We’ve just launched a new email course which is free.

Email Marketing: As Easy as ABC.

Go to http://www.pathdirect.com/abc or sign up in the sidebar now.

Links at a Glance: If you are in a hurry, download these PDFs now.

• Introducing PathDirect Lite (PDF)
• MyClientcenter Hosting Factsheet (PDF)
• MyClientCenter Email Factsheet (PDF)
• MyClientCenter Email Features

Read more here: www.pathdirect.com/lite/

Heavy on features and light on your budget…

Have Fun!

In our opinion, email marketing remains the most cost effective and cost efficient way to reach thousands of customers instantly and with measurable results

If you are considering using Email Marketing for your business in Singapore, then you should consider the following:

• Does the Singapore Email Marketing Service Provider use its own software platform that can assist in getting more results for you?
• Do you know that getting started in email marketing is a lot of work, but it’s work that’s done once and then you’re halfway there?
• Define your Singapore Email Marketing Strategy clearly from how you attract more subscribers and sign up more contacts, as well as how to interact with them to achieve the maximum response and results.
• It’s all about communication and relationship, not just about the number of emails you send.
• Singapore Email Marketing companies are plenty, but ask which one of them specialises in Email Marketing. (that’s us)

Once you’ve got your Singapore Email Marketing Plan defined clearly, select a partner and start connecting with more customers right away.

Just ran through the Earth Hour homepage and found out Path Consulting Pte Ltd is the #146 company in Singapore to pledge our support for Earth Hour. We’re just 2 places behind DBS Bank and 8 spots before Sentosa. That’s great.

The reason Path Consulting is really keen to support Earth Hour is because our business really is to help small businesses and non profit organisations get really earth friendly by adopting email marketing and doing more intergrated promotions on their websites and blogs.

Email marketing with newsletters and landing pages not only increases advertising effectiveness, it also saves the business money, increases their response rate (well, email delivery is almost instant and can be connected to social media networks and video enabled marketing as well.

We’re on a drive to provide some custom reports for industries to help them get started with creative web and email marketing.

We’re also formulating a WEBS framework for strategic marketing on the Internet for Small Business to take advantage of Integration Marketing between online and offline activities. Be prepared to be blow away by our marketing measurement tools and systems to better evaluate how your marketing is serving you and if it’s making you money or not.

More in the next few weeks. Btw, Earth day is on 22 April 2009.

Check it out here: www.pathdirect.com

That’s why we’ve always told clients that they need both, but they can get started in email marketing without a website.

“Really? How so?” They ask.

Well, here’s how it works.

Most of our clients run a business with a store, a specific location, or a personal service they offer to others. They meet their customers face to face. If that’s the case, you can start an email list by simply asking a few simple questions:

Would you like to receive updates from us?

Can I have your email address? I would like to send you a new checklist that I just created to help you along.

We’re launching an email newsletter soon, so would you mind if I added you to the list so you can receive it?

The 3 examples all see the customer’s permission before you get their email address and start sending them a whole lot of email.

On the other hand, if you already are running an email newsletter or a mailing list, then it makes sense to ALSO have a nice website handy. This is very useful when you start sending out newsletters with short excerpts of long articles, and then you could easily point your email readers to your website where they can “Read More” of your article.

A well organised, easy to update website is also critical as it keeps your customers and visitors coming back to read all the wonderful expert content you’ve posted on your website.

In the next article, we’ll be discussing a bit of whether you should spend money and develop a media rich flash website, or simply go for the low-down 5 page website…. our answer (which is “Neither”) may come as a pleasant surprise to you.

We pride ourselves in being a company that promotes loving the Earth and saving our Environment by what we do. We recommend marketing over email and the web to reduce cost and save paper too.

Now you can do your part and VOTE for EARTH now by participating in Earth Hour 2009.

Click here to find out more about Earth Hour and how you can Vote Earth now.

The landscape is changing. Corporations are shrinking and from what I heard, many are reducing their social commitments and corporate donations to charities and non profit causes to focus on their core business - to make more money. It’s a challenging time for many companies out there and in a certain way, non profit organisations are affected by the downturn in the economy as well.

What’s the solution?

Take things into your own hands. Start finding quick, easy-to-do, cheap-to-implement ways to get your word out there, to drive greater awareness among supporters, volunteers, donors, clients. Start communicating with your key stakeholders regularly to ensure they know what you are doing and why you are doing it.

Reaffirm your commitment to the community to share what your far reaching goals are and highlight how exactly the community can help you reach those goals.

What is the solution we recommend?

It goes like this: Leverage on the power of the Internet, start creating content to share with everyone, and get connected in as many ways as possible.

Here’s what to do:

1. Revamp your website (no, don’t farm it out. Do it yourself - we’ll show you how soon.)
2. Start a blog and post to it regularly (weekly or fortnightly at least) - Announce new events, new courses, new insights, new needs
3. Start an email newsletter and send it to as many people as possible (print it out for those who really don’t have access to email and a printer)
4. Build up your lists - board of directors, corporate donors, private donors, supporters, volunteers, trainers, staff, friends of your organisation, beneficiaries, family of beneficiaries, friends of beneficiaries, clients and vendors
5. Offer a free info pack for all who pass your way on the web - a couple of articles, reports, white papers and maybe an email course to those keen on your wares
6. Start connecting with people all over Singapore, your local community, your region and the world
7. Get a Facebook account, start a Facebook page, share your events and articles via Facebook
8. Get a Twitter Account, Start micro-blogging, come up with some interesting content and links and pass it through Twitter. Great for little things that don’t make it to the corporate website.
9. Learn to do Podcasts and Vodcasts (or video casts). Then post them on iTunes and other podcast sharing sites, plus of course, Videos should go to YouTube. You will get traffic from these two sites so when you list your website, link it to a sign up page for your newsletter.

There’s lots more that you can do.

If you are from a non profit organisation, contact us and we’ll be able to share with you how you can benefit from web, email marketing and social media intrgration.

Why? The reason is simple. Those who are advertising in print media and broadcast media will be spending less there. With the marketing dollars saved, they must invest in some form of lead management and relationship building tool to keep their new and current customers up to date on what’s happening.

