The Noob's Zen Guide to Email Marketing and Social Media Speak

Are you new to email marketing and social media? (Oh no, a noobie, a noob!) Sick of all the marketing mumbo jumbo double speak? Not sure what all these terms mean? This article will help clear up some of that. Or possibly make you more confused, I'm not sure which. If you are a seasoned email marketer, however, for God's sake, don't read this article. It will bore you so badly that you'll read to the end and say "that's 6 minutes of my life I'll never get back."


Social stuff:
Klout - This is kind of a cool one. Klout is a company and a score. This score measures your "importance" in terms of how much influence you have across the internet. It refers mainly to people who have a lot of Twitter followers and particularly those people who's Twitter followers follow them on a particular topic. The score is used by companies who want to understand how important a particular customer is to their company/brand. So, if you are Ronco, one of the greatest inventors of all time, and you sell a lot of "Spray-Paint-the-Bald-Away",
a Twitter user with 4 followers (one being their mother) does not have the same influence on Ronco's brand as a Twitter user with 19,086 followers, who writes a blog about products for hair loss. By the way, if you find a good blog on hair loss, send me the link.

Bitly - You know how Twitter only allows you to share 140 characters of text? Well Bitly is a company that will help you take a really long URL that you want to share on Twitter and shorten it. So a link like http://blog.thoughtreach.com/2012/07/why-cant-i-do-email-marketing-with-outlook.html will shorten to something like http://bit.ly/M7ho2q which makes it fit a lot better into the Twitter box. When your Twitter followers click the shortlink, it will auto-forward them to the long link.

Mosaic - Not even all the seasoned email marketers know about this one. A mosaic in email marketing is an HTML table that is full of lots and lots of rows and columns, each having a different background color. If built properly, the mosaic can render a fairly good representation of what an image would actually look like. Read why using mosiacs is impactful and then why you may not want to use them.

Social sharing - this is where you post a link to something on a place like Facebook, Twitter, Google+, Pinterest etc.


The Big Picture
ISP -  Internet Service Provider. These numbskulls either provide access to the internet or they provide email inboxes (like Gmail, Hotmail, AOL, Yahoo). Marketers will babble on and on about "don't get blocked at ISPs" so get used to this one.

ESP - Email Service Provider. These companies provide mass email sending software tools for marketers. The greatest of all of them is Thought Reach (a company destined to rule the earth one day). But, in the list too are Eloqua, Marqueto, Constant Contact, and Monkey Mail or Mail Chimpanzee, or whatever they call themselves these days.

SaaS - Software as a Service. This just means that it's a software product that you access by using your browser (instead of having to download and install the software).

Mobile - in the email world, this refers to all the bajillion recipients who open their emails on a mobile device. About 1/3rd of all mass email sent is opened on a mobile device.

Email marketing metrics
Click throughs - this is the number of times that any link inside your email message was clicked. This is an important measure of how engaged your recipients are (more on engagement below). If they are clicking, they must have at least some level of interest and thus want to receive  your emails.

Open rate - This is the rate at which your subscribers open your email. Some open, some don't. Not all mass emails sent will register an open if the recipient opens the email, but a lot will. It's not a perfect metric, but it helps you understand if you are on the right track. Open rate is determined by a one pixel image quietly hidden in the email. Once this image is loaded, the open is registered.

Read rate - The read rate is different than the open rate because it’s not based on the one pixel image pixel. The read rate is based on mailbox providers marking the message as “read” due to subscriber activity in the inbox. This is a type of data that you need a third party provider to obtain, like Return Path.

The Who (minus Roger Daltrey)
Receivers - actually, this doesn't refer to the people who receive your email. Instead, it refers to the ISPs like Gmail that are first receiving your email before putting it in the inbox (or spam box ) of your subscriber.

Senders - senders can either refer to the marketer who is sending the email, or to the ESP that the marketer is using to send the email.

Subscribers - these are the people who have signed up for your email list.

Recipients - these are the same as subscribers.

Double opt in - this is a method of verifying that a new subscriber to your email list really, really wants your email. In this method of subscribing, a visitor comes to your website, fills out a form to get onto your email list, and then your system automagically emails them and asks them to click a link to confirm. Using this type of subscription method will help you avoid spam complaints by ensuring that the person who's email address was entered, is actually the person who signed up for the list in the first place.

