The louder I shout, the more people will hear me...

Recently walking through a bustling packed out Oxford Circus [Oxford Street, London] I could hear someone reading from The Bible through a megaphone, this led me to questioning why the guy was standing there? You can never see these people having captive audiences; their voices usually lands on deaf ears. The only reason I could think was because of the logic, mass marketing opportunity: loads of people + a megaphone = more responses.

Unfortunately, this is a method that many marketers believe works with email marketing. I disagree. A successful marketer is a clever marketer. I often get asked who I'd suggest for a marketer to buy a list from. Simple answer... NOWHERE!

Gone are the days where you could send unlimited emails and reach the inbox with no strategy. ISP filters are much more advanced and rely on so much more than content as they once used to. It is common knowledge the ISPs look at complaints and spam traps, but more and more I am finding clients having issues based on unresponsive users. Let's face it, ISPs expect to see what every marketer wants to see, engagement.

In my opinion, a lack of engagement from the subscriber leads to a much larger problem. Long term inactive subscribers are costing the companies in more ways than CPM and it's my opinion the best way to treat subscribers is to make the unsubscribe method a lot clearer. In many cases this is often hidden in T&Cs to help retain subscribers. Many subscribers just want out. If it's not clear they default to the next easiest option; The Abuse Button. These subscribers can however be turned from a pain to a remedy. By making the unsubscribe method clearer and deploying a short and simple exit survey you can find out if you are emailing too much, contents too irrelevant, or simply the subscriber just doesn't remember signing up to your emails.

Either way, with this new data from previously inactive and damaging subscribers, you can address frequency/content/signup and work to building a positive reputation with an engaged database.

Start of something...

So let's start the blog by introducing myself. I'm Steve and I work for an Email Service Provider (ESP) in the UK specialising in deliverability. I have worked in email for approximately four years now; however I have worked in deliverability in particular for over a year.

This is a place were I plan on writing my opinion on topics within the industry.

Let's see what unfolds...