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Changing Your Email From Line? Consider This…

Your from line is your branding in the inbox. It sparks instant recognition of your business. And since it’s the very first thing subscribers see, it may be the biggest factor in getting your emails opened.

So hopefully you don’t just swap from names without blinking an eye. Hopefully you blink several times while you’re thinking about the consequences.

While switching from names should never be done on a whim, there are some cases where a switch is completely necessary. This change can hugely effect your campaign, so it’s vital to have some cautions in place.

Why From Names Shouldn’t Change

From lines are what stand out in the inbox. Subject lines with “20% off” certainly don’t – anyone can send them (and most people do). It’s the familiarity and goodwill inspired by your a reference to your brand that can make all the difference.

Change your from line, and that reference may go unrecognized. Without knowing the email came from someone they know and trust, subscribers may not want to open it.

In fact, they may even assume it represents a new campaign – one they didn’t subscribe to. And – click! – as quick as that, you’ve been reported as spam.

For example, when I saw these emails in my inbox, I knew I’d signed up for emails from Yogasphere. I did not know who Laura and Elle were.

The first email from Laura almost got reported as spam, ’til I noticed the mention of Yogasphere in the snippet. Had I not caught that, I’d probably have ended up blocking their emails permanently.

As for Blush Salon, it appears they use their company name for one-off emails and the owners’ names for their seasonal newsletter. Again, it was the company name in the snippet text that saved them from the spam folder.

Note on name choice: to be honest, I’ve never met Steve & Jay. I’m more familiar with the salon. Individual names may be credited with a more “personal” tone, but here, I’m more comfortable with emails from the establishment.

So you see how a from name switch could cause you to lose subscribers. It’s just not something you want to do….

Unless You’re In These Situations

Some times, keeping your from name the same just isn’t a good option.

Maybe the person your emails are “from” has left your company.

Maybe you’ve chosen a formal name for your marketing campaign that you want to start using.

Or maybe you’ve been using an “info@” address in your from line, and you’d like to put on a friendlier face for your readers. You’ve carefully considered the switch, and only intend to make it once.

In Those Cases, Take Precautions

• Plan to make the switch once and only once. The more changes you make, the more risk of losing subscribers you take. So choose the from name that’s going to work best for your company over the long haul (while still triggering positive brand recognition).
• If your campaign is self-aware (that is, if you tend to talk directly to your subscribers about what’s going on in your emails), announce the switch beforehand. Readers who see the announcement will be prepared for your new from line.
• If you can, work your old from line into your first few subject lines after the switch. This won’t work as well if you’ve been using someone’s name, but otherwise, it can provide that saving flash of recognition.

Any Other Transition Tips?

If you want to switch from names because you send from several different people, you could use a standard company from name and switch signatures inside the message instead.

Can you think of any other ways to avoid changing your from name – or cautions you should take if you find you have to?

Hat Tip To: Email Marketing Tips

From Web Forms to Welcome: What to Write in Your Email Campaign

Industry standard. Best practice. Optimization. Buzzwords can get head-spinning when you’re first setting up your email marketing campaign, especially when you’re more concerned about what to say and how to say it to get subscribers confirmed to your list (there’s three more buzzwords for you!)

Relax. We’re here to help and bring a little clarity to your set-up content confusion. Whether you’re unsure how to label your web form fields or are drawing a blank on customizing your confirmation message, we have tips and examples to guide you through your first communications with your subscribers, starting with your web form.

Web Forms

Use your web form to make a great first impression on your subscribers. Keep it short, clear and show them exactly what kind of value they can expect from the very beginning.

Remember that your web form is the gateway to your whole campaign and your first chance to tell subscribers what they can expect from your emails. But first you have to get them on your list. You’re asking permission to get into their inboxes, but what are you offering subscribers in return?

