The DigitalMailer Blog

February 13, 2013

Thoughts on the State of the (Credit) Union (and Bank Marketing Survey), 2013

Filed under: Banks,Credit Unions,DigitalMailer,e-Statements,email marketing,mobile technology,ROI,Special Reports,Survey,targeted marketing,Twitter,web sites — admin @ 12:23 pm

by Jimmy Marks

Last night was the State of the Union address. All the big-wigs in Washington, D.C. gathered together to applaud, not-applaud, talk, listen, and pretend to listen to a summary of how America’s doing and what the administration is likely to do in the coming year.

But nothing President Obama said was as stirring or shocking as what I read yesterday in the State of Bank & Credit Union Marketing report from the Financial Brand and Aite’s Ron Shevlin.

[Author's Note -- As this is a "State of the Union" themed post, please feel free to stand up and clap or sit and stare disapprovingly as you choose. Make a real show of it and disturb everyone in your office. That's what I'm doing.]

In the past, this report has been an eye-opener about the world of credit union and bank marketing and this year did not disappoint. Well, it sort of disappointed…because there are a lot of roadblocks for banks and credit unions (and yes, us CUSOs and vendors) to overcome this year.

(more…)

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December 20, 2012

The Twelve Days of Electronic Marketing

by Ron Daly

If you’re waiting until the last minute to figure out that perfect gift for a special someone, might I dissuade you from looking into giving them the “Twelve Days of Christmas” gifts? Twelve drummers drumming, eleven pipers piping, and so on, will cost you quite a pretty penny. Plus, where do you put it all? I haven’t really got the room for the 364 total presents I’d be getting. Maybe we could stick the birds outside in the back yard, but all the milk maids and leaping gentlemen would be a little annoying.

I’ve decided none of you is getting all these birds, rings, busy artisans, etc. Instead, I’m giving you the twelve days of electronic marketing! Sing along, if you think you can.

On the 12 Days of Christmas, DigitalMailer Gave to Me:

12 Months of eMailing - A monthly email newsletter doesn’t cost much to send and gives your customers an idea of what’s shaking at your business.
11 major holidays- You’ve got:
1. New Year’s
2. Valentine’s Day
3. St. Patrick’s Day
4. Easter
5. Mother’s Day
6. Father’s Day
7. 4th of July
8. “Back-to-School”
9. Halloween
10. Thanksgiving
11. Christmas/Holiday
That’s eleven easy touch-points with built-in branding to play with – get to work and make something outstanding.
10 fingers typing – Got an initiative you’re trying to get off the ground? Have a fun community outreach program? Got something really interesting to say? Start a blog! It’s never been easier.
9 referrers referring – If you’re looking into NetPromoter scoring, remember – nines and tens are your only “referrers”. Sevens and eights aren’t counted and six and below are detractors. And always ask “why?” when it comes to the score you were given.
8 hours of working – The eight hour workday is disappearing. People are working from home and on the go. Consider how much information you’re hoping they’ll retain. Make your messages clear and concise, and always lead them to an action. Be efficient, you want to be a solution, not part of a bigger problem.
7 days a week – Are certain emails more likely to work on the weekend? How will you know if you’re not split-testing? Consider a weekend email for new home buyers looking into open houses, or car shoppers who might take a Saturday afternoon to browse the lots.
6 month reviews – Check out how your efforts are doing every six months or so. Set benchmarks, evaluate, make changes, and strive for the best.
5 GOLD RINGS! (Just felt like singing that one.)
4 points-of-contact – We like to give people a few ways to get hold of us, if they need us. We welcome people to email us, call, write or tweet at us…whatever works for them, works for us.
3 calls-to-action – In a good email campaign, you’ll want to give at least three call-to-action links: one at the top, in text, for the impulsive; one that’s a big graphic for the visually minded; one toward the bottom for the thorough readers.
2 ways to view – Remember, more and more users are reading their email on a mobile device – ReturnPath estimates that more people will be reading email on a mobile device than on a computer by the end of 2012 (which, I don’t need to remind you, is less than two weeks away). We’re working on a few ways to optimize emails responsively that we’re going to share with our clients in 2013. What are you doing to prepare?
And a cartridge printer in need (of a job) – More mobile documents, fewer things to print out, more ways to save and store those documents…we’re committed to taking our clients further away from their paper needs.

Not to toot my own Christmas trumpet or anything, but that’s a much better list. Better to have good advice and food for thought than a bunch of dancers, geese and hens breaking all your furniture and getting allergy-causing down everywhere.

From all of us to all of you, MERRY CHRISTMAS and a happy, productive, lucrative new year!

