Open rate pitfall reading edition and referance guide

Fail Proof Ways of getting in the in box

In Box Dilemma

In Box Dilemma By Frederick Owen Jr. www.winwithfred.com

Inbox Dilemma Printable version

OPEN RATE PITFALL • Thanks for subscribing, here’s your free gift... That’s

where so many like myself started and that is where the free fall began. It is well and good that you thanked your new subscriber but did you direct them the right way. You see, I was a subscriber to my own email list and found my emails in the spam box...I was like, it’s all Awebers fault I thought, but it really wasn’t. You see, some things are out of your control, but there is a huge question we forget to ask our brand new subscriber...

• Thank you for subscribing, please add me to your

contacts so you will continue to get our valuable emails and we wont end up in your pile of junk mail.

• Rule of thumb is when they go to my thank you page I

ask them to do just that, and when they get my first follow-up I do the same. Your not only directing them the right direction your become a VIP in their contact list. Just remember, you can lose that VIP status if you start hammering them with garbage so keep it relevant.

� Fact is, if you don’t ask them the odds of you ending up

in the Spam box do up dramatically.

EMAIL FORMAT

Subject Line • Keep the subject line less then 49 characters, reason

being, it is likely going to get cut off in their user preview depending on who they have their email through. Also, don’t go too short because that can trigger some bad results.

• keep the punctuation down to a bare minimum, there is

no need to give blast them with exclamation points or crazy dollar signs, cause that is a good way of getting kicked straight out of the inbox.

• Eliminate the “CAPS” - Do not hit your subject line with

a ton of Capital Letters, it will not get you through a lot of the SPAM Filters.

• Test your subject lines, split test them. Make them

relevant to your email content. A very cool tool I came across is called the Free Subject Line Checker, it grades your subject line based upon thousands of emails submitted.

• Don’t copy other peers emails, it is okay to get different

ideas from different avenues but if you copy it looks sloppy and just doesn’t sit well with fellow marketers. Be an innovator of your craft, and you will stand out.


Email Body

• The email body is one of the hardest things for an email marketer because so many times they get caught up in the long, drawn out emails. The first sentence or 2 have the most impact.

• Don’t copy other peers emails, it is okay to get different

ideas from different avenues but if you copy it looks sloppy and just doesn’t sit well with fellow marketers, Be an innovator of your craft.

• Keep it Relevant to the subject line and to the point .

Don’t be sneaky and try to lure someone into just clicking on the email with some off the wall verbiage. One thing you need to always remember is why did they sign up for your email newsletter in the first place? If you promise them training, give them training. Once someone sees that you are legitimately there to help them they will be looking forward to your emails and will trust you.

• Always use your real name or business name, if they

find out that your not who you are prepare for the unsubscribe.

• When sending an email message make sure the offer is

relevant to the target audience!

Recommendations for Avoiding Spam Filters Industry experts estimate between 10 and 20 percent of permissioned email messages do not arrive in the inbox as intended because the receiving ISP incorrectly identified the message as spam. This presents a problem for marketers because revenue is lost and campaign results are inaccurate. Message Guidelines You may wish to follow these guidelines when designing a message. Please remember that these are general rules and do not provide a 100% guarantee that a filter will not tag your message. Message Length Keep the message short and to the point (about one page maximum in length). The additional details of a message should be provided on a hyperlinked web page. Key Selling Points Use bullet points to illustrate the key selling points, which will tell the user why they should respond to the call-to-action. Images Use ALT tags in the HTML code for each image used in the HTML design. Minimize graphics and images to logos, photos of products, or situational photos that support the message and appeal to the target audience visually.


To Share or not to Share? Include share buttons for one or more social marketing sites. This will enhance credibility and help your campaign to go “viral.” If I get an email that really grabs me I share it, so the goal for you is to want someone to share the love. Sharing = More Prospects. Social media is so powerful that there is really no reason to not take advantage of the many benefits it has to offer. Should I use P.S. This is one thing I have realized it is very beneficial to use, because next to the Subject line this is one of the most widely looked at areas in the email. Now remember, you still have to keep it relevant and use a lot of the tips above. The p.s. or even p.p.s. gives you another chance to reaffirm your call to action or even put another offer on the table with a different link. You just want to make sure that you are not bombarding your subscribers with offer after offer and no substance. If you don’t explain your product or opportunity you are losing a major chance of generating a sale, but remember...you want them craving for more. Your message will get deleted and you will not build any trust with your subscriber, and that in turn will result in wasted time and wasted sales. The thing is the email structure and content will reflect your sales, hands down

The links How many links should I have in my email? That is a good question, it really depends on what you are offering. Rule of thumb is to have 2 to 5 links, but make sure they are relevant to the email. If they are in the right position of the email, they will get clicked. Note: I personally only like to use 3 at the most.


DOES FONT REALLY MATTER?

It sure does, and here are the reasons why? You should only use universally available fonts Arial, Verdana, Tahoma, or Times New Roman. Any other fonts will resort to a default font if the recipient doesn’t have it installed on their computer. Minimize the number of fonts, sizes, and colors for an overall more efficient look and design. If you have different sizes and different fonts it can create a very messy, unprofessional looking email. • Arial • Veranda • Tahoma • Times New Roman

Note: You can use others fonts if you wish but I have had the best luck with these.

