A client has asked us about changing the FROM address in their emails so they can provide a more descriptive text to help with subscriber recognition. We thought about this question for a while and decided to run a couple of tests to see what would be the impact of changing the FROM address.

Now before we begin the FROM address field in an email can comprise of two parts:

The senders email address such as "Newsletters@mobilizemail.com",

A text part such as "Mobilize Mail". The text part if provided is sometimes displayed instead of the email address.

So for a FROM address you could have: "Mobilize Mail <newsletters@mobilizemail.com>".

In most modern email clients this would be displayed as:

If you did not have a text part in the FROM address then the email would be displayed like this:

When you click the reply button your email client is normally smart enough to use the email address that was supplied within the FROM address.

Best Practices for the FROM Address

The most common best practice around the content of the FROM address is to provide something that will spark some form of recognition with the subscribers such as your business name or your full name.

In the example above the FROM contains "Mobilize Mail" which alerts the subscriber instantly to who sent the email. The subject line also provides a good indication of the intent of the email.

Now, what happens if after a while you decide to change the FROM address to something else?

For example:

That should not be a problem should it?

Well there are a number of considerations to think about before you make the leap. For example what if the subscriber added a rule in their email client that located your emails based on the FROM content?

Below we can see a subscriber has created a mailbox rule for any email that contains "Mobilize Mail" in the FROM field.

By changing your FROM address you may in fact be damaging your existing relationship with the subscribers by making their existing mailbox rules redundant or worse causing your emails to be deleted or moved to the trash folder.

How did the email clients like the change?

One thing that we were interested in was how an email client would deal with a change in the FROM address if there was a current address book entry.

For example below is an Entourage address book entry for "Mobilize Mail".

When an email is sent to the client this is how the FROM address currently appears:

Now lets change the address book entry for Mobilize Mail to "Joe Bloggs" as below.

We then send the same email again to this subscriber with the same FROM address which is "Mobilize Mail <newsletters@mobilizemail.com>".

Below is how Entourage now displays the FROM address. Entourage completely ignored the FROM address in the email!

We can see from this example that Entourage will display the details within the address book for the sender not what has been added to the emails FROM address.

This could be a pain for some email marketers who frequently send out emails using the same email address but change part of the FROM address.

In order to see how some of the more popular email clients dealt with changes to the FROM address with an existing address book entry we created the following simple test:

1. Create an email campaign with the following FROM address "Mobilize Mail <newsletters@mobilizemail.com>" and send to the test email lab.
2. Once the email arrived add the senders details (in the FROM address) to each email clients address book including the text part which is "Mobilize Mail".
3. Send the second email campaign and change the FROM address to "Mobilize Mail Newsletter Service <newsletters@mobilizemail.com>".
4. Finally send the third email campaign but only have "newsletters@mobilizemail.com" in the FROM address (no text part).

What we are looking for is if the address book entry overruled the change in the FROM address of the email. The findings are below:

Apple Mail:

No problems with Apple Mail.

Entourage:

Bummer! The Entourage address book controls the FROM address!

Eudora:

Gmail:

Interesting. All 3 emails are grouped by the "Mobilize Mail" contacts entry which works like an address book. When the email group is clicked all 3 emails are expanded - see below.

Lotus Notes:

Lotus Notes is happy.

Outlook 2007:

All good here.

Thunderbird:

Changes showed up in Thunderbird.

Windows Live:

Yahoo! Mail:

Our testing identified only one email client namely Entourage that refused to display the emails correct FROM address if there was an existing entry in the address book for the recipient.

Gmail grouped the emails together based on the "Contact" entry which is not great but at least the correct FROM address details are displayed when you click on the email group.

Our Tips for the FROM Address

Even though only one of the email clients refused to display the emails FROM address (namely Entourage) and instead displayed the address book details you should still seriously think before you change your FROM address text or email address.

Subscribers these days create rules to help them manage their email which includes rules using the content of the FROM address.

We recommend that caution should be taken to any decision to change the FROM address details. If you do need to change the details then warn the subscriber in at least one email prior to the change so any changes they need to make can be done at their end.