They need a tool that takes care of current and new customers, they need to find some cost savings in time, effort and man hours. It must be simple enough to be done in house with some external help. It must be able to yield a positive ROI and build up the brand of the company is well. Oh yeah, ideally it can cost less than a dollar per customer reached.

What better tool than email marketing?

In terms of cost and getting a Return on Investment, Email Marketing is the most cost friendly, effective, measurable and instant marketing mechanism to reach hundreds and thousands of contacts at once.

With the statistics such as open rates, link tracking, automated bounce and subscriber management numbers coming in, marketers can also be more mindful of how their email campaigns are being read and responded to.

So, what should be in your email marketing toolkit and master plan in 2009?

1. Get Started!

The best way to engage more prospects and customers through email is to simply get started. Start collecting email addresses, tell your clients you’re moving into email as a major form of communication and getting the best deals and updates to them. Start rallying your staff to let them know that every lead counts and to take real good care of customers. With email marketing, you can automate up to 80% of the communication and follow up, so there should be no slip ups in the initial data collection and intros by your team members to new prospects and clients. Start putting some good marketing dollars aside to do more with your email marketing.

2. Build Your List

Start building up your list of fresh leads, old leads, referred leads, prospective customers, new customers, old customers, repeat customers and VIP customers. Whether it’s one huge list or 15 sub lists, start building up your lists and filling them in with more leads every week (if not every business day)

3. Plan Your Communications Calendar and Holiday Greetings

It’s no excuse not knowing what’s coming up in 2009. For your convenience, we have published the Singapore Public Holidays, School Holidays and Major Festivals and Special Occasions for 2009. Decide which festivals are good for you to send greetings and how many days or weeks in advance to send those greetings. If you simply kept in touch with every contact in your database, I am sure we’ll be seeing more new business coming to you soon. If you’re dealing with parents and children, perhaps Mother’s Day, Father’s Day and Children’s Day deserve some heartwarming notes. If you’re in retail, then Easter, National Day and Christmas might be sellout holidays. Be sure to sneak in a special offer while you’re at it.

4. Decide What Responses You Want From Your Contacts

It’s fine to send your contacts 3 emails a month if you know how you want them to react and respond to your emails. Perhaps 1 email should be information and educational, sharing an article of good knowledge and tips for your contact. The 2nd email should perhaps share some tips on how to make the best use of your product and service. The 3rd email can make a special offer or invite the contact down for an event. Decide if you want your prospects to click a link to indicate their response, or to lead them to an article from your website. Or perhaps they need to fill up a registration form for your event. The responses have to be tracked and measured to give you more information on what works better in your email campaign.

5. Give, Give, Give

Be generous with your customers. Always give them far more value than they pay for and then still give a bit more. When you feel that you’ve done the maximum giving, then be ready to start giving a bit to charity on behalf of your clients. Give them brochures, factsheets, vouchers and membership cards. Give your clients something to give to their family and friends. And when your clients refer you a fresh new lead, give thanks and let them know how much you appreciate their help. Make your clients beam when you donate a small part of your sales and profits to charity and make that donation in their honor. Give and soon, you will be given more blessings that you could manage.

6. Track Everything

Measure, track, evaluate and reformulate. Your marketing campaigns will always be changing if you track the responses and results from your email campaign and make small changes. You might be seeing more clickthroughs to articles of a certain topic or decide to change some colours. You might want to play around with the size of buttons in your emails and see which gets a better response rate. Test as much as you want, but when you get something that works, stick with it for a while and reap the most benefits out of it. If you have a refer a friend campaign that consistently pulls in a few new leads for you every week, then keep with it. You must be doing something right.

7. Have Fun

Email marketing does not have to be stale or lifeless. It can be personal, it can be fun, it can be a learning experience, or it can be a whole lot of buzz. Make your email SING and tease your customers once in a while. Make your clients WANT to receive your email and demand it when they missed an issue (or if you missed an issue). Ask your clients what they want to see and hear from your newsletters and give it to them.

8. Surprise: Expect the Unexpected!

While you can plan everything for your email marketing in 2009, prepare to be surprised. Some markets might move, prices will change, costs will rise and sales might fall. Be prepared to do more and plan a few Plan Bs just in case. If you find that you are short on money, then be prepared to go out on a limb and plan 1 more promotion to get the customers to respond. Don’t be surprised if a big client decides to downsize their budget and your involvement as well. Have a plan ready to cope with that and simply, be ready for some surprises. Take it in your stride and move on.

Well, here’s a simple way to get started for 2009 and to start refining your email marketing campaigns and communications.

Have a Happy 2009 ahead!

New Year’s Day
1 January 2009 (Thursday)

Chinese New Year
26 January 2009 (Monday)
27 January 2009 (Tuesday)

Good Friday
10 April 2009 (Friday)

Labour Day
1 May 2009 (Friday)

Vesak Day
9 May 2009 (Saturday)

National Day
9 August 2009 (Sunday)*

Hari Raya Puasa
20 September 2009 (Sunday)*

Deepavali
15 November 2009 (Sunday)*

Hari Raya Haji
27 November 2009 (Friday)

Christmas Day
25 December 2009 (Friday)

*Following Monday is a public holiday in lieu.

Plus an additional list of other festivals and occasions to remember:

Valentine’s Day
14 February 2009 (Saturday)

Easter Sunday
12 April 2009 (Sunday)

Earth Day
22 April 2009 (Tuesday)

Secretary’s Day
23 April 2009 (Thursday)

Mother’s Day
10 May 2009 (Sunday)

World Environment Day
5 June 2009 (Friday)

Father’s Day
21 June 2009 (Sunday)

Youth Day
5 July 2009 (Sunday)

Racial Harmony Day
21 July 2009 (Tuesday)

Teacher’s Day
1 September 2009 (Tuesday)

Grandparent’s Day
14 September 2009 (Monday)

Children’s Day
1 October 2009 (Thursday)

Boss’s Day
14 October 2009 (Wednesday)

Thanksgiving Day
22 November 2009 (Sunday)

Boxing Day
26 December 2009 (Saturday)

Singapore School Vacations

14 March 2009 (Saturday) to 22 March 2009 (Sunday)

30 May 2009 (Saturday) to 28 May 2009 (Sunday)

5 September 2009 (Saturday) to 13 September 2009 (Sunday)

21 November 2009 (Saturday) to 3 January 2010 (Sunday)

Here’s the short version:

Subject: <ADV> Then comes your subject line

You must use this tag when you are sending unsolicited commercial email to businesses and individuals in Singapore. Unsolicited may mean the recipient may know of you, have given you their business card or email contact before, but did not specifically ask to be on your mailing list.

