Bill's Blog

Back Home at Clickz

Around 10 years ago I started writing a weekly column for Clickz when Ann Handley and Andy Bourland ran it. A lot of water under the bridge later and here I am back writing for Clickz. My first article went live today which can be found here:  http://www.clickz.com/3632133 about, what else, competitive intelligence in the Email Space. I compare 3 computer manufacturers and examine their different email strategies based on close examination on their email methods. I've hidden the names of the actual companies, but the data is all real. One of the big take aways was the importance of partnerships in other email newsletters through sponsorships, media buys, and 3rd party stand alone offers. Conferences and seminars focus heavily on building your own list and the strategy around deliverablity and increasing open rate, but not enough is said about the equally important element of purchasing media in other successful newsletters.

Alerts Beta:

I quick reminder for those interested: We will be closing pre-registration for our Alerts product at the end of the month. If you want to be on the list of people who gets to try Alerts for 30 days for free and with no credit card needed, you need to register before December 31st.  Here is the url to register: http://tinyurl.com/EDSAlerts

Cyber Monday

According to the trade journals and data supplied by comScore, Cyber Monday was a big hit this year, up significantly from last year. But from what I an understand, the numbers took into account the entire holiday weekend, from Black Friday through Cyber Monday.

When I actually look at the online stats for retailers and compare Black Friday's traffic numbers to Cyber Monday, it is obvious that the clear winner is Friday. Across the board, the Friday traffic numbers for Friday were much higher than on Monday and even those retailers who promoted specific Cyber Monday sales throught email drops did not see a particular spike in traffic to their site.

In a certain way, marketers have gotten things backwards. The term Black Friday (so called because traditionally that is when retailers went from the red to the black) was used to discribe a phenomena where people took advantage of the Thanksgiving holiday to do their Christmas and Holiday shopping. Cyber Monday was where the internet saw its boost because people used their high speed access at work to do their shopping when they returned from their Thanksgiving break. But today many people have high speed access in their homes and so Black Friday is a stampead for both online and brick and mortar stores. As a result, I don't think we see that monday spike happening as much anymore.

But markers still promote Cyber Monday sales and Black Friday sales, especially in their email marketing as if these terms meant something (like Thanksgiving sales or Presidents Day Sales) to the general public rather than the specialized marketing terms they acutally are.

I mean with the current stock market situation, do you really want to be promoting "Black Friday" sales to the general public? Maybe it is the Madmen factor: markers are convinced that the general public is fascinated by their every move.

Introducing Email Data Source "Alerts"

Well, it has been awhile since I last blogged, but time to pick up the ball again and I can think of no better way to get started by offering all of you a free trial of our new Alerts product.

Well, almost. It is not quite ready to ship yet so here is the deal. If you pre-register for Alerts you will become part of our beta program, be the first to try it out, AND get 60 days to try it out at no cost. You don't even need to lay down a credit card. Just sign up, try it, and let us know what you think.

So the real question: What is Alerts? Email Data Source processes nearly 1 million email marketing campaigns a month, from thousands of companies, publications, and affiliate lists. Alerts lets you set up custom searches and be alerted every time an email that fits your search criteria matches an email that is archived into our database. For instance, you could be alerted every time a specific sender sends an email campaign. Or be alerted every time the words "Free Shipping" appear in the subject line of an email that contains a link going to your favorite retailer. Or be alerted every time an email goes out from a specific ESP. There are hundreds of uses for Alerts to monitor your competition and your own brand.

Once you receive an alert in your inbox, you will be able to view the email creative, as well as the sender and other information about the email campaign.

To sign up for Alerts, please go to http://www.formspring.com/forms/?460912-xw7CLOiuXN

And feel free to tell your friends as well. The more the merrier.

Until next time

Bill McCloskey

Three Moves Ahead

For anyone who has lived the start-up life it is clear that business success is part chess game and part luck (plus a lot of work). We can’t help you with the luck part, but when it comes to business as a chess game we have just the ticket:

Bob Rice, successful investor, entrepreneur, and former CEO of Viewpoint, Inc. has just written a engaging new book on business strategy: Three Moves Ahead: What Chess Can Teach You about Business. Don’t worry if you don’t know your rook from your bishop: Bob discusses chess strategies (and how they apply to business) in a way that even a novice can understand.

Bob delves into up close and personal accounts of start up strategy by digging into business such as…well us, here at Email Data Source. Bob is an early investor in Email Data Source and sits on our board, so if you wanted to know the secret to our success, all you need to do is plunk down your $24.95 ($16.47 now on Amazon.com). All the money goes to charity, so buy two.

Bob’s  website, threemovesahead.com, is launching in the next few days and you can get more info and purchase Three Moves Ahead right here: http://www.amazon.com/Three-Moves-Ahead-Chess-Business/dp/0470178213/ref=pd_bbs_sr_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1206478142&sr=8-1

Pizza Delivery Mini Study

I am excited to announce our most recent mini study detailing the best practices of Pizza Deliverers. Pizza Delivery Marketers are trailblazers in email marketing and this study provides valuable insight to marketers in all industries.

To view our most recent mini study email your request to [email protected]

Stay posted to my blog for upcoming mini studies in a variety of industries.