Tags: Email Message Design, Email Subject Heading, HTML emails

Every couple of weeks I wait with baited breath for the next installment of Tim Ferriss’s exciting life. Tim Ferris is a man who states that he only works 4 hours a week to earn more in a month than some people earn in a year. I have read his book and love it so it was an easy leap to get me to sign up to receive updates to his blog via email.

Sometimes Tim provides a little movie dealing with something interesting which automatically appears within my email client. In the last installment it was how to “peel” a hard-boiled egg without peeling!!

To view the movie within my email client all I have to do is play it. The movie starts in seconds and there is no latency and well – it just plays where it is – no trips to a web site or nothing.

I thoroughly enjoy watching the movies and told many of my friends to sign up to his email alerts.

What I forgot to mention was that unless you are using Apple Mail as your email client you are not in fact going to see the movies nor in Tim’s case will you ever know they were ever present!

You see Apple Mail as of this posting seems to be the only email client that plays flash movies.

In order to prove my statement I ran Tim’s latest email blog alert through our email test lab – see the results below:

Apple Mail

Go Tim!
Tims video in Apple Mail

Entourage

Interesting that Entourage at least provided a blank space where the flash should be running. At least you know something might be missing.

Yahoo! Mail

There is even no mention of the movie not even a little broken icon to make me wonder what I am missing.

Gmail

Nope – nothing here.

Outlook

No surprises here. Outlook 2007 would be the last email application I would expect flash to run in.

Outlook Express (Windows Mail)

A warning about the flash file is all that Outlook Express can muster.

Thunderbird

Thunderbird at least displays a blank area where the flash should be.

Windows Live Hotmail

Hotmail doesn’t want to know about the flash file either.

So is it Worth Sending Flash Movies in Email?
Looking at the results the only reason you would bother inserting flash movies in an email is if you knew for a fact that most if not all of your subscribers used Apple Mail.

If not don’t bother. You can try and fiddle with wrapping the flash in a table or a DIV and provide a backup image but I doubt that even the image would appear if its anywhere near the HTML that deals with the flash file.

In Tim’s case I doubt he is even aware of this issue and maybe its not a concern as most people would just visit his blog.

Mark over at Email Marketing Reports has a number of articles on the subject including this one.

The May 08 Habeas study reveals consumer attitudes towards email and online interaction with businesses. There’s some really valuable insight here for your online marketing…

Email vs other communication mediums – will it survive?

The study confirms increasing concern about email fraud, scams, spam, viruses, and privacy, but…despite all this:

What about emerging platforms such as mobile?

There is an increasing trend toward consumer use of mobile devices such as internet-enabled phones, but far from superseding email, they will provide another arena for it. Just like Web sites, mobile versions of email need to be compact and focused to reach mobile users effectively. This is an opportunity not many businesses are tapping into yet, but will become more commonplace – probably for businesses with more time-sensitive services. It could be worth thinking forward to be ahead of the game…

What are the most important factors for success?

The study confirmed interest from consumers in gaining more control over their online interactions with businesses, and noted other trust factors:

What things will most scare your customers off?

Previous studies have shown a real ‘email insecurity factor’ among consumers, in fact nearly 60% keep different addresses for entities they trust vs don’t trust. If you can make it into their latter category, your emails will likely attract ready attention.

So…stick with email but keep looking forward with good reputation management

Far from being eclipsed by other emerging communications methods, consumers expect email to be the main workhorse channel into the future. Organisations that build trust with consumers through forward-looking reputation management strategies will stand out and gain long-term competitive advantage. As a brand expert recently said…your reputation is your brand - the most important asset your business has.

Outlook 2003 was one of the first major email applications to set image blocking on by default. Many email applications both desktop based and web based have followed suit. In fact these days its better to just assume that images within your email content will not be shown by 50% of your subscribers.

A recent study provided another statistic that all email marketers should find interesting:

“Study Finds Emails of 23% of Retailers Are Completely Unintelligible When Images Are Blocked”

So if its looking bad for images what should you do?

