Small Business Online Marketing at Kutenda » email marketing

What we’re reading…

Jeb — Tue, 24 Jan 2012 07:30:56 +0000

Here are the latest articles we’ve saved to our Instapaper account:

Don’t use Instapaper yet? Get it here.

Can typos help you sell?

Jeb — Mon, 16 Jan 2012 21:50:09 +0000

(Grammarians, please click away, there’s nothing to see here…)

Copywriter and email marketer Ben Settle makes the case that typos will rarely (if ever) hurt your cause—and may actually help it. Here is Ben describing his writing “process”:

I crank the email out (usually in about 4-5 minutes) and then let ‘er rip. No editing (unless the URL is wrong) or even thinking about it.

Just sit, pound, send.

And it doesn’t hurt sales at all.

I’ve noticed it even HELPS sales sometimes.

That’s probably why old school copywriters used to purposely misspell things in their ads

It made their letters look genuine.

Like personal letters.

And not “sales pitches.”

It’s hard to resist Ben Settle. Settle is a guy who makes a living—a pretty decent living, it seems—sending daily emails about email marketing (yes, it’s all very meta). He spends a lot of time looking at his numbers, and since he’s been emailing to his list daily for several years, he can pull from a lot of data. His opinions (which are plentiful, colorful, strident and often profane) are based on real evidence.

So what makes Settle hard to resist? For one thing, he’s got a great conversational writing style, and he’s not afraid to piss people off. (In fact, he maintains that making people angry is an indicator that you’re doing something right.)

He’s a bit like your favorite radio personality: brash, smart and welcoming of controversy. His post on typos prompted a deluge of hate-mail from “spelling nazis,” who (whom?) he declares are either “anal retentive writers, editors or loser intellectuals who can’t sell their way out of a paper bag.”

But what makes Settle’s voice unique is his unlikely combination of braggadocio and integrity. The former makes him entertaining, and the latter makes him trustworthy.

How to Profit from Typos | BenSettle.com

What we’re reading…

Jeb — Fri, 13 Jan 2012 07:10:30 +0000

Here are the latest articles we’ve saved to our Instapaper* account:

*Do you use Instapaper? It’s a great (and free) tool for saving online content for later. The way it works: create an account here and drag the bookmarklet to your web browser’s toolbar. When you find content you like and want to save, just click the Instapaper bookmarklet and the page will be added to your reading list, accessible on any device that has an Internet connection. Bonus: Instapaper also lets you strip pages down to just the text, so you can dig into a good article without any distracting visual clutter.

Instapaper.com

Are your emails too fancy?

Jeb — Tue, 03 Jan 2012 18:53:42 +0000

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Derek Halpern at DIY Themes asked his readers to share their newsletter preferences—plain text emails vs. fancy HTML emails.

People said they LOVED the text email because it was simple and much easier to read. Here are some quotes:

“Clean”
“Much easier to read”
“The new format tended to make me feel as if I were a tried and trusted confidant— and that was welcomed”
“It’s clean and easy to read. Call to actions are also clean and easy to follow.”

(+1 for minimalist web designs that focus on readability instead of fancy graphics )

Couldn’t agree more. In fact, we changed our email services a few months back to reduce the amount of design clutter in an attempt to create messages with a more intimate, personal feel. (We changed the tone of our copy as well.) The results have been impressive. Our partners are seeing MUCH more engagement.

It takes a certain confidence to forgo the fancy and embrace the simple—we all want to show our plumage. But the data’s clear: it’s worth dialing down the design!

Tale of the tape: email vs. Facebook

Jeb — Tue, 06 Dec 2011 17:57:34 +0000

From VisibleGains, a reminder that email is still a weight class (or two) above social media. See the complete infographic here.

Thx, Andrew A.!

The n00b guide to online marketing

Jeb — Mon, 28 Nov 2011 16:16:27 +0000

Unbounce’s Oli Gardner offers a very, very granular look at all of the core elements of online marketing, complete with a stunning infographic and a six-month action plan for business owners. Very cool! Click through and add to your bookmarks!

