‘They did it, so we should also’ not an e -mail strategy | Farmer

Too often we see a tactic in e -mail marketing that worked for someone else and rush to replicate it – without asking if it fits our goals, the public or business context. This is why that approach rarely works as expected, and how you can take a smarter, strategy-first path instead.

The e -mail that worked – and why you shouldn’t copy it

During a recent e-mail conference, a customer and I worked together for what has become one of my favorite presentations: everything about an e-mail with browse shed who helped our customer to sell more selling people who clicked on their promotional e-mails but left the site without buying.

We have led our audience through the business case that led us to continue. In particular, we wanted to test whether an open e -mail of abandonment – an e -mail that recognized the actions of the shopper – would generate more purchases than a secret approach.

In the secret version we soften the abandoned corner by combining the browse products in a larger range of similar items, making the message more like a serendipitous promotion campaign than on a targeted follow-up.

We then detailed how we chose the copy and images for the two versions, set the test structure and timing, interpreted the results and used it in the customer’s E -mail program. (Curious to learn which test has won? See the results at the end of this article.)

But there was one thing we didn’t do: we did not encourage our attendees to imitate what we were doing and promise that they would get the same results.

Mimicry is not a marketing

Our approach worked because we built it for that customer. You may not get the same results, but not because our approach was fundamentally inadequate. Because your e -mail program is different from my customer’s.

• We sell different products.
• Our audience is different.
• Our e -mail programs and teams have different goals, dynamics and technology.
• Our customers have different relationships with our e -mail programs and different motivations for entering into our messages.

Possibilities for imitation are everywhere – at conferences and training sessions, in books and white papers and in such columns. If we do something that succeeds, we want to talk about it because we learn such a e -mail marketing.

In the past three decades we have built up a shared knowledge base of marketers by discussing what we did, what worked, what not and why. Many of us hurried to copy someone else’s success, and when it didn’t come out, we went on to the next new thing.

DIG DEPER: E -Mail marketing strategy: a guide for marketers

Strategy always comes first

A successful e -mail program has goals, strategies and tactics. It’s like a trip.

• Your goal is the destination.
• Your strategy is the card that you use to determine how you can get there.
• You use tactics to follow your card and reach your destination.

If you live in the US and your goal is to go to Paris, your strategy will determine which vehicle to use. Your options are limited – boat or plane.

If you let the day rule the day, you might think: “I have just bought this car that is the hottest on the market and I’m going to bring it to France!”

That will work if you live in England, because you can take a car boat or the Channel Tunnel. But everywhere in the US? Good luck with that! It doesn’t mean your car is poor. You just ask to do something that it is not possible. You do what your strategy tells you. Bon Voyage!

Admittedly, creating a workable strategy takes time and effort. Tactics are more fun, especially if you are one of the first to demonstrate new technology. But when you separate tactics from the strategy, you can waste time, energy and money on things that are doomed to fail.

Nobody ever grew an e -mail program by copying what everyone does.

DIG DEPER: Why you should always ask why: strategy should lead tactics in marketing planning

Copy the insight, not the implementation

Do not ignore the success stories. It is smart to keep track of what is happening in e -mail marketing, to see what others report and learn from their victories and losses. At the same time, think about how they got there and how or whether you could test something similar.

Note how they implemented their plans, but pay more attention to what they have learned. Don’t be distracted from glowing results from asking important questions such as this:

• What problem did you want to solve?
• What faith did you challenge?
• What decision -making barriers has this project deleted?
• Which buyer modalities have you tackled? In other words, have you spoken with people who buy impulsively or prefer to do research? Trying to impress or make empathy and connection to rule the day?
• How did you test your changes? Did it have a check? Was it a 50/50 split?
• Was the hypothesis proven?

Be on your guard for reports that focus on results, but not on meanings or background. Everyone likes to create, but if people cannot answer these penetrating questions, it may indicate potential gaps.

Now comes the challenging part. Take what you have learned and ask yourself or your team questions like this:

• How does this apply to our customers?
• How would this help us implement our strategy or to achieve our goals?
• Do we have the right technology to make this possible?
• What would our hypothesis be for this test?

This gives you the information you need to build a program and test whether it works in your contextual environment, goals, customers, products, technology and company data set.

Dig Deeper: 7 common problems that derail a/b/n e -mail testing success

Bring critical thinking in e -mail marketing

Like I said, we have grown e -mail marketing by learning from each other. That is what distinguishes us from other marketers. But today we trust too much on repeated knowledge, driven information and uncritical absorption of the stories of others by suppliers.

Today we need less recycled Playbooks and more reports of first -hand about the needs of marketers. That can free us from the eternal cycle of chasing trends and giving us the courage and conviction to map our own paths.

Those paths can be forged from what we have learned from others, but our experiences and insights must feed them.

I hope that my presentation of the conference has inspired those present on similar problems to consider a similar program. Yet I do not expect someone to do exactly what we have done. Similarly, I hope that this column inspires you to watch your e -mail program and find the gaps and barriers that prevent you from achieving your goals, enjoying success or serving your customers as well as possible.

Try this order:

• Ask deeper questions.
• Challenge assumptions.
• Test instead of gambling.
• Lead with your brand instead of following someone else.

Your questions and answers will lead you to develop a program for abolishing leaves, such as the program we have made for our customer, Cannadips. You can find the full case study on page 70 of my book “Holistic Email Marketing, Second Edition.” But it will not be the same as ours, and that is as it should be.

And now for the test results I promised …

The secret version received higher openings and then clicks the open. Our strategy, however, called on purchases as the success statistics. The open version generated a placement rate of 4% and a lift of 20% on the secret version. The open version won.

And that is another reason why you let your strategy dictate your tactic!