Here are some basic tips that will help your email content be understood by your subscribers even if the images are not displayed:

1) Use ALT tags for all your images. The text within the ALT tag will be displayed if the image is blocked by most (not all) email applications.

Image displayed

Image Blocked but displaying ALT text

<img src=“whale.jpg” alt=“Picture of Humpback Whale”width=“555″ height=“599″ />

We have seen quite creative ideas when it comes to the text within an alt tag! For example:

“So you don’t want to see the special deal we have for you?”

2) Try and avoid adding important messages and call to actions within images. Using an image for “Buy Now” is not a good idea instead provide a text link.

3) Provide a statement somewhere near the top which could say:

“Best viewed with images on”

A certain portion of your subscribers will have images blocked and have no idea that there is image blocking occurring.

4) Add height and width values for all your images. This is very important if you use images to space or partition your content. If images are blocked and you have not provided width and height values the email application will attempt to guess or default to a height and width which more than likely will not be in your best interests.

5) Avoid adding too many images “above the fold” as this is valuable real estate that will be viewed within the preview pane.

There is a lot of talk these days of the importance of email “sender reputation”.

The good news is the reputation of the sender can be enhanced and using an Email Service Provider (ESP) to deliver your bulk email is step in the right direction to improving your ‘sender reputation’.

I know I am biased due to owning an ESP however there is proof that using the same IP Address to email out on and implementing email authentication mechanisms such as SPF, Domain Keys, Domain Keys Internet Mail and Sender ID does provide the sender with a desirable reputation for successful email delivery. These solutions are available to you with Mobilize Mail.

However it is also very important to remember that one of the most important influencers of whether your email ends up in the inbox or spam folder is of course your subscribers. The power of the “This is SPAM” button is clearly something to be respected.

If you send emails to your subscribers that are far from interesting or poorly presented the subscribers will (one survey stated up to 60% of people use the “This is SPAM” button to unsubscribe!) without much hesitation click the dreaded button. What follows thereafter depends on the recipient’s mail server. For example your email could be processed by a content filter such as Cloudmark.

Cloudmark scans the email content looking for “finger prints” and other common spam indicators.

As with the spam complaint button, one report by itself will generally not affect your message however if enough subscribers mark your message as spam the end result is not good for you, your business and your sales.

Your email content needs to look professional, have appropriate content that is of interest to your subscribers (not you) and email presentation needs to be formatted smartly as to not raise suspicions that your email could be a hoax (called Phishing).

The latest Habeas report provided the following alarming facts that you need to be aware of:

1. 69 percent of respondents worry about being victimized by e-mail fraud scams, up from 62 percent in 2007.
2. 35 percent said they don’t know what to look for when trying to sift through e-mail messages that are potentially dangerous. This means 65 percent feel they know what to look for.
3. About 25 percent lose “some degree of faith” in a company that can’t deliver e-mail reliably.

This means that if your message does get to your subscribers, they might still decide that it looks like spam and click the “This is SPAM” button. Overtime your email will end up in the spam folder.

We recommend that you not only provide content that is of interest to your subscribers but also really focus on providing a professionally presented email (we can help you here with our content presentation services for email. If you are an existing client please send your content to newsletter@mobilizemail.com ).

Here are some tips to help you that our content presentation team deem as 101:

1. Avoid small text (less then 8 points should be avoided but no large than 14 points.
2. Try and keep the use of ‘spammy’ words down for example mentioning the word “free!” 10 times in your message is not a smart idea.
3. Misspelled words are a ‘no no’ – it seems spammers are not great spellers.
4. Don’t hide text by making it the same colour as the background on which the text is presented.
5. No CAPS!
6. Respect your subscribers’ inbox by only sending on the frequency you initially promised them. If you stated a monthly newsletter then avid sending them a fortnightly one.
7. Make sure the subject line provides some spark of recognition to the subscriber about your business. Using a vague or ‘spammy’ subject line is almost guaranteed to get your email ignored.

At the end of the day it all comes down to common sense. Provide email content that is interesting to them (not you) and is professionally formatted.

