August 17, 2002
Your [5] E-ComTips
Service ID [1]
Good morning [3],
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WHAT'S NEW?
Order volume increased nicely for many of our merchants last month and the
trend seems to be continuing this month. This observation corresponds with
information from surveys of combined brick and morter/Internet merchants
who reported better performance with the Internet channel.
In this issue of E-ComTips we continue the series on getting known by
exploring the how-to's and hazards of bulk e-mailing. We're also pleased
to announce that E-ComTips has been selected for listing with 
FreeTechMail.org,
your source for some of the most prestigious IT newsletters on the Internet.
If there are any issues in particular you would like us to cover, drop us
a note and we'll see what we can do. Please use the
Mail Form
at ImagineNation to correspond.
Team....ImagineNation |
E-ComTips
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Using the E-Commerce Internet .... getting known ....bulk e-mail |
Continuing with our tips on getting known, we
saved e-mail marketing for a newsletter by itself. Sending bulk e-mail is not
for the faint of heart.This is a broad and complex field of endeavor replete
with pot holes, barricades, and land mines.
The first thing that comes to mind when mentioning bulk e-mail is Spam Mail.
Spam is unsolicited bulk e-mail, sometimes called UBM or USM. In the minds
of many, spamming ranks up there with other heinous crimes against humanity
and a spammer is hardly human. We suspect we know why this attitude is but,
for the life of us, don't know why e-mail is perceived differently from unsolicited
snail mail, highway billboards, and telemarketing. Heck, we get at least 50
USM's a day; we deal with it; we direct these messages automatically to our
"dump" box. Some of it makes for interesting reading when we have the time.
Keep in mind though, we've never bought anything as a result of a spam ad.
Which brings us to the point. This newsletter, for instance, is bulk e-mail.
It is NOT unsolicited. Everyone on our list has either signed up for the
newsletter or has downloaded one of our products and was informed that in
doing so they would be on the list. Hopefully, we've made it just as easy
to get off the list and we do not share subscriber information with anyone.
So, what we'll discuss here is to assist merchants in advertising through bulk
e-mail, NOT by spamming. Links that we provide here are for your information
only. The links do NOT indicate that we in any way indorse the products or
services that may be presented.
GETTING AN E-MAIL LIST
Before you send your bulk e-mail ad to anyone, you will need a list of
recipients. We're not sure when a list becomes bulk ....probably when you
send the same message to more than one person. The best way to get a list is
to create your own from your customer list or from a sign up form you host.
Unfortunately, this isn't a viable solution for the new merchant trying to get
their web site known.
It's easier to suggest where not to get a list than it is to know where to
find a valid list:
DO NOT buy one million names for $19.95 or whatever the going price is now.
These lists come from the bottom feeders ....the screen scrapers and e-mail
harvesters that scan the Internet and news groups for any e-mail addresses they
can find.
DO NOT buy a list on CD. Think about it; if someone wanted to opt out, how
would they? Any CD list will be out of date before you get it and the addresses
probably come from harvesters or someone else's list. Whatever, the recipients
haven't opted into your mailing.
DO NOT in general buy any e-mail list.
Valid e-mail lists are never for sale. Valid lists are closely guarded,
proprietary resources of the company that developed the list. They can never
be viewed and can only be rented.
DO NOT pay someone to send your message
to their list unless they provide audit reports and the URL of their
unsubscribe page. You must be able to confirm that their promises have been
kept. If this information is not readily available to your satisfaction, do
not use the list.
None-the-less, there are legitimate mail lists where the recipients have opted in to a
particular mailing and indicated their willingness to receive related material.
You don't buy the list; you contract with the provider to send your message
to the list. Some providers will have the ability to select from their lists
by client interests, income, and demographics. A few of these services are:
http://www.wspromotion.com/newsletter.html
http://www.spamfreebulkemail.com/
http://www.edirect.com/
http://www.4optinemail.com/
You'll find when searching for mail lists a large variation in cost per
recipient. Be sure to ask yourself why!
Also, enquire about how many other ads, if any, will be in the message
that goes out. Single ad e-mail messages to a valid list can be very expensive.
Look at:
http://theadstop.com/traffic/buyemail.asp
There is newsletter sponsorship. You incorporate your ad into the
newsletter itself similiar to the way we put our own ads into this newsletter.
Sponsorship can be a very effective way of bulk e-mailing. By finding just
the right newsletter in which to advertise, you will be placeing your ad in
front of a savvy and highly attentive group of people that have an interest
in your offering.
Sponsorships can also be fairly expensive, usually in the
range of 1 to 20 cents per e-mail depending on such factors as the size of the
ad, type of ad (text vs html), and how well targeted the newsletter is. You
can check on a few of these services here. They may not be appropriate for
your business but, will give you an idea of how they work and how much they
cost.
http://opt-influence.com/
http://www.wilsonweb.com/ads/rc-newsletter.htm
http://www.ineedhits.com/news/
Another way to get your site known through e-mail is to write an article that
relates to your site and provides in depth information on a subject on which
you can be considered an expert. Don't be intimidated by the word "expert".
Remember, if you know your product, then to almost all other people in the
world, you are an expert. There are repositories where you can submit these
articles for pick up by interested e-zine publishers. Also, you can search
for publications directly related to your subject and submit specifically
to them.One article submission service is:
http://www.ezinetrendz.com/articlesubmission.htm
or try a more direct approach as an example:
http://www.businessknowhow.com/newsletter/articleguidelines.htm
Often these publications will be the same ones that send the newsletters
you've located for sponsorship advertising. Don't hesitate to suggest that you'll
pay for a sponsorship if they'll run your article. A good article may actually
constitute the bulk of the newsletter and you'll get it published for free.
