Everything You Need to Know About Email Marketing Today
2020 was the year email was supposed to die, then COVID hit and every company reached back to 2005 and leaned into spray and pray. Why do so many companies get email marketing wrong? Find out in this episode with special guest Loren Meyer.
Sends are up, opens are up, but there is little change in the click rates – what does this mean, and why are your customers expecting something different than what you are delivering?
In this episode of The Summit Podcast Lauren and Kyle discuss:
- There is a lot of life left in email
- How companies are failing their customers with their MarComm
- When an email isn’t just an email
- Where you can get the biggest ROI for your buck
- What the future of email marketing really looks like
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TRANSCRIPT
Intro:
Welcome to the summit. A podcast focused on bringing you the knowledge and insights for industry leaders. I’m your host Kyle Hamer, and I’m on a mission to help you exceed your potential. As a sales guy, turned marketer, I am passionate about building sustainable businesses. And if there’s one thing I’ve learned in my 20-year career, that you won’t find an overnight growth scheme, a shortcut to success, or a way to hack yourself to the top. Nope. Success is the byproduct of hard work, great relationships, and deep understanding done over and over. We’re here to help you unlock that success with some secrets from other people, one conversation at a time.
Kyle Hamer:
At a time today’s guest on the show. The Summit is Lauren Meyer . Lauren. Welcome to the show.
:
Hey Kyle, thanks. Happy to be here. We’re excited to have you here now, for those of you who don’t know, Lauren, Lauren is a well, she’s an email savant. Her career has put her in a place that has taken her on this great adventure. Uh , she works for a company named Kickbox. Now she’s had a chance to travel all over the world and knows in email inside and out. She’s a recent California transplant from New York City. Uh, but she does have Midwest or at least Rustbelt roots coming out of , uh , Pennsylvania and has a passion for pizza. So did I miss anything?
Lauren Meyer:
Uh , I think that pretty much covers it, I guess maybe I’ll just mention that I’ve got a two year old twins at home too. So I’m when I’m not focusing on email, which feels like all of the time I eat sleep and dream email, I’m chasing two-year-olds around. Yeah .
Kyle Hamer:
That’s awesome. Now give us like the, the 32nd to one minute overview of what Kickbox is for those people are like, okay, I’ve never heard of Kickbox unless, you know , it’s like an MMA thing.
Lauren Meyer:
Yeah, sure. Yeah. And we , um, do not , uh, do MMA. We are not a kickboxing company. We actually are an email verifier . Well, let’s say we’ve, we’ve been an email verification company for several years. Um, and focusing on really just helping customers improve the quality of their lists by kicking out invalid addresses. Um, we have a really cool sign up form that you can use one out of signed form, but , um, the ability to plug real time verification into your signup forms. So figure instead of somebody , um, kind of mistaking Gmail and typing the wrong thing. And then you , um, not being able to connect with that future customer, giving them the ability to make sure that they enter a correct address at the point of signup . Um, so that’s what we’ve been doing for many years. And then over the summer, we actually , um , introduced a , uh , an entire deliverability monitoring suite , um, that is focused on really just helping people understand, are they going to the inbox? If they’re not going to the inbox, potentially why and giving them lots of tools and , and different data points to help them kind of troubleshoot those issues and really just optimize their, their email.
Kyle Hamer:
Cool. Well, you look, if you, if you’re somebody who’s ever had to try and figure out how to do email verification through a third party service, whether it’s an API call or , uh , trying to do it through web hooks, the whole entire thing can be a giant pain in the butt. So I think you guys have found a place to , to , to, to make life a little bit easier.
Lauren Meyer:
Yeah, I hope so. Yeah, I think so. I think our product is pretty intuitive. I mean, honestly you can just kind of drag and drop a file if you’ve got an existing file, but really I love that that real-time verification aspect, which does include setting up an API. And I know some people are a little bit afraid of even just that , like, what does , what does API even stand for? Oh gosh, I don’t want to think about that, but once you plug it in it , it’s really simple and it really works very well.
Kyle Hamer:
That’s awesome. Well, as you could probably imagine listening in today, we’re going to talk about email, but what we’re going to talk about as it relates to email is how pretty much everything you know about email is wrong. And , and people are like, wait, what, how do you mean what I know about email is wrong? What I would say is, is that there’s this much misinformation in the market today about email, as there is about the, you know, the benefits of hair growth CIRM . There’s just a lot of bad information. And so we’ve got Lauren on the show today to kind of help us clear up some of the misconceptions, but before we get into like what the misconceptions are, Lauren , can you give us the state of the world? Like what is going on in the, in the world of email? This is why is this all of a sudden important topic? Yeah .
Lauren Meyer:
Well, I mean, I know we’re saving misconceptions for later, but I guess I’ll break the news. That email is not dead. In fact email is doing better than ever. And , you know, I think for, for many years , um, the ROI from email tends to average around 42, us dollars to $1 spent on email . So 42 to one , um, pretty awesome results there. But I think, you know, even just this year , um, we have seen so many people shifting to , to focusing more on e-commerce or the digital experience because their brick and mortar stores have been closed or they’re, you know , trying to announce , um, store closings or changes in hours or, or the way that they’re kind of trying to help customers through this, this pandemic. Um, so I think it’s just, you know, we’ve got people that are, that are kind of starting email marketing for the first time that are, they’re shifting much more heavily into it. Um, you know, we’ve got, yeah , lots of, lots of , of volume changes. So there’s certain industries, you know, like obviously travel has taken a big hit. So travel has kind of had to figure out what to do. So some travel companies, honestly pause sending back in, in March and just said, we’re not going to send email for awhile . We’ll just kind of lay low. Um, which, you know, is , is not the greatest thing to do. You just, you still wouldn’t have some kind of, you know , relevance in the market and kind of remind customers of who you are and the fact that you still exist. Um , but I think that we’ve, we’ve seen a lot of shifts , um, but really yet people are just relying on email much more heavily than I think they ever have in the past, which is kind of exciting.
Kyle Hamer:
It is exciting. I mean, it, it’s exciting because if you think about the volume of email that comes out per day, and then you talk about a 42 to one, so $42 for every dollar spent turned around, it’s amazing to think about the volume that’s going on. I was reading somewhere that there’s roughly about 300 billion emails sent a day. Has that changed dramatically since the pandemic?