Spam with Bacon
Spamtrap (honeypot) - Now we've hit upon the good stuff.  Spam traps are email addresses used by ISPs to trap spammers. These are email addresses that are either completely made up or have been dormant for a long time. The ISP is looking to catch people spamming so that they can block the email being sent by that person. If a completely made up email address is suddenly receiving messages, the email is likely spam. If you "accidentally" email a spamtrap email address, here's what you can do to help fix the mess you're now in.

SenderScore.org - this is a free website that can tell you how well your email sending reputation is with the receiving ISPs. Many ISPs report information to senderscore.org that tells others if they think you behave well as a brand in your email practices. Ask your ESP what your IP address is, and enter it at senderscore. It's a little like high school. A score in the high 90's is great. One in the 30's is not quite so great, and may land you in detention.

IP Address - this is a little like the street address in front of your house. Only in this case it's the internet address from which you are sending your email. Unless you send more than 50-100k emails per month, you are likely sharing an IP address with other senders. This isn't necessarily a bad thing. But it's always a good idea to check the senderscore of your IP address to be sure it is good and that other senders on that same IP address aren't negatively impacting you.

Sender reputation - this is another term used to convey how well your brand behaves with its email sending practices.

Reputation monitoring - this is the practice of a marketer monitoring how well their brand is perceived by ISPs in terms of sender reputation. Software tools can be used to detect email reputation.

Engaged / Engagement Rate - These don't mean the same thing that your girlfriend says they do. When you email your recipients, the number of times that they open the email and click a link within it is called the engagement rate. ISPs use this rate as a determining factor in whether or not they deliver your email to the inbox or not. It's a long story, but trust me, if a subscriber hasn't opened or clicked in a long, long time, you need to remove them from your list to protect your engagement rate.

Authentication - only true email marketing geeks get excited about this one. But any marketer sending mass email needs to have their emails "authenticated." Authentication technologies are things that tell the receiving ISP exactly where the email is coming from and that you are who you say you are. Unless your email is authenticated properly, it may not make it to the inbox because it is not trusted. Authentication technologies include DKIM, DomainKeys, Sender ID, SPF, and DMARC. Not that you care what those stand for, but you want to make sure your ESP sets these up for you.

Segments / segmentation - this is a term that relates to dividing your email list into different groupings. A reporting / analytics tool within your email marketing tool will help you create these groups. For example, if you sell a lot of Ronco "Spray-Paint-the-Bald-Away", you'll want to segment on people who are male, are over 50, and are predisposed to using spray paint on their bald heads. These are the same people who would buy a Chia pet too. Just some free advice.

Search:
SERP - Search Engine Results Page. This term is used to describe the placement of where your webpage sits in the rankings of the search engines. Is your webpage on page one of the search engine results page or on page 39,599?

SEO- Search Engine Optimization. SEO is a set of skills and techniques used to help rank the pages of your website higher in the Google (and other) search engine rankings.

Panda - the name of a software update to Google's search algorithm. Google's algorithm is what calculates where your webpage shows up in the SERP. This particular update routed out a lot of low quality websites from the Google search results. If you aren't doing anything black hat on your website, you have nothing to worry about.

Black hat - these are nefarious techniques that unscrupulous webmasters use to get their web pages to rank higher in the search engine rankings. Use black hat techniques and you might just end up back in detention again.

White hat - these are the good ways to do SEO. Having really good content (unlike this article : ), having really important sites link to yours, and writing in natural language by not stuffing keywords all over the place are examples of white hat techniques.

Twitter:
Tweet - a short message you send out to your followers.

Followers - these are your minions. Those people who, for some reason, unbeknownst to the rest of mankind, want to hear what you are tweeting. Try not to accidentally lose all your followers by being spoofed into giving up your Twitter password.

Followers are your minions.
People dumb enough, I mean
smart enough to listen to what
you have to say.

Following - these are the people you want to hear what they are blabbing about. To become a follower, you may have clicked the little "follow" link like this one.
Follow @ThoughtReach

@ThoughtReach - any time you see an @ symbol, that is someone or some company's username on Twitter.

#something - a # symbol on Twitter is like a keyword or phrase. It might be something like "#emailmarketing" which is a way for Twitter followers to search for people talking specifically about the topic of email marketing. The # symbol just helps identify all the caterwauling going on about that topic.

