India top source of spam in 3rd quarter of 2011: Kaspersky Lab's Spam Report

More than 50% of all spam messages in the world during the third quarter of 2011 originated from just six countries, with India accounting for the highest 14.8% of such messages.

Forrester Research predicts Interactive Marketing spending will reach $76.6 billion by 2016

A new report by Forrester Research forecasts that U.S. interactive marketing spending will reach $76.6 billion by 2016, equal to TV spending this year and comprising 35% of all advertising. That's a huge jump since this year interactive will comprise 19% of all spending, according to Forrester.

According to the report, search and display will remain to be the biggest pieces of the interactive spending pie, comprising 44% and 36%, respectively, in 2016, though search will have lost share from 55% in 2011. Mobile paid advertising and search will experience astronomic development and are surpassing email and social this year.

The top 10 Email Marketing Companies

Email marketing is a form of direct marketing which uses electronic mail as a means of communicating commercial or fund-raising messages to an audience. Every email sent to a potential or current customer could be considered email marketing.

Right now, there are variety of companies offering various email marketing solutions to target customers. Their services and client satisfaction have been put into test to find out the best email marketing companies. Almost every email marketing service providing firms have participated in this test. They have gone through an evaluation system for the top ranking. The evaluation was examined by experienced and well trained researchers.

Interesting new feature from Google - SMART FOLDERS for Gmail Users

Google continues to release interesting new features designed to help email users. It has improved filtering and helped us save time doing standard email-related tasks. But Gmail's newest feature, Smart Folders.

The Smart Folders automatically identifies bulk email messages and puts them in a “special” folder.

Email Marketing

What is it?

Though there are many online marketing methods to generate leads E-mail marketing can be defined as a means of direct marketing in which the email is required being a medium to speak with your targeted audience. 

As the penetration in the Internet is growing, businesses are finding e mail marketing an easy way to focus on their audience and pitch their services or products.

Why Email Marketing?

Email is an ideal solution for brand reinforcement, product testing, promotional offers and customer surveys. It's fast, cheap and easy to send special announcements, newsletters, and promotional offers to their customers via email.

Email marketing is an effective tool to pursue internet business. It can be a concept that invokes immediate response or action from the prospects. 

Email Marketing has many features. I’d like to list out the important features below,

• Inexpensive 
• Drive traffic to your website 
• Increase profits 
• There are various tools like auto responders, bounce messages, read receipts and clicks to trace the email messages. These help out with correlating sales with marketing and measuring the negative or positive responses. 
• Can make sure that the message reaches the targeted audience 
• Cost effective way of reaching a targeted audience to distribute information 
• Encourages customer loyalty, strengthens relationships, and builds trust. 
• Increase brand awareness

Well, the recent survey says that “Consumers want personalized e-mail from marketers” - More than half of US and UK consumers said they would be more receptive to e-mails from marketers if they were personalized and highly-targeted. That is among the key findings of a new report issued from e-mail service provider - e-Dialog, June 07, 2010.

VAT raised to result in 'More Focused' Marketing Campaigns

A new study has found that the forthcoming rise in VAT will have an affect on marketing campaigns. Email marketing and other types of campaigns will need to become more effective in order to win business once the VAT rise comes into effect, a new study suggests.

According to affiliate network LinkShare, a number of marketers believe that mass marketing techniques will give way to individualised campaigns next year when VAT rises to 20 per cent.


More than one in three consumers said they would be curbing their spending habits once the increase is introduced, while 18 per cent expect to see an increased emphasis on measurement and return on investment.

Liane Dietrich, managing director of LinkShare UK, said the VAT increase could have some benefits for retailers and brands which provide value for money.

"Consumers are savvy and dedicated to the quest for the best value; they won’t go back to pre-recession habits when the economy starts to recover," the industry expert said.

"They will continue to base their decisions on the research and value-driven factors that they have become accustomed to over the last eighteen months."

The research comes just days after a study by Acxiom found that retailers who used creative marketing tactics, such as digital channels, in the run up to Christmas could enjoy more success.

