
 
It's similar to messages that were detected by our spam filters

That's not exactly information that is game changing.  It is a start, and any little bit of information helps.  We like the fact that at least Gmail is beginning a dialogue with their users.

Return Path also discussed the Gmail issues today in their In the Know newsletter.  They believe the clients impacted have some weakness (complaints, low engagement, etc...) that caused the filter changes to have more effect.  We haven't always seen a direct correlation with our clients in respect, but it is a good starting point.  From Return Path:

On February 10th, it appears that Gmail has tightened its spam filters.  We heard numerous reports from marketers and email service providers (ESPs) about seeing increased spam folder delivery at Gmail, and we are still hearing complaints even a month later.  I looked into our numbers and verified that something did indeed happen on February 10th, but if you have a high sending reputation and go beyond best practices, your deliverability rates probably didn't move much.

Tomorrow, I will discuss things to look at to tighten up at Gmail and the successful strategies that some clients have implemented.

Attending the Marketing Sherpa Email Summit last month reinforced that email is nowhere near the dead zone -- very much to the contrary. Email marketing has been invigorated by mobile and social consumer engagement and we are at the tip of a digital marketing iceberg. Within the digital marketer's toolkit, email is the mature element, so it's relied upon as the customer communication dialogue 'glue' and key driver to action. If you're reading this, you probably already knew that, but it's nice validation nevertheless. 

The conference was chock full of marketing lessons and some of the most interesting stories were shared by smaller businesses, who naturally tended to manage their email and marketing programs like a conversation they would have directly with a consumer. For example:

• Jermaine Griggs, Founder of Hear & Play Music presented a case study titled, "Personal vs. Robotic: How a small business increased lifetime customer value 316% by turning automated email into personal experiences." Jermaine's focus on fine tuning automated customer lifecycle marketing touch points has garnered great results. In fact, not only do consumers purchase, they often thank him for taking the time to reach out and share very relevant information right when they need it. Yes, relevancy is appreciated by consumers and they respond in kind. This was a great example of building a relationship and not just focusing at the product and price level of the conversation.
• Marcus "The Pool Guy" Sheridan, founder of The Sales Lion engaged the crowd with stories of selling fiberglass pools. Yes, fiberglass pools. Marcus is very upfront in letting consumers know he is expecting them to buy, as the end goal, and he proactively addresses product concerns and competitive issues up front. Email programs focus on this trusted advisor level of information sharing, with cross-channel initiatives aligned to preemptively strike where there are known questions from consumers about product fit, quality and more.
• Responsys customer, Ryan Amirault, Digital Marketing Manager at Whole Foods Market, shared a cross-channel case study focused on driving 70K new subscribers in one month. By keeping their process nimble, tapping cross-channel (SMS, QR, social), incenting store employees and keeping it fun, they met the acquisition goal in a tight timeframe.

Beyond many insightful presentations, three general themes emerged - Mobile Relevancy, Customer Choice and Actionable Data.

• Mobile Relevancy - Mobile relevancy is key, since the device is always near and always on. We need to be hyper-relevant and understand we are "marketing to a moment," in a sense. Today, we have opportunities to drive mobile consumer action, finely tuned to time and place, with a need for greater relevancy than ever.
• Customer Choice - Customer's today have more power and they know it. Social media continues to raise subscriber and consumer expectations. As marketers, we need to listen and respond accordingly to customer wants and needs.
Data Depth - Data, data and more data - it's what fuels our digital marketing machines. As social and mobile channels continue to grow, data becomes more complex and real-time. Get the data right and the rest will follow.

In summary, the Marketing Sherpa Email Summit reinforced that email isn't the newest, shiniest part of the marketing mix, but it is a mature element and a bright spot in the customer dialogue to drive action and conversion. With a focus on customer choice, mobile relevancy and data depth, email marketing is a key factor in creating relevant cross-channel consumer dialogues and driving action.

I had the pleasure of attending my third consecutive SXSW Interactive conference this past week. I attended sessions that were both educational and thought provoking. In this post I've included a few actionable tips and insights from my favorite presenters, who largely focus on living and contributing in world where it's so easy to get caught up in the technology loop.

• We are all makers: We create content. We consume content. We reference content and share content with others. We engage with content and we ultimately start back at the beginning and create and make again. We are makers (referred by Tiffani Jones Brown) or producers (as referenced by Kristina Halvorson). There are brilliant minds working within the discipline of Content Strategy to ensure that the interface is the publication and the publication is the interface. Content Strategists are not just content planners: a plan is nothing, but the planning is everything. This select team of individuals is testing what works and doesn't work and constantly going through an iterative process.
• Data visualized: As we continue to make and produce content, more and more data is becoming available. As a result, there's opportunity like never before for researchers, scientists and historians to dig into large and complex datasets. For example, research is being uncovered at Indiana University with Johan Bollen that correlates the emotions expressed within Twitter with the rise and fall of the stock market. And the research team at Microsoft has created Layerscape, a powerful and visual tool to study and analyze complex Earth and oceanic datasets.
• Back to basics: We all have the perception that we are indeed great multitaskers. We have many windows opened on our computer screens at a time. We participate in multiple conversations at once by either creating content or interpreting content delivered to us. We get stuck within the technology loop and crave to take in everything at once. Well, a fun fact is that multitasking isn't possible when you attempt two tasks that require the same side of the brain. Good news is that most of us can walk and chew gum. We can fold laundry and listen to music. However, we cannot respond to an IM while reading an email while participating in a conference call. Here are some tips from the amazing panel:
• Create environmental changes to change your behavior. Turn off the internet to write and do real work.
• Create a to-do list with six quadrants. Five of the quadrants will hold items to be achieved within the year. The sixth quadrant will hold your tasks to complete today. Notice the time and effort put into the sixth quadrant and begin to shift your behavior to begin to focus on the other five key tasks to complete in the year.
• Create a "to-don't" list. And stick to NOT doing those things that are time sucks.
• Set your watch to beep every hour on the hour. Take 1 min. during that alarm to evaluate the work you are doing. Is this valuable? Does this help me accomplish my tasks at hand? Realign and move forward for the next hour. 