Nonsensical
Fair Trade coffee - a black liquid substance consumed by marketers nearly as much as it is consumed by software developers and typically packed full of caffeine (a God-given substance that I'm sure is an unrecognized fulfillment of scripture somewhere). The "Fair Trade" part means that the coffee (or chocolate or whatever) is sourced in a manner that certifies that the grower was paid in a fair manner. It also typically is associated to good-earth practices like organic farming.  If you are a marketer and your coffee isn't Fair Trade, and you are hearing this for the first time, that's ok. Just make the switch. A hilarious look at coffee facts.

Ficus tree- a thing thrown at me by Loraine, who sits in the cube next to me. Loraine's forays with flying ficus trees appear notoriously throughout the Thought Reach blog. You'll just have to bear with us on that topic.

Why frequent marketing touches will fail every time

It's so common that we small business marketers believe that frequently interacting with our customers is what grows relationships with them. Send them a lot of emails and tweets, touch them on a Facebook business page, respond to every comment on our blog posts, repin their pins on Pinterest, blah blah blah. Sounds good right? The more you interact the closer your relationship is with your customers, right? I mean, that's what a relationship is right? It's about interacting a bunch of times? Well, let me ask you a question. Was it the number of times you went on a date with your future husband when you were "courting" (sorry, it's an old southern term) that really added up to that head-over-heels love that grew between you? Or was it the quality of the shared experience that the two of you had together during that time? Think out loud for a minute. But don't let Loraine in the cube next to you hear this. Did it matter that you and your (future) husband happened to hear the Louis Armstrong song "What a wonderful world" playing in the background on your date, OR was it actually the fact that that song was playing the first time the two of you ever danced? The first time the two of you danced was a shared experience. And the fact that Louis Armstrong's "What a wonderful world" already meant something special to you, and you two shared that experience together, is what built the relationship between you.

It's the shared experiences in our lives that stand out and matter to us, not the number of times we happen to have interacted together. In your marketing, you need to build a shared experience with your customers in order to have a real relationship with them. What does that mean in a small business?  Take a look at a few examples-->.

Ted's Montana Grill
Ted Turner started this small chain of restaurants several years ago. If you don't know Ted, he's this "semi-wealthy" guy who seemingly would to be able to turn even dried cow pies into gold. At any rate, Ted's doesn't just serve up a great, perfectly seasoned, lean, Bison burger and call it quits. That wouldn't be enough to build a shared relationship with his customers. Instead Ted's makes it clear that they care about the environment. The tables are covered with recycled paper instead of fine linen tablecloths that have to be laundered constantly. The drinking straws are made of paper. That's right, paper. Why? Because a paper straw simply disintegrates in the land fill whereas plastic straws will be preserved right along side a twinkie for a thousand years or so. The restrooms have these sporty toilets that may have cost more to purchase, but save on water in the long run. All of this screams of sharing this common feeling and goal with customers who care about the environment, but who still want a spankin' good burger or steak.

Whole Foods
Whole Foods is a grocery chain on a mission to sell nothing but the healthiest products available. A customer who is conscious about their personal health, concerned about what they eat, and concerned about how the foods were grown and sourced would normally go to a typical grocery store and have to scrutinize every product label to see what the ingredients are, and if the label mentions anything about the growing and sourcing of the product. Instead, if you step into Whole Foods, customers rest assured that every single item in the store is basically healthy. You don't even have to look at the labels. We're talking about tens of thousands of items here.  Everything is organically produced, thus it is better for the environment. No product contains toxins like high fructose corn syrup, BHT/TBHQ (chemical preservatives), or trans fats. And everything is sourced in such a way that there are no unfair labor practices being used (such as poor treatment of workers, child labor, or human slavery). Even their coffees are all labeled "Fair Trade", "Whole Trade", "Rainforest Alliance Certified", "We don't kill unicorns", or something similar. Whole Foods makes it a point to tell their customers these things. They reach out and show that they actually care about this stuff.  It's an experience they share with their customers who also care about these things. As a byproduct, they sell a lot more groceries and make a lot more profit.

Thought Reach
We at Thought Reach also use shared experiences to grow relationships with our customers.  For one thing, we make it known that we are obsessed with good coffee.  Our customers identify with us because they too love great coffee. And since we support the Fair Trade movement, our customers who also care deeply about this cause identify with us. It's a shared experience that transcends the normal business relationship that is based on just a bunch of interactions.

