Concep Best Practice Guide

8/7/2019 Concep Best Practice Guide

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B2B EMAIL MARKETING

BEST PRACTICE GUIDE 2009

www.concepglobal.com


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For more best practice and insight, visit www.concepglobal.comCopyright 2009, Concep Inc

B2B Email Marketing:Best Practice Guide 2009

Dear fellow B2B marketer,

Another 12 months have passed and email marketing continues to evolve as a key

channel within the B2B marketing mix. Whilst unsolicited email remains a signicant

problem and even legitimate marketers continue to send untargeted messages,

there still exists a great opportunity to harness the power of the channel by following

a few simple rules.

This guide, based on that which I wrote last year, contains additional topics which have

come to the fore as key considerations within any email marketing strategy. Using

email to gather data (online forms), segmentation of data and content formatting are

three of these I write about in the 2009 guide.

Perhaps one of the hottest topics is the growing use of handheld devices (such as

Blackberrys) to receive and read email. As if dealing with multiple email clients isnt

enough for our creative teams, we all now have to design our templates for the small

screen as well!

Database (CRM and AMS integration) continues to be integral and in the future we

will look more at integration of email into other channels, such as ofine.

For the time being I guarantee if you follow the pointers within this guide you will be

maximising your success rates from your email marketing campaigns.

Best regards,

Anthony Green

President, Concep New York

+1 212 925 0380

[email protected]


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Table of Contents

Page Topic

2 Brand control and consistency

3 Image blocking and above the fold

5 Online forms surveys and RSVPs

6 Content formatting

7 Different recipients, ve different email formats

9 Deliverability and rendering

11 Subject line and personalisation

12 Segmentation

12 Opt-out/unsubscribe

13 Integration

14 Legal considerations: CAN-SPAM and EU data protection

15 Glossary of terms and About Concep

16 About

17 Check list



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2

BRAND CONTROL &

CONSISTENCYBrand control and consistency should be

key considerations for any professional

organisation looking to communicate to

another. If a client/prospect is exposed

to multiple touch-points of your business

then they should have a consistent brand

experience across every communication

(email, direct mail, web and so on) that

they receive. Brand language should also

be a consistent across all channels.

The worlds largest law rm, Clifford

Chance LLP (www.cliffordchance.com)

has dozens of email marketers across

marketing, business development and

events departments who deliver various

communications locally, nationally and

globally across 29 ofces around the world.

These templates are pre-designed and

developed by a central marketing team in

London, then distributed to various usersas applicable across the globe. See g. 1.

If your organisation has multiple users,

such as the Clifford Chance example above,

another good idea is to only grant access to

the company colour palette, where no user

of the Email Marketing System (EMS) can

access any other colours when building

an email campaign except those that

have been pre-determined by the central

marketing team. See g. 2.

FIG. 1 - Pre-dened email templates for global marketing

FIG. 2 - Specic company color palette is the only option


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3

IMAGE BLOCKING &

ABOVE THE FOLD FOR HTML

As image blocking is becoming more and

more prevalent within email clients such

as Outlook and many webmail services, its

important to consider the incorporation of

above-the-fold design. Within this area

should be such things as date, company

name in text and section links if applicable.

See gs. 3.1 and 3.2.

Ensure your call to action is prominent,perhaps towards the top of the email. Be

sure to include a text link (not only an image)

to again counter image blocking. See g. 4.

FIG. 3.2Preview pane with image

blocking switched off

Image and text both linkto hosted podcast page

FIG. 4Ensure the Call to

action is prominent

Text links to contentbelow

FIG. 3.1Preview pane with image

blocking switched on


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4

FIG. 5.1Image blocking switched on no balance of images with text

FIG. 5.2Image blocking switched on a good balance of images with text

Use images within the email campaign as

appropriate but they must be balanced with

text. Ensure alt-tags are added to every

image. Compare the difference between an

email made up solely of images and one with

a balance of images and text in g. 5.1 and

5.2.

A footnote to this is that newer versions of MS

Outlook add default text before the alt-tag to

make life just a little bit more difcult for us

all!


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5

FIG. 6Microsite pages for data capture

ONLINE FORMS

SURVEYS AND RSVP

Email marketing is a two-way medium of

communication and an efcient method of

gathering data from your recipients in the

form of online surveys and event invitations.

Its important to remember that email clients

can generally not display forms within the

Inbox proper. Therefore the email should link

to a web page microsite where the form is

hosted. Once the recipient is within the web

environment there are no restrictions oncomplexity or data capture.

