MarketingExperiments Blog: Research-driven optimization, testing, and marketing ideas

At MarketingSherpa Email Summit 2013, Donna Krizik, Director of Client Communications, Crestwood Associates LLC, presented some impressive email copywriting tests. Let’s take a closer look at what she learned about email body copy today on the MarketingExperiments blog …

Background:  Crestwood Associates is a Microsoft Dynamics ERP and CRM reseller. The new release of Dynamics CRM touted 45 new features. Crestwood wanted both existing ERP and CRM customers, along with prospects, to sign up for an informative webinar, which would then get customers and prospects to schedule an upgrade or new deployment.

Audience: Marketing and Sales staff who either have CRM or are in the market for CRM

Objective:  Get customers to click on a link to register or learn more

Primary Research Question:  What email copy will maximize my clickthroughs?

Test Design:  Complete copy change. Donna’s team changed everything (just about).

CONTROL

After reviewing the above email copy, Donna identified a few elements that might be hindering conversion:

• Overall, there was just too much going on.
• The first line focused on the product, not the customer: “Microsoft Dynamics CRM helps you …”
• There were five calls-to-action (two in the main copy, plus three in the sidebar).
• The call-to-action language was generic and did not offer any value (“Click here” and “read this document”).
• The language in the bullet points was “fuzzy.”

TREATMENT #1

In this treatment, Donna reworded the main body copy to start with a customer pain point instead of a product. (“Are you struggling each month, trying to get a handle on your sales pipeline?”)

She also removed two of the five calls-to-action (CTAs), removing the “Top 10 Reasons to Choose CRM” whitepaper CTA from both the main body copy and the right-hand sidebar copy.

TREATMENT #2
 

For this treatment, the copy stayed the same as Treatment #1; however, Donna removed one more call-to-action (removing “click here to learn more about …” from the main body copy). This email had two calls-to-action, in the right-hand sidebar.

She also changed the right-hand sidebar background color from dark purple to light green.

TREATMENT #3
 

 
Again, Donna started with a pain point question her audience of salespeople might relate to along with a solution. This time, however, Donna “picked ONE feature of CRM that would solve their problem and focused on it (a very sexy feature) and quantified some ease of use and functionality they can take advantage of” instead of talking about CRM in general, high-level terms as in the previous two treatments that had more general language like “with CRM you can quickly identify your top customers.”

Here are some other changes Donna made in Treatment #3:

• Added a transition at the bottom of the main copy calling attention to the CTA on the sidebar
• Had only one CTA in the sidebar, which focused on the event
• Had a clear call-to-action that did not require much commitment from the audience for taking the next step – “Preview the Agenda here”
• Added urgency

RESULTS

The simpler email (one call-to-action as opposed to five) focusing on the customer’s pain points instead of the product, and suggested a specific solution, generated a 400% higher clickthrough rate than the control.

What you need to understand

Here are Donna’s key email body copy takeaways, based on this test:

• Focus on audience – speak directly with them and their pain point.
• Focus on one key benefit, map it to the pain and solve it.
• Eliminate multiple equally weighted CTAs. They are too confusing, and muddy the ‘What do you want me to do?’ question.
• Soften your ask (learn, preview, sample, see, view, tour).

Justin Bridegan, Senior Marketing Manager, MECLABS, moderated this session at Email Summit, so I asked him for his key takeaways from this test, as well.

“It’s very important in the first couple of sentences to really engage the audience. If you don’t engage them in the beginning, it doesn’t matter what the rest of the copy says. Pulling them in with pain points and benefits really makes a difference,” Justin said.

“Focus on your customers’ challenges and pain points first, before you get into your product. You have to pull them in, just like a good movie. On Netflix, I watch the first five minutes. If I’m bored, I pull it,” he added.

Aside from the opening copy, Justin also alluded to simplifying the email itself.

“In a movie, if too much is going on too soon, people will say, ‘Whoa, forget it.’ Every time she removed something she got a better result.”

“Marketers are under pressure to do too much with their emails right now. They keep trying to put more into it to get more out of it. That’s not the place, or the right time, to do that,” Justin advised marketers. “I’ve found that in my own copy. One call-to-action is better. This email is primarily for this one, specific goal. Then, let the landing page sell them.”

“It should all make sense together, and if it doesn’t, it doesn’t belong in the email,” Justin concluded.

Aside from the simpler email more focused on the customer’s pain point, the specificity of the solution likely also played a role in the higher clickthrough rate.