• Become a citizen first, consumer second: And the last take away from listening to very motivating presentations from Biz Stone, Al Gore and Sean Parker ultimately resulted in, do something for good. As we continue to create, make and produce, we need to be sure we weave cause into everything, daily. Stone states that opportunities can be manufactured and creativity is a renewable resource. We must learn to fail spectacularly to begin to succeed spectacularly. And look to leverage the power of social media and other technologies to give power to the people.

 

Additional links:
Your Brain on Multitasking
Rude Awakening: Content Strategy is Super Hard
Copy Matters: Content Strategy for the Interface
Data Visualization and the Future of Research
Content As a Means for Social Change
Sean Parker Presentation 

Ogilvy notes
Biz Stone  
Al Gore & Sean Parker

Attending this year's SXSW Interactive will definitely go down as one of the highlights of my year. The shear amount of high-quality content, top tier presenters and events was both exhilarating and a bit overwhelming. For me, the most interesting topics that bubbled up were around mobile marketing, data and respect for user's privacy and attention.

With the rise of GPS-enabled smart phones, ubiquitous geo-location is now available to a large number of consumers and it's changing what it means to be in a location. Being somewhere is no longer about a simple point on a map--it's a collection of personal experiences. With images, opinions, reviews, map queries, tweets, posts and check-ins come opportunities for marketers to provide more relevant real-time content, whether it's alerting a user to a preference, like a nearby ice cream shop or a direct marketing message about a product or service nearby. But with that ability comes a responsibility to not only ensure that the communications are permission based, but also to provide real and immediate benefits to the user.

Alex Rainert, Head of Product at foursquare, made the very distinct point that relevant content isn't only about proximity and permission; it's about real value. It's unlikely that users will be delighted if a Starbucks coupon pops up as they walk within 20 feet of a retail location, but they will be delighted to know that a friend is checking in to their favorite pizza place and there's a discount in effect for the next two hours.

My main takeaway from the many panels and discussions at SXSW Interactive is that we, as marketers, will be working with more and more personalized, real-time data. And while we do, it's crucial that consumers understand what type of data is being collected and how it will be used.  More than ever, as consumers offer up their attention and personal information, we need to give them smart, relevant, high-value content that makes the trade-off worth it for them, each and every time.

Session references:
Design and the Mobile Startup
Location Tracking: Threatening or Value-added?
Ambient Location and the Future of the Interface

Pinterest allows you to post or "pin" images and videos from around the web onto a virtual pinboard. Users can pin what they like on the web or even upload images and videos from their desktop. Users can share, get opinions and follow each other based on interests and repin (just like retweet) what they like. My favorite part is that you can browse pinboards created by other people, which is a fun way to discover new things and get inspiration from those who share your interests. I could spend hours looking for new ways to decorate my home!

Brands are now creating their own profiles and encouraging their customers to follow their profiles and pin products on their web sites. Data from ComScore states that Pinterest just hit 11.7 million unique monthly U.S. visitors, crossing the 10 million mark faster than any other standalone site in history. Users are spending so much time sharing their favorite images and videos that now only Facebook and Tumblr have more social media time on site than Pinterest. A new study by Shareaholic has found that Pinterest now drives more referral traffic than Twitter.

Does your business have a Pinterest page? If not, you may want to consider creating one soon.  

Here are top 5 things that brands can consider as they start building their presence on Pinterest:

·         Define the customer segment you want to go after on Pinterest and cater your content based on that. Majority of Pinterest users are women in the age of 25 - 44. This infographic can help you understand the characteristics of Pinterest users.

·         Enable your customers to pin products from your website. This gives your customers an opportunity to share what they purchased on your web site or get opinions on it from their friends.

·          Make sure you use highly attractive and catchy images to pin that provide value to your customers. Pinterest is a highly visual site and the attractiveness of the images that get shared will determine the level of engagement the pins receive and to what extent they get shared. Whole Foods has been approaching this well by not just promotional pinning, but also offering ideas and information.

·         Acquire new Pinterest followers by having a specific call to action to follow your brand on Pinterest through your website, in your newsletters and promotional emails.

·         Create relevant Pinterest boards in coordination with your marketing activities in other channels.

So get going and start pinning today!

In April of last year, Facebook launched Facebook Studio, a site showcasing the innovative ways that marketers use Facebook to support clients' business initiatives. As the site puts it, Facebook Studio is "a place to celebrate the agencies and marketers that are driving business growth through real connections and authentic conversations made possible with Facebook."