Lauren Meyer:
Um , you know, I actually don’t think it has, you know, I, I’ve got a lot of contexts who work at ESPs and overall like the overall global volume that’s being sent from Yuma hasn’t changed much, but I think that’s because we see that variance where there’s some people that are sending a lot more than they used to, but others that aren’t so overall , um, things have remained pretty stable. I think it’s just, when you actually get down to the individual center level that you see so much , um, so much, you know , variety versus what’s been happening in the past. Um, you know, we , we have seen some trends where , um, Openreach have actually been up quite a bit. I think they probably peaked back in, in kind of like mid March or let’s say end of April. Um, but, but those are still higher than they were. I think some people were reporting, you know, as high as, you know , 20% more , um, than, than they were at the same period last year. So open rates are up. Um, but click-through rates, conversions seem to be kind of about where they were last year. So that’s something that’s kind of interesting where it’s like people are , um, they seem to have like a greater, greater appetite for email, but it hasn’t really changed their, their kind of spending habits too, too much in that sense. So , um, a little bit interesting there.
Kyle Hamer:
Well, let’s talk about that, cause that, that is very interesting. If you think about, you know, the shift in the workforce and the things that have happened this year with people being forced to work from home, I can’t, you know, I’ve got, I’ve gotta be in front of my email box, I’ve got to have it open more consistently in addition to Slack and teams and whatever else I’ve got going on the open rates moving up, but people’s click through rates, not changing or not improving. What do you think is the, I mean, you’ve been doing this for years. So what do you think are the common challenges folks are or what are they getting wrong? Like why is it we’re not seeing that with similar trends?
Lauren Meyer:
Yeah. I mean, I think it really is just, you know, this year has been so insane. I mean, it really, you know, there’s certain people that are kind of saying you should throw your marketing playbook out the window because whatever you’ve been doing in the past is just not going to work this year. Um, it , you know, it’s , I don’t think it’s that, that dramatic, but really, you know, we’ve seen some people that are really doing well when they’re, they’re very empathetic in the emails that they send. They’re really providing value. Like every email that they send has some clear value for their , their , their recipient. Um, others are not, I think there’s, you know, there was a period where , um, it felt like almost every, every other email that you received was from, from some CEO and it was sort of, some of them were really well done and others were , were just clear virtue signaling and they kind of just fell flat and they were really kind of, you know , um, lamps , the slaughter, if you will, because people were just like, what’s going on with this? This is, this is not good at email. Um, and so I think it’s just, you know, it’s a matter of people’s interest is still there, but some people are facing, you know, that they don’t have a job. So their budget is different than it was in past year. So it’s like, I still like this brand. I still like these products I’m still interested. I just can’t buy it right now. So they’re kind of, they’re still engaging with the emails. Um , it really just depends on what kind of email you’re sending, right. So I think that’s where, you know, e-commerce is , is one aspect of the market, but you know , if you’re in B2B and you’ve got that long sales cycle and you’re, and you’re really kind of trying to focus on , um, eventually getting that person to convert to a customer , um, that looks very different, you know, so I think it just, it really depends on kind of what your goals are, but I think that really is just think people are home more. Um, they’ve got a little bit more , some people have a little bit more time on their hands. Um, others, I think that , you know, their, their, their consumption of email has changed, but they still do have a very finite time in their day where they’re like, Hey, I I’m still looking emails, right? They’re still doing that. I think they just , um, that they’re doing a little bit more, but , but the , again, that conversion rate, the , the amount of money they have to spend on something, you know, it hasn’t really gone up. So conversions are not
Kyle Hamer:
Well, it’s interesting because you talked about virtual virtue signaling. And one of the things that I’ve been traipsing around LinkedIn battle crying against is the loss of humanity in the email. Um, like it , it, it’s almost like companies forget how to be creative, forget how to talk, conversationally, forget how to appeal to somebody via written form. And we’ve turned email into this , um, this medium, that’s basically another billboard. And what I’m interested in is , is what you’re seeing or what you’ve seen be successful for different groups in different industries, whether it’s e-commerce or B2B in, in driving up , uh, improved click rates or engagements rates. Even if I don’t have the dollars today, what’s going to force me to start, you know, encourage me to take that next step. Is there, are there techniques or things that people aren’t considering?
Lauren Meyer:
Yeah, I think, you know, it’s one of those, you know, we’ve been all talking about big data for so long and people are collecting all these data points. Um, but I think it’s to the point where like, they have so much data, but they don’t really know what they should be looking at within that data. And so they don’t look at anything. Right. So I think it’s just, there’s this kind of over overkill of like, okay, well, I don’t know, I don’t know what to do. And so you , you kind of just rely on what worked in the past. And so the companies that are excelling, especially this year when consumption has changed within their subscriber base , um , it’s really just following the data and learning from what you’re seeing, right. Like if you have a welcome series for example , um, and you start to see that there’s like a lot of churn on your list after the third email that you sent , um, dig into that, figure out what’s going on there. Right. Is there something with the content? Is it something with , um, I don’t know how quickly you sent that is , is there something wrong with that process , um, that you can do to kind of improve it? And so I think the companies that are doing well are really kind of tweaking things , um , looking again to see, like, you know, it’s not, you know, email , um, subscriber, interests, deliverability, none of that stuff is a constant. It does change all the time. Um, we’ve even seen reports where, you know, I think maybe it was Eloquist. He was talking about this recently. Um, just seeing where there are certain subscribers who might go from being super active on your list to kind of just falling off and not really opening emails for quite a while , then all of a sudden they kind of just, they , they, they open one and then they fall right back into your engaged segment again, and they become a regular subscriber again. Right. So , um , I think it’s , it’s just a matter of watching those trends and acting accordingly, right? Like I just, I can’t stand it when there’s those companies that just, they target everybody in their list the same way they just send to them, I don’t know, daily or weekly or whatever their frequency is. And then at some point they kind of just dropped them off the list and say, well, they’re inactive, they’re gone by bye . Right. Um, I really prefer, and I think this is, this is what’s, what’s, what’s really great about some companies that are succeeding is following that data and having different kinds of customer profiles within your list. So you can kind of say, Hey, here’s my active group. Here’s my group that I’m looking to try to get to purchase for the first time. Here’s my recurring purchasers , um, things like that. And, you know, you’re just targeting them a little bit differently. Um, and understanding that that those things can change right. Business as usual , um, is not really business as usual. So I think that the companies, they get that , um, it’s not something you have to do every single day. You don’t always have to be looking at your data in that sense, but at least once a month or once a quarter step back and say like, are we doing the right thing is what we’re doing, making sense. Um, and are there places within the data that tell us that there’s something that’s wrong?
