1. Each month replace one of your previously planned broadcast emails with a targeted email to a segment of your list. A well-crafted, targeted email can generate as much sales as a broadcast email, while simultaneously increasing engagement and reducing list fatigue. However, a targeted email does take a little extra effort to create.

2. Schedule a review of all your email forms and triggered emails. Sign-up forms, preference centers, welcome emails, triggered emails -- if you haven't done an inventory of these pages and emails and reviewed them to make sure that they're accurate and up to date, do it now. These tend to get set up and then forgotten about - sometimes for years.

3. Speak to the subscriber and not from the point of view of your business. Make sure that your emails and forms address consumers with them in mind. What's in it for them? What's appealing to them? And how does your email program help them?

4. Redesign your email templates with image blocking in mind.

5. Segment out your inactive subscribers. Send them different messaging than your active subscribers and at a lower frequency. Also consider sending them emails with a different template, one that has an unsubscribe link at the top, or offering the choice to opt-down to a lower frequency. After a long period of inactivity, you may also want to send a reactivation campaign, asking them to opt in again in order to continue receiving emails.

I am still unsubscribing from lots of emails in an email account that I no longer wish to use. While doing so, I've come across a couple of practices that make me want to scream. I'll share them with you so that you can make sure not to do this to your subscribers:

• don't make me log in to unsubscribe from your email. I usually don't remember my login details and asking for a password reminder results in more email in my inbox.
• give me the chance to update my email address. I might still want to receive your newsletter at a different address but am too lazy to look for your newsletter sign-up box on your webpage.
• give me an opportunity to cut down on the amount of emails you send me. Some senders send me more than 1 email per day. That's overkill. I do want to hear from you once in a while, just not every day.
• give me the chance to say which emails I do and which I don't want to receive. I am not interested in everything that you send me. Give me a chance to choose the content I want.
• don't use font size 6 (or 1) for your unsubscribe link. In some emails the footer text is so small that you need a magnifying glass to be able to read it. I wear glasses because I have bad eye sight. Don't remind me of that every time I want to unsubscribe.
• don't make the links blend in with the rest of the text. Use some underlining at least so that I can easily recognize the unsubscribe link.
• don't get too clever with naming your unsubscribe link. The word "Unsubscribe" is what I'm looking for. I recognize that word instantly. Don't make me read the whole footer. I'm unsubscribing, remember?
• don't send me a confirmation of my unsubscribe request. A simple "you've been unsubscribed" on your website will do. Remember: I am trying to reduce, not increase inbox overload by unsubscribing.
• use my email address in the To-line, not my name - that way it's easier for me to see which alias I've used to sign up for your newsletter.
• don't make the "why do you want to unsubscribe from this list" survey question mandatory. I admit, I didn't see anyone doing this, but just in case you'd be tempted to do this: don't!

Have you seen unsubscribe tactics that make you want to scream? Please share!

1. Sending irrelevant email messages
2. Sending emails too frequently
3. Expanding permission to other mailings
4. Sending an offer to customers for a product/service they have already purchased
5. Not using any of the data you collected from recipients to create targeted messages
6. Lack of personalization
7. Bad personalization
8. Not using a friendly (recognizable) "From" name, especially in "welcome" messages
9. Using one “From” name/address in the welcome email and then different ones in your regular emails
10. Poor design or confusing navigation
11. Making it hard for readers to manage their subscriptions or contact you from email
12. Using one or two large images to show products or present information.
13. Using images to present action items
14. Emails with typos, the wrong date or product photo, broken links or coding errors

The average length of home ownership is about seven years. We haven't seen similar figures for how long companies stay with one email marketing technology or vendor, but it's reasonable most companies will eventually switch technologies.

At our company, 99 percent of our clients have switched from another technology, whether homegrown software, a purchased software system, use of an agency, or direct use of a hosted email service provider (ESP) solution. Some new clients need more advanced features, while others want to improve their delivery rates.

If you plan to switch email marketing providers in the future, keep this checklist in mind as you make the transition from your old technology to the new one:

• Verify IPs. Verify you'll receive either dedicated or shared IPs from your new provider. If your original service had problems managing bounces and unsubscribe requests, a shared IP environment will suit you better in the short term. When moving to a dedicated IP environment, you're more prone to blocking if your mailings generate a spike in user spam complaints.
  
  Run the IPs through a spam checker tool such as http://www.openrbl.org/ orwww.DNSstuff.com. Not all listings may be significant, but you should discuss any potential issues with your ESP.
  
