Four Unpredictions for 2012

I like to make what I call “unpredictions” – the things I think won’t happen in the coming year. (You can see my 2011 version here and the reckoning of the same here.) Here are my four for 2012: 1. …

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2011 Unpredictions: The Reckoning

Every year I make a few “unpredictions” (the things I think won’t happen in the coming year) and I also reckon my prognostication from the previous year. Here were my unpredictions for 2011 and my assessment of how I did. …

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Word of the Week: Misconceptions

This weekly roundup is about common misconceptions held dearly by a lot of email marketers. For example, there’s always been a strong desire of email marketers, coupled with a strong fear, to use the word “free” in email messages, or to look for the holy grail of send times. This week’s roundup of articles and blogs answer this and also other misconceptions in the email marketing world.

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Join Us at the Online Trust Forum 2011

On October 17th – 19th, Return Path will be attending the 6th Annual OTA Online Trust Forum in Washington DC. The theme this year is “Realizing the Promise of Trust,” and we are thrilled to be participating in and sponsoring this event. The Forum will address the business, technical and regulatory challenges impacting online trust and confidence in online services and communications. We’re looking forward to keynotes by the Federal Trade Commission, Center for Democracy & Technology and Publishers Clearing House.

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Word of the Week: Video

The push for video in email is simple. Email marketers have seen huge boosts in response rates, as well as an increase in conversions and revenue when video has been present. A recent Mediapost article reminds us of the huge gains in click through rates and engagement when video in email is present. They state an example of shoeline.com increasing sales conversions by 44% when using video in their emails. Past case studies from other companies have also had similar results.

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A New Practical Application for Email

How many times have you made a purchase and needed to return an item, but couldn’t find the receipt? Or, the receipt got accidentally washed in that new pair of pants and is totally unreadable? Or, your husband made the purchase and has no idea where the receipt could be – or if he actually ever got one?

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Prospecting Under CASL

Since Canada recently passed a new national anti-spam law (which I’ll refer to as CASL – Canada’s Anti-Spam Law) I’ve been thinking about how this may affect lead generation and business prospecting by email. Honestly the CAN-SPAM Act is not hard to comply with, and still folks fail to meet the standard – and CASL appears to me to make things a bit tougher.

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Word of the Week: Opt-in

This week’s Word of the Week is opt-in, where I highlight some blogs and articles dealing with opt-in and how marketers depend on proper and effective opt-in methods for higher list growth and deliverability.

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More Questions Around “Building Reputation and Spurring Engagement in the Age of Social and Mobile”

I recently presented a webinar for the AMA entitled “Building Reputation and Spurring Engagement in the Age of Social and Mobile.” You can listen to the recording. We had a great attendance, and didn’t have the opportunity to answer all of the audience questions. I promised the listeners I would follow-up in a blog post, so as promised; here are the answers to your questions.

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How to Be a Great at Ping Pong and Email Marketing

I love ping pong, and that’s probably a bit of an understatement. I may have gotten a blister from playing so much during my last visit, but I will neither confirm nor deny that. Luckily, I’m not the only one who appreciates a good game of ping pong. I’ve had a lot of fun spending time with some terrific Return Path players. As it turns out, ping pong is actually good for you, according to this article sent around by our own Senior Director of People, Cathy Hawley, who beat me the last time I visited. I’m currently in training for the rematch.

So what does ping-pong have to do with email marketing? It turns out that the best practices that apply to optimizing your email marketing campaigns and the skills required to win a game of ping pong are actually very similar. Let me elaborate…

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