Now the longer version

The main confusion comes in the way we define unsolicited commercial email and how marketers should deal with the grey areas of whether to <ADV> or not to <ADV>.

Let’s first look at bad practices in using the <ADV> tag.

There is only ONE flavour of the tag that the law recognises:

Subject: <ADV> All Caps, Add the Triangular Brackets Before and After, Add a Space, then your Subject Line

These very creative variations do not make the mark:

• ADV
• adv
• <adv>
• <A D V>
• <Adv>
• <ADv>
• <A.D.V.>
• (ADV)
• [ADV]
• (adv)

The only one that the law recognises is:

• <ADV>

Now the BIG Question: When MUST We Use It, When Can We Omit It and When Is It Optional?

MUST USE <ADV>

The situation where it is a must have is when the email is completely Unsolicited, there is no prior business relationship and that person has otherwise not given his or her explicit consent to receive your messages.

Add the <ADV> and then seek the recipients’ permission to mail them more valuable emails if they choose to OPT IN.

CASE STUDY 1

The classic case: Businessman Tom has been in business for 5 years now and he’s got a chunky business card holder in his drawer. He decides to use email to make even more money for his business, so he asks an assistant to complete the data entry of all the business cards and email contacts. He then proceeds to send them an email. The problem is, Tom doesn’t know all the people in his business card file personally. Some of them were acquaintances, friends, friends of friends, ex-colleagues moving to new opportunities, and a small handful of them were previous and current clients.

The first time he sent them an email, he received a terrible backlash and a loss of over 20 hours in productivity responding to “Who are you?” messages and some rather nasty “stop sending me **** or else…” emails. He did get one or two responses thanking him for the update, saying they would keep him in mind if they were considering a purchase.

The Solution: Tom should add the <ADV> tag to his email as most of the people on his list did not sign up for his email newsletter. They also did not give consent or have a prior business relationship to want to receive his emails. Tom can also add a tiny line at the end to say that the person is receiving the email because: 1) he may know Tom, 2) he may need Tom’s services, or 3) he may be in line for a referral reward if he can recommend Tom some new business. Either way, since nobody said they wanted to be on Tom’s email list, then Tom’s best best is to use the <ADV> tag and offer an unsubscribe link in the email from the start.

Case Study 2:

There could be another situation where although the company and the email recipient have a business relationship, there was never a time the company openly asked for permission to send them newsletters and promotional emails.

This is very obvious in all our locally based banks in their email newsletters. Since every bank has made an effort to collect email addresses to keep your information up to date, they have also found that if you have some money sitting in your bank, perhaps you will consider putting more money in, getting a credit card or even consider investing some of that money in higher earning investment vehicles. They start sending you a newsletter, but the technical issue is that although they did ASK for your email, they did not say they will be including you in all the newsletter that the bank produces.

Subscribers end up getting very upset that the bank they’ve been using for 10 years and after updating their email 3 years ago have suddenly started receiving 2-3 emails per month since 2 months ago.

The Solution: Many of the banks now use the <ADV> tag in all their email newsletters to avoid the hassle of going back to each account holder to ask for permission to mail. The alternative is to ask and risk losing over 50% of the database due to indifference and those not knowing what to do to remain subscribed to the newsletter.

OPTIONAL TO USE <ADV>

There are some conditional clauses that allow the optional use of the <ADV> tag. These include people who have an active relationship with the company or business that is emailing them. It also includes those where prior consent was given to contact them on promotional and seasonal offers, or to be included in an updates list. The company may also already be sending a physical newsletter to the subscribers, and now have moved to offer an online version to save some money and save the Earth too.

Case Study 3:

A retailer has been collecting customer information for years and been sending them Christmas cards and in the last 3 years, started a monthly printed newsletter that is mailed to all his loyal customers. Most of his customers are regulars and do repeat business with him on an average of 3 times a year.

Now that he has decided to start an email newsletter, he wishes to convert most, if not all his customers to the online version of his newsletter.

He sends them a letter to announce that the printed newsletter will be discontinued from the next issue, but customers who do not have their email addresses with the store can either update their email contacts or pick up a personal copy in the store.

Since he has an active relationship with his customers, and they have been receiving his newsletter for some time now, it is safe to assume that he has already gotten permission to email them.

However,  the first time he email his customers, there was a flurry of responses that asked why he was sending email to that address, for people asking to be unsubscribed and even, a confused husband wondering who’s been using his email address to sign up for a women’s clothing store. This led the retailer to become very uncertain about sending his 2nd issue of the email newsletter.

The Solution: While the retailer has indeed been keeping close contact with his customers via mail, he must understand that communicating via email might be a new channel of communication for some of his customers. It’s true that not everyone gives out their personal email addresses (for fear of getting spammed) or simply because they might have forgotten their email address. To be safe, until it’s been established that the majority of the email recipients are keen to receive the email newsletter, he should use the <ADV> tag.

Another way is to start informing customers to expect an email and that if they wish, they could unsubscribe immediately and never receive another email from the store. Respecting customers and their privacy alerts them to the retail store’s fair practices and encourages them to respond more favourably to future email contact. When the trust is there, the <ADV> tag may be omitted as there’s a current and active business relationship.

No Need to Use <ADV>

You may have been waiting for this part for quite a while now.

Just think about it: Your best friend just received news that will save you 50% off your airfare for your next vacation and simply loves to share Good Stuff with you.

Wouldn’t it be strange if the email started like this:

Subject: <ADV> Bob, you can’t afford to miss this deal (50% off airfare)

Surely, your years of relationship means you would willing agree to receive his emails, and that you already trust your BEST Friend, and that you may honestly want to learn more about that promotion.

That’s the fundamental basis of reasons why you may not need to use the <ADV> tag.

Case Study 4

Eunice is a successful florists. She has a nice website and all her regular clients sign up online to receive a reminder near major holidays and special occasions so they can order a bouquet for their loved ones. When they sign up, they agree to receive all email updates and communications including promotions and newsletters.

