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Posts Tagged ‘Email Marketing’

Say Goodbye To Batch And Blast Email Marketing And Start Engaging Your Subscribers and Customers With Greater Relevancy And Less Effort

Tuesday, September 1st, 2009

Ross Kramer, CEO of Listrak, explains how Event Triggered Messaging allows you to design and decide the conversation you want to have with your customers.

Automated email marketing, also known as Event Triggered Messaging (ETM) is NOW technology that will enable virtually any sized business to greatly energize its email marketing. What does that means in business terms? It means improving customer relationships and customer care and it means increasing purchase frequency and brand loyalty. It also means reduced time and money compared with manual processing and management.

How does that work? Automated email messaging is designed to send transactional email messages that are triggered by subscriber actions or profiling attributes. You can trigger messages from just about any customer or subscriber touch-point and you can lead each recipient down the path that is most relevant to their needs.

So for example someone makes a hotel reservation online, after which they are automatically sent a confirmation email. A set number of days prior to their hotel stay they are automatically sent another email containing links to various local activities and hotel amenities. Depending on the action, or in-action, of the recipient, they will then receive a further more specific email related to the area or activity they clicked on that prompts them to make an actual booking or purchase. If they choose to do nothing – after a set period – they are removed from the conversation.

The result is a natural, progressive conversation with each customer that provides them with useful individualized information, without the marketer or business having to reach out or respond manually. Even elaborate email campaigns can be mapped out in minutes, empowering businesses to build deeper relationships with customers and prospects – while spending less time managing them.

As an example – automatic cart abandonment emails aimed at encouraging shoppers to complete or even increase the level of their transaction by the inclusion of discount offers or free shipping have proven highly effective and have much higher open rates than promotional emails.

Not all Event Triggered Messages are complex. Simple auto-responders like welcome messages are triggered by someone completing a form online. And anniversary or birthday messages based on information captured from online forms, can be set up to automatically send an email with a special anniversary discount offer every year at the same time.

In a nutshell ETM lets you design and decide ahead of time what sort of conversation you want to have with your customers and subscribers, and what messages you wish to send them based on their actions or profile characteristics. It’s this one-to-one interaction and the ability to integrate dynamic content that builds engagement and encourages ongoing, profitable relationships.

Listrak Conductor™ from Email Service Provider Listrak is a new event triggered messaging solution built in to Listrak Professional and Enterprise accounts. It’s both powerful and easy to use. It’s also priced so that just about any business can afford to use it, not just the big guys. There are no upfront costs, volume pricing and pay per use pricing are both offered, plus accounts receive 500 free Conductor messages every month. Pretty much a no-brainer to try.

In terms of easy to use, Conductor lets marketers plot their email conversations “whiteboard style,” giving them a quick snapshot of every conversation path. Plus, the system includes a bunch of time-saving features like ready to use templates and visual reporting tools that make it easy to edit the conversation flow, create and save the emails, define the timing for each message, and select the events to kick off the conversation.

If you need more convincing to try automated email marketing (event triggered messaging), refer to Forrester’s June 2009 US Email Marketing Forecast 2009-2014. According to the report, email remains an indispensable low-cost communications tool for consumers and businesses alike – with an ROI that is 2 to 3 times higher than any other form of direct marketing.

The report also forecasts greater adoption of relevancy empowering tactics, such as triggering, segmentation and dynamic content – as businesses face increased clutter in the in-box and the need to get serious about relevance. Forrester also suggests that any business innovating now to increase relevancy, will have a tremendous opportunity to outpace any competition that choose to defer adoption due to the current economy.

What are you waiting for? For more information, visit www.listrak.com/conductor or call us at 877.364.4556.

Tags: Customer Relationship Management, Email Marketing, Event Triggered Messaging, Listrak, Ross Kramer
Posted in Email Marketing, Guest Articles | 2 Comments »

The Ins and Outs of Professional Services Marketing

Monday, August 31st, 2009

Online Marketing with RSS Ray and RSSRay.com announces a new episode that you do not want to miss.

