Combining Video and Email

Video has quickly become the hottest way to deliver content on the internet. As compared to just a few years ago, today’s internet videos are easier to integrate, better quality and with more and more users connecting with a high-speed connection, easier to deliver than ever. Manufactures are showing product demos online, real estate agents are serving video walk-throughs of properties; with a little imagination the possibilities are endless.

So how does this integrate with your email marketing campaign?

The first thing to remember is that you cannot embed videos in an email. It simply won’t work. The technology that drives email programs has not caught up to internet browsers. But that shouldn’t stop you
from linking to your video content. Few links are more compelling than links to video, so don’t skip them just because you can’t directly embed video in your email.

Let’s take a look at an email with good technique.

This is a simple postcard style email and it’s used very effectively. Not only is the video link icon backed-up with text just below it, there are two links in the body copy. This email will certainly generate some clicks.

The really nice element here is the video icon. It’s instantly recognizable and it’s inviting too and that is very important. A lot of emails will use screen captures as a link to the video, which is fine if you have the ability to overlay a “play” icon, otherwise it just looks like any other image. Consequently there is very little incentive to click the link; how often do you click on images just to see if something will happen. The video icon is readily available and easily recognized and can invite clicks in a way that simple screen-captures can’t.

Consider these guidelines when adding video links in your email:

Use either a high-quality screen-capture or icon as the visual point of reference for your link.

Avoid using low-quality screen-captures that look like plain images.

Re-enforce the image or icon with an adjacent text link such as “Click here to see our product in action!”

Try to have two links to the same video in close proximity to your visual point of reference.

Build Your List while you sleep

One of the great features the ReachMail has is the Form Wizard. You can create a list sign-up form on your website that automatically adds new subscribers to any of your lists in ReachMail. Follow the step by step instructions and you’ll be provided with HTML code that you can add to your website (or newsletter). You can choose from a number of options on both the list level and the permission level. For lists, you can choose double opt-in (where an email is automatically sent to the recipient for them to confirm the signup or single opt-in where no confirmation is required. If you’re really strict you can also set it up to require an administrator to confirm the sign-up. On the list level, you can add as many fields as you like (ie. postal address, interests etc) and choose to make some (or all) mandatory. Keep in mind that you need to create the list first before you create your form. If you need assistance email support@reachmail.com or call us at 888-947-3224

Improve Deliverability by Branding your email

Who sent this? That’s the absolute first question email recipients think of when they receive an email. It may seem obvious to you but keep in mind that your recipients have to sort through dozens, if not hundreds of messages daily. If it’s not absolutely clear then the recipient reaches for the “delete” button or, horror of horrors the, “This is Spam” button. What to do?

Brand Your Email – Stephen Pollard wrote an excellent column in ClickZ http://www.clickz.com/3632346 discussing how to do it. Here’s what he recommends in a nutshell:

1. Brand the sender line. This means your company, your brand or your newsletter name, whatever you think your readers would recognize first. Be as specific as possible.

2. Brand the subject line. This is your fail-safe, in case the recipient doesn’t recognize or look at your sender line. Just because it’s there doesn’t mean people will see it, after all.

3. Brand your message copy in text as well as images. With images off, readers won’t see your gorgeous company logo. You can name it in alt text that appears inside image boxes when images are disabled, but that doesn’t always show up. Name your brand in the first line of text (the snippet or preheader line) or elsewhere in the top left quadrant of your message body to accommodate the skimpiest preview pane or mobile-phone screen.

4. Always review messages with and without images enabled before sending. Look at your e-mails the way your recipients do. How far do you have to read into them to learn who the sender is or what the e-mail is about? If you’re halfway down and still can’t answer the three Ws, revise your copy.

Holiday Marketing Gift – more customer email addresses
Growing a permission email list takes time, money and effort. If you have customer contacts that are missing email addresses there is one way to quickly obtain their email addresses as well as ensuring that they’re permission based. How? ReachMail’s Email Append Service. Properly done, Email Append allows you to extend the relationship you have with your current customers from the postal world to the digital world of email marketing.

ReachMail Media Services partners with three of the largest data providers including Axciom, InfoUSA and Experian to build the largest database of opt-in email addresses to our customers. Simply provide us with the complete postal record of your customers and ReachMail Media Services will compare it with the databases of all three providers. If there is a match ReachMail will arrange for a “Welcome” email message to be sent to the email address. If your customer prefers not to be contacted by you via email they have the opportunity to opt-out at that time. Opt-outs and undelivered records are then removed from your new email list. This new email list is then placed in your ReachMail account for you to market. Questions? Contact Brian Peiffle VP of ReachMail Media Services at 888-947-3224 x 703 or bpeiffle@reachmail.com

Getting the most out of ReachMail – Checking the performance of individual lists

Email lists are not static and neither is their performance. For example you may have gathered email addresses from a trade show two years ago. How do those lists perform over time versus subscribers to your newsletter? A list may initially perform well but nose dive in response rate 6 months later. ReachMail makes it easy to see changes in open rates, undelivered email and other metrics. Check out the “List Reports” tool from the Reports section.

