Email Campaign Management
Email Campaign Management
Email Marketing Resources
Email Marketing Companies-Another good resource on campaign management basics.
Data Zealot-one of our currently recommended email marketing companies.
Streamsend -Streamsend is a professional email marketing company with a robust product.
Summitsoft-Summitsoft has a full range of software options available for you to choose from, including email software.
There are a few crucial concepts you'll want to keep in mind to make your it easier for you to get a return on your investment for any email campaign.
First, we need to discuss the three different kinds of email marketing:
Spam
Spam is classified as unsolicited bulk email. It is not illegal, but is widely regarded as immoral and it is regulated by the Cam-Spam Act of 2003-2004. It is not an effective means of email marketing as it tends to anger many consumers.
Single Optin
This is the best option if you're trying to reach new markets. "Single Optin" means that the individual opted in to receive marketing emails on a website at one time or another. This can mean that some of the contacts on the list opted in through account creation check boxes that they were unaware of. As a result, the response rate is lower than the "Double Optin Emails", but far better than spam.
Double Optin
Double optin simply means that the individual opted in on a website, and then confirmed their desire to receive emails via email response. These are most typically newsletter receiving consumers. It is possible to purchase lists, but they are very expensive usually.
If you're a business that is simply looking to send newsletters to your clients, it won't be difficult to find inexpensive software to do it. This will be the least of your worries. Purchasing or "renting" email data isn't always an easy task, however.
Renting a List
The market rate for "renting" an email list for a single blast service is usually around three cents per email. When you rent an email list you are really just paying an overinflated rate for an email blast service to a target market. You will never see the list, so you want to make sure that you receive certain guarantees before you pay. You will want to make sure you are guaranteed at least a ninety percent delivery rate. The "delivery rate" is the amount of the emails that will actually make it to an email box. Many lists have a bunch of dead email addresses that are no longer active. If you do not get a guaranteed delivery rate from your email marketing companies then you may be hurting your chances of receiving any response from your mailing. If you receive a guarantee, most often the service will replace any emails that "bounced" with ones that don't after the inital mailing up to the percentage of the guarantee. For example, if you were to send out ten thousand emails with a ninety percent guarantee and the tracking data (that they should give you) indicates that two thousand of them bounced, then your service would have to do another email blast for you that delivers a minimum of one thousand emails successfully. You will never receive a guaranteed rate of return or response, but you will sometimes be given estimates to woo you into a purchase. Since you're rate of response is entirely based on the designed email, the message, the list, and your services capabilities, these estimates are usually not correct.
Purchasing a List
The market rate for purchasing a single optin list is about ten cents per contact. This is without any email blast service. On a positive note, your sending from your own list will only be between one-half cent and one cent per contact. So, if you're doing an extended campaign, this is the best option. When purchasing, you'll want to make sure that as much information is given to you about the contacts as possible, including full name, email address, phone number, web site they opted in on, date opted in, physical address, and interests. The more fields the better, especially if you plan to resell your list. As a list ages, it depreciates in value because it is assumed that more and more of the data on it will be incorrect as time goes on. If you purchase a list, it will be tempting to insert those contacts into some simple email campaign software to send newsletters, but don't do it. The vast majority of these programs will ban you if too many of your emails bounce, in addition your IP can become marked as a spammer on the many spam filter supplier sites in no time. You will then be effectively "black listed" and most of your emails will bounce regardless of whom they go to. Because of these dangers, you will want to have a bulk email sender do it for you.
Blast Services
When you're searching through email marketing companies for your email blast service you'll want to make sure that they give you the guarantees discussed earlier in the article. You'll also want to make sure that you're not paying too much. You're cost should be no more than one cent per email sent for the first ten thousand. Every ten thousand following that the first should become more cost effective. The initial costs for the bulk sender are the set up and your email design inquiries (don't pay for email design, you can do it yourself with little effort). Beyond this set up, you're just paying for the time that it takes to send the emails out (which can actually take longer than you might think to avoid spam filters).
Calculating Your Return on Investment
This is actually difficult to do if you haven't sent out a couple mailings yet, but if you imagine the worst case scenario, you might be able to get an idea of your ROI. Let's assume you will be sending fifty thousand emails at a cost of one thousand and five hundred dollars. You anticipate that each sale of your product would net fifty dollars in profit for you. This means that you would need to sell thirty items to get a return on your investment which means that your response rate would have to be point zero zero six percent from that single emailing to pay for itself. This may or may not happen. However, it is important to keep in mind that bulk emailing is a lot like billboard advertising in that if somone sees it many times, they are more likely to respond to it. This effect is more difficult to quantify, but if you try a few mailings you might get a more accurate feel for your ROI in both respects.
Our Recommendations
If you're looking to purchase a list or for an email blasting service, we recommend taking a look at Data Zealot.
What we have found to be unique about Data Zealot is that they offer single optin lists, email blasting, and double optin newsletter services email campaign software) all in the same place. In addition, the newsletter service doesn't stick you with a reoccuring monthly fee that increases with your list size and they have decent customer service. Lastly, they sell lists at the cost of a typical list rental. We asked why this was and we were told it's because they know their clients will need a bulk sender and they hope to be it. Let us know if you have any questions or comments.
