The result of this study may not answer all the pressing email marketing questions, but it will help us go multiple yards closer to creating the ultimate e-mail marketing message. The study was conducted by taking a sample size of more than 1100 email marketers. Let’s go direct to the results and see what you should do to make your email messages convert better.

81% of the respondents said that they collect and use personal name of the subscribers, whereas another 17% said that they do collect subscribers’ names but do not use it. Personalizing mail by greeting subscribers by their first name appears to be the most important tactics.

Expert email marketers also use data like lead source, company name, subscribers’ role in the company, etc., to make the e-mail message more relevant. See image below for the complete data.

So what are you planning to include? Let me know what tactics you use for personalization of email messages? I am waiting eagerly to hear from you.

Detailed yet interesting

Brochure writing is a detailed affair, yet crispy. Modern brochure writing style is crisp yet very effective. A brochure may run over many pages or consist just 3-4 pages, depending upon its nature. Make sure you include all important information like company’s history and description, CEO’s message, mission and vision statement, product or service detail, achievements. Since brochures are long in nature it will be all inclusive yet crisp.

Keep the style same

Irrespective of brochure’s total number of pages, keep the writing style same all over. If you are talking in passive voice, talk in the same style throughout. Don’t switch on and off between styles. If you have taken a poetic style of writing maintain that throughout. Sign off with the same flavor. Even keep your font style same.

Understand the purpose

There’s no set formula of brochure writing. Brochure writing style may vary depending upon the purpose of writing. A technical brochure or a product brochure; corporate brochure or sales brochure, each calls for a different style and purpose of writing.

Don’t overstuff

Often marketers are tempted to stuff a brochure with maximum amount of factual data. It certainly bores the reader. Don’t overstuff a brochure with data. Keep it light, crispy yet all inclusive. Touch upon all important points needed to be conveyed, and elaborating in short only most important parts. If you are mentioning product features, make sure you convert those features into benefits. Translate each feature into functional and emotional benefit. Break the paragraphs into bullet points when needed, else into short paragraphs. Don’t write a page full, in one single paragraph. Make sure you leave enough blank space or space for images on a page. It makes reading interesting.

Put quotations whenever applicable

Quotations are always appealing. While you craft a brochure page, try to put some quotations wherever they are applicable. It can be some words from the company’s chairman or some famous quotes or simply few lines you wish to emphasize. When the brochure page is designed such quotations can be nicely used in bold and bigger fonts. It easily grabs attention.

Q. Does your organization have a separate line item for email marketing in the budget?

The answer to this has unearthed the place of email marketing in a budget document. Finding it was important to see if email marketing is given due weight or not.

47% of total respondents said that e-mail marketing is not listed separately in the budget, whereas, 32% said that it is explicitly mentioned as a line within interactive marketing budget. 13% said that it is mentioned within CRM, or customer services heading, while 9% said it is mentioned under lead generation heading. (See image).

What all these mean?

Finding it was important because the place of email marketing in the budget document suggests how a company perceives it, and how much budget is going to be appropriated to it. For example, a company may invest more in email marketing if it sees it as a lead generation tool, but the company may pump in less cash, if it is seen as just another marketing channel. In this case, the company may decide to cut on some other channel to fuel email marketing, or vice versa.

This knowledge was therefore important. It was not mere of academic interest.

Before you show your loyalty to one and thrash the other one calling it a complete waste of money, I must tell you that neither of the two is wrong, and either of the two could be dangerous. It all depends upon your approach, and how you handle the tool. Let me throw some more light on the two schools to help you make informed decision on the marketing tool to use.

“Long sales page is what cut it for us”

This is the view of old school of marketing who believes in the power of mass media advertising, long sales letter, and multiple direct mail copies. Marketers subscribing to this school of thought believe in handling all the customers’ objection through a elaborate sales page. They are of the view that they get only one chance and limited opportunity to influence customers’ decisions, and they should use it to maximum.

Sales cycle is often shorter here. People either buy or they don’t from marketers of this school.

