1. Learn and Observe

You have at your fingertips more samples of state of the art e-mail marketing than you could ever hope to read. Gather e-mails from companies in your industry, subscribe to newsletters, correspondence, bulletins/alerts, and special offers. (Tip - open a free Hotmail or similar web account for these subscriptions so as not to crowd your regular messages). More advanced campaigns consist of lifecycle communications, such as Palm Pilot's 2 year "In Synch" message stream. At Inbox Marketer, we store hundreds of industry examples in our marketing/sales online library.

Once you've seen what others are doing, you can research how well various kinds of messages perform. You can conduct literature and web searches to obtain benchmark results (for example, bounce rates, open rates, click through rates, pass-through rates, unsubscribes). Ask employees and agencies to collect case studies and relevant examples at conferences.

2. Prepare the Organization

E-mail is one of those activities that, because we all do it, we are all experts. What happens in many companies is that various departments and divisions dabble in e-mail marketing, with predictably poor and uncoordinated results. Avoid this by appointing an internal champion responsible for all e-mail marketing. This "e-mail manager" should ideally be someone with a direct marketing background, or at least a quick study.

Each e-mail campaign should follow a 6 step planning process. Depending on internal creative and copy writing skills, most firms are able to write some initial messages. Pay strict attention to nuances about subject lines, message length, tone etc.

You can deploy messages internally as well, using company computers and commonly available, bulk e-mail programs. While you might chose to do this for a first campaign, 64% of companies eventually outsource message deployment to third party specialists. They have very good reason. Messages need to be properly tested on a broad range of computing platforms and operating systems to ensure that all recipients can read them. Only specialists maintain such a diverse array of equipment. Outsourcers also have the equipment needed to provide sophisticated measurement and analysis of responses. This is the very intelligence gathering of e-mail marketing. The more accurate the measurement, the greater your ability to monitor customer behavior and to fine tune messages for maximum results.

3. Build a Permission List

E-mail marketing requires greater respect for recipient privacy than direct mail - and the consequences for violators are severe. Even a few complaints can get the company Web and e-mail site shut down on short notice and for lengthy periods. You need explicit opt-in permission (not opt-out) to be able to send people marketing messages. This will not only deliver higher response rates, but keep your company in the good graces of regulators. Be sure to review the Privacy Guidelines from the Direct Marketing Association (DMA).

Opt-in lists are dynamic entities where new subscribers join and others unsubscribe in a constant state of churn. Some lists have more than 30% subscriber turnover each year. Growing these lists is a constant effort, but with excellent rewards. The key is to provide unique and useful information. Newsletters on selected topics, for example, can drive message open rates of 40% or more, and click through rates of 7%-15% - far above the average. US magazine publishers have been successful in obtaining e-mail addresses from as much as 30% of their subscriber base using opt-in techniques. Offering relevant information will deliver another important benefit - viral referrals that grow the list for you. If the information is valuable enough, readers will pass it on to friends and associates.

Newsletters are but one aspect of successful e-mail capture program. The best marketers use many points of customer contact. These include: Web site, search engines, direct mail,call centers and viral marketing programs.

4. Profile Your Targets

E-mail is the supreme one-to-one medium, yet many companies simply send everyone the same newsletter. "One size fits all" is a mass media approach appropriate to television, radio and (progressively fewer) print publications. With e-mail, this is like never shifting your Ferrari out of first gear - it does so much more.

A common newsletter might be used as the base customer dialogue, but you need to ensure that the bulk of the information remains interesting and relevant to the bulk of your audience, or subscriptions will plummet. You can test ongoing relevance by comparing each edition's CTRs, section by section. Also, analyze web logs and data collected through online surveys.

Market leaders send customized communications to different segments. They alternate short alerts with newsletters. They treat new customers differently than long standing loyals. They look for the segments with the highest potential value and stimulate them with special offers. The key is to determine what behavior do you want to change? Then design the creative to achieve that objective.

5. Set Specific Objectives

A common characteristic of failed e-mail marketing campaigns is the "just get the mail out on time" mentality. Because basic campaigns can be executed so inexpensively from virtually anyone's computer, they sometimes don't invite the same degree of planning of, say, a $200,000 direct mail campaign. Processes are ad hoc, there's no written plan and managements sets few quantitative targets.

Long before hitting the send button, a better start is to determine how e-mail's relationship-building capability should fit with the overall marketing plan. Set top line targets on list growth, cost per acquisition and, most importantly, ROI. Is e-mail just a "hot plate" to keep current customers warm? Or do you want a high percentage of transactions through e-mail?

6. Write a Brief for Each Campaign

Get your managers and agency on the same page by summarizing the rough campaign details in a 2 page creative brief. This helps focus the creative and provides a reference point for future campaigns.

7. Develop the Creative

To ensure brand consistency, develop standard templates for both HTML and text/AOL to be reused with each campaign. Balance the amount of graphics and the amount of text according to your target market.

As with any marketing communications, success depends on matching relevant offers to the right segments. The great thing about e-mail is that you can pre-test a cross section of offers very quickly. When writing the copy, ask yourself the following questions:

What is the specific goal of this-mail?

What behaviour do you want to change?

What is "value add" to this target?