“Specificity converts,” said Flint McGlaughlin, Managing Director, MECLABS. “In marketing, there should be no such thing as a general message. The marketer communicates with an aim. This aim should dictate everything else we say. This aim should influence, even constrain, every word we say.”

Related Resources:

Optimization Summit 2013 in Boston, May 20-23, 2013

Email Copywriting: How a change in tone increased lead inquiry by 349%

Email Optimization: 4 optimization suggestions to test in your next send

Email Copywriting: Tips from 3 of your peers

At MarketingSherpa Email Summit 2013, Jim Ducharme, Community Director, GetResponse, interviewed Flint McGlaughlin, Managing Director, MECLABS, about the greatest challenge for email marketers …

You can watch the video above, and here are a few of my favorite quotes from Flint …

“We’ve forgotten that email is a two-way medium. We’ve forgotten that email is a messaging medium.”

“We no longer communicate as if we were expecting some sort of give and take.”

“Email has become another way to interrupt people’s lives. The marketer who sees it as a way to restore relationships and build some sort of give and take is the marketer that will take email to the next level in his organization.”

“We don’t talk to people, we talk at them. There is no dialogue here.”

“People don’t read email because they’re excited to read email. They’re looking through their inbox for any reason not to read your email.”

  Read more…

“So, why should I purchase from you rather than any of your competitors?” your ideal customer hypothetically asks you …

“Well, because …” you begin, “[insert your value proposition here].”

Until you can give your customers a convincing answer to that question, your company is simply surviving on pockets of ignorance. So, marketer, what’s the best way to answer that question?

The truth is, you can come up with preliminary answers using your intuition, but you’ll never know the best answer until you test …

And one of the most effective test-beds for getting the absolute best answer to the question is an email campaign.

At MarketingSherpa Email Summit 2013, presenter Austin McCraw, Senior Editorial Analyst, MECLABS, shared how an email can become much more than a one-off marketing message.

In his session titled, “How You Can Use Email to Discover the Essence of Your Value Proposition,” Austin explained how marketers can use email campaigns to understand the core motivations of their customers.

Austin provided a several key reasons for why email campaigns make a great proving ground for testing value proposition, including:

• Ease of change
• Large sample sizes
• Highly competitive environment

And my favorite …  it’s something you have to do already.

“Testing value propositions in your email sends is one of the easiest ways to create a culture of testing within your organization,” Austin said.

So today’s MarketingExperiments blog post will share Austin’s five steps for using your email marketing campaigns to discover your value proposition. Our goal is to provide a systematic approach you can use to aid your value proposition development and testing efforts.

Step #1: Identify potential claims of value

Identifying potential claims of value is really all about brainstorming. The example Austin gave for this was to imagine you are selling mortgages. What would be potential claims of value you could make?

Austin came up with some potential claims of value for selling mortgages:

• Reliability
• Lowest rates
• Easy process
• Brand name
• Payment plan options
• Reduced anxiety
• Service quality
• Community involvement

Step #2: Estimate the force of each claim

You can estimate the force of your claims by using elements of appeal and exclusivity to rank the potential claims you brainstormed for your product.

Austin explained how the elements are perceived by potential prospects.

Appeal – “I want this”

Exclusivity – “I can’t get this anywhere else”

Some of your offers will have a greater appeal, but they may not be very exclusive. Other offers might be exclusive, but offer little appeal to your customers.

“You want to test claims that have high levels of both appeal and exclusivity,” Austin explained.

  Read more…

Writing copy for an email is difficult enough – but what about tone?

Are you talking to your customers or at them? Do the offers in your emails entice or do they alienate?

Today’s MarketingExperiments blog post will share an experiment featured in our recent Email Copywriting Clinic, sponsored by Ongage, in which presenter Flint McGlaughlin, Managing Director, MECLABS revealed the results of an experiment on how tone affects conversion.

Our goal is to show marketers the effectiveness of your messaging is impacted by how customers perceive it.

So, let’s take a quick look at the test background …

Background: Active Network, a large event management software provider.

Goal: To increase total lead inquiries – phone calls and form sign-ups – from visitors who abandoned the free trial sign-up process.

Research Question: Which email tone will result in a higher rate of lead inquiries?

Test Design: A/B single factor split

Treatment #1

In treatment one, visitors who abandoned the free trial sign-up were sent an email that focused on the value

of the software.