Kyle Hamer:
Well, okay. So you’ve talked about data a couple of times, and I think for a lot of organizations, they get caught up in the vanity metrics. What was my scent ? How many, how many names are on my list? How many sins did I do today? What was my deliverability? What was my open rate, getting beyond the vanity metrics that we all know, how do you, how do you really dig into your email and the information that’s there to deduce what’s working and what’s not working to the degree you’re talking to. Cause it’s, it’s really easy to look at the vantage metrics and be like, everything looks fine. Yeah. How do you, how do you take it to the next step and get to what you’re talking about?
Lauren Meyer:
Sure. So I think, you know, the one thing is really to look at your performance over time. Right? Don’t just look at that, that standalone campaign and be like, woo . We had a great sales day and our opens for the highest they’ve been in, you know, like, don’t be like, Oh yeah. Today 35% open rate. If your typical open rate is 20%, right. Like, look at that trend and see, are we trending up? Are we staying consistent or are we trending downwards over time ? Is there a huge area where you kind of just fall off a cliff at some point? Right. Because I think all of those, those, those things are really important to look at. Um, but it’s also like, look at all of your metrics, right. Because it’s a journey, right. There’s um, you know, figure, you know, somebody can’t open something if it doesn’t go to their inbox, if it’s not delivered to , to their address in the first place. Right. So cool. You’ve got them to , uh , you’ve got the , the address delivered. That’s awesome. Then you got them to open. That’s great. Now you need to focus on getting them to click through your email and , and eventually land on your website or take whatever that call to action is that you’re looking at. Um, but ultimately, I mean, email’s whole goal is to drive your business forward in some way, is it not right? Like, it’s not just to get lots of opens. That sounds great. But again, to your point, that’s a vanity metric because if people are just opening, that doesn’t mean that they’re ever going to actually help your bottom line for your business. So I think it’s just really tying your business metrics, your conversions , um , even just website visits, right. If you can see that when you send an email, even if people aren’t opening or clicking, if you see a spike in website traffic shortly after that, or if you see that your sales on your website are higher that day or something like that, if you can see indications of kind of like that butterfly effect, I think that’s the bigger thing to look at is, is, you know, don’t, don’t, don’t, don’t just get stuck in that box of , um, whew , lots of opens, lots of clicks because if those aren’t generating actual money for business and you’re doing something wrong. So I think it’s just a matter of kind of putting that whole picture together and saying is overall, is this working , um, and trace that back, like really check that against your goals with email, right? If your goal with email is literally just to kind of get brand visibility out there, okay, that’s a little bit harder to track, but if it truly is, we’re a retail business , um, we have a sale today. We want to generate as many sales as possible. You know, that’s, that’s pretty easy for you to kind of tell, you know, what you’re doing there. So I think it really is just a matter of looking at the bigger picture , um, and really trying to adjust accordingly.
Kyle Hamer:
Sure. Makes perfect sense. Now, there are a couple things that as we, you know, we listened to your dropping nuggets here and I picked up on one of the things that you said is, you know, it drives you crazy when people are like, Hey, you haven’t engaged for four emails. I’m going to move you to the, you know , dead list, never talked to you again, buh-bye now. And that’s not really actually a best practice. How do you know that that’s not a best practice in what are some of the ways in which an organization can be effective in not wearing out their welcome, but also making sure that they’re, you know, being timely.
Lauren Meyer:
Yeah. And you know, honestly, it’s , it’s one of those it’s so tricky because you know, the frequency at which you send to your audience is really dependent on the business and the, the, the content of your emails and the goals of your emails and the audience that you’re sending to. Right. If you do have that audience, that’s opening and clicking and , and doing things very often and , and maybe even know that they’ve already taken or make purchases with your business, I’m a loyal customer. Let’s say you, you might treat them very differently from somebody who’s just recently signed up, right . You want to kind of welcome them and really get them kind of get them to be a loyal subscriber . So I think it really is. Um , you have to kind of look into your data again and really try to , to kind of focus on the difference between those, those subscribers. Um, yeah. I it’s just it’s, I think it’s , it’s, it’s really important to kind of just focus on , um, yeah . Whatever data points you have access to. Right. Because in B2B, let’s say for example , um, there are a lot of issues where, you know, sometimes you can’t register an open, right? You might have open tracking in place. Um, but for whatever reason, the openness not showing up, right. The click is not showing up. It’s, it’s possible that you don’t know that that’s an active person. So that’s where you really need to look outside of those, those , uh , email metrics to be able to understand what those people are doing. And sometimes you just need to take that, that leap of faith right. And say, okay, well, let’s let send to those inactives once in a while and let’s see what happens does that generate , um , some kind of activity on the website that you can track somewhere else, something like that. Um, I, you know, it really is just, it’s, it’s , it’s really, it’s difficult. Um, but I think that’s just, you almost need to put yourself in the shoes of your recipients and say like, is this an email that I would want to receive? You know, and really when you’re doing that, not just be yourself , um, try to put on that persona of that buyer, right? If are somebody who is buying from you every single week , um, do they need an email from you every day? I don’t know. Let’s say on the other side, if you’ve got like somebody who’s buying a car , um, don’t send them stuff to buy a new car, like a week or a month or a year later, maybe send them things that , that, that tell them how they can maintain the car that they just purchased. Right. Or something like that. So it’s , it’s really just knowing the audience, knowing the intent, knowing the reason that they would want to engage with your brand and then kind of taking that leap of faith to really figure out what , what the best way forward is.
Kyle Hamer:
So I hear this debate often, and I’m hoping that maybe you can provide clarity cause I , I heard you allude to it without actually getting into it. What’s the difference between a nurture campaign and a drip campaign.