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December 4, 2012

They’ve Got Mail (But Do They Open It?)

Filed under: e-mail,email marketing,eStrategy,On-Boarding — admin @ 10:50 am

There’s a marketing adage that says getting new customers is great, but retaining your current customers is even better. Recently, we’ve discussed unengaged members and ways to help reconnect with them. But what about the chronically inactive subscribers on your email distribution lists? What can you do to reengage them?

Most likely, you track the number of recipients who unsubscribe following an email distribution. But another, possibly larger, group is made up of recipients who are “emotionally unsubscribed” from your messages–those who simply delete or ignore your emails without opening them.

Smart e-marketers know this segment shouldn’t be ignored for two reasons: First, ISPs have developed new metrics that track email engagement as a measure of message deliverability. So, if an email address consistently receives messages from a sender that are not opened, the provider may assume the messages are spam. Second, these recipients represent a pool of customers who at one time wanted a relationship with your company – and possibly still do. You don’t need to simply find new customers; you also need to re-connect with those who are failing to respond.

Here are some tips to help reach your emotionally unsubscribed recipients:

Carefully craft your subject lines. If someone has been routinely deleting your emails, try to grab their attention upfront.
Pay attention to members’ preferences. If a member requests monthly updates about loan rates, don’t send weekly notices. Ensure that you are responding to their choices.
Keep track of products your customers have used or training they’ve attended. If someone recently re-financed his mortgage, don’t send emails about your new mortgage promotion. Look for opportunities to send messages tied to individual needs.
Using an attention-getting subject line, ask users to re-connect. Send an email asking how often they’d like to receive messages and which products or services might interest them. And be sure to get creative with the subject line so it stands out and gets noticed.

The pool of emotionally unsubscribed members represents an important customer base. They already have a relationship with you; they just need to be shown the value of continuing it.

This article originally ran in our free, monthly e-newsletter. Are you signed up already? If not, sign up here to receive a monthly collection of helpful articles and interesting tidbits right in your inbox.

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October 31, 2012

The Email Marketing Haunted House

Filed under: e-mail,email marketing,One Click — admin @ 10:02 am

by Jimmy Marks

Welcome to the spoooooooky world of email marketing!

Well, no, it’s not THAT spooky. But there are plenty of scary things that you may encounter on any given campaign. Step through the doorway into our

HOUSE OF EMAIL MARKETING HORRORS!

To your left, you’ll see a freshly upturned plot of dirt. Is it a zombie? No! It’s…

LIVING-DEAD EMAIL ADDRESSES!

These are recipients that never open any of your campaigns. Maybe they didn’t double opt-in or maybe they signed up and then forgot about it. In either case, contact those individuals at the addresses in question after a few months of no opens and see if they’re still interested in receiving emails from you. If you still get no response, mark the address as “unconfirmed” and spare yourself another tally in your “unopened” column in your campaign reporting.

Now, head toward the laboratory. Egads! A giant, hulking mass comprised of the parts of others. Is it Frankenstein’s monster? No, it’s…

MONSTER-LISTS!

As you conduct more and more email marketing, you’ll find that you have multiple lists and, often, duplicate addresses. It is possible, even with the best list-management software. Police your lists every three months or so and make sure you’re not double-contacting anyone. Consolidate one email address with all the contact information and sign that address up for as many campaigns as they’ve requested. If you’re concerned about someone unsubscribing from all emails at once, consider offering a “manage subscription” form before the hard unsubscribe link. That way, the user has the option to manage their emails and choose which ones they want.

Now, down the stairs. In the corner is a large casket. Is it a vampire, here to suck your blood? NO! It’s…

HIGH SPAM SCORES!

And they’re here to drain your deliverability rate. Spam filters are getting smarter all the time and no matter what you go through to train your recipients to accept emails from you, you still have to worry about the language in your email hanging everything up in the inbox. Pay attention to your spam-score and work around any language that might be troublesome.

We make our way through the dungeon and out to the backyard where our devilish werewolf Fido has dug up an old, golden sarcophagus. Out walks a monster that’s all wrapped up. It’s not a mummy, it’s…

TRANSACTIONAL EMAILS!

And they’re not wrapped up in linen or gauze, they’re wrapped up in red tape. See, many people worry they’re spamming their recipients when they send transactional emails (i.e., low-balance notices, missed payment reminders, past-due notices). These emails are transactional messages, not marketing messages. You don’t face as many restrictions when it comes to transactional messages because they’re meant to help your recipient and you keep things on the rails. They can still look nice, and even point that recipient to useful products you offer to help avoid further issues. One good example: sending a user a delinquent payment notice can also include a message about online bill-pay or EFT programs.