Always make sure the publisher includes your credits and that the credits
include the URL to your web site.
There are the "I'll show you mine, if you'll show me yours." services.
These are related to the FFA (Free For All) linking services. With this type
service, you subscribe for a period of time, usually for a small fee, which
enables you to periodically send to the service providers e-mail list. The
list is frequently assembled from subscribers like youself. While this at
first glance may seem like a good way to promote your site inexpensively, it is
probably not very effective. Everyone except the real newbies know
enough to use a "junk" mail box from one of the free e-mail providers like
Yahoo or HotMail when signing up. This way they can initially check the box
for their sign up credentials and then never again view the box. Eventually
this box gets shut down for being over quota and inactive. Expect ad
response here to be very small. You can check out some
of these service providers at:
http://www.sendfree.com/
http://www.macsysga.com/
CREATING THE MESSAGE
This portion of the article assumes that you are doing a bulk mailing yourself
from your own mail list. However, some of the information applies equally well
when using a mail service or advertising in a newsletter.
The first rule of thumb when bulk mailing is to personalize the message. It's
usually done by incorporating the recipients name along with any other
recipient specific information in the body of the message. The technique for
doing this is called mail merge. Response to a personlized message will be as
much as four times greater than the response from sending a generic message.
Second, use your real company or store name and a valid e-mail address in the
from field of the e-mail. This may seem obvious but you want to be sure to
differentiate yourself from spammers who often use a bogus FROM name and
address. You will, however, want to set up a separate mail account for the
from field entry. This is because undeliverable and auto responder messages
will be received here and you probably don't want to mix those with your
regular mail.
Third, keep the subject line entry short and to the point. Being a little
mysterious here but not deceptive can help get the e-mail read. If the
subject doesn't match the content, the chances are that your e-mail message
will be immediately deleted.
Fourth, if this is an ad message, keep it short and to the point. Your "getting
known" objective is to drive traffic to your web site, not to sell the
product. Your web site will do the product selling. As we suggested
in an earlier newsletter with print advertising, be compelling. A 4 line
message may be all that's needed. For instance:
"All your widget needs in one place.
Please visit our new store.
http://my_domain.com
Thank you."
If this is a single, stand alone message, then you may want to make it
more like a newsletter by being informative about your products. A little
company and/or product history might be good. Naturally if you are offering
a special deal on a product, mention it here. Introductory specials can be
an effective way to drive traffic to your site.
Fifth, always include a valid unsubscribe capability. This can be a link
to a web page (preferable) or simply an e-mail link with instructions. Once
again, if you use an e-mail link, set up a separate mail box for receiving
unsubscribe messages.
FORMATTING and SENDING THE MESSAGE
Now comes the tricky part. Let's assume that you have a perfectly valid
opt-in mail list of names and e-mail addresses. If you do, you have probably
paid dearly for it in time and effort. You want to make sure every mail gets
delivered and is readable. This isn't as easy as it may sound, especially if
you want to send an HTML formatted message.
Details about formatting and sending the message is another lengthy topic
which we will cover in the next issue of E-ComTips.
Next issue: Getting known .... e-mail format and tools
Up-comming: more on attracting and keeping customers |
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FURTHER READING:
An article from Newsweek on spamming.
Don't overlook our LINKS page for information sources.
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Recent Changes
Improvements Upgrades Stories |
Thanks to an observation by an IAMS client, the PeddleGold select list
presented to the customer when clicking a readdb() link has been changed.
Before, to place an item in the shopping cart, the customer only had to enter
a quantity. The rest happened automatically. This proved to be counter
intuitive and consequently a source of customer confusion. Now the
customer must enter a quantity and click the corresponding +cart button
to enter the item.
To augment the audio feedback which doesn't always play in the particular
browser being used, we have added a visual que. A "+" sign is placed in
front of the quantity when an item goes to the shopping cart.
PeddleGold also received another change. All coded reference to button size
has been removed so that when using custom buttons, the visual presentation
will be exactly as expected, without distortion of the images. See the
"Tips" section below for information on using your own buttons with PeddleGold.
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Have you seen the new
PeddleGold storefront?
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Did you know that PeddleGold
is a robust storefront that is quick to set up, easy to maintain, has advanced features,
and integrates seamlessly with any of the ImagineNation back office utilities
for taking credit card payments? Oh, and it's free with any of those utilities.
PeddleGold is the standard for robust, easy to use, low cost storefronts.
Take a demo ride.
Check our low prices.
Get your first month free. |
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Tips 'n Tricks
HTML tags shown here use the caret (^) instead of
braces <> for proper rendering.
Brackets are represented by the curly bracket symbols ({}). |
With a PeddleGold storefront, you can substitute
your own navigation buttons for the standard set provided in the Buttons folder.
All reference to the image size has been removed from the storefront code so
that your buttons will appear in the size created. The default buttons are 32
pixels wide by 26 pixels high. It is recommended that any custom buttons you
create be in the same approximate size range.
To use your own navigation buttons, simply replace the images in the Buttons
folder with your own creations using the current image names. To perserve the
existing buttons, you might want to rename the Buttons folder itself and make
a new Buttons folder for your new images.
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