Lauren Meyer:
Woo . Okay. Yeah. And this is, you know, it’s funny because in deliverability, I am often talking about the difference between a delivery rate and a deliverability rate, because those are very different things. And I feel like , um , this is sort of a same kind of debate where it’s like people often interchangeably use drip campaign, nurture campaign to be the same thing. Like they are the same thing. Um, for me, I would say the difference and I want , I’m curious to hear what your answer to this is. Um, but I would say , um, for me, a drip campaign is, is time-based. So it’s, you know, somebody signs up they’re a new customer or , or they, you know, sign up to your list. And so they get that welcome email and then two days later they get something else that says, Hey, here’s some, I, you know , um, some features about my products or you’re a new customer. So let me walk you through how to use certain things or how to set up your profile or, you know, things like that. Right. So you’re introducing them to your brand and, and helping them along the way. Um, whereas I see the nurture campaign as more behavior based . So, you know , um, you know, visually, maybe this looks more like a decision tree where it’s not just like, boom, boom, boom, you get an email on X day. It’s like, well, did you open that first email? If yes, send them this one, two days later, if no, send them this one, one day later. And then if they do this and so it kind of gets a little bit more complex, but the idea there I think is , is really to nurture them into, okay, we can see where you’re going. We can see the links that you’re clicking on. You like our , um , thought leadership type of content, as opposed to just pure sales stuff. So it’s taking you down that path of trying to improve your segmentation, drip campaign. I don’t think gets nearly that , that , um, intricate,
Kyle Hamer:
Well, okay. So first of all, thank you. I , in , in, in some of this, I agree in some of it. I think the nuance for me is different. Okay . The way I, the way I define nurture is nurture is, is I want you to take a specific action, whether it’s a specific action to buy a specific action, to go through an onboarding process, a specific action to learn something I’m nurturing you to, to, to your point of a behavior modification. Sometimes that feels like it’s a drip because it’s time-based. And it’s like, Hey, this week I’m teaching you about this new part of the product next week, I’m gonna teach you about this part. But the point is, is I’m nurturing you the fall in love with the product and show you things that you’ve never had before. Right? Some people call it onboarding, but the , the way that it’s set up is a, is a nurture campaign. At a certain point. I can’t influence your behavior anymore, but I still want to stay in touch with you. And to me, that is the tickler or the drip, where it becomes at a certain period. There’s a reason for me to reach out again, Hey, I just wanted to, Hey, we’ve missed you. Or, but it is that time-based piece. And for many organizations, what I heard you say earlier is , uh , be intentional. You’re thinking about things only as nurture only as nurture only as nurture, and then you’re dead to me. Uh, but the, the way that you keep them engaged might be just a time-based drip, every six weeks, we just reach out and say, you should check this out. This is interesting. Or you should check that out. This is interesting. And, and you’re , you’re fishing a little bit, but you’re fishing at a timeframe or at an interval that doesn’t feel invasive. Doesn’t fill over the top, but still keeps you on the road .
Lauren Meyer:
Yeah. Yeah. I like that.
Kyle Hamer:
But you know, I mean, that’s, that’s how I define it. When w with working with people, I think everybody, to your, you know , to your point, there’s a tomato, tomato, potato, you know, what, what is it? Yeah , there’s a , there’s a bit of the finding that, and I think it’s really important that when organizations are setting up their emails, that they’re defining what the difference is like, that’s, that vocabulary is really important. Somebody says, Oh, you just do a drip campaign. That means something totally different to organization a versus a drip campaign means it’s something totally different for organization B. So I think it’s important to have those, those defined internally .
Lauren Meyer:
Yeah. I love that. And , you know, I think it’s, you know, you talk about even just defining the terms and unfortunately, that is so important with all of the , the stuff that we’re doing, like where , like, you know, you have the first who it’s like, Oh, well, I thought you were talking about this, or I’m defining , um, the click-through rate this way and you’re defining it this other way or something like that. Right. So , um, I , yeah, it’s super important, but I think even more so it’s like, you know , once you’re getting into that, if you decide to do a drip campaign , um , look at all the steps and make sure that those make sense too , right . Because like, just because you’re like, Oh , cool, drip campaign, let’s just go find it on the internet and pop it into our program. Like, it really does need to make sense for, again, your goals with email and your subscribers.
Kyle Hamer:
So I’m going to ask a question about something that, that it’s , it’s a load that I got to get off my chest. It is probably my single biggest pet peeve when it comes to, to email cold outbound, unsolicited email. Now I’m going to set this up with a couple of things. First of all, we know that , uh , there’s an article put in, I think Inc , where roughly 9% of spam ends up making it into people’s inboxes. There’s also additional statistics that show that if I reach out to you seven times or more as a sales person , I am more than likely going to be able to get a conversation, at least have a, have a chat with you. Okay. How can organizations use things like cold email? Well, first question is, should organizations use things like cold outbound email? Where does that fit in the world? Second thing is, is how can they use it so that it doesn’t feel so spammy?
Lauren Meyer:
Yeah. Um, you know, I’m torn, I work for a B2B business, right. And so , um, I , I don’t think my , my , my team is very, very much on the anti-abuse side. So we don’t do a lot of spamming. We , we really work with inbound mostly, but I get it that that businesses need to do outbound. And so it’s just part of it. Um, I think the key is how do you identify with a cold email? If the person actually is going to find value in whatever it is you are selling to them. Um, you know, the spray and pray technique has been done to death. I’ve worked with salespeople even when I was working for an ESP that didn’t allow cold emails to be sent on our platform who were sending, you know, they’re like, Hey, I’m out of my credits for ZoomInfo or whatever else they’re using. Um, and they’ve sent to hundreds of people in a week , um, with no segmentation, no idea, truly if we are a good fit for them. So I think the key is , um, I mean, this is true for all email that you’re sending, but especially for cold email is provide value. Um, get your message out there quickly. Right. Like, and I , you know, I saw something yesterday where someone was like, don’t apologize. Right ? Like, don’t just say, Hey, I’m bumping myself to the top of your inbox, or, Hey, sorry to bug you again. Or something like, just get to the point, let me know what it is that you’re offering. That is so valuable to me that it’s taking time away from everything else I’m doing in my day. So , um, you know, I think if you’re sending, you know , so that stat that you shared is what was it? Seven, seven emails sent is when the conversation kinda changes. Right. So , um, or more than seven emails , is that what you said?
