I was recently reading a blog about email marketing and branding. It was, as you might well imagine, written by a designer. The crux of the blog was that if your email newsletter was not carefully designed and branded it would not get read and would summarily be dismissed to the delete folder.

A rather bold statement to make and it made me wonder upon what foundation these claims were being made.

I say this because, while email marketinging can be very effective, there are a number of challenges that the email marketer faces, and the branding/design is but but one. I might even be bold enough to say that design and branding might even be a minor consideration. This is because for most email clients you have to actively turn images on to view the branding and design of an email, and if people are anything like me (read: lazy) they won’t necessarily turn images on the read the email.

If you are relying on the branding and design of your email to achieve the objectives of your email, then you may as well pack your bags and go home.

Before we move on let’s get it clear what I am saying. I am not saying that all email marketing should be plain text. What I am saying is that wrong to suggest only emails with images and branding will achieve the goals of the email. There are many examples of email marketing that are only in plain text/simple html that generate for their owners a healthy revenue and achieve their conversion targets.

I think this should bring up a note of caution for those involved in or considering email as a marketing and sales strategy. You need to be cautious about engaging the services of designers who have little understanding about email marketing. we should call these people “little picture” designers. This is opposed to the “big picture” designers who understand that their’s is just one part in a much bigger game.

Email marketing carries with it a number of challenges if it is to be an effective comunications and marketing tool. The first challenge that it faces is being opened by the recipient, this means that the enevelope details (subject and from fields) need to be used creatively and in a way that is specific to the subject of the email.

Once you’ve got through that challenge, it comes down to the message you are delivering. If the message you are delivering has very little to do with the envelope details, there’s a high probability that you will severly irritate your reader and the message will be deleted. The content of the email must be specific with a single call to action.

As an email marketer, you will be interested in three main statistics:

1. Open rate
2. Click through rate
3. Conversion rate

There are a number of tools and services you can use, but you might like to look at messageMaker as an email marketing application. This tool can be either self managed or managed on your behalf.

I’ve talked to hundreds of business owners and almost without exception their prime focus in regard to their website is to have it appear high in the rankings of Google. Without wishing to demean such a laudible endeavour. I have never heard in the any of these conversations  the word “conversion”. It’s as though the only thing that has to be done is get truck loads of visitors to a site and they will buy and we’ll be banking truck loads of dosh (cash) to the bank.

It appears the underlying assumption is that once the traffic starts arriving they will naturally start buying or registering - no questions asked!

Unfortunately, the reality different. People may be attracted in coming to your site because it is listed high in Google, but on arrival they are confronted with many obstacles that prevent them from either buying or registering.

There can be many on page factors that make it difficult for people to perform the action you would like them to do. For example, there can be a lack of congruence (continuity) between the search engine listing and the page (in other words what you have promised on the search engine listing, is not what is obvious or delivered on the page). Further, a page may have too many conflicting options that make it difficult for visitors to select from. Or, the process for purchasing may be too difficult and confusing. It is always a bad assumption to make, that because the page looks good, it will perform its function and convert.

I see no point in optimising a page for search engines, if no effort has been made to optimise the actual landing page so that it becomes easy for a visitor to not only fulfill their objectives in coming to the site, but also yours.

I am sure I have said this in a previous blog, I can see no point in undertaking search engine optimisation on a page if it currently performs poorly in terms of conversion. Getting more visitors to the page will not increase the conversion rate when there are inherent on-page issues that first need to be corrected and tested.

Over the past couple of months I’ve been reflecting and analysing on the number of web developers and designers offering free website audits. I am simply staggered by the number. Why were so many designers and developers flaunting themselves on every street corner of the Internet offering free website audits?

I widened out my research and found this website that reflects much of my views. Have a look at it: http://www.ragepank.com/articles/the-value-of-free/

There is a very cynical motivation why these designers and developers are offering free audits. It’s just a marketing gimmick to try and lure witless website owners into getting them to do the work in “remedying” those things that are holding them back from earning bucket loads of money on the internet.

I recently became privy to a “Free website audit report” prepared by one of these, good natured web companies. It was only after page two, of this somewhat heavy tome that it had me lurching for the nearest deep receptacle so I could heave up from the core of my being.

You are right, it was a cheap cookie cutter job that was ambiguous, misleading and erroneous. And while its essence could be distilled down to what could be written on the top of a medium sized microchip, it was heavily padded and weighted with the type of fluff that would have even prevented the Titanic from sinking. I am sure most of this had also been plagiarised from multiple sources. I looked to find the author of this document, only to find that it was a “sales consultant” from this company.

Admittedly it’s not too hard to find something on a webpage that could be an issue, but if the depth of the audit is just a series of superficial “Yes”/”No” answers, or one-liners, then the value and efficacy of the audit is somewhat pallid. It is hardly going to be of the calibre that will help an owner really understand what not only is or may be an issue, but what should be the next step(s) to remedy that situation.

Some time ago I had thought it necessary to compete head on with these “free website audit”, but that is now but a distant nightmare. To do a website audit takes time, thought and analysis. It often involves many hours of work, and is unique.

I am now thinking of adding a short highlighted paragraph to the top of my website audit page:

“You have probably noticed that many companies do not charge for website audits. We are different, we charge. We put a lot of effort into an audit in order to give you the best assessment of your site and how it can be improved. For us a website audit is not a cheap marketing tool to get you to become a customer, but is a means by which we can assess ways in which we can improve the performance of your site in a serious and quantifiable manner.”