Our developers are very happy to release the “web version” tag for our clients.

The web version tag when added to your message content will provide a link to a web version of your email! So if a subscriber wishes to view your email message within a web browser then they can now do so!

To add a web version link within your message simply just add [WEBVERSION] or [WEBVERSIONBASE] to your message content.

See the online help guide for more information.

If you want to get enough information from subscribers for ‘marketing intelligence’, but are unsure or nervous about asking too much and putting them off - here are some tips…

Getting enough data to personalise content adequately

The ‘right amount of questions’ really depends on your business strategy. If you’re going for sheer quantity to make the ‘sales funnel’ as wide as possible, then you might only ask for email address and maybe first name if you want to personalise. You may later qualify or filter these subscribers by inviting them to a second form with more detailed questions to go on a ‘warm prospects’ list to whom you may send a different newsletter. If you want to qualify your prospects straight-off, to focus your marketing, then you’ll need to ask more questions.

Useful Information fields to have

Besides email address, you may want postal address if you’re sending postal mail - and make it a ‘required’ field to ensure your visitor can’t leave the form without filling this out. It can also be useful if your subscriber’s email bounces – to send a letter asking them for an address update (and making a sales connection with them).

Phone numbers can be especially important if you need to:

• Call your customers to confirm something,
• Build relationship,
• Qualify them as likely business prospects, or
• Fix email bounces (also an excuse to call and qualify them).

Asking for a visitor’s product or life interests is a great marketing tool for:

• Content customisation, which subscribers love as it gives them control and boosts the relevance factor key to email marketing success, or
• Segmenting your list for different kinds of prospects requiring different marketing approaches or newsletters - which is more effective than ‘one size fits all’ marketing

What are the sensitive or tricky questions that scare people off?

Asking for age can be sensitive, unless you tell visitors why you need to know – a key for tricky questions in general.

Credit Card information, household income and gender can all be a bit personal and turn off your registrant. Expect some bogus information here as there are just too many scams happening online and people are generally afraid.

How many information fields does it take to put people off?

Generally, it pays to limit the number of fields to the minimum you need to get the key information, to avoid excessive ‘friction’ – the term online marketing experts use for things on your web page that deter visitors from signing up or purchasing.

Ensuring the quality and genuineness of your mailing list

To verify subscribers as real people, a CAPTCHA feature can be used on your form, which is made up of distorted letters or numbers that a registrant needs to type into a field like the one shown above. This eliminates unwanted automated scripts or “bots”, saving you time cleaning out your lists to filter out these bogus registrations from potential customers.

Striking the right balance

In short, only ask as many questions as you need to gather required information to personalise emails or segment your list for different kinds of prospects requiring different marketing approaches or newsletters. If you have to ask sensitive questions, ensure you show visitors why you need to know.

We are very pleased to announce a new feature has been added to your Account.

Our Feature Request email was very well received a few weeks ago and it has kept our development team very busy. Due to popular demand the feature we now have - is a default value for a subscriber attribute!

Before this feature was added to your Account

Prior to this new feature - the personalization of your messages for example “First Name” would present an empty space if the subscriber did not have a value for “First Name”

For example:

If you had “Dear [First Name]” within your email message (as seen in figure 1) and the subscriber did not have a value for the “First Name” then the message would go out with “Dear ,” as seen in (figure 2).

Figure 1

Figure 2

From today onwards our new feature applies. If a subscriber does not have a value in an attribute you want to use within your email then a default value can be added!

Figure 3

In the example above the email message contains the default value for the “First Name” attribute and was used because the subscriber did not have a value in the “First Name” attribute.

To set a default value for an attribute update the “Default” field within the subscriber attribute form.

Figure 4

Its that easy!