Inbox

Microsite Page 1

Microsite Page 2


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6

CONTENT FORMATTING

Large amounts of content (within e-newsletters for example) should not all be included

within the rst page delivered to the Inbox. The above the fold links should take the

recipient to a teaser of the article within the body of the email, with a further link to then

drive the recipient online to read the remainder of the article.

This structure allows the recipient to scan the email and quickly navigate to the content

that is most relevant to them. Link tracking then allows us to monitor which content is

most relevant to both the audience as a whole and to the individual recipient.

FIG. 7.2Full articles hosted online

Above the foldlinks take therecipient to therelevant section

Teaser intros withlink to hostedpages

FIG. 7.1Inbox with summary and links


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7

DIFFERENT RECIPIENTS, FIVE

DIFFERENT EMAIL FORMATS

HTML is not the only version to consider.

Another advantage of using a dedicated EMS

is that your emails will (at least, they should)

be delivered as a multi-part message

(MIME), meaning a plain text version will

be delivered to the recipients Inbox in the

event that their email client cannot accept

or render HTML correctly. One should

also ensure that there exists the option for

subscribers to change their delivery formatby way of a subscription form (see more on

subscription forms below).

Concep recommend not including the entire

content of the HTML message within the

Plain Text version, but rather a personalised

message and introductory text enticing the

reader to follow a link which will take them

to a web-hosted version of the email. This

way the reporting functionality of the EMS

can still be utilised. See g. 8.

Link to web version of the HTML

FIG. 8Plain text message with link to web version


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8

Link to mobile andprint-friendly versio

FIG. 9Links to web and print/mobile versions

Two versions down but still three to go!

A link to the web-hosted version should

also live at the top of the HTML campaign,

this time for those who receive a mangled

version of the HTML (old versions of

Lotus Notes, Novel Groupwise etc will

mangle HTML). For the growing number

of recipients who pickup their email via

a mobile device (e.g. Blackberry) another

link to a print/mobile version should be

prominent above the fold. See g. 9.

The nal version involves attaching a PDF

version of the full email campaign. Prior to

send, the entire HTML email can be converted

to a PDF (via a third party PDF creation tool)

and attached as a downloadable le within

the email. Some recipients will prefer to

save your email marketing messages to

their desktop or print them in PDF form, so

including this fth and nal version caters for

almost all tastes.

Link to web version of the HTML


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9

DELIVERABILITY AND RENDERING

Marketing messages delivered by email should not be sent from the individuals email

address or even the companies domain. A dedicated domain should be established for

marketing messages so they are separated from regular email communications. This is

important as phishing and spoong schemes, where fraudsters send emails under the

guise of a recognised brand (nancial services brands are frequently targeted), use real

domains but are sending the emails from other mail servers.

Another risk with using your own domain for your email marketing is that of blacklisting

your whole organisations email trafc. Groups such as Spamhaus and Spamcop see

themselves as the Spam Police and have the ability to contact ISPs to register a domain

as Spam. Management are understandably upset when the entire company cannot sendany emails because your last email marketing campaign was reported by one person

who acted on it. See g. 10 for examples of dedicated domains.

In addition, creating HTML code in Dreamweaver (or similar) and pasting it into

Outlook or Lotus Notes is an absolute no-go. Not only does this contravene the

former point of not using your day-to-day email client but less control can be

exerted over how the email will render once it arrives (if it arrives) at its destination.

Using a dedicated EMS is strongly suggested as it not only gives more control over

this but the sender can also see how many emails were delivered, how many wereopened and how many were undeliverable, amongst a wide array of other reports

available across various EMS. Creating and sending email from Outlook and Lotus

Notes is simply Email marketing in the dark.

FIG. 10Examples of standard and dedicated domains

...creating HTML code

in Dreamweaver (orsimilar) and pastingHTML into Outlookor Lotus Notes is anabsolute no-go

Company Standard

domain

Dedicated domain for email

marketing

Ernst & Young @uk.ey.com @eyintouch.co.uk

Grant Thornton @gtuk.com @ecomms.grant-thornton.co.uk

Bank of New York @bankofny.com @consultantlink.bankofny.com


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10

FIG. 11.1From email address

FIG. 11.2From name

Further, all email marketing campaigns

should be sent from a consistent and

recognisable address, hence the former

point of a hard-coded dedicated domain

across all communications. The physical

from name can be adapted of course and

should be as specic to the mailing list as

feasible. Many EMSs allow for the from

name to be mail merged from the database,

meaning each recipient can receive their

email from the specic contact within

the business with whom they deal. Open

and response rates have been proven to

increase when the recipient receives an

email from a senior partner Bob Smith

rather than Smith and Smith LLP. See g

11.1 and 11.2.