The Gallery makes it super simple to find sample campaigns, featuring a library of examples that are sortable based on filters like industry, target country, and Facebook features used by a given campaign.

And the Learning Lab is a helpful resource to reference when trying to understand the various tools & products available on the Facebook platform.

What a great resource for marketers! I'm really excited to be able to use Facebook Studios to find stellar case studies for client presentations, and I'm even more excited to have a go-to site for cross-channel inspiration.

Plus, how cool would it be to see your own work featured in the Spotlight?! Something to aspire to...

» Explore Facebook Studio

Google Labs announced their new preview pane functionality on Thursday. You can read their release (and instructions) here.

Now that Outlook, Yahoo! and Gmail all offer preview pane functionality, this will increase the number of email recipients choosing to sort through their inbox this way.

Large portions of Business to Consumer emails are sent to email addresses at Yahoo! and Gmail. General email best practices account for preview pane pain, so this serves as a great reminder to be reviewing your emails in actual inboxes before you send them to your subscribers.

This example from REI illustrates the importance of messaging hierarchy. Subscribers are viewing our emails in 350-400 pixels at a time. They should get a general sense of what your email is about in that area and an idea that there's more below.

Here are some email best practices reminders:

• Use a combination of HTML and graphical imagery and text
• Make good use of the top 350-400 pixels by including information in your preheader and top promo area
• Choose navigation items that will increase traffic to your site, keep the items to between 3 and 5.
• Use imagery and design to give the subscriber visual cues to keep scrolling

Personally, I'm excited to have preview pane functionality in Gmail. Their layout mirrors my work email and tablet user interface. It makes it really easy to flip through a couple messages at a time. I have to think this will also get me to actually view and download the messages I just "mark as read," so let's see what this does for open rates on messages sent to Gmail.

Thanks gmail!

From: LinkedIn Today

Subject Line: Top Headlines in Design

Date: May 20^th, 2011

 

LinkedIn has partnered with Twitter to deliver a news service called LinkedIn Today. Based on your industry of interest, you can customize your own Front Page as well as opt to receive daily or weekly email digests of the top news being shared and tweeted by professionals around the world.

 

What draws my attention to the email digest is its simple execution and how it translates to the mobile inbox. With so many people now checking their emails through smart portable devices, this raises interesting questions about leveraging content delivery for different email clients as well as mobile devices.

 

Several stories are featured in each send and each have a small thumbnail image, followed by a brief headline and original site where the article came from. Next, a short article preview and a link to read the rest of the story are provided. It also calls out how many times the story has been shared and allows for the subscriber to share with others as well.

 

Tailoring emails to be easily digested on a computer screen and mobile device is a tricky balancing act. However, as more people read emails on the go, some creative forethought and strategic planning can yield a better mobile experience and better user engagement between businesses and subscribers.

Today I am at the Adobe Omniture Summit in Salt Lake City to announce some very exciting new enhancements to our existing integration with the Adobe Online Marketing Suite, powered by Omniture. Responsys has been very busy creating this integration aimed at accelerating time-to-market and reducing the complexity of cross-channel marketing campaigns, and I believe our customers will be impressed with the results. 

The improvement to the Responsys integration gives marketers a new level of power and ease of use by automatically summarizing web analytics data that is captured by Adobe SiteCatalyst, powered by Omniture, into pre-defined audience segments within the Responsys Interact user interface.  Without any manual work or technical resources required, Responsys Interact users can instantly target campaigns based on who has recently browsed, purchased, or abandoned a shopping cart on their website.  This better equips our customers to take advantage of today's technology to translate their data into smart business decisions.

Responsys and Adobe already work together with hundreds of  global brands such as Avery®, Dollar Thrifty Automotive Group, Freshpair.com, Intrawest, Onlineshoes.com, and Thomson Reuters to power their data-driven marketing campaigns to increase ROI and make smarter business decisions.  If you are interested in learning more about our offering, you can visit http://www.responsys.com/suite/index.php

 For those of you who are attending the Adobe Omniture Summit, I hope to see you at my keynote presentation , "Welcome to the New School of Marketing" on Thursday, March 10 at 9:10 a.m.

 

Best,

Scott Olrich, Chief Marketing and Sales Officer, Responsys

Sender: Neiman Marcus
Subject Line: Save Face! Michael Kors gifts are just in time
Date: Wednesday, December 8, 2010

Sender: Bloomingdale's
Subject Line: Coats to Keep You Warm All Winter Long + Sale!
Date: Thursday, December 16, 2010

Facebook Profile Picture: Lisa Harmon
Date: Wednesday, December 17, 2010

Magazine: Vogue
Cover: Angelina Jolie
Issue: December 2010

Every once in a while, a topic comes up in the Responsys Creative Team offices that gets us all fired up (like when Gap changed its logo a couple of months ago).

The latest topic that's got our tongues wagging is Pantone's announcement of its 2011 color of the year: Honeysuckle. It's basically like Hot Pink IMO. I have some pretty strong girly genes, so I'm ok with it. In any event, now I am obsessed with the color, and have been seeing it everywhere: in emails, on Vogue's cover logo, and the lovely Lisa Harmon's lips on her Facebook profile picture.