Eunice’s clients love her newsletters which are colourful and always pack some great ideas on how to woo a girlfriend or to dazzle your wife. Yes, even some really touching stories around Mother’s Day gets a tearful eye or two. Once, she was away for a long holiday and her clients emailed to ask why they did not receive that month’s email newsletter. They showed their concern to ask if something was wrong.

Eunice has recently automated her email newsletter scheduling and reminders. She batches all her work so she only needs to pop in once or twice a month to see how things are going, and then she’s off doing what she does best: creating even more fantastic floral bouquets. She wonders if she needs to use the <ADV> tag in her email newsletter (since the law came into effect only last year).

The Solution: No need to use the <ADV> tag. All of Eunice’s clients signed up via the website to receive more information and to use her email reminder service. Since they entered the email addresses themselves and read the terms before sending in their forms, they have given their consent to receive the email newsletters. They also trust Eunice and love receiving her latest newsletters. The newsletter is also a great source of repeat business for Eunice and the emails that she sends now are personalised to each person’s name and email. All her clients wonder how Eunice manages to find the time to send each newsletter and hand crafted email individually to them.  They want the emails and miss it when it’s not available.

Here’s where you want to be… eventually

The cases where you DO NOT NEED to add the <ADV> tag are as follows:

• Your subscriber knowingly gave you permission to email them when they gave you their email address. This can be a checkbox in a customer sign up form, or agreeing to the terms and conditions of your store membership (which includes allowing all email and phone contact) when they got their discount card.
• Your customers signed up on your website to receive your newsletter and email updates.
• Your customers asked for you to email them more information about a product, items they have purchased and specifically to notify them when more products are in the store.
• Your subscribers were imported to an email list, but the first email they received was an email that asked them to confirm that they wanted to receive more emails from the store, and you only mailed those who clicked the link to confirm their intention.
• You turned up at an event and with every business card you received, you asked for permission to add them to your regular newsletter list and they all agreed.

The three determinants to whether you can fully omit the use of the <ADV> tag is really:

1. Is there a prior relationship with the business?
2. Does the recipient feel the emails are relevant to him or her?
3. Was prior consent given (ideally online) to receive your messages?

If the answer to all 3 is a resounding YES, then it’s okay to omit the <ADV> tag and just include the company contact information and unsubscribe link in the footer. Remember, the more you respect the email recipients and their privacy, the more they will come to respect and trust you more.

Contact us if you wish to share your email marketing challenge or are looking for automated solutions to manage your email marketing campaigns.

You need to have a database of prospects and clients you want to contact. Make sure you have all the relevant information from them, such as their First Name, Last Name, Email Address and maybe a Mobile Contact Number.

Next, you need to decide how you want to present your communication to them. Of course, we believe that email is the most cost effective, easy to integrate and most flexible platform for any small business or non profit organisation.

There are generally 3 formats of emails we can send: The Text Email, the HTML Letterhead email and the fully loaded HMTL Email Newsletter format. For the newsletter template, choose a theme that reflects the nature of your business. Make it narrow (like between 600 to 800 pixels wide) and for length, keep it within 2-3 A4 pages to retain your readers’ short attention spans. Be liberal with the use of colour and add lots of images if relevant.

Next, you need an email marketing service or platform like what we use. The software and technology integration is managed by MyClientCenter.com for Small Business and MyClientCenter.org for non profit organisations. Of course, if you have your website hosted with us at MyClientCenter.net, we can assure superior deliverability and optimise your website and DNS settings for optimum email reach.

That aside, you need to have an email marketing strategy. What we suggest when we talk about Strategy is simply how you collect leads, how you follow up with leads, and how do you ensure leads buy from you. Map it out, work out the scenarios, and start tracking your activity.

Of course, if you are working with PathDirect, we have all the recommended formats and templates for you to use. We will also be able to advise what is the best way to approach the particular type of clients you work with and get better results.

Most of all, we ensure that you get started with your email marketing quickly and then work slowly to perfect your communication style while improving your clients’ response to your brand of marketing.

The answer should be obvious, or is it?

Basically email offers you the most instant and direct form of contact. Overall, it is the most cost effective to reach hundreds to thousands of contact, customers and prospects. It is can be text rich, plus media rich with images, links to audio downloads or podcasts, or even links to online video.

Email marketing is using email to market to new, future and current customers. You can see who opens your email, reads it, clicks on links in it, and even who they forwarded the email to.

If you run a small business, small business unit in a large corporation, a non profit organisation or maybe just the fact that you work for yourself, you can use email marketing to leverage your marketing for your business.

Share with us what your greatest email marketing challenge by sending an email to support [at] pathdirect.com

1) Always get permission to email (either before or after)

There are a few scenarios. This seems to make the most sense.

• If you have a prior business relationship with the email recipient (already your customer)
• If they have asked to be contacted or to be included in your list (brandy bowl for namecards in store)
• If they belong to a special group that must use your services (eg cleanroom engineers need specialised goggles and prescription lenses)
• They belong to the same association as you (once again, you must ask their permission.)
• If you met them in person before and have their contact or business card
• If you are a customer of theirs (they could become a customer of yours)

It’s okay to email in the above circumstances, but what if you have an old list of customers or someone with whom you have not already asked his or her permission to contact? Then do this.

• We have a newsletter which I will be sending to you shortly. If you do not wish to receive the newsletter, you can click on the unsubscribe link to be removed from our lists.
  <<unsubscribe link here>>
• You are being contacted as you have been referred to us by {Their Friend’s Name}. While we would like to ask your permission to contact you again and to share with you our Newsletter Weekly. Please make your selection now.
  Yes, please send me your regular newsletter and email updates.
  Yes, please send me email updates only (no newsletter).
  No, please do not send me any more emails or newsletters. [This is an Unsubscribe Link]
• We will be sending you our regular newsletter as a way of keeping in touch with our best customers. We have lots of valuable tips and interesting articles to share with you. You can unsubscribe anytime from our newsletters by following the unsubscribe link.

Simply follow this and get ready to manage a few unsubscribes. Unless you run a particular awfully produced newsletter with no news and lots of ads, it is unlikely you will see more than a 5 to 10% unsubscribe rate.

What ever base you are left with should be better in quality than a totally “cold” list and you can develop a new relationship with these new subscribers via email.

