How B2B Marketers Can Boost E-mail Leads

It's no surprise that close to 90% of B2B marketers use e-mail to generate new leads when the latest data from the DMA shows e-mail marketing delivers an average $43 return for every $1 spent. But that doesn't mean B2B e-mails are a guaranteed success. B2B e-mailers may want to benchmark their efforts against a recent infographic from EmailMonks that offers proven ways to help boost those all-important open and click rates. Start with personalization. Marketers personalize e-mails because 91% get better open and click rates when they do, and that means going beyond using a first name to targeted, personalized content based on demographics, purchase and browsing history, subscriber interests, etc. Achieving that quality targeted personalization requires good list segmentation; blasting a one-size-fits-all message to the whole e-mail list is a recipe for low response. Segmenting by age, gender, preferences, purchase history and more delivers 14.31% higher opens and 100.95% higher clicks than non-segmented list campaigns, notes the EmailMonks infographic. Executing that personal touch also means permission-based e-mail that respects recipient preferences and lets them manage frequency and timing of contacts. Then, as the infographic points out, 35% of e-mails are opened based on the subject line alone. What makes up a winning subject line? Brevity is the soul of subject line wit; with 54% of e-mails opened on a mobile device, a subject line of around three words scores higher since most mobile devices can show only four to seven words across the screen. Personalization counts big, too; personalized subject lines are 26% more likely to be opened than general ones. Once the e-mail is opened, the crafting of a good call-to-action (CTA) will drive more click-throughs. The CTA should be noticeable and "above-the fold"; in fact most brands prefer to place a CTA in the top third of an e-mail, and 48% match the CTA colors to their brand logos. Oh, and make sure the CTA links to an effective, mobile-optmized landing page, too. Looking for specific examples? Go to our onsite blog post for a link to 17 B2B e-mail templates based on actual successful e-mails: http://www.acculistusa.com/how-to-boost-e-mail-lead-gen-for-b2b-publishers-marketers/

Format Matters: Text E-mails Outdo HTML Versions

There's an ongoing debate in e-mail marketing over which format option will optimize results: simple text-based e-mails or fancier html versions. Marketo recently reported some surprising findings on this point: Analysis shows text-based e-mails perform significantly better than their more creative HTML counterparts. Although both formats have the same open rate, text-based e-mails have 21% higher unique click-to-open rates on the offer link and 17% higher unique click-through rates on the offer link, according to the Marketo study. So should marketers dump their html creatives? Not so fast. Why did the text-based versions win more response? The Marketo study found that text-based e-mails' fewer visual distractions focus response on the call-to-action link. In HTML versions, nearly 16% of clicks went to other links (such as logos) instead of the main call-to-action link, per Marketo. Other research shows that text e-mails are also viewed as more personal by recipients, who see the visually rich html e-mails as clearly commercial. Finally, text-based versions have a better chance of delivery since the messages are less likely to be caught in spam filters or to have mobile viewing issues. On the other hand, a key drawback of plain text formats, with no html, is that there is no tracking of open rates or clicks. Text-based e-mails without any html design elements also lack engaging visual impact for branding or product promotion, have less ability to break information into easy-to-read/scan sections or columns, and have fewer tools for directing CTA attention. So html e-mails continue to be used because of advantages that make them the right choice for campaigns relying on branding, richer messaging and detailed metrics. For example, html allows incorporation of branded images and logos that may yield higher conversion rates for some verticals. An html e-mail also can package more information in digestible, easy-to-read bites. It can direct action via color, clickable text and buttons. Most important, html offers tracking of opens and clicks for marketing metrics! For links to more detail, see http://www.acculistusa.com/seeking-e-mail-response-marketers-face-text-vs-html-choice/

