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While some believe that the rise of Twitter and Facebook has sounded email's death knell, Jordan Cohen, writing at the Pivotal Veracity blog, disagrees. He takes issue with statements like this one from the Wall Street Journal: "Email has had a good run as [the] king of communications. But its ... more
A few years ago, Neil Schwartzman downloaded—but never used—the trial version of an anti-spam software program. "It turned out it was Windows-only," he explains at his blog, "so I never installed it, as I use a Mac. Have done since 1986." Following the download, he received the customary follow-up—one email to ... more
As the goblins and ghouls out there munch away on their Halloween bounty, fond memories arise of one apparition we saw a lot of this season—the Monster Mash JibJab "sendable." The e-card uses facial-recognition technology to seamlessly attach the faces of your friends or family to the body of a monster. ... more
If you visit political blogs, you may have noticed that some bloggers try to outsmart content filters that flag incendiary words by substituting numbers and symbols for letters (e.g., pr0p@ganda), or by inserting periods or spaces where they don't belong within words (e.g., m.orons). Unfortunately, says Karl Foxley, he has begun to ... more
"The holiday season is the most important time of year for retailers, when aggressive goals are set for increased traffic and sales, both in-store and online," says eROI's Alex Williams in a MarketingProfs article on key takeaways from his podcast with Chad White of Smith-Harmon. As you experience this holiday season's campaigns ... more
Good news: You don't have to lose sight of your brand's tried-and-true persona to participate in the quest for deeper engagement at the new social sites. Just think of the social-media generation as a silver-dish serving of people who already want to talk to you; you just need to make ... more
You've done a great job of cultivating your email list—and your subscribers have rewarded your efforts with extraordinary loyalty. So far, so good. But Mark Brownlow of Email Marketing Reports says such best-case scenarios come with their own unique set of pitfalls: Becoming complacent. When you don't have to ... more
Ever wonder how great search results end up that way? Well, in a recent post at the User Interface Engineering blog, Jared Spool says there are no shortcuts to search-result success. According to Spool, "There is no way you can produce a great search-results page [on your website] without spending ... more
You've probably heard a lot that the days of "push" messaging—a mythical golden age when marketers could feed passive viewers whatever rigmarole the ad department pleased—are dead. So true. But for you, it's not a bad thing; it's a chance to develop long-term, even downright codependent relationships with users. And there ... more
"We all have opinions about what constitutes spam," begins a post at the Marketance blog. Indeed, while some would argue that meeting the letter of the CAN-SPAM law puts you in the clear, others insist such legislation is merely the jumping-off point for best practices. In the end, spam is ... more
"The pumpkins come out, the days grow shorter, the weather cools, and there's no mistaking that the holiday season is upon us," says Karen Talavera in an article at MarketingProfs. And though marketers face the challenge of lingering recession worries, you can still add holiday sparkle to a subscriber's inbox, ... more
When you have products or services that customers don't buy on a regular basis—for instance, big-screen televisions or luxury excursions on the Orient Express—targeted email offers based on previous purchases may not be the best way to determine what they want next. That's why Sean Duffy of the UK-based EmailCenter ... more
Research coming out of Penn State reports that 20% of tweets—those wee messages published on Twitter—are brand-oriented. And not the way you'd naturally expect. While researchers originally thought they'd find lots of brand engagement in the form of product reviews or referrals, what they discovered was this (hold on to ... more
"Hoping to keep its 119 rooms filled," writes Hugo Martín at the Los Angeles Times, "Hotel Erwin on Venice Beach is offering an unusual promotion for its countercultural clientele: an Ink and Stay package that includes $100 toward a tattoo and a bottle of tequila to numb the pain." The ... more
If you sell products to consumers, the year-end holidays are a make-or-break big deal. So, making sure online buyers find you easily and happily by planning your search strategy ahead of launch is paramount. Derek Gordon provides some useful tips for doing so in a recent issue of VatorNews. Among them: ... more
There are infinite ways to destroy an email marketing program. And in a recent humorous post at the Deliverability.com blog, Andrew Kordek explains how to ruin your reputation in nine easy steps. It's easier than you think! Among Kordek's "tips": Blather. "First and foremost," he begins, "you need to understand ... more
Across all demographics—and yes, we mean all demographics—social networks are where the traffic's at. Because barriers to entry are low and engagement is high, this is perfect turf for marketers who want to communicate with users on a personal level. Best way to do that? Invite them to share in an immersive ... more
For the small-business owner, getting your name out via local search is a must. And to many marketers, that means optimizing for Google's universal results. After all, Google is the leader of the search-engine pack these days. But as David Mihm points out in a recent article at Search Engine ... more
Not long ago, the friend of a MarketingProfs colleague—we'll call him Pete—sighed in annoyance as he tapped furiously on his iPhone's keypad. He was visibly angry as he explained he had just received "the thousandth email this month" from a major retailer. "I'm sick of it," he said. "I'm unsubscribing. ... more
This summer, Pear Analytics released a study that got plenty of play in the Twitter/blogosphere. According to the Pear research, 40.5 percent of the messages published on social-media-darling Twitter are "pointless babble," and a mere 8.7 percent of tweets have pass-along value to others. The piece won itself a lot of ... more
It's not just the recession; the digital revolution has wreaked havoc on traditional music retailers, who can rarely match online juggernauts like iTunes or eMusic on price or convenience. "As of April," reports Amy Kaufman at The Wrap, "there were 185 record stores in the LA area, down from 259 ... more
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