Customisable prex to email address Hard coded dedicated domain

Mail merge the recipients contact

name with the company


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11

SUBJECT LINE

Ensure the subject line accurately reects

the content of the email but also grabs

attention. Try some split testing to see

what works across different mailing lists.

Split testing simply means dividing mailing

lists up into smaller groups (perhaps

simply down the middle) and testing

different subject lines on each group to see

if there is any change in open/view rates or

other statistics such as click-throughs or

response rates.

The more targeted your campaign the

more engaging the subject line can be, as

you focus in on the main message without

worrying about alienating other readers.

In terms of recommended length, opinions

differ. My suggestion is to make it as long as

it needs, to be both engaging and reective

of content. It could be 10 or 30 characters -

the choice is yours..

FIG. 12Personalisation

PERSONALISATION

At the very least the To line should

include the recipients rst and last name.

Its also a good idea to personalise the

introduction, such as Dear Mr Green

or Hi Anthony, via a simple mail merge

through the EMS. See g. 12.

Personalised To name and introduction

The more targeted your campaign the moreengaging the subject line can be, as you focusin on the main message without worryingabout alienating other readers


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12

SEGMENTATION

Data/contact segmentation is one of the many

goals of targeted marketing. How relevant

are your contacts nding the content? Are

they clicking on links, downloading les

and transitioning from merely a name on a

database to a hot prospect or customer?

This is where segmentation comes in. More

relevant emails lead to increased response

rates, which can mean a greater ROI for your

email marketing efforts. As an example, youcan create segments based on rules such as:

a specic data eld

how often recipients have viewed campaigns

if contacts have clicked a link or downloaded

a le

This means you can send specic follow-up

email campaigns to only those recipients

who have, for example, clicked a link in the

past 30 days or send a special offer emailto re-engage those contacts who have not

viewed a campaign in the past 60 days.

OPT-OUT/UNSUBSCRIBE

Its absolutely paramount that you ensure

the recipient has the ability to easily opt-out/

unsubscribe from the either the particular

type of communication you have sent them

(e.g. nancial services newsletters) or allcommunications from your organisation.

Once unsubscribed there should exist the

functionality within the EMS to ensure that

email addresses can never be sent an email of

that nature again, even if they are added to a

mailing list inadvertently. See g. 13.

FIG. 13Unsubscribe page

Are they clicking on links, downloading filesand transitioning from merely a name on adatabase to a hot prospect or customer?


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13

Linking to a subscription page is a more robust method of managing user preferences

and unsubscribe requests. Instead of only offering the ability to unsubscribe, give

users the option to also change their preferences by communication type, frequency

etc. See g. 14.

INTEGRATE WITH WEBSITES/MICROSITES

As previously noted, if your email is heavy with content do not include the entire

content within the rst page (i.e. the page that arrives in the Inbox). As a rule of

thumb, the email should not be more than 2-3 screens deep. Use links to Read

more and take the recipient through to a web page to read additional content. Thisalso has great advantage in terms of tracking the topics of interest to the entire

mailing list and individuals themselves.

Many EMSs now integrate with or provide their own web-tracking facility, meaning

once a recipient clicks on a link, you can see every page of the website/microsite

that each individual recipient visits and for how long!

INTEGRATE WITH CRM/AMS

Today its mandatory for any professional organisation to have a centralised CRM

or AMS database where all client and staff data is maintained. All other systems,

including the EMS, should therefore integrate with this by pulling data (names,

email addresses etc) from the database and feeding relevant information (opt-

outs/unsubscribes, undeliverable emails/bouncebacks etc) back, once an email

campaign has been delivered.

FIG. 14Link to an unsubscribe page


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FIG. 16An example of an opt-out page with the additional option of switching emailtracking off

LEGAL CONSIDERATIONS:

CAN-SPAM AND EU DATAPROTECTION

Under CAN-SPAM you must include the

ability for the recipient to opt-out and also

include the valid physical postal address

of your organisation. More information

available here:

http://www.ftc.gov/opa/2008/05/canspam.shtm

Under EU data protection a similar rule

applies. Within the UK a new rule wasintroduced on January 1, 2007 stating that

the name of the UK Registered company

entity, the company registration number,

the place of registration (i.e. England and

Wales) and the registered ofce address

be included on every email marketing

campaign. See g. 15.

