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Smarter Software for Communities

June 25, 2015

DRIVING TRAFFIC TO YOUR WEBSITE AND YOUR EDO USING EMAIL MARKETING TOOLS

EMAIL MARKETING MANAGEMENT

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In this session…

1. The state of email marketing

2. Why email marketing for economic development

3. Outlining your email marketing goals

4. Defining your audience

5. Determining your purpose

6. How to increase open rates

7. How to write emails that convert

8. 5 ways to grow your email list

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Speaker Bios

Guillermo Mazier, Director of Strategic Accounts• Former economic developer and tourism

marketer for the Costa Rican Investment and Trade Development Board

• Managed economic development and tourism campaign for Tortugero, CR

• Industry speaker, content strategy, and digital marketing specialist

guillermom@atlas-advertising.comwww.twitter.com/atlasad

Whitney Daly, Proposal Writer & Marketing Manager• Marketing for Community Systems and Atlas

Advertising for one year• Six years combined marketing and advertising

experiencewhitneyd@communitysys.comwww.twitter.com/atlasad

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http://gmailmeter.com/

“Email” consumes a big portion of what

we do

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Smarter Software for Communities

The State of Email Marketing

6The State of Email Marketing

Email is here to stay.

– 73% of marketers agree that email marketing is core to their business.

– 60% of marketers claim that email is a critical enabler of products and services, versus 42% of marketers in 2014.

– 20% of marketers say that their business' primary revenue source is directly linked to email operations.

– 43% of businesses have email teams of 2-3 people.– 74% of marketers believe email produces or will produce ROI in the

future.– For 69.7% of US internet users, email is the preferred method of

communicating with businesses. (eMarketer)

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Why Email Marketing For Economic Development

8Why Email Marketing for EDOs

It’s the most reliable form of economic development marketing that we have. Check out the benchmarks.

Industry Open Click Soft Bounce

Agriculture and Food Services 25.77% 3.49% 0.68%

Architecture and Construction 25.19% 3.16% 1.66%

Arts and Artists 27.93% 2.99% 0.78%

Beauty and Personal Care 19.50% 2.27% 0.52%

Business and Finance 21.59% 2.93% 0.81%

Computers and Electronics 21.68% 2.62% 1.13%

9Why Email Marketing for EDOs

It’s the most reliable form of economic development marketing that we have. Check out the benchmarks.

Industry Open Click Soft Bounce

Economic Development 19.77% 1-3% 3.68%

10Why Email Marketing for EDOs

11Why Email Marketing for EDOs

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Outlining Your Email Marketing Goals

Email Marketing Offer:http://offers.atlas-advertising.com/email-marketing-planning-template

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Defining Your Audience

“Please don’t send me meaningless emails.”

-Site Selector 2015

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Defining your Audience:Segmentation

“Try to appeal to everyone, and you’ll appeal to no one. Segmentation helps you create targeted offers that convert.”

Segmentation: the act of dividing a broad target market into smaller subsets based on demographics or behavior. Segmenting an email or campaign allows you to target your offer, determine which segments are performing best, and optimize accordingly.

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Defining your Audience:Segmentation

Said another way:

“One of the biggest mistakes that email marketers make is trying to appeal to everyone. Think about the game of darts: you have to aim in order to hit

the board. If you let your darts go without aiming them, you probably won’t be very popular. If you hit the board, you score. And if your aim is very good and you hit the bull’s eye,

even better!”

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Defining your Audience:Target Audiences

For our marketing team, we segment into four main target markets: Marketers, Business Developers, Researchers, and Executive Directors.

One example of segmentation via subject lines:

Marketers: Marketers: Build a high performing econ dev website for less (open rate: 20.78%)

Business Developers: Business Developers: Learn to engage prospects faster (open rate: 24.24%)

Researchers: Researchers: Manage, report on, and deliver robust data (open rate: 25.46%)

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Defining your Audience:Target Audiences

For your marketing team, you could consider target markets such as:

• Business decision makers

• Site selectors

• Companies

• Prospects

• Utilities

• Existing businesses

• Community members

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Defining your Audience:Segmentation

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Smarter Software for Communities

Determining Your Purpose

20Determining your Purpose

Why is it important to determine your purpose?

• Just like segmentation, having a purpose will allow you to use specific messaging for a specific purpose. Deliberate messaging allows you to convey certain content to your audiences and influence/persuade/convince them to take specific action.

• Without a purpose or plan of action, your readers will are likely to:

– Delete the email

– Find no value from the content

– Take no specific action

– Unsubscribe

– Mark as spam

21Determining your Purpose

What are you going to say to your audience, and why do they care?

Decide if your email is:

• Strictly informative / FYI (“We’ll be upgrading your system…”)

• An announcement or relevant news (“We’re now partnering with a new company/organization/vendor, and the benefit to you is…”)

• A product or service release (“We’re rolling out X to enhance your current system…”)

• A promotion for an event, presentation, or webinar (“We’ll be hosting an event at this year’s IEDC conference…”)

• Highlighting a blog post, a newsletter, case studies, industry news, etc. (“TVA announces huge economic development win…”)

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How to Increase Open Rates

23Increasing Open Rates

People read emails on a variety of devices and through a number of different platforms:

– iPhone: 26%

– Outlook: 13%

– iPad: 13%

– Gmail: 10%

– Android: 10%

– Apple Mail: 8%

– Outlook: 5%

– Yahoo! Mail: 5%

– Windows Live Mail: 3%

– Windows Mail: 2%

*iOS devices (iPhone and iPad) generate 39% of total, meaning…

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Increasing Open Rates:Mobile Optimization

All emails MUST be optimized for smartphone devices.