From: west elm
Subject Line: Wherever you go, WE are with you
Date: Wednesday, September 8, 2010

In addition to redesigning their website to feel friendlier with the introduction of both paper texture and handwritten font, west elm has also launched city guides in Philadelphia, Portland and Chicago. I'm curious about how y'all think about this. Does it make sense for west elm? How does it help the brand? The customer?

Also, I am interested in your reaction to the WE element. Please comment!

What: Holiday
Who: Mark Brownlow
Date: Friday, September 3, 2010

The fantastic and prolific Mark Brownlow has pulled together an excellent list of holiday resources, for those of you seeking inspiration and guidance.
Check it out here >

Did you know that more and more retailers are simply clicking the Spam button to unsubscribe from email lists? Not a good trend for the health of our email programs, by any means. So what's a retailer to do? Read the latest report from Chad White. Highlighting examples of the good, the bad and the downright ugly, this in-depth study will help you whip your opt-out process into shape. It examines the unsubscribe experiences at 100 top online retailers - covering everything from unsubscribe instructions in emails, to opt-out page components and confirmations, to the honoring of unsubscribe requests.

Get the whole scoop. Download the free report now

From: Lisa Harmon
Subject Line: Email Idols
Date: Wednesday, February 3, 2010

For those of you who didn't make it to the EEC's 2010 Conference, I'd like to share with you the fun of and the learnings from our Wednesday morning keynote session, "Email Idol." Creative teams from Smith-Harmon, Mighty Interactive and eROI took to the stage to show their best efforts at email stardom: Each redesigned email campaigns from USAA and National Geographic.

The good news? We were all Email Idols. Mighty Interactive's creative won the USAA audience favorite vote, Smith-Harmon's creative won the National Geographic audience favorite vote, and eROI's creative garnered the most orders when National Geographic ran an A/B/C/D split test between their control and our challenger versions.

Special thanks to Marc Haseltine of National Geographic, John Leistra of USAA, Sam White of eROI, Mike Corak of Mighty Interactive and Jim Spence of Smith-Harmon for rocking EEC 2010! I hope their efforts inspire you to do some creative testing of your own :).

Watch the Round 1 USAA video >
Watch the Round 2 National Geographic video >
Download the Powerpoint >

From: Lisa Harmon
Subject Line: Beyond Best Practices
Date: Wednesday, February 3, 2010

I was lucky enough to meet and talk with Marc Borgers and Michael Straathof of Borgers&Straathof at last week's EEC 2010 Email Evolution Conference. We chatted about moving beyond email creative best practices. Now that there's a general understanding of what the best practices are, there's an opportunity to find leverage in (and have fun with) breaking the rules! Watch the video >

In October, I wrote about the genius EEC Marketing Haiku Slam. Since then (at random moments on the elliptical or on an airplane), when inspiration strikes I jot one down. My most recent favorite is below. I'd love to hear yours!

A/B Test
Ideally I'd split
My existence and test B
Against the control

Deep thoughts on a Monday morning... :). Have a great week!

For those of you who missed this year's Email Insider Summit, we've brought our "Email Top Chef Masters" presentation to you:
Download the PowerPoint here >

Plus, read what people are saying about the preso:
Arti Parikh from Orbitz mastered the art of creative testing >
Meg Reynolds from REI taught us a thing or two about incremental lift >
Chrstine Scott from General Mills shared engagement secrets >
Carolyn Ude from ESPN saw positive results with lifecycle messaging >

And, perhaps most importantly, we wore costumes >

Special thanks to Arti, Meg, Christine and Carolyn for both wearing aprons AND bringing us their marketing smarts. I feel so lucky to be working in an industry with such amazing individuals :)!

From: Facebook
Subject line: New Privacy Settings
Date: Wednesday, December 9, 2009

Great job by Facebook making it easier to share and not share. Once you have lots of people on Facebook you are bound to have a mixture of who you know (from college buds to in-laws). You need to post on a "need to know" basis. Now you can.

The "Specific People" option lets you choose friends individually or from your predefined Friend Lists.

So for a small business, you could do social posts just like you send targeted email. Don't think you can do that yet for a large business due to restrictions on Friend List sizes.

Black Friday, Cyber Monday...Cyber Sunday? Though the holiday season has just begun, it has already set the bar for 2010. Retailers are setting new records in terms of email volume and finding new and exciting ways to get ahead of the pack. Smith-Harmon Research Director Chad White is on the front lines, highlighting the top email trends of the holiday season in his new five-page report, "Black Friday and Cyber Monday Set Retail Email Volume Records."

This research report gives you the lowdown on when retailers sent emails and provides some useful tips for how to take advantage of top selling days like Cyber Monday. Armed with Chad's email wisdom, you'll be ready to tackle those benchmarks for next year's holiday campaign.

Here's a taste:
"In addition to more retailers sending email on Black Friday itself, retailers also promoted Black Friday in their promotional emails much more vigorously and much earlier this year than in the past. During the four weeks leading up to Nov. 27, the number of retail emails referencing Black Friday rose 96% this year compared to 2008."

Get the whole scoop: Download the free report now.