“We are close buddy. We will not sell you”

This is what the other camp of marketers believes in. Marketers swearing by “relationship first” maxim often lead you in believing that they have your best interest in their hearts, and no matter what they will not try to sell you anything. It is only when you have spent some time with them that they start recommending (read selling) products to you.

Sales cycle for this kind of marketing ranges from long to very long. People, because they trust this group, often buy more than one product from them.

Which side are you on?

So, which group of marketers do you belong to? The “long sales copy” one or the relationship one? As said earlier, there is nothing right or wrong about the either of the two. It all depends upon how you use it.

For me, I believe in both of them.

That brought me to a Gadget Ownership, 2010 study conducted by the Pew Research Center’s Internet & American Life Project in this month in the United States. The result tallied with the common belief on the matter.

The study suggested that 85% Americans own a cell phone, and only 59% and 52% owns desktop computers and laptop computers, respectively. Another 4% is said to have access to tablet computers. (See image below).

The depth of cell phone penetration has provided a never-before for marketers to reach individual customers. But do not assume that the old rules of the game will be applicable. To become successful here, you may need to rethink the rules of engagement. You should, therefore, make a move fast, before everyone else does.

What are the tools of cold prospecting?

Ideally, any tool that connects you with your audience could be uses for cold prospecting, but practically, many of those tools cannot be used because of the expense involved. Typically, a business will use one or more of the following communication tools for cold prospecting:

• Call on cell phones
• Call on landlines
• Text messages
• E-mails
• Direct mails on home or office address

Each of the above tools are also overused (read abused) tools, and that is why all the unsolicited attempts to get in touch with your future market are considered spam or junk. This perception is not too far from reality. It is such perception that renders these tools useless?

Then how to use any?

This is a natural question that springs out in the mind. But the good news is that there is a way to put these tools in use, which I going to outline below.

• The very first rule of cold prospecting is moderation. Do not go on steroid. Everyone equally hates, and some hates more, cold callers. But not all the time. At times people are receptive to the messages they receive. Do not bombard users with multiple calls or multiple variants of your message. They are already too bogged down by such messages.
• Once a user expressed his unwillingness to buy your product or services, strike out his or her name from your database. Your database software should have a list of out of bound contacts, whom you should never contact.
• Instead of cold calls, send emails, text messages, and creatively done postcards to suspects. These are less intrusive mean of communication.
• Never call in the peak time or the peak season when your suspects are busy doing their important works.

Take the above precautions, and you will increase your chances of acceptance. Your cold calls will not remain as mindless.

2,300 marketers, who were interviewed by MarketingSherpa for its Social Media Marketing Benchmark Report, testified this.

7% of the marketers said that social media is producing measurable results, so they will increase the budget. 49% of the total respondents said that their organizations were more than keen to increase their social media budget, for they saw it as a promising tactics.

27% marketers said that the results of social media cannot be seen now, so they do not want to stretch the budget too far for that, and will keep the budget as it is, whereas, 17% sees no value in the investment. They feel social media is free, so there is no need to spend anything. See chart below for a visual representation of the survey result.

But, which social media is the marketers’ favorite when it comes to distributing marketing dollars?

In a study conducted by King Fish Media, Hubspot and Junta 42, it was found that LinkedIn is at the top of the chart, followed by Twitter and Facebook.

87% of the survey participant said they include LinkedIn in their social media strategy, and 12% said they are planning to add it to the equation. 84% marketers consider twitter when framing a marketing budget, while another 16% said they will add soon. As long as Facebook is concerned, only 78% use it, while 22% said they are planning to use this social media marketing tool.

Almost all the big social media websites featured in the list, but what was missing noticeably was MySpace. Well, it was not missing entirely, but seeing the success it once enjoyed, the current status is akin to disappearing for MySpace. A mere 9% people said they use MySpace, and same percentage of people said they will use it in future (See image for the complete survey data).

Bandwidth shot through the roof

The speed with which we access the Internet is one reason behind such a sudden and huge proliferation of videos on the Internet. But, it is not just the increased bandwidth that led to this development. There are many more things. One such thing is laziness on our part.

