The From Line

Partnership provides inbound email management, live customer chat and better customer retention Gold Lasso’s teaming up with Bamboo Cricket, a Florida-based customer service solutions company, to offer our clients inbound email management and live customer chat technology. More and more email marketers are discovering that it really pays to read their customers’ emails. With Bamboo Cricket’s email management solution, our clients can easily uncover “high value” messages from important customers that are currently being ignored. And by simply responding appropriately, you have the chance to retain those customers for about $1 each. And that, according to Stan Rapp, Chairman of Engage, is less than 1% of that client’s lifetime value to the marketer. Bamboo Cricket also offers a free evaluation report so customers can prove the ROI before they buy. And if you’re ready to take the next step up in customer service, Bamboo Cricket provides an outstanding live customer chat application as well.

For more information, please contact your designated eLoop Account Manager.

All this talk about the economy should have you asking one question: Am I getting my moneys worth? This pertains to all aspects of your business. Of course, I can only help you answer that question as it pertains to your ESP. So, as an eLoop Account Manager, it’s my duty to make sure you are aware of all the premium features available to you.

Now I am sure some of you are using these features, but many of our clients are not. All of the features below (listed by section) are available to you in eLoop at no additional charge. They are simply sitting there waiting to be used!

Data Collection
Surveys
Landing Pages
Opt-In Pages
Referral Pages
Customized Forward-to-a-Friend

Data Management
Complex list building (including Boolean statements)

Outbound Messaging
Dynamic Content: allows you to insert virtually anything in place of another item within a Message when a certain condition or set of conditions is met.

Enhanced Message Testing: offers three premium options: eDesign Optimizer, eContent Scorer, and eDelivery Tracker.

Account Settings
Communication Categories: This allows the recipient to set preferences that act as a suppression mechanism, allowing only the desired messages to reach them.

The key to business success in a down economy is to NOT discontinue your marketing efforts. Many businesses are fearful of spending (which is totally understandable), but cutting all marketing is not the answer. Change it up!

Analysts are already reporting that marketing dollars are shifting to email – the most cost effective channel proven to have the highest ROI. During tough economic times, it’s important to think carefully about how you’re using email and make every single email count for something.

1) Fear can be an excellent motivator.
It’s a scary time for business professionals right now. There is widespread fear of job loss and budget cuts. Instead of feeding those fears, capitalize on them. Connect with your customers in a way that quells their fears a bit. Position your products and services so that they show value in tough times. Cut out whatever is not necessary and get right to the point.

2) Motivate. Motivate. Motivate.
It’s time to be creative. Think about how you can change or improve your offers to clients. Discounts are effective but they are not the only motivator out there. When every dollar counts, think of other ways you can provide value without leaving money on the table. Is there information or helpful hints you can offer that will be of value to your clients and protect your budget at the same time?

3) Partnerships
Now is a great time to team up and offer “more for your money” services.

4) Integrate email with social marketing tools.
Email is a great way to initiate contact – continue it with a posting to a Facebook Wall, Tweets, MySpace or a blog.

5) Solidify your sender reputation.
The number of emails sent will increase in a down economy. In response to this, ISPs may vamp up their throttling, spam filtering and lower their volume caps. Sender reputation means everything so check your sender score at either senderscore.org or senderbase.org and continue to follow best practices.

6) Feedback is free!
Always, always ask for feedback. Make it a goal for all of your employees. Every email should have a means included to submit feedback. Online transactions and telephone calls should also be solicited for feedback.

7) How can you help?
Most wallets are sewn shut right now. Think of ways your organization can bring value and relevance to your clients. Consider changing your offerings or pairing up your products.

8) Consider flexible terms. Make it very clear if you offer flexible payment terms, reward points or discounts for larger orders.

9) Client appreciation holds a lot of weight. Whitepapers, user tips, small token gifts, and coupons are simple and inexpensive ways to thank your clients and entice prospects. Remember that word-of-mouth is the most powerful advertising out there.

10)  Test timing.
One of the greatest perks of email marketing is that you are not tied to anything. You can test, test, test! You have the ability to determine what works best for your subscribers. Maybe one of your lists gets a great response on a Monday morning and another on a Wednesday afternoon…go for it! Try out the new Sunday-sending theory. Industry experts have reported great success in sending Sunday evening emails. With mobile devices and flexible technology, people tend to check their mail on Sundays so they know what’s in store for them the next day.

Obviously these are just some of the ways that you can leverage email to work for you in a down economy. It’s all about smart marketing!

As we all know, email marketing is an ever-changing marketing form. It is easily adaptable to market fluctuations, economic hardships, and sudden changes in marketing strategies.

There are so many trends that can impact email marketing, but I’d like to cover four that I feel most affect our clients. It’s important to keep these in mind while devising your email marketing strategy for 2009.

1) Control is in the subscriber’s hands now more than ever.

It used to be that subscribers had little or no control over a sender’s email program. Times have surely changed. With eLoop (as is true with most email tools today), subscribers are able to decide many things for themselves:

• Whether to opt-in to your communications
• When, where and how they will read your messages
• If and when they want to change their preferences for content, format and frequency
• Whether to report your email as spam
• When to end the relationship

2) Emerging channels are creating shifts

Email has begun the shift to allow for the multi-channel approach. There are so many communication channels available to get your message delivered – you’ve got text messaging, email, and voice among the most prominent. These days, it’s easy to combine these mediums and provide a “combo” to your recipients. Preference selection comes into play here – allowing the recipient to decide how they’d like to receive certain messages.

For example, travelers might prefer promotions via email, flight delay notifications via voice, and weather updates via text messages.

3) You find your email list shrinking – your number of inactive records is way up!

This may come as a shock, but you should expect to lose about one third of your list each year due to bounces, opt-outs and spam complaints. To add to the shock, you can pretty much bank on 25-50% of your email list being stagnant, meaning they have not opened or clicked on your messages in 12 or more months.

Now that I’ve got your attention, rest assured…you can reduce these scary numbers! In order to do so, you’ve got to make some improvements to your email program.

• Give more control to your recipients (as discussed above).
• Manage subscriber’s expectations from the start
• Create welcome programs
• Use trigger-based messaging and a relevant target approach

4) Design Emails to Render Across Multiple Environments

There are so many environments out there in which you can read your email. Desktop email reading has taken a backseat to mobile email. The downside of this is that many mobile phones turn your fabulous-looking HTML messages into a mess of URLs and code.

The majority of recipients view emails several times and on different devices. The message may initially come to their Blackberry or iPhone, but later that day, they may view it in Outlook, Gmail or Yahoo.

The importance of designing your email to render properly across the board can’t be stressed enough. In eLoop, we offer enhanced rendering testing which shows you how the message will render on mobile devices and in various email clients. If you are interested in learning more about enhanced testing, please email This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it..

So there you have it…four trends that are not going anywhere anytime soon. Luckily, email tends to adapt very well to change in trends. If you have any questions regarding the information provided, do not hesitate to contact me directly at 301-990-9857 x213 or via email at This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it..