I've always believed that email is an art form. The whole industry's in on it with the genius eec Email Haiku Slam. Below are just a handful of the awesome examples. Check out all the email poetry entries - and offer your own - at emailexperience.org!

Email done quite well
Is loved by ISPs
And subscribers too

blasts are from the past
and relevance they will kill
ROI, think not

Loren McDonald
Silverpop

Email leaves the leaves
on the trees; it connects and
saves our world at oncet

Sarah Hatch
ExactTarget

Timely arrows sent
From my marketing quiver
Win the valued prey

Kimberly Canedo
Responsys

From: Coach
Subject Line: have you seen it? the new coach.com
Date: Monday, April 4, 2009

Coach.com announced their website revamp via email this morning. In contrast to the very focused approach taken by Williams-Sonoma in 2008, Coach's message is an explosion of screenshots and pink. While I could go on about the lack of standard logo and navigation, the unfortunate, not-so-easy-to-read tiny graphical text and the endless scrolling, that would just be boring. By now, we've all taken a trip on the best practices train to 516 W34th Street and back. (Check out our Email Insider "Break the Rules" article for more on this topic.) What I like about this email is that while it's absolutely overflowing with content and screengrabs, it's also overflowing with enthusiasm and excitement. I get the sense that Coach is excited about the new coach.com, and therefore, so am I. As an email viewer, do I have the patience to actually squint through the fine print and all the little screenshots? Not so much. But I am inspired to click through and check out the new website (and I'm not really even a Coach shopper), so in essence, this email has more than done it's job.

I like to make this analogy: a promotional retail email should act like a retail store window. It needs to be compelling enough to bring passers-by inside.

From:Lisa Harmon
Subject Line: What!? Who said email isn't sexy!?
Date: March 11, 2009

Looks like we've hit the big time, kids! Special thanks to Mike Smayo of Thrillist for forwarding along this BusinessWeek article about the efficacy of email newsletters in a down economy. It's true; the rest of the marketing and business worlds are finally "getting it!" ...Although I'd call email marketing nothing but glamorous ;)...

From: Smith-Harmon
Subject Line: Smith-Harmon Releases Retail Welcome Email Benchmark Study
Date: March 10, 2009

The 3rd Annual Study Covers Trends and Best Practices for Creating an Impactful and Engaging Welcome Email

SEATTLE, March 10, 2009 — Smith-Harmon, Inc., an email marketing strategy and creative services agency, today announced the release of the Retail Welcome Email Benchmark Study. Looking at welcome email trends and best practices among the nation’s top online retailers, the study also includes advice and insights from Responsys, which partnered with Smith-Harmon on this study

“The welcome email is probably the single greatest opportunity that email marketers have to engage subscribers and drive action,” says Lisa Harmon, co-founder and principal at Smith-Harmon. “Welcome messages generate superior open rates and, done well, create a halo effect that boosts subscribers’ engagement with subsequent promotional and trigger emails.”

Given the golden opportunity that welcome emails present marketers, it’s unfortunate that so many still let the moment pass—or bungle the interaction with uninspired messaging. After examining the welcome email practices of 112 of the largest online retailers, Smith-Harmon found that only 76% of them sent out welcome emails. While that’s up from 72% in 2007 and 66% in 2006, it’s disheartening that more companies aren’t seizing this key marketing moment.

“The very first step in any email program is to acquire names to send your message to, but often in that process, we fail to set solid expectations on what the subscriber has really just agreed to receive,” says Stefan Pollard, senior strategic consultant with email service provider Responsys, which partnered with us on this study. “This gap is where the welcome email shines in its importance to start that new relationship with a wealth of information that the sign-up process may not have had time to communicate. More than simply confirming that an action has been taken, the welcome email is the first chance you have to engage your new subscriber and provide immediate value from your email program.”

We found plenty of opportunity for improvement, as some retailers didn’t make the strongest first impressions. For instance, 23% of retailers took more than 24 hours to deliver their welcome emails, greatly diminishing their effectiveness.

Others didn’t take advantage of their welcome emails to set expectations and drive engagement and sales. For example, only 76% explained the benefits of being a subscriber and only 87% included a link to their homepage.

Many retailers also failed to use their welcome email for progressive profiling, asking subscribers for more information about themselves and their interests to boost the relevancy of future emails. Only 24% of retailers did this, down from 28% in 2006.

"Creating welcome series rather than a having a single welcome email is also a growing trend," says Aaron Smith, co-founder and principal at Smith-Harmon. “Our award-winning work on REI’s year-long welcome series for new co-op members proves that these can be very effective at driving long-term engagement.” At least 9% of retailers are currently using welcome series of two or more emails.

Other key findings from the study include:

• Text-only welcome emails are becoming increasingly antiquated. More than 89% of retailers sent HTML welcome emails, up from 78% in 2007 and 69% in 2006.
• The role that welcome emails can play in ensuring future deliverability of emails is growing. More than 68% of retailers used welcome emails to ask new subscribers to add the sender to their address book, up from about 62% in 2007 and 49% in 2006.
• The number of top online retailers making their emails CAN-SPAM compliant rose significantly. Nearly 71% included both an unsubscribe link and their mailing address, up from 58% in 2007 and 52% in 2006.
• While 15% of welcome emails include a forward-to-a-friend link, none of those studied included a share-with-your-network (SWYN) link. We expect many marketers to adopt SWYN this year, including adding it to their welcome emails.