And now, we reach the end of our tour here in the graveyard. We hope you enjoyed this look at the horrors of email marketing. And on the way out, watch out for…

THE BONES OF THE STARVED EMAIL LIST!

Adding new recipients to your most-used email campaign list is a must. It keeps the list alive and healthy, not withered and boney like the skeleton here. Put some meat on those bones with a subscription form that snaps right into your website.

HAPPY HALLOWEEN TO ALL, FROM EVERYONE AT DIGITALMAILER!

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October 23, 2012

Where’d Everyone Go? How to Handle Out-of-Office Replies

Filed under: DigitalMailer,e-mail,email,email marketing,Marketing,member enrollment,smart marketing,SPAM — admin @ 11:48 am

by Ron Daly

We send a lot of emails to a lot of businesses here at DigitalMailer. One thing that always amazes me? How many “out of office” replies we get after a send. Sometimes, it’s as high as 25% of the list. And with list sizes that can go into the hundreds (or even thousands), a high number of out-of-office replies can be a problem.

So how do you deal with these replies? It depends on the message. If the list is large and the message isn’t high priority, missing a handful of potential contacts isn’t the end of the world…you might think about holding off and letting them manage the email in their own way and trying again the next time.

What about an important message to a targeted group of contacts? That’s different, because that message might need an action on the other end. Consider this: set a criteria to your email list that’s basically a checkbox, labeled “out of office?”. When your out-of-office replies come in, search for those contacts, check the box and save. A few days later, re-send to selected contacts – this time, only to those with the “out of office?” box selected. If the message is important, you need to get through somehow.

Be sure to check through your out-of-office replies because some might not be out-of-office replies after all. It might be an auto-responder letting you know your point-of-contact doesn’t work there anymore. Keep on top of these, as you might not be reaching the person you should be reaching. Even the best email marketing engines need a little human interaction to make them great.

Now, get back to work! I have an email to send you.

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August 16, 2012

How do you “measure up”?

Filed under: Banks,Credit Unions,DigitalMailer,e-mail,email,email marketing,eStrategy,junk mail,Marketing,marketing on a budget,One Click Campaign,targeted marketing,Uncategorized — admin @ 1:51 pm

A great article just came out of MarketingProfs.com, offering up new insights into the average open rates, click-through rates (CTRs), and unsubscribe rates for financial service email marketing campaigns. To highlight a few important points:

Financial services campaigns had a 22.6% average open rate. This might seem small, but it’s actually pretty good compared to other businesses (especially education, health and retail). If you’re getting open rates higher than 22%, you’re doing well.
FIs can anticipate an average CTR of 3.5%. Again; small in theory, big in practice. You always want this number to be higher than it is, and the more focused your list, the more you should expect a high CTR.
The average unsubscribe rate for FIs is .18%. What?! You read that correctly – that’s point-one-eight percent. It might make you think that people really love getting emails from their FI, yes? Not necessarily. See, that doesn’t account for people who see an email from their bank or credit union and drop it into trash. Nor does it account for “priority inboxing” (thanks, Gmail, for making emails even harder to get read).

So, what can we take away from all this? Well, as an industry, it would be nice if those rates reflected a highly-engaged readership. It can happen, it DOES happen. But we also shouldn’t use this to shame ourselves out of ever using email marketing again — remember, these numbers are actually pretty good, considering.

How can we raise the bar?

Better Content/Unique Content – The short-and-sweet way to increase your open rates? Make sure it’s an email worth opening. Consider special offers that are only accessible via your email list. That way, users aren’t just users, they’re “insiders”.
A Better Focus on Calls-to-Action – As we’ve discussed before, try out different calls-to-action – text, images, text AND images, different wordings, different positions – it all matters, and it’s all dependent.
The “Let-Out” – Don’t hide unsubscribe links from people. If they want out, let them out. It’s only going to improve your open rate in the long-run (after all, the open rate is the number of opens divided the number of emails sent – decrease the bottom number and the percentage will increase. Simple math, yes?)

Learn more about DigitalMailer’s Email Marketing engine, the ARB.

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February 1, 2012

Knowns and Unknowns: The Troubling Numbers in a Recent Social Media Study

Filed under: Banks,Blogging,Compliance,Credit Unions,e-mail,e-Statements,email,email marketing,Facebook,smart marketing,Social media,Twitter — Tags: Bank Marketing Strategy, Jim Marous — admin @ 11:15 am

by Ron Daly

Jim Marous just did a fantastic story over on his blog, Bank Marketing Strategy. In it, he showed the results of a study he did about bank and credit union marketing strategy, conducted in conjunction with the Financial Brand‘s Jeffry Pilcher. According to their results, credit unions are heaver social media users overall whereas your “non-community banks” use progressive online media channels for advertising (banner ads, fully-online account opening, iOS apps, etc.).