  
• Confirm authentication. Confirm authentication methods are updated to reflect your new outgoing email IP addresses. If you didn't use authentication (SPF, DomainKeys) before the switch, work with your ESP to set it up.
  
  
• Define reporting. To compare your current service to the new one, make sure you understand how reporting numbers are compiled and any differences in the service you're moving to. Open rates are sometimes calculated from the total number of users sent, for example, and sometimes from the number of users left after bounces are removed.
  
  
• Establish benchmarks. Save your historical reporting data. To compare accurately, record your reports' actual numbers rather than the ESP's percentage. This will help you compare and evaluate new services and adjust your program as necessary.
  
  
• Apply unsubscribe and bounce lists. Don't forget to import unsubscribes and bounces from your old system to the new environment. This may seem like a no-brainer, but we often run into cases where this step hasn't been properly executed. Also, understand how your new ESP processes bounces, spam complaints, and unsubscribes. Are spam complaints automatically unsubscribed? Are bounces resent? How many times, and for how many days?
  
  
• Update your content/forms. Ensure all unsubscribe and member update functions are still active when you move mail providers. If you use the update-preferences and send-to-a-friend functions provided by your current ESP, make sure you update the code on your Web site and in the link in the email. If your sender address changes, be sure to update the add-to-address-book instructions with your new address.
  
  
• Slowly ramp up email. This is particularly important if your bounce processing was less than stellar or you haven't mailed to your lists in over three months. Try your first send over the course of a few days to a week, and break the list up into smaller chunks. You want to avoid a large spike of bounces and spam complaints that could get you blocked.
  
  
• Test before going live. Run samples of all of your marketing communications through the new program before sending your first campaign, newsletter, or sales offer to see how images and functionality vary and to find any blocking issues. Test mailings in different browsers, email clients, and platforms: PC, Mac, perhaps even on a handheld PDA or your cell phone.
  
  
• Get your staff on board. Run informal training or get-acquainted sessions with your staff and anyone else in your company, from the CEO to IT and salespeople who will use, fix, or pay for anything you send through your new ESP.
  
  
• Talk to your account executive. Make sure your account executive or support staff understands what you're trying to accomplish. They know their systems better than you do and may suggest easier or more efficient ways of accomplishing your goal. Some ESPs offer API (define) functions that can help automate certain parts of your process.
  
  
• Use your ESP's resource center. Most ESPs offer tools and articles on their sites or support packages that help tune your messages. Some tools available include filter checks, HTML code valuators, and subject and sender line character display counters.
  
  
• Best practices sessions. Take advantage of your new ESP's best practices training sessions, Webinars, and seminars. These sessions will give you further insight into how to improve your deliverability and increase results from your email program.
  
  
• Newsletters. Most ESPs offer a variety of communications, including a general customer newsletter discussing new features and updates; a best practices and tips newsletter; and emergency/status notifications. Make sure you and your team are added to those lists.

"Over 94% of marketers are using or going to use email marketing by year's end." So says the October 2006 Forrester report, "Email Marketing Landscape." According to the same report, over 58 percent of companies interviewed indicated they deliver email using a variety of email services -- 31 percent through full service agencies and 28 percent through Application Service Providers (ASPs, or more intimately known as ESPs to this space, meaning Email Service Providers). Only 15 percent indicated they use internal technology to service their email marketing needs.

In a former column entitled "How To Evaluate E-Mail Vendors," I suggested several functional capabilities you should look for in a vendor. This really is a hot topic these days. When my company audits email programs, most clients we talk to are questioning the value they are getting in their service relationships both internally and externally. My team has seen five RFPs this year alone for selecting ESPs. The business requirements look unmistakably similar across every company, but when you look underneath the requirements into what they really want, these are quite often not reflected in the RFPs.

Here are five critical questions you need to ask yourself before engaging in this effort.

1. What type of service do you need? While the analysts will categorize the ESPs into full service, self service and a hybrid service, this can be confusing. What if you want to use a full service vendor, where they do everything for you, and then grow a team internally and ultimately do it all yourself? Does that exclude the selection of partners that tout full service only? Does it exclude self-service only companies from solving your "today" problems? I know two ESPs that have been slotted into these arbitrary analyst categories as self service only, when in fact they do provide the classic full service capabilities. Then there is a well-known ESP that is listed as full service only by analysts, and ironically a large part of their business is self-managed by their clients.