By Sarah Wright

Source: THE DIRECT MARKETING ASSOCIATION (UK) LTD


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Begin an Email Campaign

E-mail marketing has evolved, moving from simple one-way messages and autoresponders to a much more sophisticated way of communicating with your customers. There are a few basic things you need to know about e-mail marketing to build deeper relationships with your customers to generate revenues, grow your business and get ahead of your competition. They are,

Efficient & Effective Communication

Build a List

Even if you only have 10 e-mail addresses, you need to start somewhere. Add those to your database. Once you have your list started, make sure that you launch a campaign to keep in touch and in front of your contacts without overwhelming their inbox. I suggest two e-mails per month maximum. It's not about e-mail quantity; it's about quality.

Set up Contact Information Capture Forms

It's easy to add forms to your website or blog to allow visitors to give you their contact information, such as e-mail address, name and phone number.

Decide What You Want to Accomplish

Before you launch your first campaign, you need to decide what it is that you want to accomplish. Do you want to deepen the quality of relationships, take your list through the sales cycle, educate them? Why are you sending your e-mails? Set clear goals before you send your first e-mail, and build your messages and campaign around those goals.

Set up Auto-respond E-mails

Set up at least six e-mails that will automatically release on the dates and times you choose to send out to your list. Keep them short, simple and to the point. Do not make them "sales pitchy"; use autorespond e-mails to educate and build relationships, and the rest will follow.

 

Add Triggers to E-mails
Triggers are used to send clients into a new sales cycle based on topic. If your client clicks on a link in one of the e-mails you sent her about your product or service. As soon as she clicks on that link, it automatically triggers the release of a message sending her information about a similar product or service based on the original link.

Monitor Results
Once per month, look at reporting to see which e-mails are more effective and have a higher rate of opening as well as click-through. Use the lessons learned to build your next campaign. It's important to know how your list is responding to the e-mails that you send. If you aren't getting a good click-through response, the problem is either the quality of your message or the topic.

E-mail Marketing is an effective way to increase relationships, response rates and conversions through smart, targeted communication.

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Best Email Marketing Practices

1) Email marketing is the glue that binds successful online marketing campaigns. 

Before the 21^st century, email marketing was still considered risky and unproven in terms of generating results. Within the past 10 years, email has not only replaced direct marketing, but it is now a top revenue generator for many companies.  Even with the meteoric rise of social media, email remains at the heart of all online applications and will remain there for the foreseeable future. Email should be the hub of any online marketing strategy for the best chance at success. 

2) "Spray and pray" doesn't work.

It's hard to believe that this mass email approach is still employed by marketers, but it is alive and well. Not only is this approach not strategic, but it is often rejected by ISPs. Relevance is critical to email marketing success. Marketers must respect the opt-in process and create timely, personalized communications that entice the recipient to not only open the message, but act on it, too. 

3) Get your emails to the inbox.

In the old days (or, the late '90s) when email marketing was still in its infancy, many marketers were so focused on pushing their emails out, they gave little thought about whether they were actually received. Ten years later, it is clear that email deliverability is one of the most important aspects of email marketing.  After all, a recipient cannot read and act upon your email message if they never received it in the first place. How can businesses ensure their emails are delivered? It starts with a solid online reputation. Businesses with great online reputations ensure that every message they send is welcomed by the recipient and are respectful of their email preferences.

4) Viral content is still king.

In 1999, an email that was forwarded to friends and co-workers was considered viral. Social media has taken the concept of viral to the next level, thanks to content-sharing sites like YouTube, Facebook and Linkedin.  In spite of this evolution,  email forwards from  friends, co-workers and even the aforementioned social media sites are still a very effective way to market your business in the 21^st century. Therefore it is important to make your content engaging and shareable.

5) Measure the results, not the indicators.

In the late 1990s, when marketers began shifting from direct mail marketing, the measurability of email was what made it so appealing:  the number of opens, click-throughs and bouncebacks were often the measure of a campaign's success.  With the growth of technology and real-time analytics over the past decade, email marketers have unprecedented insight into whether a campaign converted recipients into customers.  So while open rates and click-throughs are great indicators of how your email was received, and whether it engaged your recipients, the business results of the campaign are most important in the ultimate evaluation.