I had the opportunity to attend a gigantic conference last week, The 2014 MIMA Summit, and I wanted to share with you a key take-away that I took away from the event. This year's event was themed Rise of the Machines and it took a more technical approach to Interactive Marketing which not only speaks to the geeky side of me but also the realist in me because let's face it, marketers can want things, but it takes a developer/inventor/architect/engineer to realize and manifest something from thin air.

The lunch keynote speaker was Dean Kamen, the founder and president of DEKA Research & Development Corporation which developed the HomeChoice™ portable dialysis machine, the iBOT™ Mobility System, the Segway™ Human Transporter, a DARPA-funded robotic arm, a new and improved Stirling engine and the Slingshot. 

It’s back to school time! Do you know what else? It’s also the time of year that ISPs will begin to make their inbox algorithms more restrictive in anticipation for increasing email volume for the holidays.

Now we at HighRoad understand that in the association space, you aren’t out there marketing products that Auntie Jeannie may enjoy as a holiday gift. We do know from the aggregated statistics from all of our association partners/clients that there could be a dip in deliverability if back to school time means your association starts to ramp up email volume at the same time ISPs are making it more difficult to reach inboxes.

So what if your Membership campaigns require you to ramp up your volume to drive Membership goals at the same time ISPs are getting more restrictive? It means during this time, you must mind your P’s and Q’s and:

• Send emails to known good/valid email addresses. If you are not sure if the emails are valid and if it’s been longer than 6-months that you’ve sent an email to the address, we highly suggest using an Email Validation Service. Sending to older email address will mean you will have a higher bounce rate or worse yet, sending to a recycled spam trap.

Wouldn’t we all like to look like rock star email marketers getting north of 50% open rates, staying off of blacklists and getting almost 100% inbox rates? We all want things, but amazing email metrics are only possible by being strategic and having stellar content. There is no magic wand or easy button. So how does one become more strategic with their email marketing campaigns?

Follow the HighRoad Recipe for eMail Marketing Success:

-Authentication to optimize inbox delivery (DKIM/Sender ID/DMARC)
-Survey your constituents to see what content they value and could take it or leave it
-Segmentation & dynamic content delivery
-Analyze email consuming behaviors, AB Test deployments and do more of what works
-Suppress non-engaged from daily deployments (Non-openers within 180 days)
-Suppress non-engaged before the holidays (September – Mid January non-openers within 90-days)
-Motivate engaged subscribers to share your emails on the top 5 social platforms using Social Share
-AND implement a Permission Campaign 1-2 times per year (July & March)

Are you still not convinced that the cost is justified to reformat existing templates to be mobile friendly and use Responsive HTML design? I'm sure you've heard the buzz about the growth in mobile email consumption in every webinar you have attended or whitepaper you have downloaded.

B2B marketers have been especially slow to move to Responsive design because most B2B email recipients typically have been Outlook users, but that is quickly changing.

Did you know that using the Custom Search feature inside your HighRoad Campaign eMail account can tell you how many subscribers are consuming your emails on their mobile device?

Navigate to Subscribers>Search>Custom Search.

Click on Behavior/Activity on the left under Search Fields.

Drag the Subscribers by Mobile Activity to the yellow search criteria bar and select one of the available options in the drop down menu.

One of the biggest challenges for eMail marketers is monitoring bounce logs and trying to make sense of why an ISP is suddenly not letting your eMails through to in-boxes. It can sometimes feel like you’re herding cats. When it comes to deliverability, eMail subscriber engagement with your eMails (even if they are your members) counts.

Before you hit the send button:

• Has your IT department implemented Domain Keys for better Yahoo deliverability?
• Has your IT department implemented Sender ID for better MSN/Hotmail/Live?
• Are you sending your eMail to valid eMail addresses?
• Are you excluding eMail addresses that have not engaged with your previous eMails in the past 60-180 days?

In Canada, the Electronic Commerce Protection Act (ECPA) Bill C-27 Passed Unanimously on December 2, 2009. Canada's Fighting Internet and Wireless Spam Act (FISA) C-28 passed 12/15/2010 by the Canadian Government and replaced bill c-27 but failed to go into law. FISA or CASL (Canadian Anti-Spam Law) will go into law July 1, 2014 and here is what it will mean for your organization when sending eMail communications to your members: