Email Marketing Best Practices
Target Marketing is offering a free (registration required) ‘white paper’ on email marketing best practices.
Actually, it’s more of a tip sheet, but valuable nonetheless. I’ll preview their 12 tips, but urge you to get the full paper.
Best Practices
- Write great subject lines.
- Don’t forget the preview pane!
- Avoid SPAM language. They offer words to avoid.
- Make it look good.
- Treat your recipients like real people.
- Focus on meaningful content.
- Establish your brand. Become familiar to your recipients.
- Include an offer.
- Avoid large images.
- Ask to be on their list.
- Know and follow CAN-SPAM regulations.
- Study major email providers policies.
Straightforward and sound. You can find additional email marketing intelligence collected by Targeted Marketing here.
Tom
4 responses to “Email Marketing Best Practices”
Behavioral Science Q & A
Integrating an individual giving appeal with other communications from a charity can have both positive and negative effects, and the outcome largely depends on how it’s executed. Advantages of Integration Brand Consistency: Maintaining a consistent appearance and messaging across all communications can reinforce the org’s brand identity and strengthen brand recognition and trust among your […]
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I’m not aware of any in-market tests specifically comparing recurring vs. gift frequency language. I suspect the answer might not be the same with all gift frequencies, nor with all people. It sounds like a great opportunity for you to test and find out what works for your audience. Based on the literature, here’s a couple […]
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Based on what we know from existing data, those renewal notices can actually be pretty effective in getting people to donate. They tap into our psychology – creating a sense of urgency, reminding us of past support, and using personalization to make the message hit home. They’re playing on our natural tendencies to feel obligated […]
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Interesting question. I had a quick look at the testing done on this topic. On the positive side, in all cases, over half of donors decide to cover the fee. In some cases, it goes as high as 65%. Not a negligible percentage at all. Here’s another test from iRaiser showing consistent results (see point […]
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There’s just one thing to consider when designing a supporter journey: the supporter. More specifically, you need to take into account: Who the supporter is i.e. their identity, which is the reason they support this cause, and their personality, which describes the way they “see” and process the world. These will determine the kind of […]
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I’m not an expert in this but a quick search surfaced this article on the effect of tax reforms on 2019’s charitable giving. The researchers didn’t find a reduction. Actually, they observed an “increase in charitable contributions in 2019, even with the lower tax rates and the dramatically smaller number of taxpayers who itemize their […]
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I would not promote something like this for this price: “By requesting this whitepaper and providing the information above, Target Marketing Group may provide this information to the advertiser.”
In addition to the traditional email marketing (mass email) one should look at another marketing opportunity and that is the emails we all send from our corporate email addresses every day. I represent a company that has developed a solution for just those emails and thus this post.
The basic idea behind wrapmail is to utilize the facts that all businesses have websites and employees that send emails every day. These emails can become complete marketing tools and help promote, brand, sell and cross-sell in addition to drive traffic to the website and conduct research. Wrapmail is available for free at http://www.wrapmail.com
WrapMail also helps search for missing children with every email sent by incorporating an optional RSS feed from the Center for Missing and Exploited Children
Thank you VERY much for this post. It hits on alot of valid points that definetly needed to be addresed. Especially when it comes to something as difficult as email marketing.
I have been working on a site that covers all things marketing along with modifiers such as mobile marketing and social media marketing. Its definitely worth a look. Let me know what you think PLEASE. Thanks.
p.s. I am not spam. Todays date is 9-13-2011 🙂
I would add two closely aligned tips to this list. First, segment your list. Your major donors and your grassroots volunteers likely have slightly different interests. Second, personalize your email. This can be as easy as having a greeting that reads “Dear George” instead of “Dear friend.” Or you can get as elaborate as “Dear George, Your recent gift of $50…”
Happy email writing!
Cheryl