But when I read the social media report, I almost fell out of my chair. Not because of the number of channels the respondents said they were using, not because of the high number of people who said they were “planning to use” social media. It was because of the number of respondents that say they were “not sure” about which social media platforms they were using.

You’re not sure? You don’t know?

How is that possible? And what’s worse, according to the post, 82% of respondents work in the marketing department of their financial institution. Of everyone in those banks or credit unions, a marketing person SHOULD know.

I know, it’s a minor quibble – there aren’t many respondents saying they’re “not sure”. But six out of forty-six bank respondents not knowing whether or not their company has a blog? A blog typically sits on the website. That’s something anyone who knows your web address should know. Shameful.

Why am I getting worked up about this? Because it’s foolish. Not knowing whether or not you’re using a particular social network? That’s a problem. Because if you’re not sure, then you’re ALSO not sure that someone ELSE isn’t MISrepresenting you in that space. And you’re ALSO not sure that there’s not a “[Your FI's Name Here] Sucks” page out there. And you’re ALSO not sure that an employee is or isn’t following guidelines.

If Jim Marous and Jeffry Pilcher decide to do this study again next year (and I hope they do, because this is some great info), I hope there’s a big fat zero next to every “not sure” on that chart. Because when it comes to your financial institution’s reputation and customer/member relationships, you can’t afford to be ignorant.

[Click here to learn more about DigitalMailer's new Social Monitoring tool, SocialSentry.]

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January 4, 2012

DigitalMailer is back! And so is Winter…

Filed under: DigitalMailer,e-mail,e-Statements,electronic statements,email marketing,Marketing — admin @ 10:22 am

by Ron Daly

Brrrrr! It’s freezing out there!

We got through November and December of 2011 without a lot of scary Winter weather. Christmas was a cool-but-manageable 57º Fahrenheit here in town and everyone had a lovely holiday. But the first week of 2012 has seen a big shift. It was 19º on my drive in and won’t get much higher than that today. Yesterday, it blew down a blizzard for a few fleeting moments – not enough to stop traffic, but enough to get the attention of everyone here at DMI world headquarters.

But worry not, o faithful reader! We’re not letting Old Man Winter get the best of us. We’ve got plenty of hot coffee and a spiffy new set of offices that are temperature controlled to ensure you get all your problems solved, your statements loaded and your emails delivered.

We’re going to be making some additions to our site that will make it easier to spread the word about our company, our mission, and our passion for helping our clients. So please, tell a friend or a colleague about us. Tell them to sign up for our newsletter, a once-per-month collection of stories and talking points that goes straight to your email inbox. Tell them to check out the rest of our site, as well as our Facebook page and Twitter feed for more info.

Whatever you do, be sure to keep coming back to the DigitalMailer blog every week. Because no matter how cold it is outside, we’re determined to make 2012 our hottest year ever!

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December 14, 2011

The difference between “Trash” and “Spam”

Filed under: e-mail,email,email marketing,Marketing,SPAM,spam filters,SPAM history.,technology,Twitter — admin @ 11:56 am

by Jimmy Marks

Yes, I get Spam. Even as a person who is very vigilant about where his email address goes when he signs up for things, I still get emails for pills, cheap software and videos of celebrities I don’t like doing things I don’t want to see them doing.

Usually, it goes in my “Spam” or “Junk” folder. Sometimes, it gets through to the top level, into my inbox. And then, I have a choice to make.

Do I hit “Trash”? Or do I hit “Spam”?

It depends. Let’s take an email from a certain online vendor named after a famous South American river. I get these emails a lot, and I get a LOT of these emails. Special offers, coupons, daily deals – I open them, I see what’s inside, I close them. Sometimes, I even buy something from the email. But not very often.

So, when I get an email from this “Famous River” website that doesn’t have an item I want inside, is it Spam?

No.

Why not? Because I have a relationship with the company. They will let me unsubscribe if I want, but I don’t want to. Sometimes, I DO buy something, so I keep the emails coming. But if there’s something in the email I don’t want or need, I just trash it. I’m done with the email and that’s the end of the action.

Now, let’s try a different email. This one’s from some prince who’s emailing me from some country I’ve never heard of before. He wants to transfer money from his account to mine and sell me some cheap prescriptions and blah blah blah… this email is clearly Spam. So should I mark it as Spam?

Yes.

