Video 6


Subscriber segmentation - you know what this is.  Or you think…  Well, it’s when you - no, that’s not it, wait… Okay, you take a segment and…
Still not entirely sure yet, hey?  That’s okay, we find a lot of our clients (especially new email marketers) think they understand all our features, but when it comes to it they’re not sure how to implement them.  They loose out on all the amazing power tools we offer!

The videos you’ve been watching this past week were all produced with the aim of making our services even more accessible to you.  And so, as you’ve probably guessed, the latest of our GraphicMail videos is about Subscriber Segmentation.  Segmenting your mailing list means you group various contacts together according to specific criteria.  The video gives you a more detailed explanation of how to do it and what it means for your marketing campaign.  It’s targeted email marketing at its best.

This may be the last in our series of video blogs, but don’t for a moment think the fun stops here!  The six videos we’ve blogged about this past week are but the first - we’ll have more for you in April.  Happy viewing!

Have you heard about our Webinars?  If you have any questions about our services, you can sign up for one of our online webinars.  A member of our team will fill you in on how anything works, and the live interaction gives you a chance to ask any questions that are still unanswered.

Video

You’ve noticed the buzz around our FeedMail service; you even think it sounds impressive, this RSS to email business.  But it sounds like more time and effort spent on email marketing and you really have other business to get back to…  Never fear!  Give us a few minutes and we’ll have that ball rolling for you.

Our renowned FeedMail service let’s you send RSS feeds (that’s a live newsfeed on the latest activity in your blog or website) straight to email.  It’s like a mini-headline that is sent to your subscribers’ inboxes and they can then click on the link to your blog or website if they want the full story.  So you see, it actually saves you time, rather than taking time.
Your readers will be constantly up to date on your latest happenings, services or promotions, while you’ll have more targeted contact with your subscribers over a wider range of communication channels.  It's a win-win situation.

Of course, we’ve very conveniently put together a video showing you how to operate FeedMail!  It explains the service and you can see where to find it all in your account.  Who could ask for more?  It’s the couch potato’s way of learning how to keep subscribers up to date.

Video 5

Ready to watch the Oscars tonight?  We’re picking up where we left off last week and continuing our own celebration of film with the GraphicMail videos!

As part of our series of new email marketing videos we included one specifically on TriggerMail.  So while we told you all about the new TriggerMail feature when we launched it last month, you can now actually see how these advanced autoresponders work.

TriggerMail was developed to save you time, right? So instead of trying to figure it out on your own, why not watch this brief TriggerMail introductory video to see exactly how it works and what you can do with it? It'll show you where to find TriggerMail in your account, how to set it up and what it can do for you. 


Like it?  The latest buzz around email marketing is incorporating video into your emails.  Did you know that you can also include a still shot of a YouTube video in your emails?  Hop on the bandwagon and see how your subscribers respond.

Video 4

You’ve created an email newsletter, sent it out, and did your best to optimise deliverability rates.  You pat yourself on the back, think “Yep, I’ve got the hang of this” and happily continue sending monthly newsletters, impressed by your new-found email marketing skills.  This is when we tap you on the back and say “You're not quite done yet, tiger”.

Of all the value-added services our email marketing platform provides you with, our comprehensive reports and statistics are one of the most important.  Every time you send an email newsletter we provide you with a full statistical report showing you how your emails were received, how many of your subscribers opened or followed a link in your email and much, much more.  Reading these reports is one of the most important things you can do for your email marketing campaign, because it tells you where you went wrong so you can tweak your approach and improve in future campaigns.

This video shows you how to do just that!  It shows you where you can view the reports and where to find all the different email metrics, all while giving you tips on how you can improve. 

If there’s one thing we know about our clients it’s that they want results – so have a look at this one and learn how to read yours.

Video 3

Deliverability - what a mouth full! It’s really just the process of getting your emails into your subscribers’ inboxes. Well, maybe not “just”. Deliverability has always been a concern for email marketers, but the ever changing landscape makes it even harder to ensure excellent delivery of your email campaigns.

We'll be honest, no email marketing platform can guarantee 100% inbox delivery.  Your reputation, and by that we mean the quality of your message and your readers interest in it, is the best antidote to delivery issues.  Every time someone opens your email or clicks on a link in it, it improves your reputation.  Every time they complain it harms your reputation.

So how do you keep current on changes to ISPs, ESPs, legislation, opt-in, open rates, click rates and opt-out? What are the latest best practices? Do you know fact vs. fiction when it comes to email deliverability? Do you know your own deliverability rate?

Spend a worthwhile 3 minutes with email deliverability guru GraphicMail, who will give you an overview of Yahoo, Comcast,  Roadrunner and other major feedback loops, the CAN-SPAM Act, sender authentication and permission methods.

Did you know?

GraphicMail is a member of ReturnPath, the EEC and Truste.

Video 2

How did you like our new email marketing tour?  Makes for some fun, informative entertainment behind your desk, doesn’t it?  Well, we think the next one in our series of video tutorials should be very useful for aspirant and accustomed email marketers alike.

This one is all about newsletter templates.  Say you’ve signed up and set up a mailing list, you know what you want to say… and then you hit blank.  Great, you want to send out email newsletters, but how do you even make one of those?  And how should it look?

Newsletter templates have to convey so many things!  Sure, content is important (you want to get the right message out after all), but the frame it’s presented in is equally important.  The look and feel of your emails has to be consistent with your brand image so that you don’t only attract once-off sales, but build a loyal customer base.  It needs to simultaneously be visually exciting and easy on the eye, so your subscribers will actually read it.