You will soon realise that getting permission helps you develop a more responsive and a higher quality list. You will be making more money with a 1,000 strong list with 50% open rate than a 5,000 strong list with a 1 percent open rate. It’s more than a numbers game if eventually, you want a list which values your relationship with them.

1) Always Get Permission to Email

If someone subscribes to your email list voluntarily, it does mean he or she has given you permission to email.
If it’s someone you’ve manually added to your database (for a variety of reasons), it’s only polite to ask.
If you ask and someone says no, that’s better than not asking and getting black listed as a spammer with your ISP.

2) Send Multi-Part (MIME) Emails with TEXT and HTML versions

In our technologically advanced world with high speed broadband, amazing mixed multimedia and super duper web technologies, we often forget that not everyone is as technologically enabled as we are. The advent of mobile internet and broadband on mobile phones also see people receiving email at low speeds of 128kbps and reading email with text only email browsers.

Multi-Part emails have 2 versions built in, a pure Text version and a HTML version (with links to images). If the HTML email recipient downloads images, then he can see your entire newsletter with content and images.

Avoid sending as HTML only or having your newsletter display as ONE big image (with no ability to select text). Definitely not email recipient friendly.

3) Use a Valid Sender Address and Reply To Address, Avoid Free Email Addresses

It’s okay to use fancy names for your email address. Such as thegoodnews@yourdomain.com, but make sure that the email address exists (to get bounce, responded and returned email). Make sure there is someone to read and respond to emails to the “Reply To” email address too.

Try not to do this:

From: “do-not-reply@yourdomain.com” and From: “bounce@yourdomain.com” My gmail account only shows the email username as “do-not-reply” and “bounce” and I instantly get turned off.

Never ever send a mass mailing list with a Hotmail, Yahoo! or Gmail account. Your chances of getting blocked is over 50% if you send bulk email.

4) Send the email to 1 recipient at a time. Stop using your BCC.

I know, hearing this from a professional email marketing service where we send to thousands of emails at a go seems incredulous. But it’s true. While we send to thousands, all emails are sent ONE at a time.

This allows us to input the name and email into every email with personalised content.

To: Sally Jones <sally.jones.88@gmail.com>
Message: Dear Sally, how’s things with your family? Send my regards to your husband, Earl.

This is so much better than this negative example below:

From: The Big Store <almost.spam@the-big-store..com>
To: undisclosed recipients
[Hidden -BCC: sally.jones.88@gmail.com and possibly a thousand other emails]

This smells like spam right away.

5) Allow Your Subscribers to Opt Out of or Unsubscribe from Your Emails

You must provide a way for your subscribers to unsubscribe from your list. This is in compliance with global anti-spam laws. When you receive such a request, you must remove the email address within 10 days.

Here’s a few ways:

“To unsubscribe, reply with “Unsubscribe” in the subject line.”

“To unsubscribe, send an email to unsubscribe@yourdomain.com”

“If you do not wish to receive any more emails from us, click here: [place the unsubscribe link here]”

“If you wish to update your email address, click here [update link]. To remove your email address from our list permanently, click here [unsubscribe link]”

“You subscribe to our list as sally.jones.88@gmail.com on [subscribe date]. If you do not wish to receive any more emails, click here [unsubscribe link]“

As we move from the first example to the last, you will see that the level of involvement of the user may be higher. They will have less reasons to unsubscribe or be more convinced that they did give you permission to email them in the first place.

As for creating an unsubscribe link, only professional grade email marketing software can give you this. An alternative is to use an unsubscribe form on your website instead.

6) Always have a “Privacy Policy” on hand for customers to refer to

This is a bit of work, but email recipients feel safer knowing you actually do have a privacy policy that states you respect the privacy and the right of the individual to their privacy and will not share their information with anyone without permission. You should also have a clause to allow you to use a third party emailing service should you require as an acceptable use of that information.

Uphold your privacy policy as law. Do not ever share, sell or rent your contacts’ information. If you wish to do a joint promotion, send it as a personal review or recommendation of another company’s product. Never give them the whole list.

7) Avoid buying email lists

Same principle applies. People belonging to a certain list may not have given their permission to be emailed. Publishing their email address in a directory does not mean giving permission to receive unsolicited business offers or spam.

Email Lists that have already been overused by every possible industry in the world will be virtually useless by the time you get those email addresses in your hands. They will be full of errors or non existent email addresses that will hurt your sender reputation and get you blacklisted as a spammer with major Internet Service Providers (ISPs).

This is a huge no-no. Don’t do it.

8) Be Clear In Your Subject Line (and add the <ADV> if it’s an UCE in Singapore)

Identify yourself, your company or the newsletter name. Be descriptive of the contents they will expect. Be personal with your email subject lines. Respect the law in your country (Singapore allows Unsolicited Commercial Emails to people & businesses in Singapore if you add “<ADV> ” to the subject line.

Try not to have vague subject lines. Avoid too many punctuation marks. Avoid Pitching in the subject line. Avoid money signs. Avoid words that Spam content filters look out for: millions,

Subject: Buy today to enjoy hundreds of $$$ in savings!!!

Subject: You can make millions with this money-making business and get rich quick!

Subject: Spice up your sex life with this nutritious soup

The Subject line is like the headline in a newspaper ad. Make it bold yet subtle. Make it appealing, yet communicate what you mean.

Subject: PathDIrect August Edition: Get Your Email Delivered Into The Inbox Today

Subject: Parenting Weekly: Children’s Art can make you smile

Subject: Karen, when was the last time you took a well deserved break?

Subject: ThriftCentral:10 Brilliant Ways to cut your household expenses by 25%!

Be creative and test which subject lines get you the best response. Make it fun at times too.

9) Never Attach Huge Files In Email (That include images and PDFs)

If possible, never ever send attachments to your messages.

Use hand coded HTML, insert image links that draw the images from the web.

Here’s why:

HTML Email: 50k >> Send 1,000 emails via HTML: 50,000k or about 50MB

Email with Image Attachment: 512k >> Send 1,000 emails with attached image: 512,000k or about 500MB

That’s more bandwidth use for your ISP, your broad band connection, slower delivery times, congested mail boxes (in your bounce account) as well as in your recipients’ email accounts.

This means trouble if you don’t play your cards right. If you sent to 10,000 recipients, you would have used 5GB of email bandwidth and caused far more problems for everyone down the line.

