The New Rules of Marketing and PR

I have thoroughly enjoyed putting many of their recommendations into practice. Yes they really do work and this is my favourite experience so far.

My story:

The invite to our recent Email Marketing Secrets event was sent out to our subscribers and on the same day a journalist from Fairfax Digital – who wasn’t on our database - contacted us for an interview about an article he was writing.

No press release, no cold call, no PR agency – just the journalist contacting us!

How did it happen?
Good question and it was simple actually.  The journalist had our email forwarded to him by a friend who thought he’d like it. And he did!

This type of scenario is exactly what you are looking for.

In The New Rules of Marketing and PR Meerman Scott encourages you to use the web to publish useful and interesting information about topics that journalists want to write about too.  And in Inbound Marketing the authors advocate having content that attracts people you to your website (or facebook page or twitter or blog) rather than interrupt people with traditional outbound marketing.

By using the ‘new rules of PR’ you can attract people to your organisation using ‘inbound marketing.’  It does work!

What’s the secret?
As David, Brian & Dharmesh would say “create & publish content that people are interested in!”

The results?
The article was published on the Sydney Morning Herald website and then syndicated on the The Age, Brisbane Times, WA Today and several independent blogs. And the article has been tweeted 41 times so far.

Not only was the coverage itself excellent, but because the article contained a back link to our website, it had the secondary effect of strengthening our search engine rankings too.

Published on SMH.com.au & many more

Have you also had an experience like this?
Have you read a book, put something from it into practice and then had it ‘work’  like you’d hoped?

At our recent ‘Email Marketing Secrets’ event, I was tweeted a question from Tara Noonan from Star Creative. She asked (via her 140 character tweet):

@Bluewire_Media Can you pls talk a bit about subject lines that will send ur msg straight to the spam folder #bluewire

So to answer that question:

If your subject line includes any words or characters that you associate with SPAM – like free, viagra, you’ve won, !!!!!, too many CAPITALS, then chances are you’ll be caught in your recipients Junk Mail folder.  If you think about it, it makes sense really – don’t write a subject line that remotely resembles SPAM, or your email will end up in the Junk Mail folder!

When writing your subject lines, keep them truthful and interesting.  Let the reader know that they can expect if they open your email  so you entice them to do exactly that!

You know from twitter that there’s a lot that can be said in 140 characters, so be descriptive and try to convey the most important part of your email in the subject line. With a subject line, you typically have 50 – 70 characters so use them well!

Email Marketing Brisbane: If you’d like a hand with your email marketing, feel free to give us a call on 1300 258 394.

Now it’s worth mentioning that the Hypoxi girls send one of the best email newsletters I have seen.  My bias isn’t towards its design specifically (which I’ll admit Bluewire actually does), but what I love is the red hot content that the Hypoxi girls write themselves!

And for the record, the girls get well-above average open rates & 3-4 times the average click through rates. So they are setting the standard, but still want to improve!

So, with their permission, I want to share with you the 7 tips I gave them.

Tip #1: Experiment with your Subject Line & From Name

• You could focus on one popular part of the newsletter, like the competition.
  eg. Subject Line: HYPOXI NEWS: “Which unlucky-in-love actress is “friendly with her ex?
• Maybe try something punchy or raunchy.
  eg. Subject Line: Have more fun in the bedroom with Hypoxi!
• You could try sending from the company, not the founders.
  eg. From: Hypoxi Australia (although I still prefer the personal touch myself)

Tip #2:  Experiment with Send day & time

• Mornings work best for me, but it could be different for your target market. Maybe it’s Saturday morning? Or after work?

Tip #3:  Conduct a Survey

• I suggest asking your readers what they like best, or what else they’d like to read about.
• Also monitor stats because will show what content is most popular.

Tip #4: Resend the same email 4 days later

• I always get an extra 7-13% open rate by re-sending the same newsletter 4 days later to people who didn’t open the first time.
• All I do (for Bluewire) is change is subject line, but leave the email the same
  eg. Subject Line: Did you miss June’s Bluewire News…?  [web strategy plan + more]

Tip #5:  Share on Facebook

• by updating facebook fans with a link to the online version of your email.
• post that link to your Facebook Page’s wall.
• post that link on your personal wall.

Tip #6: Tweet on Twitter

• Add the Tweet Meme functionality which embeds a ‘real-time’ tweet tally in your email – it’s very cool!
• Encourage people to retweet with incentives like prizes.

Tip #7:  Archive your Emails on your website

• Add a website section called “News Archive”
• Archive all your old newsletters  (great content for search engines & humans alike)
• Include a subscribe to our newsletter form on each archive page

I hope that helps.

These are all things I do and I find it tough to keep open rates high too, especially when people are so busy.  But as always, focus on remarkable content and then fine tune your emails with my 7 tips above!

Email Marketing: For email marketing that uses all these tips, please call Bluewire Media on 1300 258 394.

