NetNews our ONLINE NEWSLETTER (Latest issue)

Developments in web marketing, site design, and web services

The Online Newsletter from Net Commerce Solutions

At last, the upturn we guessed at in December seems to be happening – online retail sales are growing strongly year on year, and many of our own clients are getting busier, stepping up their site promotion and refreshing their web site designs.

We have covered in (1)  - at greater length than usual – how to use one of the key web promotion tools, i.e. email marketing, to help push your own web business forward. There is a lot of experience behind these suggestions and we hope applying them helps bring you useful, repeating, gains in your income.

1.NET ISSUES
Significant issues that could impact on your website approach

How to use email marketing effectively

Email marketing is a powerful, low cost way to generate sales. The following email marketing tips are drawn from many years of managing client email marketing campaigns.

1. Get your processes sorted before you start emailing marketing campaigns

Collect email addresses systematically e.g. those you sell to, send brochures to, or those who visit your website. 

If you send email marketing from your web server, the load can affect the performance of your website. So send mailings from a separate server which is white listed with leading ISPs to prevent mailings being wrongly identified as SPAM. 

Set up a system to handle email marketing bounces.  If you send from your PC or website, decide how to handle each email that bounces -  use a third party like Net Commerce Solutions with the software to handle them automatically.

2.Email marketing needs good design

Design an email template using your corporate colours and logo - this can be used for all future emailings at no extra cost.  Always include an unsubscribe option in the template.

And always develop a text only version of your emailings for those who can only receive text.  This needs to include the full url of all links including your unsubscribe option.

NCS, via its Brand Design Service, can of course assist with the Design aspect.

3.Link your email marketing to your website content and promotion

One of the main purposes of emailing marketing should be to get recipients to visit your website, so always link to your website in your mailing - you can link from images as well as from text. 

If you include an image of a product, link the image to that product on your website.  If you mention a product, link the text to that product page on your website.

Avoid making your emailing look like SPAM to the SPAM filters.  Using multicoloured text is generally a bad idea as is using only images.  Some email marketing providers like NCS can test your mailing in all the main email packages and SPAM filters to check how it is likely to fare.

4.Good email marketing needs appealing emails

Make the subject line of your email interesting – if not, the recipient may not even open it. Action words and compelling, up to the minute subjects should be included e.g. enter our free competition, see our new product.

Try to include salutations (e.g. Dear Michael) in your mailings if you know the people involved.  But be sure to get their names right!

5.Check the results of your email marketing

Set up an M/I system to check which emails bounced, which were opened / unopened, who clicked on which links, and how many spam complaints you got. And refine your email marketing by comparing campaigns sent at various different times to find when it’s best to reach your target audience. 

NCS provides a full set of reports on all your mailings showing who opened them, who clicked on which links, and therefore who is interested in which products. 

6.For effective email marketing, manage your email list properly

Manage your emailing list so that those who unsubscribe hear from you no more. You can resend mailings which bounce with a soft bounce (i.e. something like mail box full) - you may get through next time, but stop sending emails to addresses which have a hard bounce (e.g. no such email address, no such domain). Of course, our mailing list management software will do this for you automatically. 

7.Good email marketing needs good timing

When is the best time to send emailings? Experience tells us that for classic newsletters, Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday mornings generally give the best results.  However, with Blackberries and other 3G mobile phones on the increase, we are now finding emailings at 6pm are often opened and read much more quickly than previously.

Choose the best times of year for your emailings.  This will vary according to your business, but think of the special dates, i.e. Christmas, Easter, Valentine’s Day, Mothering Sunday etc.

Remember, we can help you with every aspect of email marketing, including email design, website content alignment, monitoring and selecting the timing of your campaigns.

2. NET HAPPENINGS
News, themes and trends from the Internet – home and abroad

Online channels show strong growth.....                                

Mobile web access/m-commerce – shows continued strong growth – around a fifth of all retail web site visits are now made via mobile internet (nma.co.uk/ComScore)

Social Networking – approx 86% of the UK online population visited a social networking site in January 2010. Within this Facebook continues to dominate – its volumes grew by nearly 50% during the last year (nma.co.uk/ComScore).

UK online sales are now climbing strongly – the IMRG/Capgemini Sales Index showed that, year on year, e-retail grew by 15% in March.

- IPA/BDO Bellwether report (April) showed that, overall, UK  marketing budgets will increase in 2010 – i.e. the first time since 2007. Within this, Online marketing spend, especially Search, is forecast to grow particularly strongly

- Google revenue grew by 23% in Q1, showing the scale of the shift to online marketing (nma.co.uk).

3. NET TIPS
Some hints you could consider

Be local – if you are a locally based business, make it very clear where you do business. Using the local area code with your phone number shows immediately that you are based in the vicinity. Non–geographic numbers, e.g. 0870, are a valuable business tool, but the local number shows you are really local. NCS can help build your local search engine presence.

Use that space - the top right hand corner of a webpage is the most valuable "call to action" area on a website – make sure you don’t fill that part of the screen with eye-candy, or a very deep header, but use it for your key message.

Be alive to 2012 – we know some web owners are already considering how to adapt their offer or their promotion to reflect opportunities coming out of the 2012 London Olympics – it might be worth reflecting whether it will give any new opportunities for your business.

4. NCS FOCUS
News and services from NCS that might help

News Releases – has your business done anything worth telling the world about – e.g. new clients gained, or new products/services you now offer?  If so, think about a News Release – we have much experience in preparing and distributing Online Press Releases. An Online news release can also be a useful way to create inbound links to your site.

Google Maps – we have helped our clients, and ourselves, gain useful links from Google Maps.

Firstly, register an account with Google, and verify your listing. Key action is to then add reviews. To practice, (and using us as an example) once you have an account you can add a (hopefully) good/5 star review for our web design and SEO promotion, or for a friend’s business - just search on Maps for Net Commerce Solutions and write a review covering our web design and SEO / promotion plus general service level to you.If you are happy with the procedure, you can ask a few clients to add a review - it can give you a strong local ranking with Google.

Does your shopping cart work? – a recent survey (Internet Retailing) found that 64% of online shoppers abandon sites at point of purchase because the shopping cart on the site doesn’t work properly. Please contact us if you would like a free check.

Dave Abernethy,
Managing Director,
Net Commerce Solutions Ltd

Tel:     (+44) (0) 870 246 7642

info@net-commerce-solutions.co.uk     Web site: www.net-commerce-solutions.co.uk

Registered in England and Wales. Company number 4052885: 6 Bramble Close, Harpenden, Herts, AL5 4AN