List Reports shows you at a glance how many active recipients you have in a list, your bounces (hard and soft with a history of each for every mailing you’ve done. To run the report simply select the list you want.

The report has two sections. The first shows you graphically the current breakdown of your list, Active recipients, opt-outs and bounce detail. Plus a section on html or text preference

Want to see how your list performed over time? The second section lists the most recent mailings including open rates and bounce details. The key indicator to look at is “Total Read Recipients” over time. Don’t remember what the content was? Simply click on the mailing name to be presented with your HTML copy.

Deliverability Tip – Beware of old Hotmail or MSN email addresses
Unique among major ISPs, Microsoft looks for spammers by how often emailers send email to “old” hotmail or msn addresses. ReachMail has found that if you have a list that has not been mailed to in a long time that you may inadvertently have a spam trap within your list. How? It appears that Microsoft monitors dormant/unused accounts, typically hotmail accounts that are no longer being used by the recipient.
These are legitimate email addresses that have been abandoned by their owner a frequent occurrence since hotmail accounts are free. If you mail to one of these then Microsoft “hits” you as a spammer and reduces your deliverability for at least two weeks we’ve seen. Our advice: if you’ve not emailed a list in over 6 months and it includes these domains contact us for the proper procedure. We’ll keep you on Bill Gates good side….and your response rates up!

ReachMail API – Beta Testers Requested
ReachMail is nearing completion of a full featured API that will allow you to synch ReachMail with virtually any database. You’ll be able to access and control your ReachMail account from programs such as salesforce.com, ACT or any other database such as SQL Server. If you’re interested in becoming a beta tester for the new ReachMail API or if you’d like to be personally contacted when it becomes available – please email Greg Gulik at ggulik@reachmail.com

Introducing ReachMail Media Services

This month ReachMail is proud to introduce our newest division, ReachMail Media Services (RMS). RMS is an independent media buyer with expertise in list rentals and cost-per-lead programs. RMS brings together the best from direct marketing and demand generation to offer clients a fully integrated prospecting solution. RMS is fully independent of any media owner or publisher to insure that recommendations are objective and performance based. RMS’s core focus is to recommend the mix of marketing programs that will drive the lowest overall CPQL, cost-per-quality-lead.

RMS has brought in Brian Peiffle as division head. “I’m excited about offering a unique resource to marketers,” says Brian, “By consolidating the CPL and list purchase with one vendor our clients can limit duplication issues and leverage their entire marketing spend to get the best rates.” Brian, former Sr. VP of List Brokerage with InfoUSA, has over 10 years of experience guiding marketers to the most targeted media for reaching their prospects.

To learn more about ReachMail Media Services, please visit reachmail.net/media or email bpeiffle@reachmail.com

Getting the most out of ReachMail – Contents and Assets

Attaching files to a large email distribution is tricky. It severely hampers delivery rates, can damage your reputation with ISPs and can harm your relationship with your recipients. So how do you deliver a crucial PDF or PowerPoint presentation to your list? ReachMail’s contents and assets library has the answers. The contents and assets library is a simple way to host your documents and deliver them to your recipients on-demand for download. All you have to do is upload your files, link to them in your email, and that’s it. All your recipients will be able to click the link and download your file.

There’s no size quota for the library, you can upload as many files as you like regardless of size. There’s also no expiration date, your files stay available until you delete them. Your files are hosted on a secure server and are accessible only through your account. It’s the easiest way to provide your recipients with PDF, Word, Excel or PowerPoint files (or any other file type) without large attachments jamming their inbox or damaging your reputation with ISPs.

The Contents and Assests library is part of the ReachMail enhanced edition. For more information on upgrading the enhanced edition and what it has to offer please contact sales@reachmail.com
Deliverability Tip

Recently we came across an issue with the content filter on the earthlink.net domain that we thought we would share. It seems that earthlink.net uses a junk mail filter that searches the content of incoming emails for poorly formed HTML as well as certain HTML tags. Any instances of these will trigger the filter and capture the mail. The mail won’t even go the junk folder, it will simply not be delivered. If you have a lot of earthlink.net addresses in your list check out your mailings and adjust them as needed to fit these rules.

• No open HTML tags: close your tags, Earthlink won’t deliver bad HTML.
• No font tags: Earthlink will not deliver any mail with a font tag, if you need to emphasize copy use bold, underline, italic, or emphasis tags.
• No span tags: You will be delivered, but to the junk folder.
• Use heading tags: You can use heading tags in concert with inline style elements to use color and size to set off copy.

ReachMail API – Beta Testers Requested

ReachMail is nearing completion of a full featured API that will allow you to synch ReachMail with virtually any database. You’ll be able to access and control your ReachMail account from programs such as salesforce.com, ACT or any other database such as SQL Server. If you’re interested in becoming a beta tester for the new ReachMail API or if you’d like to be personally contacted when it becomes available – please email Greg Gulik at ggulik@reachmail.com