While traditional marketing channels experience a drop in advertising spend during a downturn or recession - Email remains strong and the Marketer’s choice for communication. In 2007/2008 Industry growth in onlline advertising and email marketing continues to show digital media is the preferred choice.

Email Marketing is Evolving

Email marketing is continuing to evolve and the solutions enhancements are providing more value for business. We are witnessing an increase in client requests for solutions capable of managing more complex communication e.g. rewards programs, promotions and events registration.

In a tighter market competition is fierce and businesses are responding with more ingenious incentives to drive more sales revenue.

Competitions for free holidays, new cars, pamper packs are all the rage and the good news is email has evolved to manage the data capture, communication and record management for these marketing incentive schemes.

Do you have an Event or Promotion coming up? Contact us for your tailored email solution.

A mentor once told me that the rarest thing in the world is common sense.

Over the years I constantly remind myself of this advice and with email marketing its very important to use common sense. Here is an example.

Last week I received a commercial email from a property related business which was full of talk about how great a company they were, how many sales they did last month, how many awards they have won, blah-blah-blah.

Now if the author bothered to think like one of his/her subscribers they would ask themselves:

1. What benefit is this email giving me?
2. Do they help me with a problem I have?
3. Would I read another email sent from them?

9 times out of 10 if you think like your subscribers before you write your email message you will provide an email that will add value to the subscriber and they will continue to open your emails.

If you don’t then 10 times out of 10 you will start losing subscribers and that means business.

Tip: Think like your subscribers when creating your email message.

Tags: email marketing tips

Assuming our headline has got your attention you may be wondering what we mean by “integrate and propagate”. Of course we are referring to email marketing solutions and your business. In short we are suggesting you integrate your email marketing system with your core business systems to grow your business efficiently.

Email marketing systems can deliver a lot more value to your business once your email solutions are integrated (combined) with your core business systems. Human productivity improvement can be realised, customer acquisition, and retention levels can increase and the business can scale to new heights or broaden its reach with existing and new customers.

Email marketing solutions are often seen as "standalone" systems that are essentially worthwhile for e-newsletter presentation, delivery to bulk email lists and basic email address data management. Most systems do allow for more "power user" capability so you can use your email solution as an effective business communication tool.

Humans use 10 percent of their brain and maybe just
10 percent of their email marketing system.

When your systems are standalone core data capture issues are identified or become more pronounced (especially your business grows) and noticeably information bottlenecks can occur resulting in poor time and cost management.

A further reconciliation process is also usually required to ensure all systems have the correct up-to-date information. Integrating your core business systems and databases with your Mobilize Mail account provides you with the time and cost efficiencies, where information can be shared via a single entry point. E.g. You can add new information to your database and programmatically your Mobilize Mail account is also updated allowing for the two systems to contain the same relevant information.

The new information added could also trigger the creation and delivery of an automated message. Automating the creation and delivery of emails is an example of "power user" status achieved post integration of your email solution and database or website. Automated emails may also replace the client or prospect "follow up" and "reminder" communication currently performed by you or a colleague - therefore allowing you to spend more quality time on higher reward tasks.

Integration - Starting Point

Integration can happen gradually and at a pace where results are realized for each step taken. There is also not a "one size fits all" approach to integration. The nature of your business, your goals and existing processes and systems all play a role in determining the correct strategy and implementation plan.

A simple starting point can be the data capture of your website visitor’s details onto your mailing list. What is transferred can be complex or maybe just the simple transfer of a couple of data fields e.g the visitor’s first name for personalizing your emails, and their email address.

Once these details have been transferred to your Account an automated message could be sent to them introducing you, your brand (the message can be in an HTML template) and your business prompting a further response from the recipient which can be received by you or any designated email address. Many clients use this integration feature as an initial stepping stone to a complete marriage of their emailing solution and their core business systems.

No Man is an Island -
and neither should your email marketing solution!

Please contact us for more information on how integration may benefit you and your business.

Back in October 2007 we presented our thoughts on email Subject Lines - Improving the Email Subject Line.

Six months later and we have some fresh perspective on Subject Lines – because your email message starts here! If the subject line fails to win over your recipients your email message is left unread.