Incentives are a good place to start. Retailers like Kohl’s give their customers extra coupons for signing up to their email list:

Kohl’s does a few more things right on this form by clearly explaining the content of messages their subscribers receive and using a privacy statement to ease the fears of visitors worried about clogging their inboxes with spam.

A few more content tweaks for your web form:

• Include a title that reflects the name of your newsletter
• Tell your subscribers how often they can expect your emails
• Link to a sample newsletter or offer so subscribers can preview the kind of value you send to the inbox

Still feeling stuck? Here are some more web form tips on our blog:
3 Ways to Set Expectations at Sign Up
Learn The First of 3 Critical Opportunities to Create The Right Subscriber Expectations
4 Best Practices for Web Forms

Thank You Page

New subscribers who fill out your web form are redirected to your thank you page. This is your second communication with them.

Engage subscribers on your thank you page by:

• Explaining the confirmation process (if you’re using confirmed opt-in)
• Telling them what to expect in upcoming emails
• Establishing some brand personality

Skin care company High on Health uses confirmed opt-in and illustrates the next step in the subscription process with a screen shot:

If you don’t use confirmed opt-in for your campaign, take a cue from ProBlogger who uses their thank you page to summarize the frequency and content of their emails so subscribers know what to expect:

Remember that your thank you page doesn’t have to be a boring template. Keep your thank you page consistent with your brand and site design and use it as a tool to engage subscribers before your first message hits the inbox.

More ideas to upgrade your thank you page on our blog:
3 Helpful Thank You Page Examples
Thank You: Another Critical Opportunity to Create Subscriber Expectations
Is Your Thank You Page Awful? Here Are 2 Ways You Could Make It Better

Confirmation Email

The confirmation email is your third communication with subscribers and your first time in their inbox. Make the most of it by using your from name and subject line to remind subscribers who you are and what they signed up for.

Use the body of the email to remind them of the value your emails offer:

Tell subscribers why they should confirm and make sure they know what happens after they click that link.

Just like your thank you page, use your confirmation message as a further introduction to your brand. Get creative with your copy to keep your subscribers engaged for what’s to come.

More ways to customize your confirmation message on our blog:
What To Do With Your Confirmation Message
Want Subscribers to Confirm? Get Creative!

Confirmation Page

This is the page that the link in your confirmation email directs subscribers to if your campaign uses confirmed opt-in.

Carry your brand identity through your confirmation page and keep your content simple. Tell subscribers that they’re now confirmed and give them somewhere else to click, like your homepage, a special landing page or your social network profiles:

You can also drive sales from your confirmation page, like we describe in this post.

Welcome Email

The welcome email is the first installment of your follow up series when a new subscriber confirms to your list. This is your first big chance to engage subscribers.

In your welcome email, you’ll want to include:

• An indication of how often subscribers will hear from you
• Simple whitelisting instructions to ensure that your emails get delivered
• A reminder of the value and benefits they signed up for
• An introduction to the preference center where they can change subscription settings or unsubscribe from your emails if they’re no longer interested

To keep things friendly, you might also want to introduce subscribers to your brand on a more personal level with pictures of your team or company.

Redbox’s welcome email combines a lot of these elements and includes links to help new customers start using their service right away:

Remember that your welcome message sets the tone for your campaign, so spend extra time polishing your content to build trust.

More welcome email examples from our blog:
3 Good Welcome Email Examples
Urgency Redux: Trust Can Make Or Break You

In Closing

These initial points of communication with your subscribers will build trust and the right expectations from the very start of your email campaign. We place a lot of emphasis on the content of your emails once your campaign is up and running, but paying special attention to these beginning details will start your campaign off right.

What content tips can you share from the start of your campaign?

Credit: Email Marketing Tips

New Web Form Templates For Your Site

One of the most important components of any email marketing campaign is of course, the web form. Without a way to sign up to your list, you’ll have a hard time finding anyone to send email to.