I prefer to classify ESPs in the following way: "The Fat and Content", "The Hungry" and "The Starving". What's my rationale? The success of any partnership is in the willingness and flexibility to match needs to solutions, and this is in direct alignment with the availability of resources to priorities. So, the technology might fit, the relevant experience may fit, but they may be too rigid to make you successful. While I love analyst reports and quote them quite often, take them with a grain of salt when selecting your list of potential suppliers. Some of the best sources are industry networks. The Email Experience Council is one that is emerging, and there are several "insider" lists that offer opportunities for clients to discuss experiences and refer good partners, and will likely get you higher level contacts in these potential partners. See my Blog for list details.

2. How much flexibility do you have with budget and contracting? During your selection process, don't wait till the final selection to discuss terms and options available. There may be more flexibility than you think in negotiating contracts, but many companies have done RFPs to only find themselves stuck in a swirl of contract negotiations at a late stage because extra charges popped up or SLA's didn't meet the IT department's requirements. Be sure to disclose any specifics about contracting requirements before hand. The easiest way to mitigate this is to do "pilots" which will give you a basic review of the contracting process and the flexibility of your organization, and select partners in getting this done in a short period of time. It can be difficult for some companies but the success of a pilot program is usually a good "tell" as to their willingness to work with you.

With the consolidation and crowded space we have today, contracting can get hairy with larger companies. Consider this when reviewing partners, as you may not get the SLA you are looking for or an adequate support clause. I know firsthand of five email technologies that have had various levels of failure in the last two years. Are you prepared to handle this? And how much of this can and needs to be in a contract? If there is commercial value to your email, then I'd consider strongly the effect of any system failure and subsequent recourse. This will save you headache and internal embarrassment.

3. How much integration do you really need? Everyone wants a symbiotic relationship between data and syndication and the "perfect storm" for eCRM is out there – I just haven't seen it yet. But understanding what is critical to business success and what is a "nice to have" and the trade-offs is critical. The RFP process can be a great opportunity to validate your requirements by forcing partners to come up with prioritized approaches to helping you solve problems. If you get cookie-cutter approaches that aren't somewhat customized to your issues, you have either not given enough detail to your needs, they haven't done their due diligence or you have reached the RFP machine at the ESP, responding with the same response they give to everybody. You should remember that everyone is asking these same things, so without a good "setup" of the RFP process you are likely to get very generic approaches to pricing and implementation.

4. How do I transition from one vendor to another effectively and efficiently? This is a critical situation. Change management is tough. And yes, that's what is involved. You will likely change some of your processes, train new people and begin to work with new technology and support teams. This shouldn't be taken lightly. In the final analysis, this could be the most expensive aspect of the whole effort. First of all, you have to budget for this transition, don't expect the partner to absorb these costs. If you don't have the budget and intestinal fortitude for this type of effort, it's wise to reconsider why you are switching providers. Secondly, be clear about the details of this change in your RFP and expect your future partner to give you a plan for this transition so it does not affect your operation and delivery performance. There should be a clear ROI for this transition, if not, you'll always think it's too expensive and takes too long.

5. What type of partnership do you want? The number one reason I hear why people are changing ESPs is they don't feel they are getting the value they deserve. Is this the ESP's fault if you are paying $3CPMs, and you scrutinize every service fee associated with email campaigns? The quality of the people working on your account is directly correlated to the budget you've allocated to it. It's different if you are delivering 1B message a year, but if you are a $20K per annum account, don't expect their top consultant to hold your hand. Secondly, watch for the "switch." That's when you buy the person pitching you and you end up with a distant cousin who has less than a year doing email. In the agency world, the client wants to meet the team they will be working with and that is what you are contracting for. Be clear about roles, the value they will add and the relative costs. Be wary of anyone that will throw-in this or that value-added service -- it usually doesn't materialize. But most importantly both the partner and client should be realistic about this relationship and the keys to success. The clearer those success metrics are the easier it is to keep a scorecard as to performance.

The RFP process can be simple or very painful depending on your budget, resources and company culture. The transition can be even more painful, but don't be an ostrich; you'd do yourself a disserve if you didn't pull your head up out of the sand and look around every year to see what new technologies and suppliers are doing. Trade shows don't provide enough of a view by themselves, you have to out some effort into this.