 
Impressive: could you play Yann Tiersen on 6 iPhones?

People working in Small and Medium Entreprises (aka SMEs) from across Australia converged to Sydney Olympic Park for the first SME Technology Summit.

The one-day event had a couple of keynote presentations & a panel discussion, interspersed with 3 ‘tracks’ running simultaneously so you could choose your own agenda.

The keynotes were Tim Pethick, the entrepreneur who founded Nudie & Mark Pesce, a  futurist, commentator & panelist on ABC’s New Inventors.

Tim shared how he has embraced technology to help catapult the success of his juice company & it was good to hear about how he’s used ‘crowdsourcing’, social media, CRM and Skype to be really take off.

Mark showcased some real examples of (huge) companies that seem to be missing the mark when it comes to social media.  The cause: NOT LISTENING.

Mark Pesce (via http://lindajohannesson.com)

It is very easy to MONITOR what people are saying about your company (eg use google alerts) yet instead these companies (or most likely their ad agencies – according to Mark) are too pre-occupied with their own ‘clever’ campaigns to notice the public conversations people are having about them.

The good thing about SME Technology Summit is that it highlighted how all the different technologies can work together (rather than in isolation as is often the case of more specialised conferences).

The panel consisted of Josh Mehlman - writer and former editor of #Nett magazine, Suzi Dafnis – Australian Businesswomen Network, David James CEO of Brasserie Bread & Phil Morle, co-founder of Polleninzer.

The panel (via http://lindajohannesson.com)

It opened up an informative discussion where many ideas came up.  I personally liked what happens on Phil’s “internal twitter” where staff ‘tweet’ CRM Woo-Hoos and the CRM Boo-Hoos.  When a boo-hoo gets published, the IT team then have to try to fix that problem so the system works better!

After lunch, I had the opportunity to deliver an email marketing workshop & I was pleased so many delegates chose to attend.

Those who came along learnt my ‘secret formula for email marketing success‘ and got to take the whitepaper away as a tool for creating their own campaigns.  I also had the pleasure of meeting Dale Beaumont, author of 16 best sellers, who was in the room too.

If you missed out, feel free to download my ’Secret Formula for Email Marketing Success… plus 115 tips, ideas & mistakes to avoid‘ whitepaper.

The networking drinks were a great way to wrap up an interesting day. I got to chat with  the two Daniels (Doherty and Mangion) who introduced me to augemented reality on the iPhone & the Smart Pen — both blew my mind & they warrant blog posts on another day!

Thanks and congrats to Ross Dawson, Jess Nelson & the crew for organising everything!

Related posts:
SME Summit was tops – Linda Johannesson blog
SME Tech Summit Speaker Contacts and Presentations – SME Tech Summit blog

Email Marketing Presenter: If you’d like Adam Franklin to give his email marketing presentation at your conference, call Bluewire Media on 1300 258 394.

Here’s a 5 minute snippet where I outline 6 common mistakes & I share the biggest ‘oops’ I’ve ever made!

Stay tuned for the full presentation on DVD.

Email Marketing Sydney:  If you’d like help creating fun & engaging emails call Bluewire Media on 1300 258 394.

In this interview with Bluewire Media, he shares his secrets for writing one of the industry’s most popular email newsletters.

Watch the interview to find out:
- How James got started & how he became an employee engagement expert
- How he grew from 20 subscribers to over 5,500 subscribers.
- James’ tips for writing engaging content
- James’ Top Tip for someone starting email marketing
- How he plans to reach 100,000 subscribers in 5 years

Email Marketing Sydney: If you’d like email marketing services like copywriting or email template design, feel free to call Bluewire Media on 1300 258 394.

Employee Engagement Sydney:  James Adonis can be contacted on (02) 9331 2465. Whether it’s via his motivational presentations, workshops, books, or other services, he will show your managers how to become the most extraordinary leaders of people.

With compliments: You can download $180 worth of e-books by James Adonis

While I certainly agree that much of the wording used in essays becomes useless in the ‘real world’ – I don’t think that short, punchy copy equates to “dumbing down”. In fact, good copy should be as light on word count (and word length) as it can, while still delivering the message. And believe me, it’s a lot easier to ramble then it is to get straight to the point. When drippy essay language gets ditched, so too should the idea that four syllables plus means you know what you are talking about.

Somebody once told me that no matter what you write, you should read it over and cut every single word that doesn’t need to be there. That’s not to say describing words have to go – I love a good adjective, and anyway, their sole purpose is to add meaning to a noun.

So the rule is, if it adds value it can stay.

Copywriting Brisbane: If you’d like copywriting with character, call Bluewire Media on 1300 258 394.

 
Evolution of a logo design

NHRR logo development from Herbert Matter on Vimeo.

Here he gives you a sneak peek into what you can expect!

TICKET INFORMATION

EMSA – Email Marketing Summit Australia
Wed Nov 12th, Harbour’s Edge, Darling Harbour, Sydney
Tickets $149