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How to Craft Winning Email Creative
MDR’s Market Education
Free Webinar Series
How to Craft Winning Email Creative:
Expert Tips and Examples
December 11, 2012
Copyright 2012 Market Data Retrieval
How to Craft Winning Email Creative
MDR’s Free Webinar Series
AGENDA
• Purpose of an Email
• Apperson “Before and After” Case Study
• Examples of Email Creative With Panel Suggestions for
Improvement
• Overview of Key Takeaways
SLIDES
• Available tomorrow, along with full recording
Q&A
• Submit using the Q & A button in the lower right corner of
the screen. Please send your question(s) to ALL panelists.
Copyright 2012 Market Data Retrieval
How to Craft Winning Email Creative
Kerry Bobeczko
Marketing Manager, Apperson
•
•
•
Prior to joining Apperson five years ago, Kerry worked for six years in
marketing for the construction industry, where she was instrumental
in increasing revenues for her employer by 300% in addition to
getting them ranked among the Top 25 Construction Innovators in
the world.
Kerry brought Apperson into the digital era of marketing by
introducing them to email, social media, CMS website management,
and web advertising.
Kerry recently led Apperson through a companywide rebranding
initiative that ultimately positioned Apperson’s marketing messaging
to better focus on the core value and benefits of the products
they sell.
Copyright 2012 Market Data Retrieval
How to Craft Winning Email Creative
Carrie Estrada
Marketing Manager, Education, Apperson
•
•
•
Prior to joining Apperson three years ago, Carrie worked for eight
years in marketing for a balloon wholesale distribution company,
where she was instrumental in getting them into a dynamic web
platform with ecommerce as well as introducing them to social media.
During her brief tenure, Carrie has brought Apperson into the online
help platform by creating easy to follow how-to videos for their
software programs as well as creating and conducting weekly training
webinars.
Carrie is known as the face of Apperson as she is frequently
interfacing with their customers at various venues to ensure they are
having the best user experience.
Copyright 2012 Market Data Retrieval
How to Craft Winning Email Creative
Derek Fairfield
Leader, E-Marketing Solutions, MDR
•
Derek manages MDR’s e-marketing solutions and acts as a strategic
consultant for our interactive marketing customers. He also directs MDR’s
industry-leading e-marketing research and best practices efforts.
•
Prior to leading e-marketing product development, Derek managed MDR’s
Sales Solution product line as well as its Analytics products.
•
Before joining MDR, Derek designed, developed, and deployed B2C and
B2B marketing strategies and programs for start-ups and Fortune 500
companies. In 1997, Derek led an account team that won a DMA Echo
Award for online lead generation and email acquisition campaigns.
Copyright 2012 Market Data Retrieval
How to Craft Winning Email Creative
Christopher Ziemnicki
Vice President, Product Development, MDR
•
Since joining MDR in 2004, Chris has been instrumental in developing
and managing some of MDR’s most successful marketing products,
including a broad suite of best-in-class Email Marketing Solutions.
•
In addition to leading MDR’s product development, Chris acts as chief
strategic interactive marketing consultant to MDR customers,
directing MDR’s industry-leading educational digital marketing
research and best practices efforts.
•
Chris recently launched the industry’s first display advertising solution
that exclusively targets educators and expands MDR’s offerings to the
digital web advertising space.
•
He is a frequent panelist at education marketing industry events and
presents regularly on MDR educational marketing webinars.
Copyright 2012 Market Data Retrieval
How to Craft Winning Email Creative
The purpose of the email is to
sell a click
Key Principle
• The objective of an email is to get a click.
Therefore, your email message must
engage the recipient with just enough
value to inspire them to click for more
information.
Dr. Flint McGlaughlin
Managing Director
MECLABS / Marketing Experiments
Copyright 2012 Market Data Retrieval
How to Craft Winning Email Creative
Focus your email on selling the
click, not the product
Overarching Goal: Conversion
Email
Conversion
Path
Envelope
Fields
Sub-Goal:
To inspire an
open
Email
Message
Sub-Goal:
To inspire a
click
Landing
Page
Sub-Goal:
To convince
to convert
Shopping
Cart
Sub-Goal:
To maintain
conversion
momentum
• The purpose of the email is to inspire a click to the landing page.
• The purpose of the landing page is to convert the sale.
• Selling your product twice (email and landing page) disrupts the
reader’s thought sequence and mitigates conversion.