One benefit of attaching images to your HTML emails is that when they download the images, you can also track who opens your mail via a tracking image. Ask us more if you wish to implement this.

10) Be a Professional Email Sender (Always follow the rules and TEST, TEST and TEST)

Do what it takes to get your emails delivered. If you are sending thousands of emails a month, it makes sense to invest some good dollars in professional email marketing services and software. Always test your email campaigns before you click the “Send to Thousands” only to have discovered a critical mistake or a typo error.

Make sure you have the best email deliverability practises as well to get maximum delivery into the inbox.

Good luck in your email marketing endeavours and as long as you follow these 10 Best Practices, you’re in fairly safe grounds.

When we meet small business owners, we often ask them what marketing activities they already have committed their budgets to.

Many of them cite the following activities as part of their marketing mix.

• Hire sales people
• Send a flyer
• Share a corporate brochure
• Create a product catalog or a product newsletter
• Printed newsletter (most of the time in black & white photocopy)
• Send a greeting card or email at major festive holidays
• SMS marketing - costs a lot, got some responses, but limited texting capability
• Advertising in monthly, bi-monthly or quarterly magazine (in related industry)
• Advertising in other printed magazines, commemoratives, trade journals.
• Maintaining a database on Excel spreadsheet or within Outlook address book

Here’s how to get all your marketing activities in order:

List Building

• Sign up for email marketing service (can be from PathDirect)
• Create various contact lists for your prospects, new customers, current customers and VIPs
• Create sign up forms for the various contact lists (this can be used by staff or customer facing)
• Integrate a newsletter sign up form for website
• In store, create a sign up form for customers and prospects to get your newsletter (this requires an extra data entry step for your frontline or back office staff to complete)
• Get all your sales people a web based sign up form to track their new and converted leads
• You are basically creating ONE huge database with many small lists of your new, current and future customers and capturing all their details as well (can include sales details and who they are served by)
• Be prepared to create minisites for special events (include landing page, sign up form and thank you page
• Start thinking about using email marketing to integrate all your marketing activities.

Integrate All Marketing Activities with Email

• Website: Add an online newsletter sign up form
• Website: Stop putting your email address out there to be captured for spambots. Create a contact form linked to your email marketing. Those contacting you can also opt to receive your newsletter.
• In Store: Ask every walk in prospect to sign up for your newsletter
• In Store Promotion: Create a lucky draw (with or without minimum purchase) and give away your premium best selling item (eg a $25 product or one free trial worth $45) away. This should get you more leads to market to. All participants of the lucky draw will automatically agree to be on your newsletter.
• Post Sale Sign Up: Get your customers to fill up a customer profile form. Input this into your special webform later on. Better still, if you have an internet connection, let your customers sign up themselves online.
• Advertising in Print: Sell your company and offer a freebie (like free trial product or an educational report) to all who are interested. Sign up at a special minisite on your web: www.promo.yourdomain.com OR www.yourdomain.com/promo
• Billboard Advertising: Capture attention and capture more leads. Be bold and get people to visit your website to download a coupon or to get a free report, like “How to Dress For Prom for Under $80″ or “21 Ways to Be Fat Free in 21 Days (and start losing inches immediately)”
• Special Email Referral Activity: Invite your prospects and customers to get more people to your offers. “Refer the Names and Emails of 5 of your closest friends, and enjoy a ticket to our special private event or workshop.” or “Share this newsletter to win an iPhone this Christmas!”
• Invite Brochure or Flyer recipients to special private sales: “Sign up for our newsletters and be the first to know when we have a special promo or major discounts in our regular private sales. Email subscribers get the  best deals before members of the public.”

Following Up with New Leads:

• Once you’ve got new leads being added into your database regularly, be sure to follow up with them consistently for the best results.
• Send a welcome email to any new subscriber on your lists. If it’s a new prospect, let them know what they can expect to receive in your regular newsletters. If it’s a customer, thank him or her, and let them know how much you appreciate their support. List down some resources they can get help with their new product or service and how they can get in touch.
• While email is a great resource, don’t ignore the fact that people like real human contact once in a while. Call your customer, send a postcard or a greeting card. Arrange a lunch or buffet on a special customer appreciation day. Organise prospect-only workshops that will help you convert more people to your service at one go. Treat your top 20% of customers like real VIPs. Give them the numbers of their account manager or sales manager in case they have queries or need some support.
• Send an email once in a while from the Owner or CEO of the business. Customers love it when they think that they are important enough to be contacted directly by the business owner or the top guy in the firm. While you do that, it makes sense to ask for more feedback, more business or more referrals too.
• Don’t forget to send valuable information and updates in a regular email newsletter. Explain that while email is your main resource of the newsletter, they can opt to pick up a printed copy in the store. Why? Printed newsletters are expensive to produce, and email newsletters have less printing and delivery issues. This cost savings is passed on to customers when they enjoy special low prices and customer only promotions. Printing an email newsletter is even more simple. Your store personnel can print out one or two copies when a special customer needs it.
• Don’t forget about your customer and prospect database online. Keep on pruning and refining your lists. Start tracking who opened which email, and who clicked a particular link. Track and see where your customers preferences lie. If you notice more folks are clicking your “What’s New” links, perhaps it’s time to dedicate a sidebar or a special section in your newsletter to New Products available. If you notice people are clicking the “Read More” of your main feature articles, arrange to have more articles of valuable information ready to share with your readers.
• Regularly export your lists and maybe select a particular group (such as New Customers who made their first purchase 3 months ago) and have your store assistants call them to invite them back into the store and ask how they are doing with your product or service. This makes their buying experience memorable. If you get negative feedback, act on it right away, and when a solution is ready, have a manager call your customer back to let them know it’s been resolved.  Send a little token of appreciation too.
• Start mixing your lists together and invite everyone to your annual customer appreciation day or a special thanksgiving buffet lunch. This is a great way for prospective customers to mingle with your diehard fans of regular customers, and have a lot of goodwill rub off. Invite your customers to bring their family and friends to expand the networking opportunity. Remember to let your guests take home something that’s unique to your brand and of course, invite those who are not on the newsletter list to give their contact details to qualify in your Lucky Draw at the end of your party. Afterall, who wouldn’t want to win $100 worth of vouchers or a product hamper?
• I think if you did a mini brainstorming session once a month with your team, you could think up of hundreds more ways to get more people on your email lists and how you will be the smartest company in the block to have all your customer information at your fingertips.