Kyle Hamer:
It it’s seven it’s seven touches. So it’s seven touches your , your , you increase your likelihood of a conversation, I think by 80%.
Lauren Meyer:
Okay. Yeah. So that makes sense. So figure it’s, you know, you contact them on what , on LinkedIn, you send them an email and you try to phone, you know, give them a phone call, whatever, but I think, you know, the , the emails that you send , um, shouldn’t just be, hi, my name’s Lauren. And here’s why my business is the best and what you should do. It really is like, figure out what, what their actual pain points would be, and then try to serve those. So if you’re sending emails , um, you know, for example, if you’ve got somebody who’s like a new hire, like you’re like, Hey, you’re, you’re new to the organization. Um, maybe I can help provide information. That’s going to help you , um , be better at getting up to speed in your organization or hiring new people, your , for your team or something related to that. Um, you know, if it’s just a matter of like, Hey, I see that you’re an email and this is what you do, no businesses like them. Right? Like, so for me , um , one of my customer bases is ESPs. And so I’ve worked for ESPs into what they like and what they need and know what their pain points are. Um, so I shouldn’t just send them an email. That’s like, Hey, email verification, come check it out. Um, I know what their actual goals are, where that fits into their business model and where it doesn’t. So I think it just a matter of kind of using your emotional intelligence and your business intelligence and just, yeah. Finding the right angle the right way to provide value and stop making it about you. Right. It’s not about you. It’s about the recipient of the email and providing value to them.
Kyle Hamer:
All right. So I’ve got a cold email. I will , uh , we’ve, we’ve scrubbed the names. And, but I do want to give a bit of context. This is sent from a male sales rep to a female practitioner, and I’m just interested to get your perspective on, is this good? Is this bad? Is this harassment? What is this cold email? Okay. So here’s the email. I looked up your email and found out that your name means blooming and Greek, and sometimes refers to the young green foliage or shoots of a plant in the spring. Very cool. Speaking of blooming foliage, Hunter reps who use our product are weeding out data and planting seeds of opportunities in their pipeline. You could say that they have a garden full of budding revenue. Overall, our overall, our software cuts out administrative tasks for your reps, so they can focus on revenue generating activities. Do you want to learn more about revenue in the same head count, what it would look like? I’d like to plant a seed with you, regards sales rep.
Lauren Meyer:
Interesting. So I’m so curious because I’m wondering if , if you do have a name that’s, that’s very interesting and kind of has like an origin to it. Like, is that something that you’ve been pitched to many, many times? I don’t know as if , um , maybe, maybe somebody’s like, Oh, that’s so interesting that you looked up my name and you’re trying to get personal. Um, it’s a little over the top cutesy for me because it kind of really plays hard into that. Like planting the seed and Oh , letting it grow and all this stuff. So I think it’s, it’s a little heavy handed. I mean, I don’t, I don’t see anything wrong with the fact that it’s , it’s a male rep reaching out to a female. Like I didn’t see any real sexism or anything in there. Um, I’ve definitely seen some that are just very much like, Oh, you’ve got a beautiful profile pick . Let’s do some business together or weird things like that. That’s cringe-worthy right. So , um, here, I don’t see that. I think it’s just, it’s a little too over the top cutesy. It’s kinda like it. Doesn’t like, yes, you look me up. Yes. You know something about me for me. I often get people who are like, Hey, I see you love pepperoni pizza. Oh. You know, like my favorite type is this. And yes, I love pizza. So that’s a good opener, but then you do still need to kind of match. Like, why, why are you reaching out to me? Why should I care about your email? Um, yeah, you’ve got me interested, but yeah, it felt a little, a little heavy handed too . Like, it’s kinda like you , you waited a little long to get to , um, the , the value of email, right? Like, it’s like, I’m probably gonna stop reading when you’re like, Oh, you’re talking about my name, whatever. Um, I know the definition of my name. Right. So I don’t know. What do you think?
Kyle Hamer:
Well, I , I , I was curious and the reason I’m curious is if you’ve been on the ESP side where it’s like, Hey, we’re not doing our cold outreach at all. Like, if you don’t know, or don’t have a connection, this is a dead end for me when I read it. Um, there’s way too much room left for interpretation. Like just some of the statements, like, let me plant a seed with you. It’s like, mm .
Lauren Meyer:
About what? Yeah. Right.
Kyle Hamer:
I would have probably left that out and used a different closing line , um, and potentially made the, the email work. I’m I’m not adamant against cold outreach. I’m adamant against spamming people and spraying and praying. Right. I think that there’s, there’s value in reaching out in an intentional and an intelligent way, but that every Avenue we come up with to communicate with our potential customers or reach the market , uh, Americans are inherently lazy in what they want to do. They want to get right to scaling up and, and driving, you know, instead of sending 25 carefully crafted intentional, I know a little bit about Lauren. Uh , I need to craft this in a way that’s, that’s, that’s engaging or even just saying, Hey, here’s some information that I think you would find valuable, right? Showing up with a gift of, of information or something that, Hey, I saw this pepperoni pizza. Did you know that in New York city, there’s over 35 million pieces of pepperoni pizza eaten a day. What, that’s crazy, where did you get? And here’s an article I thought you might enjoy, right. Some way to start a conversation, right? Yeah . Versus showing up and saying, Hey, I see you like pepperoni pizza, by the way, I have a taco stand and I want you to buy my taco. Like , it’s like, doesn’t it too often, the segway falls apart before the relationship has ever built. And what I’m curious about is , you know, I asked this question earlier, but it’s, you know, you talked about people with coronavirus and people that were , uh, would you say value? What was the word you say ? You said value. Um, I’m gonna say projecting, but that’s not right. It’s um , virtue signaling virtue signaling. Thank you. That’s what, that’s the word I was looking for. So you said they were virtue signaling. There are also companies that we’re virtue signaling, but we’re doing a really good job of creating a relationship or creating humanity in what they were, they were writing. Why is it in your experience that some companies feel like we’re talking to robots and some companies will send out a mass email and feels like we’re talking to a human one, feels like a billboard and I’m just driving by getting hit in the face with it in my inbox. The other feels like somebody actually slowed down enough for the CEO of X, Y, or Z company to reach out and say, Lauren, I’m talking to you specifically.
