What was it about that message that so grabbed my attention? How did he cut through the clutter?
I had to find out and so asking Jon for an interview was the logical next step.
Jon explained, we do a best of weekly newsletter – that sent out a couple of things including a blog ‘Misstakes arr Bad by David Kirkpatrick, and we chose to deliberately include copy mistakes in the newsletter too.
[The full email text is at the end of this post.]
Recently I’ve been trying to add more value to my email sends and having a more indirect approach with my promotions. We are all so conditioned the way search engines condition us to see the snippet and click, read the value we want there – and within 5 seconds I’ll go yes or no, click the back button and I’m done.
As a direct marketer, you want to get that click but you want to get them engaged with you but you can’t do it too soon.
I was building off the rapport that the editorial team already built up and going off that. We “coddle” them and put them into a frame of mind that we’re speaking to them and not at them.
I have a report from the previous week’s send every Monday and the main metrics are open rates, click through rates and conversion rates. I keep a spreadsheet of the week by week totals so we can track progress.
We are doing some list hygiene – and as a result there is more personalisation in our emails. This is more than just subject line and name; but segmented into – book buyers, best of weeklies.
I did this test on a webinar I was promoting and I edited the test as we were going – we got a sizeable lift from just the personalisation alone.
We have about 5 lists and we segment down in terms of engagement; product buyers, book buyers; we segment down 5 times as well (email, B2B, B2C, inbound etc).
What would you have changed?
Not much – this is the first time I’ve implemented this tactic. I guess I’d be happy to update
The best thing to remember starting out is this: Always be testing. Catalog your findings. A negative result is still a result. You can still learn from it. You don’t need to use letterhead templates in the name of professionalism. Find creative ways to distinguish your message. Make it fun.
People read a ton of emails a day. Don’t try to do too much too fast. Lead their thought process from email, to landing page, to conversion. You don’t always need to sell from the subject line to the salutation.
One of the core messages of our Inbound Handbook is that we need to understand the needs and behaviours of their target audience. As you test, make sure you track everything. All links, all ads, etc. If you aren’t using tracking links, do so. If you’re not using Google Analytics or something that can show you where you’re losing them, do so.
The full email copy