Good Sources

Forester Wave Report
This is a good reference, albeit biased as they didn't include all potential vendors in categories. Be wary of reports that exclude partners due to their relationships with the analysts. While I value their "clinical" view of technologies and how they rank and score features, this is difficult to do in this space since the success of the technology, unlike other platforms, is dependant on the service support, so features can be discounted fairly easily.

Jupiter
Typically a good report, with quite a bit of detail about the capabilities and classification of vendors, but be sure to run them through your own tests, I found these reports to miss a few things after closer examination.

Design and Agency

1. What experience do you have in email creative and design for businesses in our industry?Email creative and design is radically different from any other type of marketing. The email designer has less time to capture interest than the web designer, and must do so under heavy restrictions and a completely different and exponentially more complex technical environment than the average website designer. The person designing your emails should be a specialist.

2. What project management process do you follow for campaign management and production?
Not as obvious a question as you might think. You’d be surprised how many agencies are weak in this area.

3. Did your last three email campaigns for clients all deploy on time?
A sure sign of project management problems – a partner without solid production management will have challenges here. So ask this question directly, then ask them to explain why those that didn’t were delayed. A good agency should be able to tell you that 2 out of 3 or better were right on time. And those that are delayed should be because of business reasons, and at the client’s request.

4. How far in advance of deployment will I see a proof?
You should see your first proof between 24 and 72 hours ahead of deployment, depending on how much input the agency has on creative. Any proof sent within 24 hours of deployment should be a confirmation message allowing you to verify that all your changes have been made and to authorize deployment.

5. What experience does your team have in publication management and direct marketing?
It’s been our experience that good email teams are passionate about publishing. They understand the cyclical nature of email marketing, they’re addicted to relevance and they respect deadlines.

Technology

6. What security measures are in place?
The answer should include information about redundant servers, firewalls, physical security of the location where the servers are housed, data management practises and encryption of logins and other shared data. Keep in mind that good security costs a bit of money – and the two things you’re most likely to compromise on when selecting a lower cost provider will be the flexibility of the tools and the security of your customer data.

7. How many messages can be delivered in an hour?
And what is average server uptime? Let’s take these one at a time. Messages/hour is a measure of bandwidth. Keep in mind that even if your list only has 2000 names on it, you’re hardly the agency’s only client. I’ve heard too many stories of companies that send an email campaign and it takes four hours to four days to get it into the hands of customers. When you lose immediacy, you lose some of the most important assets of email. The other big issue – server uptime. A good ESP will ensure uptime of at least 99%. That’s the same kind of uptime you’d expect from your online banking service. If the server is down once every two weeks, then guess what, so is your entire email marketing department. Now – if you don’t mind working on Saturday to make up for the fact that the server was down on Friday afternoon, that might not be an issue. Me, I like to have some options about how to spend my Saturdays.

8. Where are the databases hosted?
Many small agencies with proprietary tools will host data on their own servers. The upside to this solution is that it’s very often extremely affordable. The downside of course is everything we talked about in security and bandwidth. Small, local, server just might mean reduced security, lower bandwidth and less reliable uptime. Most successful small agencies work with an established partner to provide robust solutions to these problems at a pretty reasonable cost.

9. How is customer information captured?
You want to hear an answer that includes key phrases like “secure, hosted web form”, “link from your website” or “host on your website”, “surveys”, “contests”, “inquiries from your website”, “import a csv file” etc. The technology your agency uses should be flexible enough to give you plenty of opportunities to entice your customers to share more information with you, and to keep the information you have up-to-date. You may never need to use them, true. But then again, you may never need a heart surgeon either. It’s still comforting to know that if you do, the one at your local hospital has a medical degree isn’t it?

10. Are bounces and unsubscribes handled automatically?
The only acceptable answer is yes, absolutely. Anything else guarantees you’re wasting valuable human time doing an ineffective job of a boring task better handled by machine.

11. Tell me about some campaigns you’ve run that were more than “batch and blast”
And yes, say “batch and blast”. A good agency will know that you mean an email campaign that sent exactly the same message to everyone on the list. And they’ll see it as an opportunity to showcase the really cool, highly targeted campaigns they’ve run for clients. Beware of anyone who starts off talking about rich media – it’s cool, but if everyone gets the same flash video, it’s really just a fancier “batch and blast campaign”. What you want to hear are keywords like “triggered messages”, “adaptive sequence campaigns”, “conditional content”, “dynamic content insertion”, “forward to a friend”, “advanced personalization”, “multiple language delivery”, ‘a/b split testing”, “distribution groups” and yes, “targeted rich media”. Oh, and a good agency, will be able to explain those terms so that they make sense for your business.