25Increasing Open Rates

Ensure email “housekeeping” items are set up for success:

– Is the ‘from name’ recognizable?

– Is the ‘from email address’ a valid company email address, i.e. will someone be checking this email inbox for questions/concerns/replies?

– Did you provide a short, compelling, informative subject line that will encourage people to open your email?

– Did you include a short snippet of preview text?

– Did you include enough in your email?

– Did you include too much in your email?

– Did you include an engaging call-to-action?

– Did you include relevant and attractive images or graphics?

– Did you include social sharing options?

26Increasing Open Rates

From name:

From email address:

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Increasing Open Rates:Subject Lines

Email subject lines are the gatekeepers of your email campaigns, so keep these five things in mind when creating yours:

1. Be specific – let readers know exactly what they’re about to open

2. Localize, personalize, and target – using customer or organization attributes to tailor your subject lines can be very powerful

3. Build momentum – if you’re sending an email series/drip campaign/autoresponder, use momentum and positive experience from previous emails to keep interest high

4. Test – test what works and what doesn’t, and don’t get caught up in all the “rules”

5. Remember that a subject line is just the beginning!

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Increasing Open Rates:Subject Lines

Subject Line A Subject Line B Subject Line B Open Rates

Email marketing webinar on June 25

Create compelling calls-to-action that convert!

17.7%

Learn how to use a content management system

Improve your website traffic by as much as 33%

21.78%

Join Community Systems for an event

Join Community Systems for a beer and cheese social!

45.36%

Economic development branding

Promote a stronger economic development brand

29.76%

Improve your economic development website

Is your economic development website dying?

26.29%

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Increasing Open Rates:Preview Text

Preview text often appears right next to your subject line, and it provides a sneak peak of what your email is about.

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How to Write Emails that Convert

31Writing Emails that Convert

Did you provide enough content?

• From the content provided, do people understand the email’s intention? Does a reader know what to do with the information provided? Are next steps clearly identified?

Did you provide too much content?

• People will likely scan your email, so if you’ve inundated readers with too much content, they’ll skip over most of it.

32Writing Emails that Convert

Best practices:

• Establish relevancy

• Write in second person (“you” vs. “I” or “we”)

• Break up your content into digestible sections

• Use sub-headlines that draw attention

• Use bullet points to further break down content

• Talk about benefits, not features

• Use an image or graphic that helps define your content and paints a picture for the reader

• Most importantly, use a strong call-to-action that elicits action from the reader

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Writing Emails that Convert:Calls-to-Action

Calls-to-action should be:• Short• Clear• Engaging• Relevant

Calls-to-action should elicit action from a reader/user.

A CTA needs to encourage and inspire people to do exactly what you want them to do!

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Writing Emails that Convert:Calls-to-Action

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Writing Emails that Convert:Calls-to-Action

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Writing Emails that Convert:Calls-to-Action

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Writing Emails that Convert:Calls-to-Action

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5 Ways To Grow Your Email List

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5 Ways To Grow Your Email List

1. The pop-up/news sign-up widgetWhen it comes to using pop-ups on your website, you've probably heard some mixed reviews. And while some marketers argue that this approach is invasive, I'd combat by saying that a pop-up is only as disruptive as you allow it to be.

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5 Ways To Grow Your Email List

2. Social sharing buttonsAdding these to your emails allows readers to easily pass along your content on Facebook, Twitter and other social media platforms. On your Facebook business page, be sure to insert a link to your online newsletter.

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5 Ways To Grow Your Email List

3. Provide an offer of value

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5 Ways To Grow Your Email List

4. Learn more about your audienceContinually learn about your audience. Ask what they like and track which articles they read. From there, segment different groups of customers according to purchases and interests and develop content to appeal specifically to those subgroups.

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5 Ways To Grow Your Email List

5. Share relevant newsThere are actual human beings on the other end of every email list. So to best foster and grow your list, act like a human being and not some email marketing robot.

Average headline: A message from our CEO

Better headline: CEO expects economy to double its size within 10 years

Average headline: Customer spotlight

Better headline: Site selector says utilities played a role in relocation

Average headline: News from our Regional Organization

Better headline: Regional Leaders Talk about Jobs Goal

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Questions?

45Next Digital EDU Session

Setting Goals and Measuring the Performance of your Economic Development Website

• Review available performance benchmarks for your economic development websites

• Interpret website analytics• Interpret GIS analytics• Interpret lead conversion analytics to your CRM• Plan to increase performance over time

July 8, 201511:30 – 1:00 MSThttp://communitysys.com/About-Us/Upcoming-Webinars.aspx

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929 BroadwayDenver, CO 80203720-420-3800

www.communitysys.com

Thank you and stay in touch!

Smarter Software for Communities