Download the Retail Welcome Email Benchmark Study >

From: Smith-Harmon
Subject Line: REI and Smith-Harmon Win eec People’s Choice Award: Best in Email
Date: February 14, 2009

Year-long Welcome Email Series Recognized by Industry Peers as Groundbreaking

SEATTLE, February 13, 2009 — Smith-Harmon, Inc., an email marketing strategy and creative services agency, and Recreational Equipment, Inc. (REI), the national outdoor gear and apparel retailer, have been named the winners of the Email Experience Council’s People’s Choice Award: Best in Email for their work together on REI’s new member welcome series.

The welcome campaign consists of 12 email messages that are sent to new co-op members over the course of their first year of membership, culminating in a 1-year anniversary message. In addition to creating a dialogue between REI and its newest members, the campaign is also one of the company’s inaugural efforts to leverage membership data to increase relevancy in REI customer communications.

“Selecting a winner for this year’s People’s Choice Award was a simple task,” said Jeanniey Mullen, founder of the Email Experience Council. “Within minutes of opening up voting to the eec membership, this campaign was identified as a winner. The eec received a tremendous number of email messages and notes from those who voted praising the creative and effective approach this campaign used. We were thrilled to award the People’s Choice Award to Smith-Harmon and REI at our annual Email Evolution Conference and hope that this campaign inspires other email marketers to strive for such outstanding results.” Lisa Harmon, co-founder and principal at Smith-Harmon, said, “When there are still a significant number of marketers who don’t send a welcome email at all, REI’s 12-email new member welcome series is truly remarkable. Focused on engagement through brand messaging and education, it stands in sharp contrast to the highly promotional tenor of most retail emails, and shows that the soft-sell approach delivers higher lifetime value.”

Meg Reynolds, REI’s manager of email programs, said, “REI is delighted with this recognition from the EEC and its members. It’s great to have industry peers acknowledge your efforts as best-of-class. Smith-Harmon translates the REI brand with exceptional skill and nuance in our email communications. It’s a great partnership.”

Each email in the welcome series showcases photography submitted by REI members and focuses on a single topic—whether it’s REI’s environment stewardship, member dividends or educational resources. The images and language highlight REI’s passionate commitment to its members, local communities and the great outdoors, while encouraging new members to take part in the REI community through stewardship, outdoor clinics, gear reviews and more.

View the creatives for the 12 emails in REI’s new member welcome series.

The winner of the eec People’s Choice Award: Best in Email was announced at the Email Evolution Conference, which was held Feb. 9-11 at the Westin Kierland Resort & Spa in Scottsdale, Ariz.

From: Lisa Harmon
Subject Line: EEC09: Email Creative Fight Night Presentation Now Available!
Date: Thursday, February 12, 2009
From Left to Right: Sam White of eROI, Lisa Harmon of Smith-Harmon, Julian Scott of Responsys, Mike Corak of Mighty Interactive

For those of you who didn't make it to EEC09, grab your ringside seat to see the blow-by-blow of a knockout session - Email Creative Fight Night: Agency vs. Agency vs. Agency. Responsys, eROI and Mighty Interactive squared off to redesign three emails chosen by EEC Evolution Conference attendees. One rep from each agency showed off their skills and presented the redesigns to the crowd. Each round had a winner, and the Heavyweight Champ of Email was revelealed. I acted as ringside judge and moderator, and shared a few one-two design punches of my own. The gloves are off!
Check out the PowerPoint presentation here >
Watch round 1 >
Watch round 2 >
Watch round 3 >

From: Smith-Harmon
Subject Line: Holiday Retail Email Volume Sets Record
Date: January 15, 2009

The holidays may be over for regular folk, but for us email marketers, not so much. We're still culling through all the data to get a detailed view of the '08 holiday stats and facts. Thanks to our resident research expert, Chad White, we now have a new FREE reportlet to help us sort through the mountain of numbers and focus on the biggest stories.

Check out some of the stats he's uncovered:
Retailers ratcheted up their send volumes by 43% during the holiday email season
Retailers sent approximately 3.9 promotional emails during the week of Dec. 19
The Retail Email Index was up 15% year-over-year during the holiday email season
This season, 15% of retailers more than doubled their email output

And that's just the short of it. Chad goes into great detail to explain the results of the holiday email hoopla that sent retail email volume through the roof. This 6-page reportlet discusses trends around the overall frequency increases during the holidays, the breakdown of weekly holiday vs. pre-holiday send volumes, and the impact of pre-holiday frequencies on holiday frequencies.

Ready to dig into the data? Download the free reportlet now.

From: Smith-Harmon
Subject Line: Get a FREE Email Redesign
Date: January 8, 2009

Hey, all you EEC attendees, listen up. This is your chance to get a FREE email redesign. Yep, you heard that right. A FREE email redesign! As part of the Email Creative Fight Night session during this year's Email Evolution Conference, three top agencies will be redesigning emails chosen from those submitted by EEC attendees, like you!

I'll be moderating the session and the ringside judges will be Dylan Boyd from eROI, Julian Scott from Responsys and Mike Corak from Mighty Interactive.