Email and Social Media: Dynamic Duo

Courtney — Wed, 05 Oct 2011 21:43:39 +0000

When hashing out a marketing plan, most small business owners struggle to decide where to focus their efforts. Email marketing or social media? While both on their own are great, utilizing them together is where many SMBs find success.

A recent Constant Contact study analyzed data from small businesses that combined their email marketing with social media marketing and compared it to those who use email marketing alone. It’s clear that SMBs should do both. Smallbiztechnology.com summarized the study’s key takeaways:

Faster list growth: From June 2010 through August 2011, those using both social media and email marketing saw 14.43 percent list growth, while those using only email marketing saw 8.96 percent list growth.

Larger average list size: Those using both tactics have email lists that are 53 percent larger on average than their email-only counterparts.

With a larger list, you can begin engaging more contacts that are aware of your brand which in turn will help your click through rates:

The average click-through rate for those using both email and social media marketing was 59.3 basis points higher than for those using email only.

It has become apparent that focusing too much on one aspect of your marketing can limit your potential. Why exclude one outreach channel when you put extra KAPOW! in your marketing by using email and social media?

Holy return on investment, Batman!

How to avoid becoming a ‘digital sharecropper’

Jeb — Wed, 17 Aug 2011 17:37:40 +0000

There’s a lively debate unfolding over at Copyblogger.com about whether you can truly own your business’s online content and how best to avoid the trap of becoming a “digital sharecropper.” Sonia Simone started the conversation with her post “The Most Dangerous Threat to Your Online Marketing Efforts.”

If you’re relying on Facebook or Google to bring in all of your new customers, you’re sharecropping. You’re hoping the landlord will continue to like you and support your business, but the fact is, the landlord has no idea who you are and doesn’t actually care.

Of course, Simone makes clear that Facebook and Google are wonderful tools—essential to any well balanced online marketing strategy—but her point is that you’re playing with fire if your business model relies entirely on a third party. “The secret is to spend most of your time and creative energy building assets that you control,” says Simone. These assets include:

A well-designed website or blog populated with lots of valuable content

An opt-in email list, ideally with a high-quality autoresponder

A reputation for providing impeccable value

Read the article—and the comments—here.

Can Providing Content Really Help Your Business?

Courtney — Fri, 05 Aug 2011 15:38:40 +0000

John Jantsch, author of Duct Tape Marketing, recently wrote a great blog post about the 5 Types of Content That Every Business Must Employ. Providing relevant content on a consistent basis, Jantsch says, will promote brand awareness and help you earn trust among your prospects.

Strategically, the word content must mean more than a blog post or a blank sheet of paper each day. You must begin to think of your content as a total body of work that is being built to serve your business over time.

Of course, it’s not easy to create great content that builds awareness and trust. In a recent study noted by Search Engine Land, three out of four marketing professionals said “creating original content” and “having the time to create original content” were their top content marketing challenges.

So how do you overcome these challenges? Check out John’s full article for some ideas to get you inspired. And get out there and start writing!

Copyblogger on Split-Testing Claims: It’s Like Sex in High School

Jeb — Tue, 26 Jul 2011 00:39:48 +0000

Over at Copyblogger, Danny Iny calls bullshit on split-testing claims (and indirectly gives a lesson in snappy headline writing).

Everybody says they’re doing it. Everyone likes to pretend they’re an expert. Buzzwords and rumors abound … stories about increasing conversion rates by an order of magnitude by changing the color of a checkout button (but nobody shares the magic color!). Most importantly, nobody wants to admit that they don’t really know what they’re doing, or (gasp!) have never done it themselves. Many join the conversation without wanting to let on that they don’t even know what split testing is!

Fact is, real split-testing is hard. It’s time-intensive work that requires great precision and patience — as well as the super-human ability to overcome confirmation bias. (Continuing with his clever high-school-sex analogy, Iny says that people who are in fact split testing probably aren’t doing it very well…)

If you feel like experimenting and are willing engage in some legit science, split-testing can pay huge dividends. The key is to start with one variable at a time. (And we recommend using Google Website Optimizer — it’s free and relatively easy to use.)

But before you starting tweaking things, head over to Copyblogger to learn how to avoid making rookie split-testing mistakes. Like ending your A/B experiments, um, prematurely.