Lauren Meyer:
I , you know, I think the difference really is about knowing your audience , um , and speaking to them about things that they care about. So, you know, I think I heard of , um , some business who was, who was kind of offering like, Hey, you know, if you, if you sign up for a demo with us, if you do a demo with us , um , we’ll donate money to toys for tots. And so while I love the toys for tots and I love the idea of them donating something , um, it still feels very, very like self-interested for, for that business to say, Hey, basically we just want you to get a demo with us. Right. Um, whereas let’s say if you’re like a pet store pet store , um, and you’re saying, Hey, you know, round up to the dollar , um , for your purchase. And we’ll donate that money to , um, you know, a pet , uh, I don’t know , something related to two dogs or cats or whatever, right. Something that, that, that the pet lovers really, really care about to , um, you know, a local adoption facility or something like that. So I think it’s really is about pairing whatever the cause is with what your audience is going to care about and , and not just making it again all about you. Like, I think it just needs to be, it needs to be genuine. Like people need to feel like you actually understand their needs, you have your own morals and values, and that may , and hopefully those are aligned. And so that’s why they’re reaching out to you and telling you about this great news, but I think that’s the differences . Some companies are just, you know, it’s like one of those , um, you know, if you’re making your, your, your, all of your workers come to work during coronavirus, and then you just throw a sign on the, on the front door that says our employees are heroes like that falls flat because you’re still working your employees to the bone and not really giving them any, you know, any, any way to stay safe during a pandemic or something. So I think it really is just about , um, you know, letting whatever message you’re , you’re sending out there. Just be very true to who you are as a brand. Um, and really just, just, yeah, making it, making it very, very, very clear that, that it really is something that’s coming from your heart and not just meant to kind of drive attention and drive money towards your business
Kyle Hamer:
Samples that you’ve seen where you personally were just like, yeah, they really like, they nailed this. I wasn’t necessarily interested in the brand, or it wasn’t necessarily , uh , looking to do business, but if I get the opportunity to just because of how great of a job they did handling this particular communication or series of communications, I, I definitely want to pay attention to this company.
Lauren Meyer:
Yeah, yeah. I mean, I think, you know, I can’t think of any good examples right now because I feel like I’ve seen way too many. Um , but one was , you know, like when, when the BLM movement was, was kind of at the forefront of , of all the craziness that happened this year , um, you know, there was this, this , um, kind of talk that, that happened within our community, which is, you know, we have this term of, of blacklisting, right? If your IP or your domain could be blacklisted. And they were like, well, what’s the origin of that. That seems like that could be insensitive to certain people. And so there were certain companies and convert kit is , is one that comes to mind. Um, their leadership came out with a message that was like, look, we are going to change this. We’re going to start using the term block list. There really isn’t a huge difference between the two, but one seems like it might make people uncomfortable, the other doesn’t. And everyone’s very clear about the fact that these terms are very much the same. So let’s just go ahead and change that. And so , um, I just, I liked that it was, you know, it wasn’t just, Hey, we’re doing this cause everyone else is doing it, virtue signaling. It was very much like, look, we , we just, we wanna make a change. And we have already gone ahead and updated all of our documentation internally and going forward, the whole company is using block lists and all this stuff. And so it just, it felt very much like, wow, we just, we kind of learned something and we decided to course correct accordingly. Um, not just a way to kind of bring in a couple of extra sales like that. I think they really thought about their audience and their employees, and they heard the feedback from everyone and , and decided to make that change because of that.
Kyle Hamer:
That’s awesome. Uh , you know, it , it strikes me a lot, like the , uh, the email now it was an internal email communication that was sent out. But the email that came out from , uh, Brian Chesky, the CEO of Airbnb, and I don’t know if you’re familiar with this, but yeah , on, on May 5th, they had gotten to the point , uh, with the, the shutdown in the corn teams and the , the stop of the , um, the travel industry, where they had to make some really hard decisions and the way that the, that Brian or his ghostwriter , whoever sat down and wrote the email, when you read it, you didn’t feel like it was dire and doom and gloom, and that Airbnb was going to go out or, you know, they were, they were being impersonal with, with how they were making decisions. They were very, very transparent. They were very, very, very thankful. And they shared with the world why they were making the decisions they were making and what it meant for the business without ever making these people who were part of the cuts or the furloughs feel less than, or feel like they weren’t part of the journey or that, that they, they weren’t employable. And , and to me, there was something, so I wasn’t a big Airbnb fan before. Like I didn’t, I knew people that would use it. I was like, I don’t, I don’t get it. It’s not for me. But on the backside of that email, I was like, I’m going to pay attention to Airbnb now, because at the top, when it came down to choosing, do I make a business decision, or do I make a human decision? Brian and team made a business decision that felt very human. It felt very humane and communicated in a way where there was no guilt or shame to the people that were let go. They understood what was going on. And basically sent them out the door with a, with a glaring endorsement saying, if at any point we can hire them back. We will, if not, and you want them, we’ll take them. Like they’re, they’re amazing people. And to me, there was just something about that just was very rich. And when it came across from the email, everybody else had been saying in these challenging times, we’re doing these things to protect our employees. And it’s like, I don’t care what you’re doing to protect your employees. How are you going to maintain my level of service? And the transparency from Airbnb helped me understand why they were making transitions, what that meant for the business, how it would impact me, how it would impact the market, but did it in a way it’s like, wow, I th here’s a , here’s a company that’s not just virtue signaling. Right? They’re , they’re living and , and embodying what it means to be a company that, that loves its people that , that , that cares about what’s happening in, in is trying to be long-term viable. I don’t, there’s just something about that. That does. I found very, very, very rich.