CALL TO ACTION, DO YOU HAVE IT

Always remember why your sending the email, of course to make money, but how are you going to present it. A few key pointers to remember The Product or opportunity 1.What will it do for them? 2.Tell them why they need to this now! 3.Tell them what they need to do after they hit the page. "after they watch the video instruct them on how to take advantage of this amazing opportunity. You want them to know more...so they want to click on the link to find out more about your product or opportunity. Try to make it in a story format, like something going on in the world or a personal thing that you have been dealing with. The goal is to incorporate your story with your product. Remember, practice makes perfect. Don’t be a car salesman, Hype is overrated, pretend like your writing to a friend. Do not sound desperate either. build trust. Once trust is built you have a customer for life, and that is priceless.


GET YOUR MOBILE ON Consider designing a template that will render in a mobile device. According to 21st Century Marketer, 32% of U.S. mobile email users age 18 or older with an Internet-‐enabled phone check personal email via a mobile device between one and three times daily. And that percentage is growing every year. Capitalize on this statistic and increase your open and click rate. Marketers must follow new email best practices to ensure emails are easy to read on a mobile device, or the opportunity to market to a prospect may be lost. In 2012, The Radicati Group put out a report that states that the total number of worldwide email accounts are expected to increase from 3.3. billion accounts to over 4.3 billion accounts by 2016, 730 million of these accounts access email via mobile or tablet devices.

TO MUCH TECH CAN WRECK YOUR CAMPAIGN Use HTML software such as Dreamweaver, FrontPage or Adobe GoLive to create the HTML. Do not use word processors or publishing software that isn’t specifically created for website or email production. ImageReady or Fireworks can be used in some instances, along with HTML software, if used properly. The email itself should not include Cascading Style Sheets (CSS), JavaScript, Submission Forms, Layers or Rich Media (Flash movies, animation etc). These cause deliverability issues that can affect the campaign responses, hinder deliverability for future campaigns, and render incorrectly in many email ISPs. Use basic HTML tags for the coding. If your HTML software uses CSS for formatting, adjust the preferences to apply formatting as basic HTML tags only. If absolutely necessary, inline style sheets are an acceptable substitute for CSS. Do not use comments in the HTML code of your email as they can potentially trigger spam flagging. Provide a hyperlink to a related website or at least an email address that the recipient can contact if there is not a website available. Keep the width of the HTML message under 650 pixels to ensure the design is not cut off in the recipient’s preview panel. This eliminates the need for scrolling horizontally to see the whole design.


(continued) Keep the message size under 50KB for consumer emails and under 75KB for business emails to optimize download time and deliverability.

MORE HELPFUL TACTICLE TECH TIPS

Whenever possible, minimize the use of images in the design to avoid potential problems. The more images there are, the more time it takes for a recipient to download the email. If a recipient’s Internet speed is slow, your images may just be an obstacle to viewing. The higher the ratio of image-to-text area in an HTML, the higher the SPAM score. We recommend that no more than 33% of the design area be images or graphics, and the rest should be formatted text. Many recipients have images disabled in their email account on any emails from unknown senders. They won’t see any information that is in the images unless they choose to download them. If you have formatted text in the HTML, the recipient can at least read the text part of the email. After being able to read the text and discover what the message is, they will be more likely to allow the images to download and act on the offer. Remember that text within any images needs to be a larger size. When images are optimized or compressed to reduce file size and maximize download speed for email, the text tends to blur a bit, and will need to be larger to be legible.

(continued) You can check this before sending but it’s better to know this up front than to have to redesign the images after the fact. Do not use background images that are not supported across all email clients. Test your content rendering with Return Path and Pivotal Veracity to provide campaign preview reporting on a given offer. This type of reporting will provide a real-time snapshot of how the email content is rendering across all major ISPs and mobile devices (with both images on and off).


EXTRA INFO

RESOURCE GUIDE

• Sender score – Check your IP Address score for free -

https://www.senderscore.org/ • Subject Line Checker – Checks your subject line and

grades it. There is also an app for your phone as well. http://www.subjectline.com

• Return Path – An excellent resource for any Marketer or business. You can get your IP address certified. Plus it has many other very cool tools. http://www.returnpath.com

• Email Grader – a very cool and free tool to use to grade your email’s and take your campaigns to the next level. http://www.email.grader.com/

• Email Spam test – Another tool to make sure your emails stay out of the junk pile. http://www.emailspamtest.com

• Litmus email testing – another really cool tool to use, they also have paid plans as well to go even deeper into your emailing - https://litmus.com/email-testing

• Campaign Monitor Free HTML email template builder - http://www.campaignmonitor.com/templates/

• Mobile Marketing Association http://www.mmaglobal.com

• Mobile Search Magazine – http://www.mobilemarketingmagazine.co.uk

• Mobile Marketing Watch – http://mobilemarketingwatch.com

• Mashable – http://www.mashable.com/category/mobile • Mobile Search Marketing –

http://www.mobilesearchmarketing.com • Mobile Marketing Forum –

http://mobilemarketingforum.com


• Get Response – One of the top 5 email Marketing auto responders. http://www.getresponse.com

• Mobivity – http://www.blog.mobivity.com • arpReach - The all-new Auto Response Plus – Drive up

email delivery with no monthly fee. http://arpreach.com/ • Drive up email delivery no monthly fees. • Aweber - #1 choice for affiliate Marketers.

http://www.aweber.com

Open rate pitfall reading edition and referance guide

Marketing

frederick

key selling

open rate

basic html

subject line

doesnt sit

return path

box dilemma