Email Marketing Insights, Strategy & Best Practices

Your Customers Called…They’re Lonely

“Hey, it’s me… your old customer… remember me?

Customer disengagement happens when businesses stop communicating

I bought from you a while back. I’m in need of your service again, but I didn’t know if your business was even in existence anymore, nor did I even remember your company name. I decided to go with another company who actually cared about my business.” This is how the story goes. You celebrate over the fact that you made a sale to a new customer. Either a product is delivered or a service is performed. An order is filled out, and that customer now goes into a manila file folder in the office file cabinet. A year passes. As you wipe off the dust that has collected on your file cabinet over this period of time, you now ask, “What ever happened to that customer, and why haven’t I heard from them?” I’m here to give you a reality check. Most likely, that customer moved on because they simply felt that you didn’t value their business. They switched to a competitor of yours who actively took the time to continue the conversation, even after the product was delivered or the service was performed. In many cases, that breakdown happens quietly in the inbox. When customers stop hearing from a brand, they don’t always complain or unsubscribe—they simply disengage and move on.

This makes perfect sense when you consider that the majority of customers come to you because they developed a relationship with you prior to purchasing your offerings, or were referred to you by a friend or business colleague. When you fail to open the gates of communication and keep them informed of your brand existence, you no longer become the company that comes to mind when the need for your service arises once again.

The goal of marketing executives is to stretch their marketing budget as far as they can in an effort to gain the maximum benefit using minimal amount of resources. Without unleashing the power of marketing, any opportunity or potential for business growth goes out the window. However, our focus toward acquiring new customers is oftentimes so strong that we become blinded by the reality that 80% of your business is right in front of your face.

Instead of spending the majority of your time and resources going after new clients who must be persuaded and convinced that you are a reputable business and capable of delivering above and beyond consumer expectations, why not capitalize on those who have already chosen you over your competitors at least once before? Why not engage your customers with your business and continue the dialogue? Maybe It’s Time to Start Dating Your Customers. Before re-engaging past customers, it’s important to ensure that your outreach is going to real, reachable people. Outdated, abandoned, or invalid email addresses can undermine even the best engagement strategy.

Nurturing, retaining, communicating and maintaining the relationship with your existing customers is the key to keeping the sales rolling in, especially when, on average, repeat customers spend 33% more than new customers and are also more inclined to refer additional business your way.

It’s not rocket science. It doesn’t require any strategic thinking or a reallocation of your marketing budget. It’s actually easier than you think. All it requires is a simple email every so often, or perhaps a follow up phone call every now and then will do the trick. Pick up the phone and start calling. Make that call just to say “Hi, how are you doing. I’m here if you need anything.”

Email newsletters are the most effective method of outreach to keep your customers in tune with news of your business, new products or services you have on the market, blogs or press releases that discuss insight into your field of expertise, or anything else that will provide a value-added benefit to your customers. Never underestimate the value of an effective, relevant, and informative subject line to capture the attention of your most prized asset, your customer database. Prior to launching re-engagement efforts, a practical hygiene step is removing known junk and high-risk addresses from your database. PureList’s email list cleaning service focuses on cleaning lists so re-engagement campaigns are built on accurate, current data.

So what’s the hold up?

Acknowledging that your imploding in the basics of simply generating sales and have been screwing up for the last year or so, will not get you any closer to your goals. Do something about it. You just blew your opportunity to increase your sales by 50%. Failing to simply keep in touch with your existing customers, is unconscionable. Now pick up the phone, and make that call. A good customer is a terrible thing to waste.

This article is part of our broader resource on email list cleaning and hygiene, which explains why maintaining clean lists supports stronger engagement and long-term customer relationships.

Loyalty Marketing: Understanding it and Getting it Right

What the Dallas Cowboys & Chef Boyardee Both Prove About Loyalty Marketing

I read a quote the other day posted by Seth Godin that really opened my eyes to the true meaning of loyalty:

“Loyalty is what we call it when someone refuses a momentarily better option” – Seth Godin

We equate this type of loyalty to our own personal relationships, sports teams, television shows, or even our personal favorite brand of canned ravioli.

When you acknowledge what you’re loyal to in your daily life, I bet you’ll realize (deep down) that there’s always something better out there. For instance, are you a football fan? I personally know a die-hard Dallas Cowboys fan who acknowledges that they certainly aren’t the best team in the NFL today. But because he grew up in Dallas during their glory days, the Cowboys remain his team of choice regardless of the fact that 1) he’s now moved out of Texas and 2) he truly despises Tony Romo.

