Rebel's Guide to Email Marketing, The: Grow Your List, Break the Rules, and Win

Even though email marketing maintains one of the highest ROIs of any online channel, many marketers still follow antiquated tips or breezy "one-size-fits-all" advice that may not hold true for them in 2012. That means they're leaving money on the table. This no-nonsense, fun-to-read book is about capturing that cash. Legendary email and social marketers Jason Falls and DJ Waldow show email marketers how to identify real best practices: the practices that are best for them, with their audiences, in their environments. Falls and Waldow show how great companies of all sizes have often achieved breakthrough results by "breaking all the rules." Using real case studies, they demonstrate how companies can: * Drive list growth that translates into profits * Systematically simplify email signup to encourage opt-in * Bring real humor and creativity back into your email * Make the most of tools ranging from QR codes to texting * Make the right technical decisions about pre-check boxes and other attributes * Optimize every component of an email marketing message * Know when to deliberately introduce imperfections into your emails * Use email marketing and social media to power each other forward * Prepare for the short- and long-term futures of email marketing

Introduction: Email Marketing Is (Not) Dead     1
Email Is Dead?      3
94%     3
2.9 Billion     5
Email versus Email Marketing     7
The ROI of Email Marketing     8
What to Expect from This Book     9
Endnotes     11
Part I: THE SECRET TO EMAIL MARKETING: LIST GROWTH
Chapter 1: Why List Growth Matters     13
List Churn and List Fatigue     14
30%     15
A Few Words about Effective Tactics     17
Endnotes     19
Chapter 2: How to Grow Your List     21
Making the Opt-In Process Obvious and Easy     23
Asking Website Visitors to Subscribe     26
Using Humor and Creativity to Increase Opt-Ins     29
Using Technology: QR Codes and Smartphone Apps to Grow Your List     31
Use Social Media     34
Providing Incentive (WIIFM--What’s In It For Me?)      37
Growing Your Email List Offline     40
Endnotes     43
Chapter 3: Let’s Get Technical     45
To Pre-check or Not to Pre-check     46
Explain the Email List Sign-Up Process     48
Send a Welcome Email     50
Remember, Make a Good First Impression     54
Endnotes     55
Part II: THE ANATOMY OF AN EMAIL
Chapter 4: Examining an Email’s Body Parts     57
The Subject Line and From Address     58
The Preheader     59
The Header     60
Table of Contents     60
Main Call to Action     61
Secondary Calls to Action     62
Sharing Your Email     63
The Footer     64
Chapter 5: The First Impression     67
From Name and Subject Line     68
Preheader     72
Header     75
You Don’t Need a Second Chance Do You?      78
Endnote     79
Chapter 6: The Meat and Potatoes     81
Table of Contents     82
Zappos’s Digest TOC Email     82
MarketingProfs’s Approach to Email Table of Contents     83
Main Calls to Action     86
Secondary and Tertiary Calls to Action     90
Buttons vs. Links vs. Images     91
Endnote     96
Chapter 7: The Finishing Touches     97
Social Sharing and Social Connecting     98
Footer     100
Providing Unsubscribe Options     102
Endnote     106
Part III: BREAKING THE RULES
Chapter 8: Are Best Practices Really “Best”?      107
Best Practices Are Practices That Are Best for You     108
Test and Test Often     109
What to Expect     110
Endnotes     111
Chapter 9: My Word! You Must Read This Now!      113
Email Subject Line Words to Avoid     114
King Arthur Flour: Achieving Higher Sales Using All Caps and FREE     118
Tumbleweed: More Opens and Click-Throughs Using All Caps and Free     121
The Proper Length of a Subject Line     123
Measuring Success     125
Evidence in Favor of Long Subject Lines     126
The Most Incredible Chapter Ever     129
Endnotes     130
Chapter 10: The Perfect-Looking Email     133
It’s Okay to Send Mostly Text Emails     134
Some Subscribers Prefer Simple Text Emails     137
Writing Letters Versus Pamphlets     139
Text Emails Have a Clean Look     140
Text Works for B2C Marketers, Too!      141
One Big Image Can Work     143
King Arthur Flour’s Image-Heavy Emails     146
Making Mostly Image Emails More Readable     147
What If the Unsubscribe Link Is at the Top of the Email?      152
The Most Headache-inducing, Eye-searing Graphic Possible     157
Groupon’s Creative Unsubscribe Solution     158
Test the Rules; Don’t Just Break Them Outright     159
Beauty Is in the Eye of the Subscriber     160
Ugly Emails That Consistently Perform Well     160
A Split Test of Ugly Versus Pretty     164
Making Assumptions and Challenging Them     167
Endnotes     168
Chapter 11: The Best Ways to Grow Your List     171
Spiders, Scorpions, Snakes...and Popups     172
Installing a Lightbox to Increase Opt-Ins     174
Using Lightboxes on Blogs     175
Adding Lightboxes on a B2C Site     177
Park City Mountain Resort Tests a Popup on Its Winter 2010 Website     179
Choosing an Opt-In: Single or Double     180
Making the Case for Double Opt-In     182
Making the Case for Single Opt-In     183
Village Voice Media Moves from Double to Single Opt-In: Sees Significant List Growth     185
Sending Emails Without Permission     186
Sending an “Opt-Out” Email     189
Using an eAppend     191
Buying an Email List     193
Coming Full Circle     198
Endnotes     199
Part IV: BATMAN (EMAIL MARKETING) AND ROBIN (SOCIAL MEDIA)
Chapter 12: How Email and Social Media Go Together     203
Batman and Robin     204
Email: The Digital Glue of Social Media     205
Social Connecting vs. Social Sharing vs. Social Promoting     208
Social Connecting     208
Social Sharing     210
Social Promoting     212
Endnotes     213
Chapter 13: The Power of Pairs     215
Social Connecting     216
Using Email Marketing to Grow Your Social Following     216
Using Email Marketing to Grow Facebook Likes and Revenue     218
Social Sharing     222
Show Me the Money: How One Online Retailer Netted $250,000 Using SWYN     227
Social Promoting     229
Using Social Media to Grow Your Email List and Make Money     231
A Truly Integrated Email Marketing and Social Media Campaign     233
Two Is Better Than One     235
Endnotes     235
Part V: THE FUTURE OF EMAIL MARKETING
Chapter 14: What’s Next?      237
The Current State of Email Marketing     238
Email Marketing Predictions     239
Chapter 15: Go Forth and Conquer     247
What You Know     248
What Now?      249
Four Steps to Email Marketing Success     250
1. Grow Your List     250
2. Plan Your Content     250
3. Determine Success Metrics     251
4. Send, Test, Analyze, Adjust, Repeat     251
And Now, It’s Your Turn     252
Endnotes     252
Appendix A: Your Prize     253
Index     255