Additionally, it is illegal to move data out of

the EU without the recipients knowledge.

To do so, the data controller must beregistered with Safe Harbour or have

Model Contracts in place which ensure the

data is held in an environment acceptable

under EU law.

Within certain countries (such as Germany)

there is a grey area around the tracking

capabilities of an EMS. The sender must give

the recipient the option of refusing to have

their data captured and email interactions

tracked. Within g. 16 is an example of anopt-out page with the additional option of

switching email tracking off.

FIG. 15Include company number and place of registration/head ofce address


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15

GLOSSARY OF TERMS

Email client Outlook, Lotus Notes, Hotmail, AOL etc are all examples of email

clients.

EMS (Email Marketing System) a dedicated technology developed to create and

deliver email marketing campaigns. This does not include Outlook, Lotus Notes

and other email clients designed for one-to-one or one-to-few communications.

Image blocking refers to an email client that does not download imagery within

a HTML email by default. Research suggests 50-70% of recipients of B2B emails

will have image blocking enabled.

Alt tags are descriptions of an image (such as Concep logo.gif) that will appear

in place of an image if image blocking is enabled.

Reports among the many advantages of an EMS are the reporting capabilities.

Seeing who opened/viewed your email, what links they followed or les they

downloaded and which addresses bounced or were undeliverable are just a

handful of the reports available to the marketer.


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ABOUT CONCEP

Concep provides marketing technology and services globally through ofces in

London, New York and Sydney.

Our experienced team partners with organisations that need to harness and nurture

high-value commercial relationships. 15 of the worlds top 30 law rms work with

us and over 200 of our clients are globally recognised brands across property,

nancial and professional services sectors.

Concep Campaigner is the leading interactive email marketing platform for business

to business marketers. It supports the needs of busy marketers who need to deliver

highly professionally branded interactive email communications, whilst providingan insight into the behaviour of recipients through detailed reporting.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Anthony Green was Sales & Marketing Director at Concep London for over three

years, driving Business Development within key vertical markets. In that time Anthony

worked with clients such as Baker & McKenzie, BearingPoint, Ernst & Young and

Cushman & Wakeeld. He was the founding Chairman of the Internet Advertising

Bureau (IAB) B2B Council, a member of the IAB Email Marketing Council, a member

of the Institute of Direct Marketing (IDM) B2B Council, a course lecturer at IDM

courses and a presenter for the IDM Academy at industry events, such as Technology

for Marketing & Internet World. Anthony also regularly presented for Professional

Services Marketing Group (PSMG) and the Financial Services Forum (FSF). He was

also named one of B2B Marketings Top 20 UK Marketers in 2005.

Anthony is also a member of the Email Experience Council (EEC) and the Legal

Marketing Association (LMA). He moved to the role of President, Concep New York in

February 2007 and now heads up Conceps US operations. He may be contacted at

[email protected] .


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CHECKLIST

Have I developed a pre-approved set of email templates that ensure brand control and brandconsistency across all my email communications that reect other marketing collateral?

Have I incorporated above the fold design to counter the effects of image blocking?

Is my Call to action prominent and in the form of a link, not just an image which could be blocked?

Is my RSVP or survey hosted online, or on a secondary page of my email?

Is my content spaced out across multiple web pages for easy reading, or have I included it allwithin the Inbox where much of it could be lost?

Have I considered all the different circumstances and preferences of my recipients, in terms ofthe format of email they wish to receive? HTML, Web, Plain text, Print Friendly and PDF?

Am I sending my marketing messages from a dedicated domain or risking my companies day-to-day email domain?

Am I sending raw HTML code from Outlook or Lotus Notes, thereby exerting little control overhow the email will look when (if) it arrives at its destination?

Is my subject line both reective of the content of my email and also attention grabbing?

Am I segmenting my data based upon customer preferences and campaign interactions, therebydelivering more relevant content and deriving increased ROI?

Do I incorporate some level of personalisation within my email? Am I building these recipientproles over time?

Have I offered a no-nonsense opt-out/unsubscribe option for my recipients?

Have I set up a web subscription form to capture new subscribers from my website that also offersother options (different content, more/less regular emails etc) than simply unsubscribe?

Have I integrated my email marketing campaigns with my website so I can track traffic oneach page?

Can I integrate my EMS with my central database or CRM/AMS system for seamless data control?

Have I made the necessary legal considerations and do I comply with CAN-SPAM and EU dataprotection (as applicable)?

To speak with a specialist, contact [email protected]

YES NO


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