Making an Impact

When you start a company and start making products, you hope that it will make an impact on someone’s life. Silicon Valley is littered with solutions looking for a problem. But when we started Email Data Source, we were pretty sure we had a solution to a big problem. This week we heard, independently, from two of our clients who contacted us to let us know just how much, to quote Sally Field, they love us. They really, really love us. Both companies come from different fields, one in the financial marketspace, the other a Brick and Mortar retail outlet, but both use our tool, Email Analyst, to get data that effects how they do business on a daily basis. Data that is just not available elsewhere. Listening to clients tell you that the vision you had so many years ago is now saving them money, making them money, making them smarter in the way the go about business, is probably the greatest reward an entrepreneur can have. It means the work, sweat, sacrifice, and stress have all been worth it. You’ve had an impact. And THAT is a rare accomplishment.

DMA Correction

In my last post I bemoaned the fact that the DMA couldn't seem to get their internal processess correct after I received what appeared to be an email from them inviting me to an event but which contained someone elses email address, name, and password.

Well there is a slight correction. It did arrive from the DMA but it was intended as a pass-along viral invitation to a Direct Marketing Club event that was sent out to the Echo Award Judges. The name and password seem to be from someone at the Direct Marketing Club and the DMA claims they were just passing on a nice event.

But this does highlight how important it is to have processes in place when emailing your internal list. The email I received came from someone at the DMA. There was no "FWD:" in the subject line and no instructions or indication that it was a viral email, was passed along from someone else, or how to register for the event with someone else's name and password. And forwarding someone else's password and name in any communications is a bad idea in the first place.

So, is this really a correction? The DMA still needs to firm up their processess when it comes to communicating with their base, but the damage in this case was limited to less than a 100 people.

You decide.

When is the DMA Going to Get It Right?

When is the DMA going to get their internal processes straightened out!

The kings of direct marketing are still fumbling internally when it comes to their own interactive direct marketing efforts. Case in point, a few minutes ago I received an invitation from the DMA to join their DMCNY networking event.

Nice looking email and it was sent out using Exact Target, a very good ESP. So what is wrong?

When I went to register in the email it said my user name was SBoysen. Now, a lot of people misspell my name, but I’ve never seen it that far off. Suspicious, I looked at the Can-Spam footer. It says it was sent to [email protected] a domain I’ll keep to myself. Certain not my email address. Better yet, I can go into Mr. Boysen’s account and change all his preferences. The one thing I cannot do is unsubscribe to the email. I can unsubscribe Mr. Boysen, however.

I wonder what it will finally take for the DMA to take their email marketing efforts seriously enough to put the time and money into fixing them. When an outfit like Exact Target can’t help them, how bad is it?

Introducing Political Monitor

We’ve just developed a new monitoring tool for all you politicos out there. Political Monitor is a tool especially designed to monitor the email campaigns of the leading political parties and those running for office. Political Monitor is currently monitoring not only all the Presidential candidates and potential political candidates (like Al Gore), but will be monitoring all those running for Congress as well.

With political monitor you can keep tabs on both the internal mailings of the various candidates, but any 3^rd party link, ad, or newsletter that is driving traffic to their Web sites. For instance, did you know that there is a link on an email newsletter called “The Freebie Swamp” that drives traffic to John Edwards web site. The link doesn’t mention John Edwards but says: “*Free* ‘End The War’ Bumper Sticker”.

With Political Monitor you can directly compare the web site traffic of one candidate to another, see how often they are deploying their email campaigns and what those campaigns look like, and how effective they may have been in driving traffic to the site.

We are making Political Monitor available to legitimate news outlets for free to use through the 2008 election season. If you are a reporter working for the a newspaper, television or radio outlet, or select web sites and wish to learn more, drop me a line at [email protected] and we can get you started.

Heid Lehmann

Today’s post is dedicated to my good friend Heidi Lehmann. The occasion is that the company she works for, Third Screen Media, was just acquired by AOL. Heidi and I worked together side by side for years at a company I founded in 2000 called Emerging Interest. Emerging Interest’s business model was connecting technology vendors with the decision makers at advertising agencies. For years we ran The Advertising Road Show where we brought up to 5 vendors to present on site at agencies and for brand marketers. The success of the program was in large part due to Heidi’s organizational skills and more importantly, her ability as a people person. Heidi makes everyone around her feel special like they are the center of the universe. And our business couldn’t have run without her.

When I first started working with Heidi, she lived in Boston and my company was in New York. She had been working for me for a few months but we had yet to meet face to face. She finally decided to make it down to New York for our first in person meeting and took the train down. The date? September 11, 2001. Needless to say, we didn’t meet face to face that day, as Heidi’s train turned around just outside of Manhattan.

In 2003, when I started building what became Email Analyst, I made the decision to shut down the event business. It was particularly hard because it meant that Heidi would be moving on to greener pastures. She may have been concerned about her future but I wasn’t. Within weeks she was offered a job a small start-up: Third Screen Media. Heidi opened the New York office and hung in there during the early days, but soon became a superstar in the field of mobile marketing. Just like I knew she would.

The amount of the AOL deal was undisclosed but I hope she gets a real nice payday out it. Martini’s are on YOU next time Heidi. Congratulations.