Apple, Inc. : Lousy Email Marketers

An example this month that bigger doesn't necessarily lead to being better. I'm an apple fan, it's what I'm using as I write this post. I purchased a shiny new MacBook Pro about a year ago with all the bells and whistles. And I love it.

Apple does many things very well. And they do marketing (the interruption type) very, very well.

Apple is lousy at email marketing
At least they send lousy marketing emails to me.

Lets start with this email (screenshot below) they sent me no more than 3 months after I spent $3,000 on my new MacBook. Notice that:

• The email looks beautiful. Perfect actually.
• They are advertising a new MacBook
  

And what I mean by new, is the MacBook that is newer than the one I purchased. And they're even marketing that the price is lower than before.

That's right. They're marketing to me. Ineptly, but marketing it is, and what they're marketing is a replacement to the laptop I had purchased less than 3 months before.



Let me say that again. They sent me an email basically saying "Hey Phil, look at the new, new MacBook. It's faster than the one you bought a couple of months ago and costs less!!"

I was dumbfounded. Why would they do that? If they hoped to make me feel special, well of course that didn't happen. To Apple, it is clear that I'm just an email address.

My Imaginary iPod
The last email they sent me was titled "The perfect speakers for your iPod."

The problem is that I don't own an iPod. Oh sure, I suppose Apple knows that most people who own a MacBook also own an iPod and so the number of people like me is rather small - and they're obviously ok with not making me feel special (see above.)

So they sent me this. Again, the email looks perfect. The message is garbage. This is interruption marketing at it's worse.




What these examples show is that whoever is running the email marketing at Apple is still stuck in the interruption marketing mindset. This is probably to be expected. Apple is very good and has had incredible success with their interruption marketing efforts.

But email is about people. And conversations. And engagement.

And Apple is not doing that. They're being lazy and simply sending a monthly email of what they want to tell me.

Just think of the data and the programmers Apple has that could be utilized to send me relevant emails. They've never once asked how my MacBook was performing (I've sent it in for repairs twice.) Apple has never asked me a question or looked for feedback from me. Ever.

My main point with this post is that small marketers can do better than the billion dollar companies. All you need to do is care, really. Just take a few minutes to engage your subscribers and you'd be doing better than Apple, one of the best marketers on the planet.

Email is a "No Blasting Zone"

Many times I've had clients ask me to help "Blast out an email!!"

I have to wonder...

• Do they like to be blasted?
• Do their subscribers like to be blasted?
• How did this idea of blasting ever get started?

Do you like to be blasted?
No, you don't. If another business were to blast your inbox, I'm sure over time you would unsubscribe or block their emails. More importantly, you would almost certainly look negatively on their brand.

Do you want your subscribers to look upon you negatively? (If yes, then blast away.)

Blasting is a one-way interruption mentality
Successful email marketers understand conversation marketing where you engage in a two way dialogue. The more you engage your subscribers and find out what they want, the better you'll be able to satisfy their wants and desires.

And that means more sales (or more donations if you are a non profit.)

Blasting is for amateurs
And those without a long term strategy. And those stuck in an interruption mindset. Shouting the loudest is not the way to get long term loyal customers.

Be a pro. Think ahead, use surveys, ask questions, engage your subscribers to find out what they want. Then use targeting to send customized emails to a subset of your overall list - speaking directly to their needs.

Your subscribers will respond by buying more of your stuff, spreading the word about your brand, and telling you more about what they want and what they like/don't like about what you have to offer.

Sign up Form Best Practices (and some things to avoid)

Email newsletters are one of the most important design elements of a web site.

The easier you make it for people to find, become interested, and sign up for you email newsletter, the faster you will grow your permission based list.

Value proposition: aka "What's in it for me?"
Do you give your email address to any business that asks for it? No, you don't. Most people give out their email address based on an implicit value equation.

There is a cost to giving out your email address because you risk receiving more spam. So what is the benefit? As a marketer, your goal is to convince the person that the benefit of receiving your marketing emails is greater than the cost/risk of providing their email address.

DO These

Link to the sign up form in multiple places
Eye tracking studies have shown that people look for the link to your newsletter sign up in 3 places.

1. Upper right
   
2. Main navigation
3. Footer of every page
   

There is no rule against linking to a web page multiple times from a different page. Also, by using several different links, you can use different words in the text.

Use important words in links to the sign up form
People scan web sites. Different people might scan for different words. The following are the most common phrases when people are scanning for a newsletter sign up. (The best link is usually "Email Newsletter Sign up".)

