Live From L.A.: Experts Advise On Best E-mail Methods
A packed session at the Direct Marketing Association’s net.marketing conference in Los Angeles Monday heard several e-mail-marketing experts rattle off a handful of best practices in the area.
Rosalind Resnick, president and CEO of NetCreations, New York, explained that prior consent to use personal information is essential online, though it is far from the practice offline. She also advised that putting e-mail house files on the market is risky, and may run afoul of anti-spam laws being developed in the states, such as in California and Virginia.
Tim Choate, president and CEO of FreeShop International Inc., urged marketers to keep the sign-up process simple: FreeShop has an “easy-join” method, where surfers put in only their e-mail address to receive mail–no other personal data is required (FreeShop has seen a 400% growth in sign ups since doing this).
Regina Brady, vice president of Interactive Services for Acxiom/Direct Media, said that it’s important to make sure the recipient of targeted e-mail knows whom it’s coming from, even if the mailer is using a service bureau. “You’ve spent a lot of time building name-brand equity and you need to leverage that,” she said.
Brady also advised including several hot links that take consumers throughout your site, segmenting your list just as in a direct mail campaign and personalizing messages by using names and by other means. It’s important, she said, to make sure you can handle the traffic coming back from a campaign (expect a 5% response); if you can’t, send the messages out over the course of a day or so.
Finally, when offering an opt out, Brady said, don’t follow the common method of making consumers hit return and change the subject line to “unsubscribe.” Instead, send them to a Web page where they can unsubscribe themselves–and offer a chance to stay on. She said that Acxiom’s interactive customers save 40% of potential opt outers that way–they change minds.
Also speaking were Stuart Obermann, president of Revnet Systems Inc., and Ben Parker, corporate solutions consultant for L-Soft International Inc. Both companies offer products and services addressing the technical aspects of doing e-mail campaigns.
