By edith on 04-28-2010

About Our Guest Author

Chris McCann is Co-Founder of [Startup Digest]. [Startup Digest] . With over 36 curators worldwide, [Startup Digest] is an email digest of the best startup events in your local community. Chris was the organizer for Geeks on a Plane Tokyo 2010 and manages social media outreach for both TEDx Silicon Valley and TEDxBerkeley.

5 Reasons Why Email is Sexy:

Most emails suck, but some organizations manage to run some really effective email newsletters for marketing and updating their customers of new products and recent company events. In a world where you dread opening your jam-packed inbox, how can email still be sexy? With real-time status updates through Facebook or Twitter, why bother with email newsletters? Email has some characteristics that make it retain its appeal.

1. Internet Access = Email Address: Most people who have Internet access have an email account. ISP’s often issue email accounts when activating service. Regardless of a person’s age, language, age, country, etc. or how active they are on social networking sites, they will most likely have an email address to reach them directly.

2. Filtering: One problem with communication today is inundation of irrelevant information. In contrast, most email lists are completely opt-in and targeted. Most are topic-specific – when you sign up for an email newsletter, you expect information on a certain topic or company.

3. Backbone: Email is the backbone infrastructure of all social networks. For example when I get a facebook message where is the first place I am notified? Email.

4. Location-specific: Email can be as location-specific or ubiquitous as the sender would like. You can send hyperlocalized information to a list of people within a certain geographic region, or send general information to people around the globe as necessary

5. Retrievable: Email is a record you can look up again for reference. If someone told you about an event in passing, it is possible that you could forget details like the dates and time, but you can easily look up the information in an email

5 Tips For Your Next Email Campaign:

Make email work for your company. Just a few small changes won’t be expensive and have a huge ROI. You will also receive immediate feedback from your audience since they can simply hit “Reply” to voice their opinions. In addition, you know exactly how many people are on the email list and you can track changes in sales, etc. Here are some quick tips:

1. Make sure the email is sent out from a person’s name, not a generic company name.
Associating the message with an actual person increases people’s have tendency to respond. In contrast, a general company email and name seems like a faceless address that will never respond back. On a related note, this is a great opportunity for the person whose name is actually being used.

Perks for the person whose name is being used: networking, visibility, and building of your personal brand on a continuous basis.
2. Make sure people opt in:
Don’t just throw people on your email list, use a form builder like Wufoo or your email newsletter provider’s email form like MailChimp, and make sure people opt-in and sign up to receive what you are sending them.

3. Give some added value to give people something they want to read:
Make sure the content has some editorial oversight or curated in some way, instead of just taking what is on your company blog and throwing it onto the newsletter. A great example of a newsletter that provides value is HARO which connects reports and the press with people who want to get their stories heard.

4. Present exclusive content:
DailyCandy and Thrillist send daily emails to keep readers “in the know” about new and exciting events, places, and products in their respective geographical areas.

5. Give a unique tie-in to your company:
Use the email newsletter as a great opportunity to showcase something unique about your company. For example, ekoVenture sends subscribers one stunning photo a day of a travel destination to whet the reader’s appetite for travel. Or the Gilt Groupe times its daily emails in a way that serve as event reminders for the starting times of its 36-hour sales.

Email is not going away soon and the companies and people who can use email effectively to market and promote their services are tapping into a very powerful and ubiquitous channel. Go out there and experiment with your next email campaign, collect feedback on the changes, and make people’s lives easier one email at a time.

About edith

Edith Yeung is the Founder of BizTechDay and SFentrepreneur. She is also a lecturer at UC Berkeley International Program and committee member of the San Francisco Small Business Week. She has previously worked with AT&T Wireless, Oracle, Siebel, Autodesk, Cisco Systems, Symantec, American Management Systems (AMS), Telstra Australia, Matav Hungary Telecom and Taiwan Semi-Conductor.

2 Responses to “Why Email Is Sexy and 5 Tips for Your Next Email Campaign”

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2. Augen Operationen Says:
   July 5th, 2010 at 11:58 am

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