They are not professional writers. All they know, is how to use words to create sentences via an electronic keyboard - they don't write copy that is engaging, interesting or easy to read.
Nathaniel Hawthorne, a novelist from the first half of the 19th century said: "Easy reading is damn hard writing". Conversely, the same applies when stated: "Easy writing is damn hard reading". Because if you find it easy to write about your topic, your reader probably finds it difficult to stay awake.
Why is it that we won't pay professionals to write the copy for the hardest thing to write in marketing, personal messages, but we pay professionals to write copy for the easiest things to write in marketing (messages to be broadcast via television, radio, press, print or websites)?
E-mail marketing is not a cheap way to replace your direct mail, or telemarketing. It is a personal communication for which you have to obtain permission to deliver. It must be well crafted, personalised and relevant to the individual who receives it. You want the individual to do what you want them to do once they read it - not what they were planning to do before they opened it.
This requires the specialist writing skills of an investigative journalist or a copywriter trained in the discipline of direct marketing. If you allow people who know how to type sentences, rather than to type copy, you'll fail - and damage your brand in the process.
Marketers pay professionals to write advertising to the masses in the form of broadcast or press advertisements, so why not for more personalised advertising? If you don't want to use a direct marketing agency, then approach a journalist from your industry's trade press - they're usually underpaid, but know how to write copy that engages an audience.
So let's now assume you have employed pros to write for you. What other things need to be considered for successful e-mail campaigns?
Two reasons people open e-mail
A rule of thumb about e-mail messages - the "From line" gets it opened and the "Subject line" gets it deleted. Here's why:
There are only two reasons people open e-mail.
- They know who is sending the message.
- They are interested in the content in the subject line.
If a person doesn't know the sender of the message they are extremely unlikely to open the message, thanks to spam and the sheer volume of messages in in-boxes. If they do know the sender, then they'll look at the subject line to determine if the content is relevant to them.
If the content isn't relevant, then they are highly unlikely to open your message. And they certainly won't scroll down your message to check if there is something of interest - they don't have the time or the inclination.
Using the email database
Once you have built your email database, there are a number of options open to you - but the temptation is to contact people every time you have something to say about yourself.
The key questions you should always ask yourself before sending emails are, "is this relevant to my relationship with this customer or prospect?", and then "will it enhance the relationship in a positive way?".
If the answer to the first question is "no", then don't bother asking yourself the next question. If the answer to the first question is "yes" but the answer to the second question is "no" then have a second thought about whether to send the e-mail.
Put the content summary above-the-fold
Just like the lead story in a newspaper is above-the-fold, so the contents of your newsletter or message must be summarised above-the-fold - that is, within the first screen.
This allows people to quickly review your content for relevance or interest and make a decision on whether to continue reading or delete your message. You can use a headline such as "In this issue" with bullet points that link readers to the key topics. Or publish a table of contents at the start of your message to serve the same purpose.
Outsource your distribution
There is a complete industry dedicated to distribution of e-mails. The suppliers have best practice technology to ensure the best possible chance your message will get through spam filters, firewalls and the like. Creating a message yourself and sending it from your Outlook is the fast way to failure. You have no idea if your message even reaches your recipients
Why do people baulk at paying almost no cost, to talk directly to people who have given them permission to do so, but happily pay enormous amounts for advertising that they hope might reach a few people in the market for their goods via mass advertising? This reasoning defies logic.
Most suppliers provide a DIY service where you can control your distribution using their software via secure web-based access. This is like having the latest technology at your desktop, just not on your server.
If you install internal e-mail distribution software, you have to train your personnel, invest in hardware and dedicated lines to distribute messages, invest in R&D to ensure your system can navigate the daily changes and developments that occur in e-mail systems and ISPs, or hope that your software supplier can provide regular upgrades.
Quite frankly, you have to be sending millions of messages to make it worthwhile.
Why guess when you can know?
One of the key principles for direct marketing success is testing. That's because direct marketing is the art of losing money in very small amounts now, so you can make it in large amounts later. You test and learn, test and learn, infinitum. After all, why guess your results when you can know what they'll be?
And e-mail is one of the easiest things to test. Given that at least 40% of your response usually occurs in the first few hours after you send a message, you can gain a reliable result with your tests. In fact you can conduct a couple of tests in a single day if you know what you're doing.
The key things to test are format - HTML versus text, subject lines, time-of-day and day-of-week of distribution. I've seen some research that suggests that 65% of all messages are opened between Tuesday morning and Thursday afternoon. You'll also find that open rates and time of opening differ for free e-mail domains versus business or paid domains.
You can even test distributors - split your distribution between a couple of distributors and see who gets better results for you, or with whom you are more comfortable working.
Don't abuse your customers or subscribers
E-mail is one of the cheapest ways to do major damage to your brand if you get it wrong. So you cannot afford to abuse the people on your list. If they opt-in for a monthly newsletter, don't send them weekly sales offers.
Invite content from your readers, via surveys, pools, forums, blogs, etc. Why sit around wondering what to brief your creative team to write about, when your readers will happily forward you opinions and information you can use - and this is usually more interesting to them than what you might have to say about your new product line for example?
Suffice to say, marketers have done enormous damage to the power of e-mail because they ignored basic courtesies and commonsense - they abused the privilege their customers gave them through permission to communicate via personalised messages.
Respect your customer and they'll respect you - and you'll probably discover your e-mail campaigns become a key part of your marketing activity.