Where does our PathDirect solutions fit in? Well, everywhere I guess.

• You can create an email marketing account and have us manage it or manage everything yourself.
• You can create contact lists of all kinds to segment your contact database and add lots of special fields that could apply to your business.
• You can import thousands of customer contact details at one go.
• You can send thousands of your contacts personalised messages that go, “Dear Sally,…”
• You can create and send regular newsletters via email.
• You can track who opened your emails and who clicked your links. See how often they read your emails too (since someone who clicks the same link 3 times is far more interested than that one click wonder.)
• You can export your customer lists to create mailing labels and personalised mail.
• You can create a customer data entry minisite with all your forms available to complete the data entry of new prospects, newsletter sign ups, lucky draw entries, new customers, and even vendors and business partners.
• You can work with us to create email marketing strategies that will grow your base and increase your sales results.
• You can have fun marketing to your prospects, customers and your very special VIP members too.
• And more…

That’s the wonder of our email marketing platform, services, and technology. More than meets the eye.

We have looked at the legal implications of sending email that people don’t want to receive any (even if they did want to receive those emails initially) and have distilled it down to a few rules that every email sender should adhere to.

Last week, we attended an industry meeting discussing the grey areas of the spam control and anti-spam legislation in Asia and around the world. While it is clear that we were already on track, we were very doubtful that email receivers clearly know what was to be classified as spam and what was not spam.

Here’s the guidelines that we can recommend you follow when sending your own email campaigns.

1) Sender Email: Have a valid ‘From’ email address. Make sure your bounce email (return-path) reaches a real account. Also check your ‘Reply-To’ address (if different from sender) works.

2) Subject Line: State the purpose of your email clearly. If you are sending an unsolicited commercial email (UCE) (which in fact is allowed only in Singapore) you must add: <ADV> before the subject line matter.

Subject: <ADV> Take the email marketing readiness test

3) Unsubscribe Option: You must allow your recipient to be able to unsubscribe from future email messages. You can either provide a web link or a reply-to address and instructions to unsubscribe.

4) Postal Address: If you are a US sender or sending to US-based email accounts (such as Hotmail, Yahoo! and Gmail) you have to provide a physical address where you can receive postal mail to allow unsubscribes.

5) Identify Youself and your business: The recipient must be clear who is sending the email and which commercial company it is from. People who are keen to do business with you would like to know who you are.

6) 10 Days Rule: Process any unsubscribe request within 10 days or less.

Make it a point to be compliant with the laws of the countries within which you operate, have contact with clients in that country or use a service provider from that country.

For more information and clarification about the spam laws around the world and how it impacts you, do drop us a link at the Get in Touch with us page.

DISCLAIMER: This set of guidelines only suggest steps to be compliant with the local and global laws that apply to email marketing. In no way do we imply greater deliverability into email inboxes or a guarantee of not getting labelled as spam. Content Spam filters can also block emails from being delivered.

Highlights of the US CAN-SPAM Act of 2003

1. Opt in only. Any unsolicited mail is SPAM.
2. Must have unsubscribe options (such as link or reply to email) and instructions on how to unsubscribe
3. Must print the postal address of the sender
4. Unsubscribe requests must be processed within 10 days
5. Criminal liability. Up to US$250 per message, max US$2 million

Highlights of the Singapore Spam Control Act 2007

1. Must label unsolicited commercial email in the subject line with <ADV>
2. Must offer unsubscribe options such as an unsubscribe link
3. Must be sent in bulk to qualify as Spam. (> 100/hour or >1,000 in 30 day period)
4. Unsubscribe requests must be processed within 10 days
5. Must have Singapore link: sender or receiver in Singapore, server or device in Singapore, company in Singapore
6. Civil Liability. Up to S$25 per message, max $1 million

Other Countries with Anti Spam Legislation

• Australia
• Hong Kong
• Japan

Read more about the legal issues here.

Our first tongue in cheek response: “Start with Email Marketing!”

It’s true. Many of our clients basically learn as they work with us the things they need to do to market themselves more effectively as a Singapore small business.

Email marketing as a small business marketing solution is not for everyone, do not be mistaken. But for most of the small businesses that already use email as a means of communication with their clients and customers, it is a viable solution.

Here’s a quick list of things to consider when marketing your small business in Singapore:

1) Get a list of your prospects and customers organised quick. Contact them immediately.

2) Ask for referrals from satisfied customers. Tell them what to say to the people they wish to refer to your business.

3) Print new namecards with a special invitation or freebie for everyone who receives your namecard. Do not just offer a discount. Share an article or a report, something that establishes you as the Expert in your industry. Give them out to EVERYONE you meet.

4) Sign up for an email marketing service. Get your contact databases in order, have a system of sending personalised messages to your contacts, and start sending festive greetings (6 to 12 times a year) or sending a regular newsletter monthly or bimonthly. Does not need to be elaborate. Just get it done.

5) Refresh your website and plug a blog into it. Add articles or posts to it every 2 weeks to 1 month at least.

6) Get your business listed in as many online business directories as you can. Singapore small businesses can list in www.hotfrog.sg for free and have backlinks to your website.

7) Explore classified ads and other free advertising portals, post in user forums and ongoing chats. Learn what people are buying and how they are buying. When ready, submit small posts online about your business and introduce yourself. Avoid hard sells and company profiling in a small ad.

8) Find people who have a database you would like to reach. Barter for a postitve review or recommendation to their list, in return for a similar promotion on your list. You will find that this is a very fun and effective way to grow your lists as they already trust the person who is sharing the information. Those who need your service will quickly contact you to sign on a deal.

9) Redo your brochures and flyers to incorporate something IRRESISTABLE to anyone reading them. Make the gift one that is of value, will be useful and can be shared with others too. Sure, a first class ticket to Japan or the latest iPhone is nice, but we were thinking of something like this:

Special Report on Real Estate Prices and Prevailing Trends (2006 to 2010)
A New Home Owner’s Guide to Purchasing A Property for Residence and Investment

Such a report could be exclusive to enquring prospects, customers who subscribe to a newsletter or maybe someone who comes in by referral. Give it a real world value in dollars (worth $49.00) but waive it off for that special respondent.