Dr. Flint McGlaughlin, Managing Director, MECLABS / Marketing Experiments
Copyright 2012 Market Data Retrieval
How to Craft Winning Email Creative
The Email Optimization Equation
Eme = rv(of + i) – (f + a)
eme
rv
of
i
f
a
=
=
=
=
=
=
©
email messaging effectiveness index
relevance to the customer
offer value (why)
incentive to take action
friction elements of process
anxiety elements of process
Dr. Flint McGlaughlin, Managing Director, MECLABS / Marketing Experiments
Copyright 2012 Market Data Retrieval
How to Craft Winning Email Creative
Relevancy Trumps All
• When prospecting, put additional focus on
relevancy and value proposition.
• Never assume an inherent value prop.
• Do a relevancy audit on your creative—use the
grandmother check.
• Your email must immediately answer the
question, “Why should I read this now?”
• Utilize data/dynamic content to increase
relevancy through personalization.
Copyright 2012 Market Data Retrieval
How to Craft Winning Email Creative
Kerry Bobeczko and
Carrie Estrada
Email Lessons Learned
From Apperson
Copyright 2012 Market Data Retrieval
How to Craft Winning Email Creative
About Apperson
Apperson creates smart, friendly, and affordable
solutions for assessing performance and measuring
success. DataLink test scanners, answer sheets,
and reporting software digitally capture data from
paper assessments, providing immediate
information for instruction.
Copyright 2012 Market Data Retrieval
How to Craft Winning Email Creative
Is Your
Message
Working?
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How to Craft Winning Email Creative
A New
Approach
Copyright 2012 Market Data Retrieval
How to Craft Winning Email Creative
TIME For Kids:
Testing Email as a Prospecting
Channel
Introduced by Peter Giordano, Marketing Manager, TIME For
Kids and Sports Illustrated Kids
• Peter Giordano works on both new customer acquisition and
customer retention efforts for both titles on all platforms.
• He joined Time Inc. in July 2011, starting in an Innovation & Strategy
group before taking on his current role.
Copyright 2012 Market Data Retrieval
How to Craft Winning Email Creative
About TIME For Kids
• Classroom magazine that engages students while presenting
them with high-quality nonfiction content
• 4 Grade-level targeted editions: K-1, Grades 2, 3-4, and 5-6
• “Around the World” supplement available for upper grade
levels—6 issues per year, studying cultures and kids in different
countries
• Teacher’s Guide included with every issue, along with Common
Core teaching tips, worksheets, and quizzes, plus free access for
subscribing teachers to gated content on timeforkids.com
• Free interactive digital edition for teachers to use on interactive
whiteboards
Copyright 2012 Market Data Retrieval
How to Craft Winning Email Creative
Campaign Background
• TFK has historically used email as a renewal
mechanism only.
• This campaign was designed to test email as
a channel for driving new customer
subscriptions.
• Prospects were identified with similar
methodology used for traditional direct mail;
lists were deciled and segmented.
Copyright 2012 Market Data Retrieval
How to Craft Winning Email Creative
Campaign Background
• Short-term goal: Determine if email is a viable channel
for new acquisition marketing and if direct mail
prospecting methodology translates to email.
• Longer-term goal: Thinking about email and direct
mail together to reach the right customers through the
right channel: determine if some lists make more sense
in email only and vice versa.
• Challenge: Direct mail package has many inserts and
additional information. Will one email convey all the
necessary information to also incent conversion?
Copyright 2012 Market Data Retrieval
How to Craft Winning Email Creative
Overall Creative
Impression
• Good-looking creative
• Nice use of visuals; they
effectively showcase the product
• Messaging is clean, to the point,
not a lot of clutter
• Offer falls into the “removing the
obstacles/barriers category” with
some “relevancy” and
“promotion”
Copyright 2012 Market Data Retrieval
How to Craft Winning Email Creative
Landing
Page
Integration
Copyright 2012 Market Data Retrieval
How to Craft Winning Email Creative
What message did ~75% of
educators get upon initial open
of the email?
“Try TIME For Kids in Your Classroom”
That’s it.
Copyright 2012 Market Data Retrieval
How to Craft Winning Email Creative
Image Suppression
•
Making your subject
line work too hard
•
Utilize “teaser” text to
help image suppression
and mobile viewing
•
Use alt tags with
relevant messaging
•
Use a mix of images
and HTML text so that
your value prop and
your call to action link
comes across with
images suppressed
Copyright 2012 Market Data Retrieval
How to Craft Winning Email Creative
Mobile Rendering
Copyright 2012 Market Data Retrieval
How to Craft Winning Email Creative
Campaign Analyzer Report
Visual Link
Reporting
for Every
Campaign
Copyright 2012 Market Data Retrieval
How to Craft Winning Email Creative
Campaign Analyzer’s
Visual Click Reporting
•
“View as a webpage” link had
the highest unique clickthrough rate, 3x that of any
other link—a clear indication
that image suppression is in
play with this creative.