I didn’t want this email, I don’t need this email, there’s no unsubscribe – it’s Spam. And I’ll treat it as such.

What’s the difference? Well, when you mark an email as “Spam”, you’re (typically) telling your email client AND your email delivery service how to process new emails from that sender. If enough people mark an email as “Spam”, the sender’s IP can be flagged and they’ll stop being treated like a real email not only on your machine and in your account, but across the web. This is a double-edged sword. If a legitimate business is sending emails to prospects or users and too many recipients mark an email as “Spam”, that sender can be blacklisted – no matter how “legitimate” their emails are.

So, remember – unsubscribe from a campaign/email series if you don’t like it. And if you can’t use it but don’t want to unsubscribe, send it to the trash. If it’s an unsolicited email from an unknown sender, that’s the right time to hit “Spam”. Keep in mind that this doesn’t just apply to email – Twitter and Blogs deal with a lot of “Spammy” followers and comments. Marking these as Spam helps Twitter and your blog host to determine which tweeters/commenters are gumming up the works. We’re all in this together – let’s get Spam out of the way so the real stuff can get through!

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October 19, 2011

Waking up to Mobile Marketing…

Filed under: DigitalMailer,e-mail,e-Statements,email marketing,enrollment campaigns,eStrategy,On-Boarding,targeted marketing,technology — admin @ 9:49 am

by Greg Crandell

I recently attended a breakfast panel program hosted by our local metro area’s business and technology publication. On the panel were folks intimately involved in mobile marketing, either as advertising and consulting services providers or as leaders in B-2-C companies. They were asked a number of questions by the moderator regarding the current state of mobile marketing, and its impact on traditional marketing. They were also asked to comment on some current trends in mobile marketing. Their answers, and their observations, were well worth getting up early to hear.

When commenting on the current state of mobile marketing, the panelists spoke of the “always mobile, always on” state of today’s consumers. They pointed out that up to 40% of mobile users are online, and mobile, while at home. The mobile platform has indeed taken its place next to the landlocked Internet device, and may be on its way to supplanting it.

Panelists also felt that “automated marketing”, stuff that is done automatically based on the mobile users’ known attributes or device channel, was likely to be the most important activity marketers could engage in to keep marketing in the mobile mix. More on automated marketing later, but what did the panelists mean when talking about keeping marketing in the mobile mix?

For these people, traditional marketing is a wounded activity. They see consumer brands driven, not by traditional marketing methods, but by consumer endorsements. And that means you can’t correct for a poor product or service by traditional branding exercises. No amount of time and money can overcome a consumer groundswell of negative feedback online. So efforts focused on convincing consumers are wasted in a world where consumers look to each other for ratings and advice.

But, even in a world moving toward brands driven by consumer endorsements, there is room to deploy traditional marketing tools such as email and direct mail. There is evidence, according to the panelists, that younger consumers (millienials) see direct mail as valid when they can tie the company and product to favorable impressions gleaned online. In other words, younger consumers react favorably to direct mail marketing that complements the work being done online, and in the mobile space, to promote endorsement and to drive interest.

The panelists said much the same thing about email marketing. They perceive it as a way to reinforce beliefs and to promote already achieved endorsements. For them, email is both a way to complement the “conversational layer” found online, and to bring “automated marketing” to the email inbox.

There is that term again – automated marketing. Just what does it mean? Well, for the panelists, and for us at DigitalMailer, it is a term that refers to all marketing efforts that use data to develop messages and uses automation to deliver them. For us at DigitalMailer, automating onboarding campaigns for new members creates easy low cost means to deliver complementary messages to folks who have chosen to do business with you. In the same way, emails that automatically operate within lending or new account platforms create the same easy to deploy and maintain marketing opportunities that once had to be scheduled and performed in ad hoc fashion year after year.

Online and mobile channels are the perfect place to automate your marketing, whether it’s messaging or surveying to learn how to serve better or to learn the messages needed to win endorsements for your worthy services. And it is automated marketing that will keep marketers “in the mix” as word-of-mouth continues to grow its brand building presence.

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Categories

The DigitalMailer Blog

Thoughts on the State of the (Credit) Union (and Bank Marketing Survey), 2013

They’ve Got Mail (But Do They Open It?)

The Email Marketing Haunted House

HOUSE OF EMAIL MARKETING HORRORS!

HAPPY HALLOWEEN TO ALL, FROM EVERYONE AT DIGITALMAILER!

Where’d Everyone Go? How to Handle Out-of-Office Replies

How do you “measure up”?

DigitalMailer is back! And so is Winter…

The difference between “Trash” and “Spam”

Waking up to Mobile Marketing…

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