Here’s a closer look at the email copy in Treatment #1:

Subject Line: Your Free RegOnline Access

Dear [Name],

You’re just one step away from getting FREE access to RegOnline, our award winning Event Registration and Management Software. Quickly man an event website, try our event marketing tools, build a registration form template or even generate custom name badges.

Click here to finish your profile and get started. Your personal profile is kept secure and we promise NEVER to sell or misuse your information.

Have questions? Call us direct at 1-800-XXX-XXXX – we can even set up your free access over the phone.

Sincerely,

[Name of Representative]

Customer Service Representative

RegOnline

Direct: 1-800-XXX-XXXX ext. XXXX

Treatment #2

The approach in Treatment #2 is engagement through addressing the elements of anxiety  leading visitors to abandon the sign-up process.

Let’s look at the email copy in Treatment #2:

Subject Line: Your Free RegOnline Access

Hi [First],

I noticed that you started the process of getting free access to RegOnline but weren’t able to finish. Are you concerned about giving out your phone number? Are you worried about high pressure sales tactics or mandatory contracts?

We believe our product sells itself, so we’re just here to provide you with whatever assistance you need in getting your event up and running – in whatever way works best for you. We promise NEVER to sell or misuse your information.

Call me direct at 1-800-XXX-XXXX and I can help get you rolling. If you’d rather just try again online, use this link instead.

Thank you in advance for your trust!

Sincerely,

[Name of Representative]

Customer Service Representative

RegOnline

Direct: 1-800-XXX-XXXX ext. XXXX

Read more…

With MarketingSherpa Email Summit 2013 just around the corner, I wanted to touch on a strategy that, for the most part, is uncharted by marketers – mobile email marketing. According to the MarketingSherpa 2013 Mobile Marketing Benchmark Report, only 11% of marketers are using mobile email marketing as a tactic.

Q: Which mobile marketing tactics does your organization currently use?

What can we learn?

So what can be learned from the pioneers currently active in the mobile space?

For starters, developing a mobile marketing program from scratch is going to produce some tough challenges marketers like Alex Corzo, Manager of Digital Communications and CRM, Marriot Vacations Worldwide – parent company of The Ritz-Carlton Destination Club – can attest to.

At last year’s Email Summit, Alex presented the four-step process his team used to develop and optimize a mobile pilot program on a shoestring budget.

According to Alex, the team encountered two key challenges:

• Landing pages not optimized for mobile browsing
• Limited resources

So, in today’s MarketingExperiments blog post, you can watch Alex’s session from Email Summit 2012. Our goal is to share a proven blueprint you can used to aid your own mobile email marketing efforts.

Related Resources:

Mobile Marketing: 59% did not perform any mobile testing or optimization

Mobile Marketing 101: 5 ideas to help you begin a conversation with your team

Mobile Marketing 101: Should you make the leap to a custom mobile site?

Optimizing email campaigns is a top challenge in marketing – just ask Julie Platt, E-Marketing Marketing Manager, Susquehanna Bancshares, who explained the task is making her team  cringe  as other priorities have trumped the redesign.

This MarketingExperiments blog includes four optimization suggestions from Adam Lapp, Associate Director of Optimization and Strategy, MECLABS, to help Julie’s team and our audience with their email optimization efforts.

Our hope is you will discover some optimization opportunities here to add to your own testing.

Also, to further help you with email optimization, in today’s Web clinic at 4:00 p.m. EST, “Copywriting Clinic: Live, on-the-spot analysis of how to improve real-world email campaigns,” Flint McGlaughlin, Managing Director, MECLABS, will show you a patented, repeatable methodology you can use to write effective email copy.

Let’s  look at Julie’s email sample …

Optimization Suggestion #1: Headline and copy

Adam’s initial concern with Julie’s email was message flow.

“There is a disconnection between the headline and the product offering.  The headline is about ‘saving,’ so I immediately think of a savings account or an investment product,” Adam said.

Adam cautioned the potential for confusion with the existing language used in the offer.

“The product is a home equity line of credit, which by definition ‘costs’ money. Sure, you save with a lower rate than the competitor, but you don’t realize this fact until the very last sentence of the primary email copy,” Adam explained.

Overall, he suggests testing a headline focusing on precision.

“I would lead off with a headline that communicates the precise nature and value of the product,” Adam said.

Here are a few of Adam’s headline test ideas:

• “Save money with a low-interest line of credit”
• “1.99% – A new low rate for the New Year”
• “Support your Resolution with a low-interest line of credit.”

Read more…