Let me throw a personal example out there for kicks to really drive this point home. As a child, I grew up on Chef Boyardee Canned Ravioli, as it was a staple in my household and the “go-to” meal of choice when my parents were too lazy or too rushed to supply a more nutritious alternative. As the story goes, it has become somewhat of a comfort food as I’ve gotten older and a brand that I associate that “warm, fuzzy feeling” with. The truth is, I know there are probably hundreds of other brands of canned ravioli out on the market that are perhaps cheaper or healthier, but to be frank, I could care less. Chef Boyardee will always be #1 in my eyes (and stomach).

I can go on and on with countless examples of how loyalty plays a role in our personal lives, but we all already understand this type of loyalty. It just makes sense to us. Why is it then, that the minute we walk into our office and close the door to the outside world, our perception of loyalty seemingly changes? In email marketing, this disconnect often shows up as a focus on short-term incentives rather than long-term relationships. Loyalty in the inbox is not created through volume or discounts alone, but through relevance, consistency, and respectful communication. As business executives, have we distorted the meaning of loyalty marketing when we try to put a dollar sign on its value? Where have we gone wrong?

Manufacturing Loyalty through Quantitative Metrics

Businesses are often misguided into thinking they can “manufacture” loyalty through the creation of loyalty programs that are analyzed solely on quantitative metrics. We spend countless hours devising incentivized reward offers and crunching numbers that we are quickly losing sight of the big picture. As a result, there are too many cookie-cutter solutions that the market has become immune to. Let’s be honest here – who really keeps track of how many bonus points he or she has accrued? Who has time to read through the intricate details and legal disclaimers that accompany each loyalty program? Don’t get me wrong – these programs do in fact play an important role, but they are only a piece of the pie.

Let’s take “program” out of the equation for a minute and set our focus primarily on the word “loyalty.” Rather than perceiving it as something you should measure, it should be perceived as something you earn through constant relationship building and follow-up. Simply put, the only way you will reap the benefits of loyalty marketing is to redirect your focus from cost cutting and reward points to customer engagement and results. People are not loyal to special cards, cash discounts, or points. They are loyal to brands. That loyalty is difficult to build when messages are sent to outdated, uninterested, or invalid email addresses. Maintaining list quality is a foundational step in ensuring that engagement efforts reach real people who still recognize and value your brand.

Think about it. Do you want customers who are looking to nickel and dime you and turn to you only when you’re the best deal around? Or do you want customers who value you for you, and will shop with you regardless of what other hot deal comes around?

So stop discounting your products and services to such a degree that you discredit your brand and spoil its reputation. Rather, focus your energy on communicating with users. Invest more time into delivering a good product or service with exceptional service to repeat customers and referrals that drive the majority of your sales.

Loyalty is based on customer experience. Customers who choose you because they are happy with your services are 100 times more valuable than customers who choose you because you are the least expensive option at the present moment. Who do you think is coming back?

Once you’ve got your customers hooked and you continue delivering beyond their expectations, they’re in it for the long haul. Reward these individuals with your utmost respect to ensure that they stand by you regardless of wavering market conditions. This might mean picking up the phone a little more often than you’re used to, or sending a periodic personalized email thanking them for their continued business.

There are certainly going to be those lone stragglers that have seemingly fallen off the face of the earth. They used to be your biggest fan, but for some odd reason or another, they’ve become apathetic. The question is, how do you treat these disengaged users? Consider launching a re-engagement email marketing campaign to revitalize those who have been inactive and strive to re-connect with them using interesting, relevant and personalized content. This process begins with a custom-designed email creative that re-instates your consumer-centric focus and your goal of continually delivering on the needs of your loyal customer base.

Before I continue on the topic of a large-scale re-engagement email campaign, it is important to first address the benefits of cleaning your email list prior to launch. Because a large segment of your customer database may consist of dead, invalid, or abandoned email addresses, you risk generating a high bounce rate from your deployment and subsequently damaging your sender reputation. Before launching a re-engagement or loyalty-focused campaign, a practical hygiene step is removing known junk and high-risk addresses. PureList’s email list cleaning service focuses on cleaning lists so re-engagement efforts are not undermined by addresses that should no longer be mailed.

The benefits of a re-engagement campaign are twofold:

1) You will convert previously inactive users to loyal, engaged customers

2) You will identify and purge uninterested users who have become indifferent to your service offerings and unsubscribe them from your list.

