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12.15.09 Learning the Terminology of Email/Newsletter Marketing  By John Vinson
If only newsletter emails could be as simple as 'send email to user' — 'user opens email'. It could happen; if the world were perfect and there wasn't such a thing as spam, trojans, or viruses. Unfortunately, we don't live in that sort of world so it then becomes vital to know your stuff. Here's a list of definitions to burn into your memory when creating newsletters for an email marketing campaign. Goal (Objective) of Emailing - The coherent, defined purpose, which allows targeting recipients appropriately, creating a unified and effective message and measuring the results. Each email, as well as the overall campaign, should have a clear goal. Hard bounce/Soft bounce - A hard bounce is the failed delivery of an e-mail due to a permanent reason like a non-existent address. A soft bounce is the failed delivery of an e-mail due to a temporary issue, like a full mailbox or an unavailable server. Headers - The documentation that accompanies the body of an email message. Headers contain information on the email itself and the route it's taken across the Internet. Recipients can normally see the "to" (identity of recipient), "from" (identity of sender) and "subject" (information in the subject line) headers in their inbox. You can modify these to influence their decision to open or delete an email. Nth Sampling - When a subset of the list is constructed based on every Nth individual. For example, if one is doing Ninth-Testing, every ninth person on the list is sent an email. Readability - The degree to which the copy is well-written as well as optimized for reading on the web. The readability of text is affected by many factors including, but not limited to: the color of the text in relation to the background color, the font, the spacing between words and between lines of text, the length of lines of text, how blocky and dense the paragraphs appear, text justification, the complexity of the grammar and the education level of your audience. Scannable Text (also called Skimmable Text) - Highlighted, bolded, bulleted or otherwise visually-distinguished content that allows the reader to quickly scan block text and distill the overall point and essential features of the communication. More correctly, scannable text is "skimmable" text - text the reader can easily skim through to determine the essence of the communication. Tracking - Collecting and evaluating the statistics from which one can measure the effectiveness of an email or an email campaign. We We Test - Developed by Future Now, Inc., this metric provides a general measure of the degree to which your communication is customer-centered. It compares the number of customer-oriented words (you, your, etc.) in the communication to the number of self- or company-referential words (we, our, I, me, etc.). KISS - "Keep it Simple, Stupid" - a directive to keep the communication clear, concise and intuitive to improve the likelihood the prospect will take action. There are of course more terms than the ones listed. However, the terms listed here could help you in creating a successful email marketing campaign. I believe the most overlooked term on the list is 'KISS'. So many times a marketer forgets that when people are reading content in emails, they favor speed over grandiose elements. About the Author: John is a staff writer for WebProNews. |
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