We are lazier than ever

Video marketers are getting hotter because consumers are getting lazier. Lack of work has taken good of us. Now are lazier than we ever were. Reading is too much time consuming. It requires active attention from our side, but we can consume video lying on our back munching “junk”.

We became multitasking

This is paradoxical. We have grown lazy, but at the same time we have given in for multitasking. When we read, we just read. We cannot do anything else, but when we watch, we do quite a number of things — play with ball, cook food, babysit kids, do other less-involving works. Video gives us space to multitask.

It connects well

Video also sells on the Internet because it connects well. By sending audio and visual stimuli, video connects with us on an emotional level, which articles fail to do that — yes, it does not hold true for stories and well-written articles, of course.

Because video fools our mind

Through sights and sounds, video gives us an illusion that the person who is delivering the message is present here and now when we are consuming it, which any article cannot replicate. A video fools our mind in believing that the communicator is present in the room, which is not so.

I hope, you now know why video is becoming “the new article” (as in the new black) for the online world. What do you think? What else video does to us? Fire up your writing genius and post your comments below this.

Writing a press release is a bit tricky – and I am not talking about technical stuffs when I wrote that – but it will not remain so, should you read this article through the end.

4 Press release tip

Use Newsworthy angle

Not every write-up can pass for a press release, and your advertising, promotional, and self-glorifying materials will also not pass for a press release.

The content of your press release should be newsworthy for it getting accepted by the online newswire (press release distribution services). If you do not have a newsworthy announcement to make then you can talk of any product offer that you are giving, or any services that you are offering. Write any non-promotional material you want, but write it from the news angle. Just provide who, what, when, where and how of the story. Do not go overboard with self promotion.

A good start is important

The very first sentence of your press release should be powerful. Use targeted headline for the press release, and succinctly provide all the required information in the first paragraph of the press release. You need to give all the details of the news (provide who, what, when, where and how) in the first paragraph only.

Keep it short

The length of your press release should not be around 500 words. Do not make it longer. No one likes to read 3-page long release. Use short sentences, and active voice. Write only those things that adds value to the reader. As said, 500-word is the number you should try to be around.

Write for the media

Many press releases fail to attract attention from media people, newswire, and journalists, etc., because the press release is not written with them in mind. It is written with readers in mind. Writing a press release for end users is a mistake, as they are not the immediate target audience of a press release. Write it for media.

You should also include your contact information at the end, to assist those who want more information about the release.

The study concluded that the marketers at large organization who have access to huge chunk of quantifiable data said the effectiveness is growing, whereas, their counterparts in smaller organization with less access to quantifiable research data said that e-mail marketing is no more effective.

Not only that the marketing agencies are not very positive about the effectiveness of email marketing campaign. Marketers themselves, but, shared different opinion about the effectiveness of an email campaign. See image for the study report.

In the poll, around 35% of the American consumers have said that they will not purchase a brand because the brand had a distasteful advertisement. Another 28% respondents said that they have said that they didn’t buy the product because they did not like the spokesperson used by the brand, while another 27% said they didn’t buy because of the program and event sponsored by the brand.

This poll has given a strong message to the marketers, and now everyone is forced to be diligent in choosing what to say, how to say where to say, and whom to use to say it. In other words, companies will need to be more careful in deciding their advertisement message, creative expression of the message, program and events to sponsor, and brand ambassador to choose.

We have often spoken if a celebrity has an impact on a brand or not. This poll clearly suggests that it does have an effect on consumer purchase. Marketers now need to be cautious in choosing a spokesperson for a brand, and in the light of this poll, running an extensive test run of advertisements is advisable. See image for the poll result.

On an average, the total time spent in December 2009 by the global consumers was five hours, 35 minutes and five seconds, whereas in the same month in 2008, the total time spent was of three hours, three minutes and 54 seconds.

In the same period, the number of unique users to various social networking sites also increased from 242 million to 307.4 million, which is a 27% YoY growth. (See chart below).

What it means for marketer?

