10) Delivery Timing: Be conscientious of the times, dates, days of the
weeks, and frequency with which the emails are delivered. There are a large
number of theories regarding the best email delivery times, but in general
you can be sure that Tuesday through Thursday is your best delivery window
for B2B emails and in general you want to get the emails into the
recipients' inbox during their working hours. Emails sent in the middle of
the night are more likely to be spam and more likely to be viewed as such.
If you can tweak your delivery settings to allow for a slight delay between
each email, that has also been shown to improve results. Also, if you send
out 1,000 emails a day spread out over 10 days, you will generally get
better results than 10,00 emails all sent in one day.
9) Diversify and Customize: Use a variety of email content and
subject lines when possible. This will make your emails look less like spam
as they hit corporate servers and you will avoid the "all eggs in one
basket" scenario. By diversifying you can also target the message more
specifically to particular industries, title types, geographies, etc. A
more specifically targeted email with customized content for a specific
sub-group make a message even more relevant to the recipient and will yield
better results.
8) Follow up Immediately: follow up with results from your email
campaign immediately, not a few days later, or a week later. A real person
would follow up with a response that they received from an email that they
sent out almost immediately, you should be set up to do the same.
7) Avoid Spam Catches: There are a million of these that you can
unknowing included in you email content, but the general rule of thumb is:
don't sound like a cheese commercial and you are less likely to be perceived
as one. More specific examples include: Don't put lots of text in ALL
CAPS, don't use words like "free" and "discount" frequently (and never in
the subject line), don't use the words "remove", or "unsubscribe" in your
unsubscribe instructions. If you are clever you can incorporate your
unsubscribe instructions into a confidentiality agreement at the bottom of
your email.
6) Check you Email's Spam Score: Here is one service that I
recommend: http://www.thecassiopeia.com/Portal/SpamTest.html there are
many more out there, and using as many as possible is advised.
5) Tracking Tradeoffs: realize that the more you do to track thing
like open rates, click through rates, etc., the more likely your email is to
be seen as unsolicited and the less likely it is to reach it's intended
recipient.
4) Response Options: Give the recipient of the email the option to
reply to the email they have received, go to a website, or pick up the phone
and call you. More options for response = more response.
3) Use a Dedicated Domain: If your company's main website is
www.abc.com, don't use that domain for your marketing
campaigns, use a dedicated domain just for your marketing campaigns, such as
www.abc-email.com. This prevents your primary
domain and company website from ever being effected by complaints.
2) Make the Email Content as Personal as Possible: The more the email
looks like one that the recipient would receive from a co-worker, colleague,
or fellow professional/executive, the more likely they are to open it. Open
with the persons name, end with a signature line, have the email actually
come from a person instead of a generic email, etc.
1) Be CAN-SPAM Compliant: Don't be deceptive with the subject line,
include a full signature line with address and phone number, include opt-out
instructions, etc. For more details on CAN-SPAM compliance, go to:
http://www.ftc.gov/bcp/edu/pubs/business/ecommerce/bus61.shtm
For more tips and further details on any of the above items, contact your
ProspectDB representative at 10keys@prospectdb.com or call 877-591-3252.