Interested in throwing your current email program into the redesign ring?
Submit your emails for redesign by January 13 to Ali Swerdlow at aswerdlow@the-dma.org.

P.S. If you're looking for some pointers on how to improve your current email design, be sure to check out the Email Design Workshop at the Email Evolution Conference .

Learn how to design for images off, optimize subject line and body copy, use animated gifs and video, create strong calls to action and put together strong content strategies.

Speakers include: Matthew Caldwell, Creative Director at Yesmail, Aaron Smith, Principal at Smith-Harmon; Jessica Morris, eMail Marketing Manager, Pottery Barn Brands (Pottery Barn, Pottery Barn Kids and PBteen); and Chad White,Research Director, Smith-Harmon.

Get more info about the Email Evolution Conference >

From: Smith-Harmon
Subject Line: Retail Email Year-End Trends for 2008
Date: January 6, 2009

If you're in the midst of planning your 2009 email marketing strategy, this free reportlet from Chad White, Smith-Harmon's research director, is a definite must-read. It's packed with stats, trends and charts about the overall retail email volume, frequency and timing among the top online retailers in 2008. Want to know which days of the week were most popular to send retail emails? Interested in the top 20 retail email days of the year? Ready to learn what the SECOND biggest retail email season was, behind Christmas? Fasten your seatbelt and get ready for a few surprises.

Download the free reportlet now to get the panoramic view of what happened in the world of retail email in 2008.

From: Smith-Harmon
Subject Line: Merry Email Marketing MAD LIBS from Smith-Harmon
Date: December 22, 2008

Remember how much fun MAD LIBS were as a kid? Take a trip down memory lane with Merry Email Marketing MAD LIBS from Smith-Harmon! Chad White, our research whiz, has put together some festive fill-in-the-blank fun with a special email twist. No one's really working this week anyways, right? (Just kidding, Lisa and Aaron.) But seriously, download these merry makers and share them with your coworkers for a laughternoon break. When you’re done, post your stories as a comment to this blog entry for all to see.

Download Merry Email Marketing MAD LIBS >

P.S. Here's mine!

Dear Santa, I’ve been very bossy this year. Using my silly email marketing strategies, I drove ten dollars in sales, which everyone agrees is industry-leading. In fact, during my annual performance review, my boss, who we’ve secretly nicknamed GoGo, said I'm the bestest marketer she has ever met during her five-year career. During the Valentine’s Day season, one loudly crafted email sold out the gold-plated Tickle Me Elmo that we outbid WalMart for. And during the back-to-school season, one of my emails sold a record number of horse-print jeans. Because I’ve been so nice, I hope you’ll grant this gorgeous Christmas wish and destroy Earthlink with a hail of frozen shoes.

From: Smith-Harmon
Subject Line: Chad White's Cyber Monday Report
Date: December 5, 2008

Online retailers put a lot of bank behind Cyber Monday this year, and the big question is: Did it pay off? That's a big ole YES from Chad White, Smith-Harmon's new Research Director. His latest FREE reportlet, Cyber Monday Sees Record Retail Email Volume is packed with much more than just retail email volume and messaging stats. This 11-page gem gets into a full-on discussion of messaging trends with creative samples.

Download the free reportlet now to get the complete story on the biggest day in online shopping.

From: Smith-Harmon
Subject Line: Stop the Press!
Date: December 1, 2008

Smith-Harmon Names Retail Email Expert Chad White as Research Director
Email Marketing Agency Launches Research Library

SEATTLE, Dec. 1, 2008 — Smith-Harmon, Inc., an email marketing strategy and creative services agency, today announced the appointment of respected email industry expert Chad White as its Research Director. In this newly created role, White will produce research on retail email marketing practices, perform industry outreach and help support Smith-Harmon clients.

“I am proud and excited to announce that Chad is joining the Smith-Harmon team,” said Lisa Harmon, Principal. “We have long admired his invaluable contributions to this space, including his Retail Email Blog, his research reports on email marketing best practices and trends, his insightful Email Insider columns, and his involvement with the Email Experience Council. Chad is well-known throughout the industry for his thought-leadership. His knowledge and experience will not only add tremendous value to Smith-Harmon, but will continue to benefit all marketers through our newly launched Research Library.”

All of White’s upcoming research reports, including a recap of Cyber Monday activity later this week, will be available for download in the Research Library, along with research from other Smith-Harmon team members.

Aaron Smith, Principal, said: “We are delighted to have Chad join our team. His efforts will figure significantly in the enhancement of our research and strategic consulting service offerings. Not only is Smith-Harmon positioned to offer our clients deeper and broader support; we are also poised to better serve the entire industry by becoming a premier source of quality research.”

Prior to joining Smith-Harmon, White was the Director of Retail Insights and Editor-at-Large at the Email Experience Council (eec), the email marketing arm of the Direct Marketing Association. He headed up the eec’s research efforts, writing dozens of reports, while also working with the eec’s Member Roundtables to hone and publish their research. Before the eec, he was an editor at Dow Jones & Co. and a managing editor at Condé Nast.

From: Me
Subject Line: 2008 Retail Email Subscription Benchmark Study Released!
Date: Wednesday, November 19, 2008

2007 was all about relevancy. 2008 is all about the subscriber. In fact, subscribers are the new black. Stay on top of the trend: check out the terrifically thorough and incredibly interesting Retail Email Subscription Benchmark Study, authored by Chad White of the eec, to help you build a richer, more effective email subscription experience.