In our October 2007 blog post we acknowledged great subject lines either provided content that is relevant and important to the recipient; suggested a sense of urgency or expiration factor ( e.g. book sale - last 2 days ) or provided something the recipient can act upon. (e.g. Travel in March 08 and Save $100). Combining more than one of these email openers in your subject line may work a treat too.

Using the recipient’s name in the subject line is another proven email opener - however what follows on after their name is equally important so the message is not confused with SPAM. You can also achieve instant recognition for subject headings by using your name ( e.g. Mobilize Mail – It all starts with the Subject Line).

Creating curiosity with a question is also an attention grabber – and as long as the question is relevant to the recipient it’s a winner. Remember to have the answer to the question within the email message your recipient will be looking for it and may judge your message on the quality of the answer. Personally I think there is nothing worse than a question without an answer – it leaves you with the feeling of being duped or tricked and that leads me onto the next focus – that being honesty. Subject Lines are part of your email message and they too need to be respectful and honest in their communication …they are to lead not mislead.

As uninteresting as it may appear the best subject lines simply describe the contents of the email message – nothing more – nothing less!

Tags: subject line

The saying goes - “People do not plan to fail…..they fail to plan“. Get 2008 off to a great start with an Email Communications Plan.

Like any other communications plan – we start by using the 4 x ‘w’s and 1 x ‘h’ (what, why, who, when and how) to create the written ‘plan of action’ for communicating with your business network with professionally presented emails.

Who do you want to reach?

Consider the various groups in your business network namely your ‘prospects, clients, suppliers and referrers’ and create an email communications plan for each group. How often do you need to communicate with each group? Create a 12 month mail out plan – in advance. You can always mail out more often on a ad hoc basis. These plans will provide the minimum requirement of communication that will assist you with growing your business.

What are your marketing objectives for each group? What type of Communication do you want to share with each group?

What are your expectations for the communication? What do you want to achieve? What type of communication do you want to share with each group. You may want to ensure you deliver a variety of messages over the months so you are sharing information, running promotions, introducing your team, company, new services or products. As the saying goes “variety is the spice of life” and email messages can get monotonous too.

When do you want to send the email messages?

When do you want the groups in your business network to receive your messages? It is time to create the schedule. What actions (if any) will you take after each message has been delivered?

How will you create and deliver the messages?

You may assign a team member to create all or some of the message content. The email presentation and testing may be assigned to your ESP (email service provider) or you may do it in-house. We suggest you deliver your messages via an ESP so you can get feedback with statistics to provide measurement for your marketing effort.

Other Considerations for your Email Communications Plan
Your communications plan will need to present the associated costs for creating, presenting and delivering your emails. You will need to identify the budget, costs and where the money is coming from for your email marketing. Other resources may also be required for the presentation of your email message including digital images. You may need to consider who will create the images for you.

To get the most productivity from your marketing campaigns we suggest you keep a careful eye on your growth of mailings lists. See ‘How to Grow Your Mailing Lists’ for valuable ideas on developing your market reach.

Here is a brief example of an Email Communications Plan:

Who to Reach? People that refer business to me – namely my ‘Referrers Group’

How often do I want to communicate with them (as a group)? Once a month commencing this month

What information do I want to be sharing? A market update newsletter that contains either a promotion, team member bio or a relevant humour piece to keep the message fresh

What are my expectations – objectives? To be viewed as an Industry Expert. Get my brand visible with my business referrers. Provide value to my referrers with special offers that make them look good.

Who will create the content and presentation of my messages? I will personally create the content, seeking market updates from external sources. My ESP will create the presentation and deliver the messages to my referrers mailing list.

What are the expected Costs? $255 + GST per month

Right now you may all be thinking - “Hey, there’s no ‘why’”.

Why am I communicating with email to share my information and market my business?
Email is time efficient and achieves a high response. Email is also very cost effective for regular communication: “Average costs of 3 to 10 cents per email, versus $2.00 for direct mail and up to $3.00 for tele-marketing. “[source: McKinsey & Company]

Tags: communications, marketing, objectives, plan