Did you know that an email re marketing strategy can result in 5-10%+ lift in sales revenue? The following are some of the functional areas your team will need to master if you want to build email in-house. In this blog we will dive deeper into each of these areas as well as other topics related to first party email strategy.
EMAIL OPS
Your email operations personnel are responsible for day to day email delivery, campaign management and optimization. They need a deep understanding of sending concepts as well as experience and relationships with the leading ESPs. Depending on their technical and design skills an internal email team can range from 1-4+ FTEs and utilize a number of subscription based software solutions.
COMPLIANCE
It is critical to keep up to date with the latest updates to CAN SPAM + CASL compliance. We cannot stress this enough as failure to do so can cause up $40,654 per message in violation (http://bit.ly/1wftWeD). You should perform routine audits of your sends and infrastructure to ensure you are compliant. For example, you must unsubscribe customers within 10 business days of them notifying you. Requests can come from regular postal mail, a reply to the email you sent or a click on the unsubscribe link. You need to make sure that this process is bulletproof or you could be in violation.
DESIGN AND DEVELOPMENT
Your team should be able to code and build email templates that render well on Mobile as well as desktop. Emails tend to render differently depending on what device it’s being viewed on (iPhone, android, desktop browser) as well as by the email service (Yahoo renders different from Gmail, Hotmail, AOL, etc.) Email copy / messaging can drastically impact deliverability and engagement. An understanding of the nuances by domain is important to ensure that things are designed properly and perform well across all emails.
DELIVERABILITY
Poor delivery rates will drastically impact the performance of any email campaign. An understanding of the factors that cause emails to not get delivered into the inbox as well as the ability to troubleshoot those issues, take corrective measures, and develop a strategy to sustain delivery is crucial for any email team. Factors that impact Yahoo delivery are different than those that impact Gmail, Hotmail, AOL, etc. These issues can also impact the reputation of your domain. At Liftlogic we constantly monitor delivery rates and test multiple factors across major domains to isolate and troubleshoot delivery issues.
METRICS + CRM
You must measure campaigns against KPIs, maintain a comprehensive suppression data / unsubscribe process and respond to customer service issues. Engagement (opens, clicks, unsubscribes, complaints) is a key indicator of how well your Email program is doing. Are your consumers opening / clicking or are they unsubscribing / complaining? Measure these and other KPIs to ensure your campaigns are performing.
ONGOING MANAGEMENT
It’s important to understand the various types of campaigns to run, when to run them and how to segment the various data sets. It is also important to synchronize campaigns across various cohorts, other media channels and other monetization strategies including call center and SMS. Failure to do so can cause a degradation in performance across all of these areas.
DON’T BE OVERWHELMED!
At Liftlogic our goal is to help you win at email. As your outsourced email department we will build and manage a best in class email strategy. We can have you up and running within 48 hours and our fees are 100% CPA based. Email bizdev@liftlogic.com to set up a consultation today!