Thursday, October 6, 2016

TIMING AND FREQUENCY - Anatomy of an Email Inbox - SOUR eMail - Oct 6, 2016

People who have worked with me have heard me talk about timing and frequency of emails many times.  Some of the culprits that soured me the most were the book stores.  What are they thinking?  I don't know about you, but I am a prolific reader, both for pleasure and for work but I certainly don't go to the bookstore every day or even every week and sometimes not even every month.  However, it would never fail that I would get emails from the bookstores that I subscribed to every single day.

Did they really think I had the time to read these or that I wanted to?   With email open rates consistently hovering around 20 to 25% and click through rates far less than that, (2 to 3%), we can do better. What happened, which is what happens I suspect, to a lot of emails is they became disinter-mediated from my attention.  I patently ignored them and ultimately unsubscribed from those emails as they were just filling up my inbox with little to no value.  No more waste for me and no more money for them.  SOUR eMail

I took a look at my email box over the last few days and here's what I see.

Loft

Between sender "Loft" and "Loft Card" I have received 7 emails as of 7 am this morning (I know I will receive one more today!) since October 3rd - that is 2 per day (not counting the "sponsored" email).  Now, I love clothes, like I love to read, but do I really need 2 per day?  I can't even tell you the last time I walked into their store or went to their website and I haven't been compelled by their subject lines (another topic coming) to open.  Even, the "Free Shipping + 50% off everything" one is losing out on my attention because I get too many - SOUR eMail!  Loft, you can do better.

I also wonder why they aren't coordinating their lists and emails to reduce both their workload and my irritation.  Most Email Service Providers (ESPs) have automated resting rules that let you set a standard of how many emails you send a day, but if you are using different accounts or have different teams working on these programs, this is being overlooked.  For all of you Chief Marketing Officers (CMO) and marketing leaders, have you developed an email marketing strategy and systems to support this?  It appears from my inbox that this is not happening with Loft and many others.

Side note:  Look at the image below - this view is from a search in my inbox for Loft - you can see that Loft is not titling their documents, so the content I see includes "untitled document" as the description.  SOUR eMail and a big missed opportunity to tell me something of value.


Not to just pick on Loft, here's a few more:

-  Costco - 1 per day
-  Secret Escape - 1 per day
-  Rugs USA - every other day (a little better)
-  White House, Black Market - 1 per day (plus one from WHBM Outlets - again I ask, CMOs', where's your strategy?)
-  VRBO - so far only 1 in 4 days (Yes, I don't take a vacation all the time, not that I wouldn't like to!)

Discount Contact Lens

So who is doing better?  There is a dearth of examples of someone doing well in frequency and timing, but I did have one this week that exemplifies the right way to make email relevant and impactful.  Here's why:

-  I know the brand and they know me
-  They know that I am a customer (good connected databases) and it has been about 90 days since I ordered my last supply of contacts
-  They aren't sending me emails in between my need period (i.e., running out of contacts)
-  They make it personalized by including the exact brand I order
-  They are making the title relevant, telling me they know I am running out
-  They aren't leading with a deal, but are using it to make sure I convert and buy from them (I normally do check for others with a better deal when I'm ready to order - who doesn't like to save money if we can?)
-  When I clicked, it sent me to a landing page with the offer and a reorder button (button could have been higher on the page)

They could be a bit better though:

-  They use sponsored emails to find potentially new customers (but appears they likely aren't screening out their current customers from these, so perhaps a waste of money)
-  When I clicked on the sponsored ad it just took me to their home page rather than a specific location to make it easy for me to respond and see the promotional details



Timing and Frequency

Today's Sample: 291 emails
Overall Grade: D
Top Performer:  Discount Contact Lens - Grade A-

Today's Tips to Improve Your Inbox Anatomy and not be a SOUR eMailer:

-  CMOs and marketers need to have a much more thoughtful and strategic approach to their email programs
-  Database structure and where your data resides across business units and channels is critical to success
-  We need to do a much better job of using the data we have to send fewer but more relevant emails:  collect only the data you need, consolidate it into one database and leverage it to send the right message at the right time to the right person
-  Use resting rules to automate the limits of emails being sent
-  Make sure any landing pages you use are relevant to the reason you are sending the email and make it easy for the recipient to take the action you want
-  Think about your product and frequency of purchase - what is the right communication cadence?  Too many of us over communicate through email.  Test a change to your cadence and measure against open rates, click throughs and ultimately ROI.  Don't forget to consider the opportunity costs of the team members time executing unwanted emails and how they could be better deployed to higher value activities.

The goal of email marketing is to stay relevant, serve our customers and prospects needs when they want and need us and ultimately deliver revenue and ROI to the company.  Email marketing is one of our highest ROI channels, but could it be even better?  Stop SOUR eMail  Let's get smarter about how we execute in this valuable channel before it becomes less so due to our bad practices.

Sources:
MailChimp
MainStreetROI

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