10) Pay for advertising in media and list yourself in trade directories or consumer directory listings. If you aren’t getting any results after going through Step 1 to 9, we recommend going through the list once more.

Take the Email Marketing Readiness Test now and see if getting started with email marketing might be a good thing for your small business in Singapore.

Very often we speak to business owners and managers who can’t seem to put their finger on this question. They know a bit about email marketing, generally agree on the fact the more frequent (but reasonable) contact with their prospects and customers will boost sales, and think that having an email newsletter is a great idea.

But why did they think email marketing would not work for them? We couldn’t figure it out at first.

We decided to get more information from our future clients with this email marketing readiness test.

Let’s go back to the three pillars of email marketing that we described earlier:

1) Customers

2) Content

3) Conversion

C is for Customer

I think at the start before we begin working with any business, we always consider if they have been in business for a while and whether they have been making an effort to compile a list of customers and prospects. If they do not already have a contact list, we will advise them to get started on that right away. For us, this C can also stand for clients or contacts, not just customers. All that matters is that you start building a list of qualified people who will listen and possibly buy from you again and again.

C is for Content

The next big thing that’s a road bump is the content bit. Many companies have all sorts of experts they work with plus they have genuinely great sales persons in their team. But when the time comes to put some of those ideas to paper, everyone generally feels that they have little or no usable content. Content can come from questions that have been asked by customers and answered by your sales team. Content can also come from upper management or the directors or founders of a company. It can also be simply rehashed from current brochures or a special report of an event that is about to happen or has already happened.

C is for Conversion

The mystery of conversion is perhaps the No. 1 Secret that everybody knows and nobody implements fully. The amazing thing about email marketing and the process of getting enabled to make it work for your business is that it forces you to think through every strategy and process to align it to email marketing. If you run an ad in the newspaper, you would be thinking: How can I grow my prospect database as a result of $1,000s spent in advertising? Then the next step would be, How can I convert more prospects from this advertisement to become a new customer and then into a long term repeat client?

That’s essentially the principle of getting conversion and knowing how to get even more conversions requires a strategy. You need a list, you need to know what your marketing objectives are, and as a result of engaging in certain actions, how many prospects convert to customers.

Email marketing makes tracking conversions easy. You put an ad out. You get a certain number of prospects who go a special site on your website (that’s called a landing page). Assuming 1000 people read the ad, 200 people visited that special website, 100 people signed up to learn more about your service and 10 people signed up, then your numbers are clear. Out of 1,000 people, you got a response rate of 20% (200 visits), 10% subscription rate, and a sales conversion rate of 1% (10 buyers).

1,000 readers > 200 visitors >100 subscriptions > 10 buyers

Another way to look at it is in response rates. Out of 200 people that visited the site, you got 50% subscription rate with a sales conversion rate of 5% (10 out of 200 people bought). The best part is that this is called instant sales conversions. If you followed up with the other 90 people who joined your list but did not buy now, you could be getting another 5% conversion next month and the month after that.

200 visitors >100 subscriptions > 10 buyers > 90 prospects may buy later

The more you know your numbers, and the more frequently you track your campaigns, you can derive some key statistics. If you know that your average sales conversion rates are about 5%  for a print ad, then if you sell a $100 product, that that for every 200 people that respond to the ad, there will be 10 buyers making you $1,000. You will then have to evaluate if paying $1,000 for the ad will be worth your money and time, or should you consider another  option that can get you a 5% conversion rate for $200.

That’s basically smart marketing. So know your customers, know your content and know your conversions. And by the way, as for the question: “Are you ready for email marketing?” Our answer: “You Better Be!”

There are 3 main pillars of PathDirect: Customers, Content and Conversion.

Customers

Customers form the basic foundation of any business. In order for businesses to survive and prosper, the quality and quantity of customers will be very important.

Content

Content is basically the core deliverable of every email marketing campaign. Offer as much quality content to win over your prospective customers and create stronger relationships with your customers.

Conversion

With every email marketing campaign launched, we seek a clear path to profitability for our clients. They must not only be able to get more customers, they must be able to return their investment in email marketing and make offers that will be taken up by their most responsive customers.

These 3 pillars of Email Marketing form the crux of the PathDirect 1.0 framework. Join our newsletters to learn more about our 3C Strategy for Small Business Profits.

We’re a small business too and we know what small businesses want and need. The idea for PathDirect started in 2003 as an idea… How to start a business on a small budget, create the framework for the business to grow and evolve, and then for the business to grow based on the strength of relationships between the business and its customers.

We had a small consulting business then and our clients were small and medium sized businesses which were young or in start up. Resources were thin while the potential for new business was huge. The only problem was to effectively reach ALL potential customers was going to be costly affair.

Small businesses still face the same problems today. The most expensive resources a small business doesn’t have in plenty is more time, better technology and enough manpower to follow through with all prospects and customers to get more sales through the registers.

Email Marketing is honestly a very cost effective, highly customisable, personable. rich in interactivity and can integrated across multiple media streams. Email marketing is responsible for creating millions of dollars in sales by businesses all over the world today. The only thing is that in order to run a successful email marketing campaign, there must be many resources coming together to work seamlessly to capture the right responses.

Email marketing has many names it is known by. Here are some (if not all) of the common names we know.

• Email Marketing
• Online Marketing
• Permission Marketing
• Opt-In Marketing
• List Marketing
• Customer Marketing
• Client Marketing
• Online Marketing
• Internet Marketing
• Electronic Direct Mail
• Interactive Marketing
• Email Blasts
• Email Newsletters
• eZine Marketing
• Database Marketing
• Marketing Automation
• Business Automation
• Integrated Marketing
• Relationship Marketing
• Follow Up Marketing
• Referral Marketing
• Word of Mouth Marketing
• Customer Relationship Management
• eMarketing

Email Marketing may be known by many names, but one thing is for sure, it works well with long term relationship building with your clients and customers. Email marketing today is combined with blogs, photos, audios and videos to provide an richer and more interactive experience.

Email marketing is still very hot and responsible for creating massive profits for businesses the world over.

Check out our “green” branding of our logo too.

Plus we’ll be planting some trees in your honour when you download the report.

Go To “Go Green With PathDirect” WhitePaper Download Now.