Return On Email Subscriber

Woot.com has built a great business and brand using great copy and a unique business model.  The following personalized email they sent to me really illustrates this.  I will let you read for your self:

WOOT, INC. INTERNAL EMAIL 
STAFF EYES ONLY 

Attention Woot employees - 

We are now entering the final phase of preparations for the Woot-Off planned for midnight tonight. This is when we depart from our usual deal-a-day model and sell one product after another, offering a new deal as soon as the previous one sells out. For some reason, Woot members like my name continue to have high expectations for this event. We must make every effort to ensure that they feel disappointed and betrayed. 

All workers should be physically and mentally straining to make this Woot-Off a success, like every muscle in a wolf’s body strains to capture and devour its prey. We expect total compliance with the following objectives: 

• Make sure the stables are thoroughly cleaned and the horses properly groomed and shod. As you know, Commander Rutledge prefers to lead us on horseback during Woot-Offs. (more…)

“1 week only: Free Custom Cover Book”.  Awesome right?  No.  It’s actually a “Buy one Get one Free” offer. Semantics?  No.  Bummer?  Yes! These types of misleading subject lines do more damage to the brand than the subscriber.

Fool me once? Shame on you.  Fool me Twice?  Ask George W. 

Now maybe I misintrepreted this email from Snapfish, but it look like to me it says: “order one, get the second free with Coupon Book108″.  Isn’t that called “Buy One Get One Free”?

This tactic may work in other marketing channels but it’s not going to work in email.  We will find out the true offer the moment we open the email.

Be honest and your audience will trust you.  Trick them and they will stop listening. Or worse, they will unsubscribe.

College Basketball is in the air and that means it is bracket time. We are working with our InFocus to bring the 2nd annual InFocus Hoops contest. This year winners take home PlayStation 3, Bose systems, and lots of other goodies. This site shows you the power of encompassing a campaign around a large social event.

Check it out and see how we use the Send to a Friend or Invite a Friend feature to drive more competition and a larger base of participants

Our Creativity Journal Contest is nearing an end on February 28th. If you are still interested in getting your creative into the mix, send it on to create AT eroi.com.

This past holiday season, we put together a creative journal and send it out to some of our select customers. These journals were a hit, finding their way into the hearts of all who received them. Thank you emails rolled into our inboxes, many asking, “Can I get one more for a co-worker?” Well due to the love of these Creativity Journals, and the fact that we have a few boxes of them left, we wanted to hold a contest with our subscribers to send us their BEST email campaign creative. Now this is open to eROI customers and subscribers alike, so no pressure as everyone has a chance to get a journal. The only requisite: the creative must ROCK.

To enter, simply send us your email creative in HTML, JPG, or PDF format by February 21st, 2007 and we will hold an internal review by our entire team to choose 10 winners. These winners will have their work featured on ReturnOnSubscriber once they are chosen and our comments will follow on this blog. Please make sure to attach your name, company, email address and 100 - 250 words describing what the campaign was for, the target audience and what time of year it was sent. Also important is the Subject Line, or lines if you did an A/B list split by Subject Line.

We look forward to your submissions and if you have any questions, reach out and touch us at “create AT eROI.com”
Submit Your Campaign By Feb 28th

2 questions to ask yourself before doing online surveys:

1. Are you prepared to use the answers from this survey to implement change in your product/brand/service?

2. If you ask an open-ended question with a comment box, are you going to read every answer and respond to the surveyee with how you will use the input they have provided?

I don’t know too many people who like taking surveys. (“I took an awesome survey yesterday from my vendor!”) Make sure that this survey is going to mean something, and before you create the question, think about what you are going to do with the answer.

You are asking a lot of the subscriber, respect their time and energy by having a plan…and don’t forget to thank them for taking the survey. Twice.

I recently found myself with some emails from an employee that moved overseas and needed to move him off these lists. Not that I did not like them, but that he had opted in for them and not me. So they were not relevant to me. This one in particular made me laugh at the humor that was on target with the brand.

Think about if you are going to lose someone to let them know that they were appreciated (they may come back later) and if you craft the exit message you might just get some word of mouth out of it.

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Welll what do you know. We were honored this AM to find that we are one of the email marketing blogs up for the ClickZ awards 2006. Please give us your love with a VOTE. (Not fair that 2 out of the 3 blogs are ours!!)

Finalists were selected from reader nominations for the ClickZ Marketing Excellence Awards 2006 that met eligibility requirements. Voting is open now through the close of business, 5 pm EST, on Wednesday, November 8, 2006. One vote in each subcategory per person (we have our ways of knowing). Winners will be announced on Monday, November 13, 2006.

VOTE for Us

We have worked with a number of companies and organizations that want to do a multi-part email campaign that is automated based off a customer response (such as a purchase). One thing that most companies want to do is mold everyone into a campaign that is generic and timing is set the same for everyone. Now, the point of these campaigns is to provide value to each customer.

Adding flexibility in your schedule and content is key in this area. Ask them questions down the road that readjust their campaigns, adjust content based off of items of interest (base this on behavior, not just what they say), stop sending emails that are not helping the cause - which if you forgot is to create an advocate out of your customer, that nirvana a customer reaches when they would spar with Roy Jones Jr just to tell people about your company.

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I am Cool, Creamy & Green

I’m cool. Yeah. I know it. Laid back, easy-going and breezy. Nothing ruffles my feathers. I’m the one everyone wants around in a crisis. I keep my head about me. I may even walk around like I own this place. Underneath my cool exterior, though, is a passionate, self-possessed person who knows what’s right and what’s good.

We worked with Kettle Foods (LOVE THE CHIPS) again to put together a great new Crave Club Site. Hats off to Kettle as they are great designers and to Maxwell PR for the direction.

I am Bold, Grown-up Cheese.

I’m a bold, big city person. Museums, theater, fine dining and cool shops… I can even appreciate performance art. I’ve got grown-up tastes but I’m not stuffy or stiff. I know how to have fun and I’m just as comfortable at a white linen-laid table as I am at the hot dog cart. I’ve got style. An individualist who isn’t afraid to show my true colors or to stand out in a crowd.