SEO (Search Engine Optimization) and SEM (Search Engine Marketing) are important, but the evidence suggests that social media is even more important. One should take note of it. The rise in time spent suggests increased in engagement, which as we know creates an army of receptive audience. Therefore, marketers should use social media more profusely than they did every before.

SWOT

SWOT stands for Strength, Weakness, Opportunity, and threat. Strength and weakness is internal to the product, whereas, opportunity and threats are external to the product. We use this matrix to find out strengths and weaknesses of our product, see what opportunity (matching our ability) the market is presenting, and gauge the threats presented by the market.

PLC

PLC stands for Product Life Cycle. A PLC study of your product gives you an idea about what stage your product is in, and what marketing channel and strategy to use. We divide PLC in following parts: introduction, Growth, Maturity, and Decline.

Introduction is the phase when the product is introduced to the market, and the organization is striving to create awareness about the product. Profit in this phase is either negative or low.

Growth is the phase in which the product gets acceptance, which results in increase in sales. Profits are high in this phase, and to cash in on the momentum the product has got, organization tends to invest some advertising dollars.

Maturity is the phase when sales start slowing down because most of the buyers have your product. Sales and profit has already passed its peak. Sales and profit may not be increasing but they are steady.

Some marketers divide this phase into early maturity and late maturity to figure out how close the product is to decline phase.

Decline is the phase when sales and profit both starts falling. It could be because the need of the market has changed and some better product is fulfilling that need, or because some other product is meeting the same need at lower cost.

From this phase either the product dies out in oblivion, or get reinvented, reintroduced and pushed on the growth track.

PESTEL

Some call it PEST while other calls it PESTEL. I have taken PESTEL because it is more complete a matrix then PEST. PESTEL is a macro-environment scanning matrix that helps a business find out how the various external factors going to affect it. PESTEL Stands for:

P: Political factors (Policy changes and how it is going to affect you)

E: Economic factors (economic growth, exchange rates, inflation, interest rates, and taxation changes are going to affect your business)

S: Social factors (How does social changes like, education, demographic, occupational, etc., going to affect you)

T: Technological factors (How advent of new technology will affect your business)

E: Environmental factors (How change in climate or rising temperature can affect your business)

L: Legal Factors (how change in legal environment going to affect your low. How much will your business suffer if the carbon emission level is set lower, and government pension plan is made mandatory for every organization, regardless of size?)

PEST matrix analyzes all the factors we discussed above except for the last two.

Definition of Marketing

“Meeting needs profitably” is the core on which the gigantic frame of marketing is standing. And when I say, marketing meets everyone’s needs profitably then I mean it for every stake holder. For consumer it is to buy solution at the best possible price, for organization it is to grow at rapid pace, for investor it means to maximize the return on Investment, and for marketer it means meeting their goals.

How can we achieve this goal

All these needs are not mutually exclusive; they can be met all at once. But for this one need to broaden one’s horizon to include other’s point of view as well. To achieve this we need to consider the following:

• Marketers need to be honest when assessing consumer’s need and/or when selling their products to meet their monthly, quarterly, or yearly target.
• Investor needs to empathize with the consumer, and marketer who are interacting in the market. They should not just focus on more and more and even more return. Being too greedy is not the answer to their problem.
• A business should understand that the number of consumers will always be limited, so they should avoid getting trapped in “perennial growth” cycle. Growth in market share, sales volume, profit, etc., should be chased but not as fiercely as companies are doing. Too much greed is not good.
• Consumers should learn to trust the marketers, and should tell them about their needs, desires, ambitions, values, etc.
• Consumers need to understand that they need marketing and marketer to search for the solutions to their problems. Marketers are not some crooked wizard.
• Consumers need to understand that for them marketer is a time-saving device, a need analyzer, and a search engine that help them find what they need.
• Regulator should see if everything is going all right. Regulator should be honest in analyzing the market condition, and if everyone is doing what he or she is required to do.
• Businesses, marketers, and investor need to be more socially responsible. They need to care for the well-being of consumers. They should think of how they can make a world a better place.

Do not think that I am someone else. I, myself is a marketer, but like most of my fellow, I do not take people for a ride.