Before you consider hiring one of many email marketing companies for any level of email campaign management, make sure you consider the advice given above. If you have any further questions, contact us at support@emailcampaignmanagement.com.
First, we need to discuss the three different kinds of email marketing:
Spam
Spam is classified as unsolicited bulk email. It is not illegal, but is widely regarded as immoral and it is regulated by the Cam-Spam Act of 2003-2004. It is not an effective means of email marketing as it tends to anger many consumers.
Single Optin
This is the best option if you're trying to reach new markets. "Single Optin" means that the individual opted in to receive marketing emails on a website at one time or another. This can mean that some of the contacts on the list opted in through account creation check boxes that they were unaware of. As a result, the response rate is lower than the "Double Optin Emails", but far better than spam.
Double Optin
Double optin simply means that the individual opted in on a website, and then confirmed their desire to receive emails via email response. These are most typically newsletter receiving consumers. It is possible to purchase lists, but they are very expensive usually.
If you're a business that is simply looking to send newsletters to your clients, it won't be difficult to find inexpensive software to do it. This will be the least of your worries. Purchasing or "renting" email data isn't always an easy task, however.
Renting a List
The market rate for "renting" an email list for a single blast service is usually around three cents per email. When you rent an email list you are really just paying an overinflated rate for an email blast service to a target market. You will never see the list, so you want to make sure that you receive certain guarantees before you pay. You will want to make sure you are guaranteed at least a ninety percent delivery rate. The "delivery rate" is the amount of the emails that will actually make it to an email box. Many lists have a bunch of dead email addresses that are no longer active. If you do not get a guaranteed delivery rate from your email marketing companies then you may be hurting your chances of receiving any response from your mailing. If you receive a guarantee, most often the service will replace any emails that "bounced" with ones that don't after the inital mailing up to the percentage of the guarantee. For example, if you were to send out ten thousand emails with a ninety percent guarantee and the tracking data (that they should give you) indicates that two thousand of them bounced, then your service would have to do another email blast for you that delivers a minimum of one thousand emails successfully. You will never receive a guaranteed rate of return or response, but you will sometimes be given estimates to woo you into a purchase. Since you're rate of response is entirely based on the designed email, the message, the list, and your services capabilities, these estimates are usually not correct.
Purchasing a List
The market rate for purchasing a single optin list is about ten cents per contact. This is without any email blast service. On a positive note, your sending from your own list will only be between one-half cent and one cent per contact. So, if you're doing an extended campaign, this is the best option. When purchasing, you'll want to make sure that as much information is given to you about the contacts as possible, including full name, email address, phone number, web site they opted in on, date opted in, physical address, and interests. The more fields the better, especially if you plan to resell your list. As a list ages, it depreciates in value because it is assumed that more and more of the data on it will be incorrect as time goes on. If you purchase a list, it will be tempting to insert those contacts into some simple email campaign software to send newsletters, but don't do it. The vast majority of these programs will ban you if too many of your emails bounce, in addition your IP can become marked as a spammer on the many spam filter supplier sites in no time. You will then be effectively "black listed" and most of your emails will bounce regardless of whom they go to. Because of these dangers, you will want to have a bulk email sender do it for you.
Blast Services
When you're searching through email marketing companies for your email blast service you'll want to make sure that they give you the guarantees discussed earlier in the article. You'll also want to make sure that you're not paying too much. You're cost should be no more than one cent per email sent for the first ten thousand. Every ten thousand following that the first should become more cost effective. The initial costs for the bulk sender are the set up and your email design inquiries (don't pay for email design, you can do it yourself with little effort). Beyond this set up, you're just paying for the time that it takes to send the emails out (which can actually take longer than you might think to avoid spam filters).
Calculating Your Return on Investment
This is actually difficult to do if you haven't sent out a couple mailings yet, but if you imagine the worst case scenario, you might be able to get an idea of your ROI. Let's assume you will be sending fifty thousand emails at a cost of one thousand and five hundred dollars. You anticipate that each sale of your product would net fifty dollars in profit for you. This means that you would need to sell thirty items to get a return on your investment which means that your response rate would have to be point zero zero six percent from that single emailing to pay for itself. This may or may not happen. However, it is important to keep in mind that bulk emailing is a lot like billboard advertising in that if somone sees it many times, they are more likely to respond to it. This effect is more difficult to quantify, but if you try a few mailings you might get a more accurate feel for your ROI in both respects.
Our Recommendations
If you're looking to purchase a list or for an email blasting service, we recommend taking a look at Data Zealot.
What we have found to be unique about Data Zealot is that they offer single optin lists, email blasting, and double optin newsletter services email campaign software) all in the same place. In addition, the newsletter service doesn't stick you with a reoccuring monthly fee that increases with your list size and they have decent customer service. Lastly, they sell lists at the cost of a typical list rental. We asked why this was and we were told it's because they know their clients will need a bulk sender and they hope to be it. Let us know if you have any questions or comments.
Before you consider hiring one of many email marketing companies for any level of email campaign management, make sure you consider the advice given above. If you have any further questions, contact us at support@emailcampaignmanagement.com.