marketingfortomorrow.com

Email marketing is a fast growing trend. It is quick, easy, and generates a substantial response rate when utilized properly. According to the Direct Marketing Association, email marketing produced the absolute highest response rate for users seeking to generate leads.

While many marketers are jumping on the email blast band wagon, some still opt for a plain old fashioned email written personally. The latter can be just as effective as a professionally written and flashy email blast, if you mind your email etiquette.

I received two emails this week that caught my attention for two drastically different reasons. The first was from a job applicant who was submitting a resume. Although my company has no job openings right now, I opened the attachment because his email was so well written. The applicant had perfect grammar, spelling, addressed me personally, and took the time to do some research on my company. As I read the email, I felt as if this job seeker knew me, my business, and what I was looking for in an employee. Unfortunately, I do not have a position to offer him but you can bet I am keeping his resume.

The second email was forwarded to me by a friend and actually was a marketing email from a competitor of mine. I have never seen a more unprofessional email. The email had purple font, grammar mistakes, spelling issues, illegal use of ellipsis, capitalization mistakes, random poetry-like indentations all over the place, and exclamation point abuse. My first impression was that I would never do business with this person.

Good email etiquette can be very handy in trying to get your message across. I’m not suggesting that you need to write like Mark Twain but a few tips can help:

• Use a subject line that is interesting and pertinent. You reader should be enticed to open it.
• Use a professional font, color, and signature. Anything too cute will be seen as unprofessional.
• Personalize the email, especially if you want to get the reader’s attention. If you can’t afford expensive email blast services then send the same email to all of your contacts but perhaps personalize the opening sentence.
• Use proper grammar. You don’t need to sound like and English professor, just utilize simple rules you learned in grammar school. Mistakes are fine (no one is perfect) but avoid obvious mistakes such as punctuation or capitalization.
• When in doubt-Google your question. A useful grammar sight can be found at http://owl.english.purdue.edu/
• Spell check is your friend, but do not rely on it to catch misused words or grammatical errors. For example, if you are trying to say “whether or not” and you spell it “weather” the spell check will over look it and your receiver will think you want to discuss the recent cold front.
• Reread your email for mistakes. I can’t stress this enough!
• Do your homework. Find out about the company and include some of that information in your email. Looking at your target’s website is a great way to learn their mission statement or business objectives and incorporate some of those key words into your email. The receiver will unwittingly get a sense that you mesh with their company.

Remember, this email could be your first and last communication with a prospect. Emails are easy to ignore and easier to delete, so make your email worthwhile and professional.

Amanda Moore

www.piptampa.com