Learn more about the groundbreaking study now >

From: Me
Subject Line: Retail Email Guide to the Holiday Season
Date: Tuesday, August 26, 2008

This just in: the Email Experience Council just released the Retail Email Guide to the Holiday Season! Last year, the eec tracked more than 3,300 emails from more than 100 top online retailers during the fourth quarter and released daily reports on strategies, tactics and trends via the Retail Email Blog. Based on that monitoring, they've created a helpful roadmap to the email holiday season so retailers and other B2C companies can better formulate their campaigns this year. This is a hugely valuable resource: make sure to make it a part of your holiday planning! Learn more about the Retail Email Guide to the Holiday Season here >

In true blogger fashion, I am happy to announce the launch of our newly redesigned blog via a blog posting :)

In addition to the fancy new look, the blog will include many more voices from the S-H team, providing a well-rounded perspective on email industry topics, from creative and strategy to copywriting and coding. Look for lots of new faces joining the blogging crew in the coming weeks!

A big thanks to all the hard-working members of team who contributed and helped make this happen!

From: Me
Subject Line: Live from the Airport: EEC Email Evolution Conference Highlights
Date: Wednesday, February 13, 2008

Congratulations to the EEC team for putting together a fantastic event; the Email Evolution Conference was evolutionary. My five favorite moments:

(1) The inspiring and entertaining kick-off keynote, which included video, audience surveys and Craig Spiezle (Microsoft's Director of Security) in a USPS uniform.
(2) The illuminating discussion about how to set up a successful internal service bureau with Lauren Skena (National Geographic), Tim Norris (Gannett), Brian Schonherz (Conde Nast) and Christina Nicholson (Williams-Sonoma).
(3) The thought-provoking (and entertaining) conversation around subscriber list health between Bob Frady (Live Nation) and Clint Kaiser (Epsilon).
(4) The forward-looking perspectives on the future of the industry from Eric Kirby (Merkle), Loren McDonald (Silverpop) and Anthony Ginn (eHarmony).
(5) David Daniels' (Jupiter Research) introduction of the word "blastards," used to refer to out-of-control batch-and-blasters.

From: FreePeople.com
Subject Line: Short Pants Romance
Date: Friday, February 1, 2008

Email + Social Networking = so hot right now! Yet despite all the talk, I haven't seen many retailers integrate email messaging with MySpace sites. Enter the notably-early-adapting Free People! (They've been blogging and RSSing forever.) Check out the hotlink to add them as a MySpace friend at the upper-right of this email. Kudos to Free People for sticking their toe into the Email + Social Networking pool! Although I'm not sure I'd recommend becoming an early adapter on the "Short Pants" trend. With construction boots? Yikes! Not hot.

From: Williams-Sonoma
Subject Line: Welcome to Our New Williams-Sonoma Site
Date: Monday, January 28, 2008

For those of you who haven't seen the newly-relaunched williams-sonoma.com, it is gorgeous! Very fresh. Check it out >

From: Me
Subject Line: Smith-Harmon and REI are 2008 EEC Performance Award Finalists!
Date: Thursday, January 24, 2008

I am proud to announce that Smith-Harmon and REI are 2008 EEC Performance Award finalists! See the details on the EEC website >

The Email Experience Council created the Email Performance Award to recognize an individual or company that has created a campaign that demonstrates the full power of email marketing. Chosen by the members of the eec, the winning campaign will provide further evidence of email marketing’s unsurpassed return on investment and provide inspiration to others seeking to elevate the performance of their own programs. Entries will be evaluated for their marketing strategy, creative components and—most importantly—results. Learn more >

Members of the eec can vote for the winner from among the Email Performance Award finalists. Just log into your eec account and follow the instructions. Voting concludes at the end of day on Monday, Jan. 28. Vote now >

About our entry:
Working with our team, REI - the outdoors apparel and gear retailer - redesigned its July 7 “Summer Shoes Gearmail” email, implementing a range of best practices to optimize for viewing in preview panes, to improve readability, and to make calls-to-action more prominent. For the redesigned email, the unique click-through rate rose 22%, unique traffic to target specialty shop rose 90%, and revenue per email rose 11%. Because of the strength of the results of this creative test, REI moved forward with an entire suite of redesigned, maximized email creative templates in time for the critical fourth-quarter period.
For details, view our nomination form >

And check out the creative:
Summary of Redesigned Creative Innovations >
Legacy Creative >
Legacy Creative in Preview Pane >
Redesigned Creative >
Redesigned Creative in Preview Pane >

From: Me
Subject Line: MAKE IT POP! Launches on the EEC Blog
Date: Thursday, October 25, 2007

I am proud to announce that I have joined the Email Experience Council blog as a contributor with "MAKE IT POP!", a weekly post dedicated to reviewing the good, the bad and the ugly in email creative.

The EEC blog is a forum for the email marketing industry's leading voices, where you'll find the opinions and thought-leadership that are driving the next evolution of email. Visit blog.emailexperience.org to check out "MAKE IT POP!", plus tons of other posts by smart folks including Bill McCloskey, Chad White, Stephanie Miller and more.