For you to apply these ideas to your business, start by thinking about what you are passionate about, and create a way to show that to your customers thereby creating a shared experience.

p.s.-  No gnomes or unicorns were harmed in the writing of this article.

What shared experiences can you use to connect with your customers?

The boring-business guide to using Pinterest to drive traffic

If your business is as boring as watching paint dry on a painting depicting grass growing in a drought, then you need to read this article

Is your business as boring as paint drying?

I'm still not surprised that a business owner isn't yet familiar with Pinterest.  What is Pinterest?  It's the #3 social network in the world, that's what it is!  It's the underdog.  It's the Cinderella story.  It's the bronze medal winner at the Olympics.  It's the (something else that I can't think of right now).  Anyway, the thing that makes it different from the Facebook and Google+'s of the world is that Pinterest is a visual social network.  It is based completely off of images instead of just text-based posts.  So why should you read the rest of this article?  It's all about showing you how to get more customers.  Can Pinterest help you do that?  Well, that depends on whether or not your business is exciting and visual-based or boring and not visual-based.  If your business is not visual based, we'll show you how to use Pinterest anyway.

What is meant by a visual business?  
Well, are you a home builder, hairstylist, architect, photographer, wedding planner, or restaurateur?  If so, you have a visual business meaning you can use images from your business to promote your business.  However, if you are an accountant, software programmer, actuarial, ice maker, keypunch operator, lawyer, or cement manufacturer then you're business is not so visual (yawn).  However, that doesn't mean that you can't use Pinterest.  In fact, you can use it to a high degree. And don't get me wrong, I'm not knocking those businesses.  In fact, I've had to use them all in the past.  Well, except the actuarial.  No one needs one of those....

An example of a visual-based business using Pinterest 

Lets say you are a homebuilder or a contractor who does remodeling projects.  Since you create something, hopefully something beautiful, you can use images of your projects to showcase your business.  People will see your "board" and share your images with others.  The images on your board will also serve to link back to your website thus driving traffic to your site and elevating you as an expert in your field.  Here's what to do- create one Pinterest board that showcases the great work you've done.  Show the broken-down shacks, I mean the beautiful homes you've built, the remodeled kitchens you've created, the dusty attics you've transformed into beautiful master baths, and the mud pits you've turned into stunning outdoor patios.

Then create another Pinterest board to display great home remodeling ideas. These aren't things that you've done, these are beautiful images that showcase great ideas for homes that inspire people.  Beautiful kitchens, new types of countertops, great looking bamboo-wood floors, and funky bathroom sinks that don't seem to make functional sense. Anyway, these things are meant to inspire people.  To move them. 

How would a non-visual business benefit from Pinterest?

If you are one of those businesses that is as boring as watching paint dry on a painting depicting grass growing in a drought, then Pinterest can still help!  One thing businesses like this can do is to help give potential clients a sense of who you and your employees are.  What types of things do you like to do?  Who are you when you are on vacation? What are you passionate about? The idea here is to communicate a sense of relationship to people that don't yet know you or your business.  

Other ideas to boost your small business
Other ideas would be for you to showcase what social causes motivate you and your staff.  Are you involved in your community?  Do you help out with the annual community fund-raiser in which money is raised to purchase double-espresso machiato latte machines for all the homeless in your area? (And if you do, that's awesome). Use things like this to create a Pinterest board that shows images of these events, or that shows images that relate to the subject matter.  For example, as an email marketing software company (boring), we have a Pinterest board showcasing coffee!  Yes, coffee.  We love coffee, we love to relax a little bit, and we have a quirky attitude.  But, we are also very moved by the Fair Trade program that aims to protect coffee growers. We care that the coffee we buy hasn't contributed to someone else's poverty. Having a board like this shows people a little bit about who we are.  It shows that we are people that care (and we do). Just conveying that sentiment to our potential clients creates a sense of connection between us. Getting the picture now?  

The overall point of using Pinterest is to drive traffic to your website or to get people talking about your brand.  In a future post, I'll talk about the how-to of Pinterest.  How to create a board, what text to include with your pinned images, and how to not get busted for copyright infringement for using someone else's images thereby having to spend this year in prison : ).  

Want to read more ideas?

28 Creative Pinboard Ideas From Real Brands on Pinterest


What Pinterest board do you think conveys a sense of who the company behind it is?  Tell us in the comment section below.