Lauren Meyer:
Yeah. And I think that’s the key is you can like whatever the subject matter is in that case, obviously bad news coming for companies, whether it’s good news that you’re sharing. I think the key is just to, to be heartfelt , um, you know, to , to be humane, if it is bad news or if it’s something that’s that people aren’t gonna want to hear. Um, and , and to be thoughtful, like, you know, it’s one of those, like, I think that’s the other thing is , is just some of this stuff just comes off. So thoughtless, like people are just speaking into a vacuum and they don’t really think about how the person on the other side might receive that message and, and realize that those people might have different beliefs and values, and maybe they’re having a hard week or a hard year. Um, you know , so I think it’s just a matter of yeah, just really being, you know, and that, that email is great because it really, it makes you think better about the company, because you’re like, wow, they really were thoughtful and , and , and just care about their , their own people. And so of course they care about their business and they’re being thoughtful in the decisions that they’re making for their business. So , um , yeah, that’s, that was a great email.
Kyle Hamer:
It was, it was good. So look , uh , we’ve talked about everything under the sun today, as it relates to email, I’m curious for an organization that’s just fighting, like they’re wrestling with email . Like I can’t get my hands around it. Sales hates it , marketing, can’t figure it out. It just seems like a pain. What advice would you give a , an organization that’s trying to get the most out of email and , and , and, you know, what’s two to three, maybe five things that they could do to right. The ship and get rolling.
Lauren Meyer:
Yeah. I think, you know, the key is to start small , um, start wherever you have , you know, don’t wait until you’ve got a huge list that you’ve built up for the last six months. Um, you know, start small, let the audience kind of can just build that audience really , um, learn from , from what’s happening. Right. So if you’re just getting started, really dig into whatever metrics you have that help you understand, you know, if you have higher open and click through rates on some emails, that’s great, but also look at your negative metrics. So , um, notice that the campaigns that tend to drive the most unsubscribes, the higher complaint rates , um, things like that, because I think that’s where, like, you’re really, you’re trying to optimize every part of your program. Um, really look at at, especially if you’re, if you’re just getting started , um, take some time to really consider what your goals are with email and then build your court , your programmatic accordingly. Like, I think a lot of times, you know, people are trying to kind of build their lists really quickly with things like a sweepstakes or , um, you know, some other kind of lead magnet that they gets a lot of signups , but like figure, you know, if you, I don’t know if you sell , um, pet supplies, which I mentioned earlier, but you have the sweepstakes that has nothing to do with that. People are just looking to win like a million dollars or a trip to Italy or something like that. Um, you know, what’s the point, like, how are , why are these people going to stay on your list about pet products , um, going forward, right? So really building build an email audience, not an audience of potential buyers, but build it around, you know , and the consider who your potential buyer is consider what types of emails those people might like, but then build that , that list collection process accordingly. So that you’re growing it with people who are potential buyers and are going to like the email content that you’re sending. Um , you don’t , I think that’s that one’s one that people tend to miss a lot , um, and then set expectations as well. So you can use a signup process if it is cold emails , um, you know, honestly do your best to try to get people to sign up. Right. So if you’ve , if you have any kind of thought leadership, if you’ve got a blog, if you have webinars, get them to sign up first, because then they are showing you in 10, but even if you’re sending cold emails , um, it really is just important to , to, to drive the value set expectations about why you’re in their inbox, why you’re in their face, what you’re looking to get out of that, why you can provide real value for people. Um, but again, especially when you’re, when you , when people are signing up , um, if you promise them weekly emails, don’t start sending to them daily, out of nowhere. Um, you know, just, just really S you know , stick with those expectations. And if you’re going to change things , um, because you’re new to your email program and you realize that that’s something you promised isn’t gonna work out , um, be up front with your audience, right? Send him an call and let them know that you’re going to change their frequency, or you’re going to change the content that they’re going to send in , or you’ve got a new type of content that you think they might be interested in, let them opt in to that, use that as like a different mail stream or something like that. So I think it really is just about , um, finding a way to respect the people that you’re about to contact via email, because I mean, yes, email is a massive place and my inbox is never going to be at zero. It’s got thousands and thousands of emails in there at this point. Um, but, but understand that, that people do have a finite amount of time in their day. And they’re looking to get value out of whatever emails they’re sending. So, you know, make them laugh , um , make them cry in a good way if that’s what you’re going for. Um, but just, just give them something that’s gonna make them feel better about your brand and not just damage damage, that brand presence that you have. And don’t just send emails just to send email, right. Really, really focused on providing that value, because if you’re just hitting send, because your boss said, you need to send weekly, find something interesting to put in that content.
Kyle Hamer:
Well, and I actually couldn’t agree with you more so , uh, working with a company , uh, probably in the last 90 days, and they changed their, their strategies. It relates to email, and they went from emailing , uh, ad hoc to emailing daily. And initially there’s this influx in shock in the market, but the shock to the list was people, were it wasn’t that we told them what they were going to do. Like they were the emails where like, say, Hey, we’re, we’ve switched from ad hoc. You’re going to get these daily. You can opt out right here. Hey, we get these daily, you can opt out right here. Uh, they had opted in because they had purchased from this particular company. But the thing that was really, really interesting is the, the guys that were doing this email program, they missed a day. So they , they were emailing every day and there was all of a sudden one Thursday, they’re like , Oh, we don’t have any content . So they waited until Friday on that Thursday, four people emailed in and said, Hey, where’s, today’s message. Where’s today’s email. I was looking forward to getting where, where is it? And when that happens, right. You realize that maybe it’s not with, you know, hundreds of thousands of people, but there are people out there that if you’re doing it right, and you’re being intentional, you’re building a relationship with on the other side of that inbox.
Lauren Meyer:
Yeah, for sure. And you should treat those people differently than maybe the rest of your audience, right? If you have ways to identify within your, your email list , um, even just two segments, the people who seem to open engage regularly, the ones who emailed you and said, Hey, where’s my email. Um, versus the ones who really only open every couple of weeks or months, right. Just maybe, maybe sense of them less, maybe send to them once a week, instead of every single day. Um, you know, I think that’s , that’s important for deliverability as well. Like, you know, especially with , um , if you’re sending a lot of, a lot of volume to Gmail, for example, Gmail cares a lot about user engagement. So if you’re sending to people daily and they never ever see that they’re opening, opening and clicking, it’s just kind of sinking further into their inbox. Um, eventually they’re going to start sending that’s a spam. So you really do need to focus on , on those engagement metrics with certain types of, you know , destinations you’re sending to
Kyle Hamer:
Sure. That makes perfect sense. Uh, one, one of the thing, maybe in, you know, a one to two minutes, what are things that marketers , uh, organizations should be aware of on the horizon, whether it comes to legislation or changing in, in, in market? I mean, we just finished up an election, but, you know, we have the CCPA, we have castle, we have GDPR, we have can spam. Are there other things that are coming as it relates to protecting that inbox that, you know, marketers and folks need to be aware of?