That being the case, you want to make sure that your web forms are getting people to sign up. Explaining the benefits of your mailing list is one major part of that process, of course, but you also need to focus potential subscribers on your form and have it grab their attention. In short, it needs to look good.

To that end, our design team always takes time to work on new web form templates (we release new templates every week, with multiple color schemes and layouts for each). We wanted to take a moment today to show you how to keep hold of visitor attention with this host of new forms.

More About Templates

To avoid any potential confusion, let’s go over the concept of web form templates briefly.

Basically, a template is a design shortcut. The idea is to give you the benefit of a professionally designed form that matches your industry and website without having to create a form from scratch. Simply pick the one you like, make any minor edits needed, and place it on your site.

Take a look at our knowledge base for a step by step walkthrough of the process.

The Perfect Template for the Occasion

Our designers like to mix things up, so templates themed around holidays or other events tend to crop up around the appropriate times of the year. Adding a sense of the season or a nod to upcoming or recent celebrations can keep your site and signup forms fresh.

We also try to have templates for a wide variety of businesses and niches. With a steady stream of new designs, we try to keep things fresh so you have the widest range of options to allow you to find the perfect form for your site.

Or the Template Perfect for Any Location

On the other hand, there’s no way to have a form for every industry – some will always slip through the cracks. Also, sometimes the topic of a blog or site might not fit into a specific box – it might be broader (or narrower) than the templates we have available.

For these situations, our team has put together a wide variety of forms that are a little more flexible. Take a look:

The idea behind these template is to give you a chance to find a form that matches your website’s look and feel, regardless of your industry. This way, you can always have a great looking form that doesn’t look tacked on or out of place.

Browse the Gallery

Want to see more templates? Take a look at our online template gallery, where you can find the perfect form for your site.

If you’re an AWeber user, once you’ve picked out a form, installing it is easy.

What Template Designs Do You Want to See?

Our design team is always looking for new ideas, so post any suggestions for new templates in the comments below!

Source: Email Marketing Tips

AWeber, Gmail, and Rapportive: Good Things Come In Threes

We’re always excited to announce a new integration using the AWeber API, whether it’s for signup forms on your blog, landing page optimization, or even social media.

This week, we’re bringing you something a little bit different – we’ve integrated with Rapportive, which is itself an add-on for Gmail. It basically connects your Gmail account to your social media networks, displaying recent tweets or wall posts from the person whose mail you’re reading.

Our app allows you to connect your Gmail account to AWeber – read on to learn more!

What Is Rapportive?

As mentioned above, Rapportive connects your Gmail account to social media sites – for more information, take a look at their website.

As it happens, AWeber and Rapportive work very well together. When do you most need access to information about your subscribers? When you’re replying to their email, of course.

The AWeber app for Rapportive displays your subscribers’ information in a sidebar while you’re reading messages from them.

The Raplet in Action

Once it’s up and running, you’ll be able to see the lists that your subscribers are on when they email you, right in the Rapportive sidebar, like so:

You can get even more information by clicking on a particular list. This will pull up a detailed view of the subscriber’s information on that list, with information including their sign-up date and the last follow up message they were sent:

Setting It Up

To get things rolling, first install Rapportive.

You can find the AWeber raplet through the “Add or Remove Raplets” option in the Rapportive menu once you have Rapportive installed – for more detailed setup instructions, refer to our knowledge base.

Soon, you’ll have access to your subscribers’ information while you’re reading their email to you. How cool is that?

What Do You Think?

How are you going to make use of this app? Are there any other features or statistics you’d like to see implemented to work with Rapportive/Gmail?

Let us know in the comments below!

Origin: Email Marketing Tips

The Pros and Cons of Birthday Emails

Are birthday emails a good idea?

There are a lot of good things about them: subscribers expect them, email marketers recommend sending them, and they’re pretty easy to set up. These things don’t mean they’re always a good idea though.

Like most things in life, birthday emails can fall in a gray area. There are pros and cons to sending them, and it’s up to you to decide if they’re something that can work for your email marketing campaign.