You might realize that you won’t always have the most attractive or cost-efficient solution to fulfill your customers needs. What you might not realize is that your devoted customers know this. However, their loyalty to your brand will dissuade them from chasing that “momentarily better option” and choose you time and time again.

This article is part of our broader resource on email list cleaning and hygiene, which explains why removing junk before sending supports healthier engagement and long-term loyalty.

What’s Your Dog Up To When He’s Home Alone?

If your dog has the balls (no pun intended) to sit back and lick his ‘family jewels’ while you’re watching, what do you think he’s up to when he’s home alone?

Have you ever left your dog home alone, unsupervised for an extended period of time? When you’ve done so, did you walk into a house in immaculate condition? Or were the natural instincts of your canine friend unleashed as if a tornado stormed through the hallways, leaving shredded tissue paper scattered through all corners of the house and bite marks on your newly painted baseboards?

Before you ask yourself how one dirty sock traveled all the way from your laundry basket to the inside drawer of your entertainment center, consider who truly may be at fault in this situation. Did you forget about Murphy’s Law – what has seemingly become the governing law of the land? I’m not trying to be cynical here in expecting the worst in any situation, but I am simply advocating the need to be prepared when nature takes it’s course and your loving fur ball leaves a welcome home present on your throw blanket – one that doesn’t smell like roses.

Unless you’ve got your dog locked up in a cage and under 24 hour surveillance, how do you really know what your dog is up to when he’s home alone?

How does your dog’s (private activities) relate to email marketing?

Take this a step further and question your email marketing evaluation strategy. Once you’ve designed your email creative, set up your landing page to effectively capture leads or sales, uploaded your verified email list, and hit the send button, do you pat yourself on the back with a job well done and call it a day? In the hustle and bustle that accompanies the implementation of an email marketing campaign, the evaluation process is often the most overlooked, yet most important piece of the puzzle. How do you truly know if your email marketing campaign is performing at its full potential without monitoring delivery, open rate, interactions with the email creative, click through rate, or return on investment? You don’t. This is where the dog comparison comes into play. Just as you don’t know what your dog is up to when you’re not at home, you can’t have any idea how your email marketing campaign is working if you don’t review the stats, tracking and details of everything else that makes up your results. If you don’t invest the time and resources into properly reviewing all of your stats, you’re setting yourself up for a series of costly mistakes that could take a toll on your bottom line. Of course, you’re not expected to hit a home run your first time at bat, but that’s why we often like to say that Mistakes & Failures are the Key to Success. Taking the information you learn from your stats will enable you to make the proper changes and tweak each new campaign you send to result in better deliverability, increased open rates and interaction and generate the best possible ROI.

What is the only way to know the true percentage of emails that have been delivered to the inbox and opened, without images being blocked? The answer lies in real-time tracking. Access to the live tracking link enables you to monitor the performance of your email campaign. This reporting tool tracks the number of emails sent, the number of emails opened, and the number of unique clicks on each link embedded in your email creative.

If, for instance, we launch a single deployment to 100,000 business decision makers and/or consumers online and only 20,000 recipients open the email, we have fulfilled 25% of your contract for 80,000 Guaranteed Opens. This means that you have the opportunity to streamline your offer and continue to deploy until 80,000 people open your email and review your advertisement. A thorough analysis of all of the performance variables detailed in the live tracking report of your first deployment will give insight into what can be done, tweaked or changed to improve the next deployment. Perhaps it’s using a different email creative, or perhaps it’s just a matter of tweaking the subject line to further relate to your audience or peak their interest to help entice them to open and read the email you have sent.

Whatever it is, we are here every step of the way to offer our expertise and a professional opinion. With 15+ years in the industry, we have seen our fair share of dogs gone wild and have witnessed Murphy’s Law in full effect. Don’t make the mistake of leaving your marketing to chance, because your dog can take care of himself. You can’t stop your dog from buffing the family jewels, but you can monitor the stats of your email marketing efforts to make a positive difference.

“We learn from failure, not from success!”
― Bram Stoker

Email Marketing Insights & Best Practices Hub

Your Customers Called…They’re Lonely

“Hey, it’s me… your old customer… remember me?

Loyalty Marketing: Understanding it and Getting it Right

What the Dallas Cowboys & Chef Boyardee Both Prove About Loyalty Marketing

What’s Your Dog Up To When He’s Home Alone?

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