E-mail Tops Digital ROI With Personalization, Mobile

E-mail marketers will be happy to know that e-mail outpaces other digital channels in terms of reported return on investment, ahead of SEO, content marketing, paid search, and social media, per the "2017 Email Marketing Industry Census" from Adestra, in association with Econsultancy. E-mail ROI was rated as good to excellent by 73% of marketers surveyed, just edging out SEO, with 72% giving SEO a good to excellent ROI rating. Content marketing slipped to third place, with 63% calling its ROI good to excellent. Paid search followed with 60% ranking its ROI as good to excellent, and social media trailed (44%). But the report also raised questions about how accurately marketers assess e-mail impact. The majority of marketers are using click-through rate (91%), open rate (80%) and conversion rate (62%) to track e-mail performance, while other important metrics, such as bounce rate, delivery rate and list growth rate, are used by a minority. List segmentation is another challenge that may be impeding even higher ROI, falling midway in the ranking of best practices even though those who carry out advanced segmentation are more than twice as likely to report "excellent" ROI from e-mail marketing as those who don’t segment. What practices do marketers use to push e-mail opens and clicks? The census found that sending personalized and relevant messaging led the list of e-mail best practices reported; 80% of marketers are already doing this and 14% are planning for it. Personalization was followed by mobile-optimizing of e-mail (73% doing and 19% planning to start), regular list cleaning (57% doing and 24% planning), and promoting social content sharing (49% doing and 22% planning on it). Personalization also is the area of e-mail marketing where most respondents (30%) say they need to focus in 2017. For more see http://www.acculistusa.com/e-mail-earns-top-digital-roi-via-personalization-mobile-strategies/

Where to Focus for Optimized E-mail Click-Through

Boosting e-mail click-through rate is a constant struggle, so we recommend to frustrated e-mail marketers a recent MarketingProfs article by Stephen Hovnanian--offering four basic areas to optimize for more quality clicks. His initial tip is to focus on optimizing user experience first--via seamless mobile and desktop designs and experiences that flow from e-mail open to final action. If your e-mail is mobile-optimized but your landing page or registration form is not mobile-friendly, you're wasting clicks, for example. Also target the audience by device usage and timing to optimize experience, and use "friction-mitigating" copy or visuals to guide recipients, advises Hovnanian. The second area of focus is varying call to action (CTA) by audience segment. For example, the CTA for the segment of top engagers (or brand champions) can go beyond clicks to urge valuable social sharing and brand advocacy. Segmenting for participation by type of content also delivers better CTA response, such as a webinar invite to past webinar attendees but a webinar recap to site visitors with interest in similar content. Third, leverage your online community and customer base for user-generated content (such as testimonials). It delivers social proof and brand advocacy building and can be paired with a strong, related CTA to boost click-through. Fourth, simply write better call-to-action copy! How? Hovnanian suggests completing the sentence "I want you to..." for active verbs and specific direction. For example, I want you to "Register for the Webinar." Of course, also test CTA design placement as well as buttons versus clickable text. For the full article, read http://www.marketingprofs.com/articles/2016/29194/four-email-optimizations-that-will-increase-your-click-through-rates

2015 E-Mail Stats Provide Benchmarks for 2016

E-mail marketers are already launching their 2016 campaigns, but a quick look back at 2015's e-mail triumphs and troubles per marketing research can offer helpful benchmarks for this year. Direct Marketing News magazine recently summarized a slew of 2015 e-mail research data, starting with the tactics most likely to boost click rate response per marketers: Respondents in Ascend2's “Email Marketing Trends” report rated a meaningful call-to-action offer as the most effective tactic for boosting click-throughs (65%), followed by list segmentation for targeting (47%), message personalization (42%), and testing and optimization (35%). The bad news is that the same respondents also rated some of the more effective methods as the most difficult, with 41% citing list segmentation as the most difficult to implement, for example. Another survey found similar agreement on strategies for success: In a 2015 survey by Econsultancy and Adestra, most marketers rely on basic segmentation (76%), optimizing for mobile devices (61%), prompting content sharing on social media (56%), and routine list data cleansing (50%). But they also agreed that their efforts weren't outstandingly successful, with 44% rating e-mail campaign performance as average compared with 41% who saw performance as good to excellent. Nevertheless, e-mail remains a favored marketing channel because of its relatively higher ROI: The Relevancy Group surveyed 300 e-mail marketing executives and 91% rated e-mail somewhat or highly effective in terms of delivering revenue. And the Direct Marketing Association's 2015 "Response Rate Report" found e-mail campaigns provide the highest median ROI of 21%-23%, followed by telephone campaigns (19-20%), social media ads (15%-17%), and direct mail (15%-17%). For more e-mail stats, go to http://www.dmnews.com/email-marketing/email-by-the-numbers/article/462945/