Lauren Meyer:
Yeah. I mean, I think, you know , the legislation is changing. It’s getting a little bit better, but I think that’s, you know, legislation always tends to be , um, pretty far behind the curve. You know , I , you know, especially when we talk about canned spam in the U S um, which is the , you know, the least , um, the least strict, if you will , um, you know, don’t set your bar at the level of what’s legal go well above that. Right. Um, you know, really, again, focus on, on what’s going to provide value to your subscribers. Um, so I think that, you know, going forward, it’s going to be more, not to say more about segmentation. I think we have a lot of segmentation, a lot of automation in place already. So I think it should be going to be kind of using those tools responsibly , um, like shiny tools are , are awesome. Automation is great, but if you’re, if you’re kind of losing that human touch within your email, I think that’s, that’s something that like, we’re almost kind of getting to that, that Exodus point where it’s like, Oh my gosh, we are to the point where we are treating everybody like a robot. So I think we’re gonna kind of have to step back from that . And I think this year has been really helpful in that where you can’t just be a robot and just hit, send and hit send, you have to be a little bit more empathetic. Um, and so I’d like to see it . And I , I’m hoping that we’ll see more of a shift in that direction where people are a little bit more responsible with email. Um, my , my one fear is, you know, we’ve been hearing all of these , um, these comments about, you know, AI and using machine learning and kind of using that to, to have your segmentation going. Um, but I think it just, it’s one of those , um, if you don’t do that stuff, right, you could be training your system with a lot of bias. Um, you could be really, really kind of screwing up your email program . So I’d say, you know, just make sure , um, if you’re getting into that, that kind of more complex stuff with automation , uh , make sure you have somebody who knows what they’re doing and can plan it out. Like, I think, you know , um , marketing operations people are very well undervalued, very, very much so, so , um, I’d like to see them get a little bit more of a light shined on them in the future, but I think, yeah, it really is just going to be about , um, going forward. People expect they , you know, that they want personalization. Um, I think there was a study recently. I think it’s 81% of people said that they want more personalization. They’re willing to give you information to get a more personalized experience and about 50% of them, I think so they they’re willing to pay for that experience. Um, so, you know, ask people what they want, right. Progressive profiling is really helpful in that sense. I see more of trying to kind of figure out what is it that , that , that my audience wants. Um, you know , but I think that’s where, you know , we , we, as, as recipients of email demand, it, we demand to have things that are relevant, right? Like I am a female and I’m married to a woman. So don’t send me clothing options that are for men, because I don’t have a husband that I’m shopping for. Right. So I think it just it’s understanding your consumers in certain ways. And then using that data to, to be helpful to them is , is where we’re going. It’s just a matter of , um, how, how many eggs are we going to break on the way to getting there, to making that perfect omelet? Right.
Kyle Hamer:
Makes sense. Yeah. Well, speaking of omelets, that brings up food and food brings me to my last question, which is pizza, my favorite, which the way I said, it’s more of a statement than a question. However, when it comes to pizza, if there was one piece of pizza that you could have, what would it be? Where would it be from and why?
Lauren Meyer:
Oh my gosh, well, I am completely torn between two. So I’m going to have to give you two answers here. Um, the first one, my favorite style of pizza is Neapolitan. Um, and actually I was in Pompei last year about last year, last October. Um, and I had the most amazing slice of me Neapolitan pizza, and honestly , I still dream about it. My mouth is watering right now, thinking about it. So , um, that would be the number one. And I think the key there was that they made the cheese locally within that region of Italy and like just the ingredients were just super fresh and super amazing. So anybody that really uses fresh ingredients I think is , is, is winning. Uh , but the other one is very different, which is , um, I used to live in New York city for the , for the past 15 years. And there was this place called Emmy squared, which is Detroit style pizza. And if you’ve never had Detroit style pizza, please go try it because it’s, it’s delicious. It’s really good. It’s, it’s kinda , it’s, it’s like a square pizza. Um, it’s, it’s got like a, kinda like a thicker crust , almost like a Chicago style a little bit, but it’s like, it’s, it’s light and airy, but it’s also kind of like greasy and just make sure it just sticks to your ribs and it feels really good. So there’s this place that just had this, this awesome one that was pepperoni and , um, a little bit of , of peppers on top. And then it had like a honey drizzle. So I think that one’s gotta be my, my, my go-to since I can’t have it anymore. You know, so now that I’m in California, we don’t, we don’t get that out here.
Kyle Hamer:
That’s awesome. Um, now I’m hungry because it’s lunchtime here. Um, so if people want to get a hold of you, Lauren, what’s the best way to get ahold of you, whether it’s a chat about email , uh , what is it the validation for, for Kickbox or just to discuss, you know, their favorite slice of pie? How do they get ahold of you?
Lauren Meyer:
I would say the best ways are probably try to connect with me on LinkedIn or on Twitter, whichever one you prefer and kind of, I’m leaning more towards Twitter these days. I think it’s just a little bit more conversational, but , um , but yeah, so, so find me on either of those , um, you know, if you want to book a demo for a new deliverability suite, feel free to kind of find kickbox.com and then you can do that. But , um, yeah, I’d love to chat with you about pizza or email or anything else.
Kyle Hamer:
Awesome. Well, it’s been great having you on the show. We’ve, we’ve spent all day today talking about, you know, everything you know about marketing, not marketing, email, everything you know about email is wrong. Uh , and really we got into some interesting topics. So thank you so much for being a guest. You’re , you’ve been incredibly generous with your , your knowledge and what you’ve shared with us. Thank you.
Lauren Meyer:
Thanks . So
Kyle Hamer:
Thank you guys for listening. This has been another episode of the summit podcast. Make sure you like subscribe, follow whatever you do. Just be a part come back next week when we got another great episode. I’m your host, Kyle Hemer . Thanks for listening.
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