Our latest GraphicMail video - Free newsletter templates - gives you a quick glance at how you can get a template; whether it’s importing or creating a template, to using one of our free templates; and what you can do with it once you have one.  It sets you on the next step in creating your campaign - and it does this in less than two minutes.

We’re hoping these email marketing videos will save you time and make life a whole lot easier.  Isn't it so much more exciting than reading a brochure?

Video 1

So you’ve been getting all these emails about GraphicMail; or maybe you’re a bit in the dark about all these new email marketing features we’ve launched recently; or you’ve been hanging around our site figuring out what we’re all about.  Perhaps you signed up for a free trial account, but just never quite got round to actually checking out our website…

GraphicMail’s stepped into the spotlight with some funky videos!  (Wait till you see the graphics…)  The videos are less than five minutes each and they cover various aspects of our service – we’ll be telling you a bit more about each one every day for the next week, similar to how we introduced you to TriggerMail.  What’s easier than kicking back with a coffee (or some popcorn if you want to go all out) and watching a quick movie to find out all you need about email marketing services. 

Start off with the Introductory Tour:  It tells you a bit more about how you can use email marketing, what it can do for you and what we can offer you.  You can get some insight into our various packages and features, all accompanied by a very, very sexy voice and images that’ll prove that it’s not nearly as scary as it sounds. 

The videos are all available on You Tube, but we’ll provide links directly to each video as we blog about them.  Keep watching this space all week!

Now run along and get your popcorn - and listen out for those background sound effects…

Shhh…  Hear that silence?  No one sighing, swearing, or muttering at their computer screens; no yawning and stretching after hours of trying to design a newsletter template…  That’s because we’ve launched a sizzling new Drag and Drop Editor!  Simple, easy and efficient, it’s here to make your email marketing-life a whole lot easier.

Creating visually enticing, content rich newsletters can be daunting – especially when you’re not familiar with the design tools you’re using.  Well, we think we’ve managed to come up with an editor that’s about as easy as it gets.  It’s kind of like one of those “The Idiot’s Guide To…” books:  A super-easy, fool-proof tool for designing you email newsletters.

It’s exactly what the name says – you drag and drop.  Everything is designed in blocks.  Simply choose the template and layout you prefer, click on the block you want to edit and start typing or inserting images.  You can even move the blocks around if you decide you want to change the layout – just click, drag and drop!  Easy.  Though the really, really nifty thing about it, is that if there’s an error or something you don’t like in one of the blocks you only need to edit that particular block, without affecting the rest of your newsletter design.  Saves a few headaches and a whole lot of time, doesn’t it?

We’ve been playing around with it in the office and had it tested by some of our bigger account clients, and so far so good, but if you do encounter some starting-off troubles our Support team is, as always, at the ready to help you out.

‘Revamp’ seems to be our current theme with three new home pages and plenty of new features – all to make your email marketing easier – but we think this is perhaps our greatest time-saver and most user friendly idea yet…  What do you think?  Log in to your account and have a look or, if you don’t have an account, simply sign up for a free trial account.  We want some feedback, so try it out and give us a shout to tell us how this one operates for you.  Just remember:  Click, drag, drop, click, drag, drop, click…

Have you just kicked of your email marketing campaign, but you’re not quite sure if it’s on track?  Or are you a power user with some niggling questions?  Do you feel lonely, trying to navigate your way through all these new GraphicMail features?  Sometimes, you just need someone to talk you through it.

So, true to form, we’ve taken action - by launching free, live webinars!  For those of you who’ve never attended one of these, it’s all the name implies:  An online seminar.  Well, maybe not quite as lengthy as a seminar…  The sessions, hosted online, are a mere 40-45 minutes long – long enough to be informative and answer any questions, without you falling asleep at your desk! 

Each session will be presented by one of our charming team members and let it be said – these guys know their stuff.  Whether you’re a newbie or a pro, they’ll teach you everything from the basics to the advanced; from creating your newsletter to analysing your reports.  You can spunge (sit back and soak up the info) or quiz them as you like, and you might even pick up some useful hints from other users’ questions.

Attending is really easy:  Simply go to the webinar page on our site, and sign up for one at a time that’s convenient for you.  (We’ve scheduled the first three for Thursday 25th February, Tuesday 2nd March and Thursday 4th March.)  You’ll be able to interact with the presenters and see everything they demonstrate live on your screen (all the instructions and registration information is our site).

So sign up and diarise those dates – let’s steer you a little further on the road to success.

TriggerMail Series Part 6


It’s been a week of getting acquainted with TriggerMail, but we’ve now reached the only TriggerMail feature we haven’t told you about yet: 

Subscription triggers

There’s really nothing to it; everytime someone subscribes to a mailing list TriggerMail automatically sends them an email. Your potential subscribers either fill in their email address on a subscription form in your website or on your Facebook page. You obviously have to set it up in the system in order for your subscribers to receive a TriggerMail. You can send them a confirmation email immediately after they subscribe, or an email a few days later telling them “Thank you for subscribing” and you could even add in links to products on your website!

Similarly, when a reader clicks on an unsubscribe link, TriggerMail can be set to send of an automated email confirming the request.  The datasets are also automatically updated, so you can be sure that your list is up to date at all times.

Congratulations, you are now fully up to speed and date with our new set of TriggerMail features!  (If there’s something you’ve missed, scroll down and read the previous entries of this 6-part series.)  With so many options, your clients are bound to be impressed by your incredible communication skills – and how you always seem to know exactly what they want!  All while saving you time, effort and money.  We’ve even impressed ourselves with this one.