Use These E-Mail Tactics to Breach Inbox Barriers

E-mail deliverability will remain a key marketing hurdle in 2016. So here are three basic tactics to drive up open and click rates and help overcome inbox filtering, courtesy of a BrandViews blog post by CRM software firm Marketo. First, use html buttons instead of image buttons for your e-mail call-to-action (CTA), advises the article. That way, when the e-mail is opened, the recipient won't have to wait for images to download; the html-coded button appears upon open and looks the same as an image-based button. Marketo reports that switching from image to html buttons delivered a 5% lift in open rate, a 15% lift in click-to-open rate and a 20% lift in click-through rate in its tests. Next, with 50% of e-mails opened on mobile phones and 65% of consumers starting the purchasing cycle on a mobile device, mobile-responsive e-mail design is clearly a must. A successful mobile e-mail version needs to include these components, per the post: the right breakpoints via media queries in the tag; larger text for readability on a small screen; and a CTA "above the fold" of the mobile screen. Marketo reports a 28% increase in click-through and a 31% boost in click-to-open rates thanks to improved mobile templates. Finally, with over 20% of e-mails landing in junk/spam folders, bouncing or blocked per Return Path, deliverability measures are clearly required. Marketo highlights these deliverability tips: retiring e-mail addresses after one hard bounce; lowering the soft-bounce threshold for retiring e-mail; and list hygiene to cull inactive and bad e-mail addresses. The goal is to only send e-mails to subscribers who want them. For design examples and resource links, read the full article at http://www.business2community.com/brandviews/marketo/3-email-marketing-must-haves-tackle-evolving-inbox-01409706#vt1T9WKppDor0isK.97

Research Offers Five Clues to E-mail Success

While chasing the holy grail of e-mail response, marketers can get lost in a forest of subject line and offer gimmicks.  Here's some helpful guidance that Direct Marketing News shared from a recent study by Retention Science, a marketing platform provider. Based on Retention Science's analysis of one billion e-mails, the article can distill five tips for success. Tip No. 1 is that percent signs trump dollar signs: According to Retention Science, 38% of customers are more likely to click on e-mails containing percent-off offers than on dollar-off deals, and 47% are more likely to convert in response to percent-off. Tip No. 2 is that mystery is better than excitement in subject line punctuation: Subject lines containing question marks have a 44% higher open rate than those containing exclamation marks. Tip No. 3 is that brevity is the soul of response: Retention Science found that e-mails containing subject lines with six to 10 words generated the highest open rates, at 21%, compared with a 14% open rate for messages with 11- to 15-word subject lines. Tip No. 4 is that timing matters--depending on whether the goal is click-through, conversion or retention. While open rates are fairly consistent year-round, click-through rates jump during the early holiday months, rising to 30% in October and 27% in November, and conversion peaks in July, with a rate 21% higher than average. But then e-mail list retention hits its nadir in August, with unsubscribes at a 28% rate. And Tip No. 5 is that novelty may spur opens, but familiarity breeds clicks. A novelty item in the subject line yields a 6% lift in open rates, but necessities in the e-mail body (such as groceries) earn a 10% higher click-through rate than featuring specialty items, even if those special items won an open for the subject line. For more on the Retention Science study, read http://www.dmnews.com/email-marketing/how-to-send-the-almost-perfect-email/article/449482/