Spam and Deliverability

12. Is email delivery success to all major ISP’s monitored in real time?
Major ISP’s doesn’t mean AOL, or Hotmail. Well it might – but it should also include the local vendors unique to your neighbourhood and those that are likely to serve your customers. If you’ve got customers in Quebec, you want to know what’s happening with Videotron. If you’re in BC, that might mean Telus or Shaw.

13. Is a Spam check tool available? Is it the only anti-spam measure taken?
Spam tools are great – they provide an immediate assessment of common triggers. But they’re hardly foolproof. Your agency partner should back up the results of automated spam check utilities with other processes and tools to ensure your messages are getting through.

14. Does the provider publish an SPF?
If they don’t know what an SPF is, thank them and end the conversation as quickly as possible. If they do, they’ll tell you. And talk about other similar programs, whether they participate and why (or why not).

15. What other deliverability initiatives are in place?
Every agency is unique, and the good ones will have systems in place that are entirely proprietary. They’ll have found unique ways to provide service to their clients that address any holes left in the processes above. Give them a chance to show off. But be prepared, this is one of those questions that’s guaranteed to include words like “proprietary” – which, by the way, is agency code for “something we do really well and we know our competition can’t do. In fact we don’t think they’ve even realized it’s an issue, so the last thing we want is for you to ask them about it!”

Reporting

16. Is reporting provided in real-time via secure web login?
Hey, there’s nothing more fun than watching your open rate climb and realizing that people are actually reading, and yes, clicking through, to your campaign. Plus, if your boss is as type A as I am, he’ll really appreciate a quick email letting him know how things are progressing. Makes you look especially on the ball and informed too!

17. Is the information displayed graphically?
Face it, most of us don’t get that excited about spreadsheets. Brings back too many haunting memories of Math 12 or worse, Calculus! It’s true what they say, a picture IS worth a thousand words!

18. Can I drill down within an individual mailing to compare responses by list segment?
Wouldn’t you like to know if a particular group of your customers wasn’t all that excited about an offer? Or better, couldn’t wait to respond? This kind of information is the pot of gold at the end of the rainbow!

19. Can I obtain reports on the composition of my list based on both demographics and behavioural profiles?
If you know that 50% of your customers are in Quebec or Ontario and that region is hit with a nasty ice storm that shuts off power to the entire region, you could reduce your mailing costs by 50% simply by not mailing to those segments during the crisis. Of say your ESP advises you that AOL is having server problems and you have a campaign about to deploy. Your next step will depend a great deal on what percentage of your subscribers are AOL email addresses.

20. Is cross campaign analysis possible?
Email is a cyclical activity. One of email campaigns are rare – usually they’re tied to a larger program. And looking at that program from a variety of angles, aggregating data across campaigns and comparing activity between various emails is an important part of determining your long-term success. We like to call them trending reports, but whatever name you use the golden nugget here is that change over time is an important indicator.

some excellent tips to help you find the right email service provider:

• Go for the larger companies. Their servers are going to be more robust, they’re likely to have more staff, including a big ISP relations or reputation management team and have the ear of companies such as AOL, Microsoft and Yahoo!.
• In particular, ask how many people they have working on ISP relations and reputation management. Ask whether their reporting can give you a breakdown by domain so you can see which ISPs are causing you problems.
• For those that prefer it, there are some very good European ESPs to choose from, but don’t be afraid to work with an American company as they dominate the email delivery space. This truly is a global business and experienced companies of scale are often US-based.
• Establish how familiar they are with your needs. It makes sense to try to find out what percentage of their clients are of a similar industry, size and have similar needs to you. You can then select the provider with the most clients matching your scale and requirements.
• Don’t be seduced by functionality.Focus on the functionality you need now or in the very near future. What you’re really looking for is ease of use and interface speed. The delivery service you choose should have a user-friendly, intuitive interface that makes setting up and automating repetitive tasks straightforward.
• Support is also very important, particularly if you’re going for a self-service solution. So ask how quickly they turn around queries, whether they offer telephone support or just email.
• Email marketing is all about understanding how your customers are interacting with your communications. So the reporting interface is absolutely critical and there are significant differences between products. For example, not all technologies allow you to group your mailings by campaign. In some ways, it’s more important to look at the reporting interface than at deployment functionality. Good email marketing is a constant learning and feedback loop, which requires detailed reports.