• Sign up
• Newsletter
• Email
  

Do not use just the branded name of the newsletter. Most people are scanning for the words in the list, so if your sign up link says something like "market watch" and nothing else, it is likely they will miss the link.

Link to the newsletter archive
If you have an archive, link to it so people can make a better decision about whether to subscribe. If you don't have an archive, describe a sample newsletter and include an image.

Say how often newsletters are sent
And if possible, let your subscribers choose how often. Most importantly, tell them the maximum frequency they will receive emails from you. (It is OK to send less frequent.)

State your privacy policy
If you have a privacy policy page, then link to it. Otherwise, have some text near the sign up form that describes the privacy of the subscriber's email address.

Sell a little
Tell them why signing up for your newsletter will make their life better. Focus on benefits, not features.

DON'T Do These

Don't rely only on a sign up box
Remember, first you need to convince the person they should sign up. Having only a sign up box for their email address provides no convincing. It's just plain lazy.


Don't require too much information (at the start)
You can always ask for more information after you have established a relationship. Remember, it's a value proposition. You show that you can provide value, your subscribers will offer up more of their information (about who they are and what they want). Then you can use those details to send them a more targeted message.

At sign up, ask for email address, first name, and last name. Only ask for more if you absolutely, positively need it. I recommend not just asking for email address because then you have absolutely no chance of adding any personalization.

Over time, you can use surveys to build out a subscriber's profile.

Don't offer a sign up gift
Many organizations offer up a sign up promotion. I'm not big on these as they can be abused. The value from the email should be what convinces someone to subscribe, not the freebie upon sign up.

With that said, one gift I advocate for is a birthday gift or other "anniversary" type of gift. This is an excellent way to distinguish email marketing from interruption marketing. Just think how personal the "Happy Birthday Philip" email feels to your subscribers. Restaurants are one of the main beneficiaries of this strategy.

Closing the Loop

Effective communication includes asking as well as telling. If your email marketing program consists only of telling, you may be missing out on a huge opportunity.

I often tell my clients to picture themselves at a table with 3 of their friends. Then to imagine they are telling these friends what is going on with their business - the same information they want to convey in their email marketing efforts. This is the same voice and style they should use when writing their emails.

What they also figure out is the following:

• their friends are going to ask questions
  
• answering the questions helps clarify the message
• they like to ask their friends about past events

Immediately they realize the importance of two way communication.

Feedback, feedback, feedback
When you go to a restaurant, I guarantee you will be asked "How is everything?" at least once during your meal. This feedback is important for the restaurant to improve. Can you imagine a restaurant that never asks for feedback? Can you imagine any business not asking for feedback?

You can't. Which points out how important customer feedback is to all businesses.

Effective ways to get feedback
The simplest way is to ask your subscribers to reply to the email you send. The person has opened the email. All they have to do is click reply and type and they're giving feedback. I'm amazed at how infrequently this is done within email marketing programs. A simple sentence at the bottom of the email - "please reply if you have any questions or comments...." - is all it takes to hear back from one of your subscribers.

And this is not an ordinary subscriber. Anyone who gives you feedback cares at least enough to tell you what they think.

The second best way to get feedback is with focused mini-surveys. Not the generic multi page kind that most businesses use. I'm talking about event specific 3-5 question surveys.

Close the loop
I'll give an example from a restaurant client. Balzac wine bar has a monthly wine dinner. They send information about the wine dinner to their subscriber list at the beginning of each month.

During the wine dinner they ask the attendees if they are on the email list. If they are, they get their name so they can send them a thank you. If not, they ask the customer if they'd wish to join. At the end of the wine dinner they have a list of subscribers who attended the wine dinner.

A few days later they send an email to this targetted subset of their email list. This email contains 3 items.

• First, it says "Thank You" for coming to the wine event
• Second, it asks them to fill out a short 4 question survey about this particular event
• Last, but certainly not least, it tells them about the next wine dinner
  

A few things should be pointed out with this example.

1. The feedback they receive on this event will be actionable and specific. This is the best kind of feedback.
2. Sending to a subset of your list based on data about your subscribers allows you to send very specific emails.
3. When these subscribers fill out the survey, you will have even more information about them - allowing you to tailor an even more customized message to them in the future.
   

Communicating with email marketing is best if the flow is two way. Don't just tell, ask as well. You'll get a lot more value then just "blasting" out a monthly email.

As always, let me know if you have any comments or questions.