But before you do that, you need to know what the pros and cons are.

What’s Good About Birthday Emails

• Pro: They’re personal

  Birthday emails are great at grabbing your subscribers’ attention. Who doesn’t like getting stuff for their birthday? By acknowledging your subscribers’ birthdays, you’re showing them you are using their information to provide personalized messages.

• Pro: They’re easy to set up

  It’s easy to send birthday emails with AWeber. We’ve talked before about how segmenting your list can help your campaign, so here’s the perfect opportunity to try it out.

• Pro: They bring good results

  Evidence shows that birthday emails do get a lot of action. One study found that birthday emails brought a 60% lift in conversions compared to the normal version of the email.

  Another study with Epson showed their “Happy Birthday” email generates revenue per email that’s 840% greater than the overall email program.

Convincing, right? But not if you don’t set it up right.

What’s Bad About Birthday Emails

• Con: They can be too generic

  I just celebrated a birthday. One of the birthday emails I received was from my gym:

  

  Sounds good, right? Except that they are always trying to give out free sessions.

  Don’t tell me my birthday present is the same thing you tried to give me for Memorial Day, the start of spring, and the last full moon (may be exaggerating here, but you get the point).

  This is the problem with a lot of birthday emails: giving out the usual deals under a different label. Besides being generic, it also….

• Con: Can make you look selfish

  So continuing with the gym example, I know the reason they keep wanting me to try a free session is because they’re hoping I’ll buy a training package.
  Is that really how you celebrate someone’s birthday? By going for the same sale you’re always trying for?
  You think because you put that pretty birthday banner at the top your job is done, but actually…

• Con: They’re not that impressive anymore

  Lots of companies send birthday emails. Some are better than others, but birthdays are a pretty easy segment to target.
  Which means that generic, self-serving emails just won’t cut it anymore. So don’t think slapping some balloons at the top of your regular promotional email will impress anyone.

This leaves us with one question…

What Should You Do With Birthday
Emails?

You know birthday emails can be good, so now you need to know how to make them good:

• Make them valuable

  The birthday email should be beneficial to the subscriber as well as you. Give the subscriber something they’ll be excited about, and something you don’t normally offer.

• Make them relevant

  Use information on subscriber behavior, such as what they’ve clicked on, to send them something they’d be interested in. Don’t take the easy way out and send to everyone who’s birthday is coming up, break it up further so the messages are more targeted.

• Make them about the subscriber

  This is their day, not yours. Send your birthday wishes, include your gift, and that’s all you need. You want your birthday emails to come across as a nice gesture, not an obvious attempt for another sale.

Here’s an example of a well done birthday email:

How Do You Feel About Birthday
Emails?

What’s the best birthday email you’ve seen? The worst?

Do you send birthday emails to your subscribers? How do you make them something the subscriber will enjoy?

Via: Email Marketing Tips

Sneak Peak Into AWeber Life And Culture

Here at AWeber we try to have as much fun as we can in proportion to the hard work that we do. You may have heard some of this fun in our voices when you call in (or you may have heard some of the fun in the background – sorry!). The culture we have over here at AWeber stems from a set of 5 Core Values that we have established. Each one of these values embodies an aspect of our daily lives as we go about creating the best service possible for you.

Come Take A Look!

We have a lot of fun here and we love coming to work each and every day, and we wanted to take a moment to give you an inside look not only at the office over here at AWeber, but into the AWeber culture as well. Check it all out in our Tour Video below!

If you’d like to learn more about the people behind AWeber, come check us out. Or if you’re interested in joining our team, see what opening are available.

Of course we couldn’t have this cool office or this wonderful culture without you, the customer. So thanks for watching our Tour Video and thank you for helping us to create a place and culture where we can not only enjoy ourselves but continue to bring you the best service possible!

How did you like the office? Share your thoughts with us!

Source: Email Marketing Tips