•
Call to action below the fold
had a higher click rate than the
CTA above the fold, indicating
that readers who could see the
email did scroll down all the
way.
Copyright 2012 Market Data Retrieval
How to Craft Winning Email Creative
Key Takeaway:
Image Suppression Best Practices
• Use a mix of HTML text and graphics.
• Ensure that any messaging in the graphics is
also in the text.
• Create a Hotmail/Gmail/Yahoo account and
send the creative to yourself to see how it
survives image suppression.
• Use tables, background images, and other
tricks to create great prospecting emails that
survive image suppression.
• Utilize “teaser” text to help image suppression
and mobile viewing.
Copyright 2012 Market Data Retrieval
How to Craft Winning Email Creative
NOT THAT!
SEND THIS
Copyright 2012 Market Data Retrieval
27
How to Craft Winning Email Creative
Click That Missing Icon!
(button with text)
(email recipient sees the button even
with the images blocked)
SEND THIS,
NOT THAT!
(image only)
(email recipient sees nothing
with the images blocked)
Copyright 2012 Market Data Retrieval
How to Craft Winning Email Creative
Key Takeaway:
Mobile Rendering Best Practices
Prospect email creative best practices will
optimize the mobile experience:
• Teaser text to help with email preview
• Designing for image sizing factor
• Designing for scan factor—providing
enough viewable value prop to get
reader to revisit via full-size browser
Copyright 2012 Market Data Retrieval
How to Craft Winning Email Creative
Pitsco:
Driving Engagement With a
Customer Email
Copyright 2012 Market Data Retrieval
How to Craft Winning Email Creative
About Pitsco
• Pitsco Education is the leading provider of ageappropriate, student-centered K-12 learning
solutions.
• The company’s standards-based K-12
curriculum promotes student success through
positive and challenging learning experiences.
• Pitsco’s curriculum combines relevant hands-on
activities and a team-based, student-directed
learning environment to deliver core courses
and career skills in STEM.
Copyright 2012 Market Data Retrieval
How to Craft Winning Email Creative
Campaign Overview
Email Objective:
• Drive customer engagement via Facebook for a
chance to win free gift. Monthly promo-based
email to customer file focuses on different
products/promotions.
Strategy:
• Facebook strategy of uploading product photos for
specific promotions has increased likes and email
list substantially. Winners have provided free
value-added PR via blogs and other websites after
the campaign.
Copyright 2012 Market Data Retrieval
How to Craft Winning Email Creative
E-Marketing: Prospects vs Customers
Prospects
• Little or no
relationship with
brand
• Relevancy and value
proposition become
much more important
• Measure of success
Customers
• Established
relationship
• More freedom to
“continue the
conversation”
• Fewer obstacles to
overcome
Email Best Practices Still Apply to
Customer Emails!
Copyright 2012 Market Data Retrieval
How to Craft Winning Email Creative
Overall Creative
Impression
• Nice job incorporating the
Pitsco brand without
having to pitch it to
existing customers.
• Contest concept is
engaging, and bridge
visuals effectively
reinforces that.
• Free gift is always a
compelling offer.
Copyright 2012 Market Data Retrieval
How to Craft Winning Email Creative
Preview Text Makes an Impact,
Especially on Mobile
Copyright 2012 Market Data Retrieval
How to Craft Winning Email Creative
Designing for Mobile
With Preview Text
Without
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How to Craft Winning Email Creative
Understand Different Mobile OS: Android
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How to Craft Winning Email Creative
Understand Different Mobile OS: iPhone
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How to Craft Winning Email Creative
Last Year’s Trends
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How to Craft Winning Email Creative
Last Year’s Trends
Copyright 2012 Market Data Retrieval
How to Craft Winning Email Creative
Key Takeaway:
Customer Emails
• Be consistent in customer emails.
• Always seek to improve your email
performance.
 Test everything!
• How are you following up with your
leads or best customers?
• Own your content.
Copyright 2012 Market Data Retrieval
How to Craft Winning Email Creative
Q&A
Carrie Estrada and Kerry Bobeczko
Marketing Managers, Apperson
[email protected]; [email protected]
Derek Fairfield
Leader, E-Marketing Solutions, MDR
(203) 225-4643
[email protected]
Chris Ziemnicki
VP, Product Development, MDR
(203) 225-4725
[email protected]
MDR is the education market’s first choice for sales, e-marketing, direct marketing, social
media, and research solutions. Powered by the most complete, current, and accurate
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To learn more about MDR’s sales, e-marketing, telesales, and direct marketing solutions,
call us at 800-333-8802 or visit www.schooldata.com.
Copyright 2012 Market Data Retrieval