A Love Story
Opt-In Email Might Be The Most Effective Form Of Marketing Out There
Now let's make sure we don't kill it.
Email marketing combines an already declared interest with a cheap delivery system and incredible opportunities to leverage consumer data. It presents a way to acquire new customers or supporters and provides a vehicle for engagement and retention.
It's also really easy to overdo.
If I had to sum up 16 years of email work in one word it would be balance. Whether it's lead generation or sustainer engagement, aggressive retail or heartfelt cause-related marketing, be prepared for a constant struggle in balancing frequency, intensity and results.
It's why I spend a lot of time talking about the psychology of the inbox. It's not always about what you want to say. It's what they want to hear.
The Old Saying Is
The right message to the right person at the right time.
The right message to the right person at the right time.
Two Quick War Stories
Including success on the 18th try.
Pretty much everything I do is a test. Even if it's been successful in the past, there are always opportunities for optimization. Constant, ongoing testing is your best friend.
At a lead generation company for auto dealers, we specialized in bad credit loans. Folks would be paying really high rates and we historically tried to hide that in every way possible. I lobbied for honesty and a reframing of the numbers — folks could rebuild their credit for the price of a Starbucks run. On the 18th email, we tried that approach. The response rate quadrupled.
Later we tried another bit of math that I had worked out. If your new car gets 10 miles per gallon better than your old car, the savings will cover the higher interest cost. That one worked really well, too.
The point here is that even with all the data to crunch, and all that's possible through segmentation and testing, it still comes down to the message.
The Importance Of Tone
Email is not a billboard. It's a conversation.
A Human Voice Matters
It's not always about what you want to say. It's what the reader is looking for.
Writing broadcast news was great training for the online world because it teaches you to write for the ear. When people read, they hear a little voice inside their head, and the more you write with rhythm, the faster they'll go through the four stages of reading a fundraising email.
• Should I do something?
• Can I do something?
• I have to do something.
• I have to do something right now.
Between eight and 13 seconds
That's how long you have to grab someone's attention in an email inbox.
As much as I want to talk about email techniques in B2B settings, or how to craft a newsletter that actually works, I want to emphasize two key points:
• Whatever you are trying to do, you have to do it fast.
• It's okay to be funny.
You will find there are times when long personalized email stories serve your purpose. You will also find, by analyzing your results, that sometimes you just need a picture, a paragraph, and a call-to-action.
A Special Note On Math And Non-Profit Emails
Email Is A 1/2,000 Game
The trick is getting the one without alienating the other 1,999.
All things being equal, a 0.5% donation rate is shooting par when it comes to a fundraising email. This figure depends on a number of things — from your particular field to your audience engagement level. Results can be affected byexternal factors like the economy or your cause being in the news. Performance can be impacted by internal considerations such as deliverability rates or list segmentation
At my last job, I'm non-disclosed on specifics but I can say we routinely crushed that 1/2,000 average donation-to-send ratio. Some outfits prefer a money-to-emails-sent metric, but I always preferred counting people instead of dollars.
The eternal question in email is how often you can send, and how often you can ask for money, before you see performance drop. The only way to find out is to send until you hit resistance. There's a lot of data science in testing that, but there's a bit of art involved, too.
Thing is, nowadays there's a simple way to make your email campaigns more effective.
Don't do what Donald Trump is doing.