Show Date: September 2, 2009 at 1 pm Eastern, 10 am Pacific

Mike Schultz, President of Wellesley Hills Group

Show Topic The Ins and Outs of Professional Services Marketing

Show Guest: Mike Schultz, President of Wellesley Hills Group

About Mike Schultz: Mike Schultz, President, is world-renowned as a consultant and expert in services marketing, branding, and rainmaking. Co-author of the book Professional Services Marketing (Wiley, 2009), Mike is an engaging and thought-provoking speaker, delivering dozens of keynotes each year in-house for clients and at leading industry conferences. Mike is also Publisher of RainToday.com, the world’s foremost publication and membership site for insight, advice, and tools for growing a service business.

Sample Questions for Mike Schultz:

• How would you rate the effectiveness of Professional Services Marketing?
• What makes for a strong value proposition for a firm that they can use in their marketing?
• What are the top tactics for generating leads?

Show Topic: How to Use Automated Email Marketing to Grow Your Bottom Line

Ross Kramer, CEO of Listrak

Show Guest: Ross Kramer, CEO of Listrak

About Ross Kramer: Ross Kramer is President and CEO of Listrak LLC. A serial entrepreneur by nature, Ross has started several marketing technology ventures, the first of which was a web hosting company in his Penn State dorm room. His latest marketing technology venture is Listrak, an email marketing service provider serving over 300 clients in the United States, Europe and the Middle East. Listrak features an intuitive web-based graphical user interface that allows permission-based marketers to manage, send, track and grow their email marketing investment.

Sample Questions for Ross Kramer:

• What is event triggered messaging?
• What type of company would benefit from event triggered messaging?
• You’ve been able to break down every conversation into five basic steps what are they?

How to Listen: Live on wsRadio.com or available by Podcast on iTunes or by RSS Feed.

RSS Ray’s Comments: “Mike Schultz is an authority on Professional Services Marketing,” stated RSS Ray, host of “Online Marketing with RSS Ray.” RSS Ray went on to say, “Ross Kramer’s knowledge of email marketing is second to none.”

Tags: Email Marketing, Listrak, Mike Schultz, Professional Services Marketing, Ross Kramer, Wellesley Hills Group
Posted in Email Marketing, Show Announcements | 1 Comment »

Free Webinar: Why Use Email Marketing?

Tuesday, August 4th, 2009

Free email marketing webinar, Wednesday at 4:00 PM Eastern, 1:00 PM Pacific.

Whether you want to acquire more new customers, convert your existing leads, or upsell your past clients, email marketing is an excellent and inexpensive solution to your needs.

If you’re not using email marketing effectively, you might be costing yourself a lot of money.

Tomorrow at 4:00 PM Eastern, 1:00 PM Pacific, RSS Ray (Brian Offenberger) will be offering a special free webinar to discuss exactly why you should use email marketing.

We highly encourage you to attend and learn all about email marketing. During the webcast, Ray will discuss why it’s important, the best ways to use it to increase profits, and more.

To register for this event visit the Right On No – Bull Marketing website and go to the free internet marketing webinars section.

Tags: Email Marketing, Free Webinar, Online Marketing Webinars, Why Use Email Marketing
Posted in Email Marketing, Show Announcements | No Comments »

The Great Video Debate

Wednesday, June 24th, 2009

Kara Trivunovic, Sr. Director of Strategic Services for StrongMail Systems discusses the pros and cons of using video in your email marketing campaign.

Kara Trivunovic After a coast-to-coast travel extravaganza last week, regardless of the venue or focus, one topic cropped up repeatedly – the pros and cons of leveraging video in email. While there are valid positions and applications for the inclusion of video within an email message, it has yet to be proven more effective than other relevancy tactics. I have three major points of conversation around this topic for which I am opening up for debate. I remain completely open to a sway-factor, so long as there is a good argument or supportable point of view. So, let the Great Video Debate begin!

Video vs. Relevance

Advocates of video in email talk about it like it is the next coming for the email industry – but let’s face it, not every email warrants a video. I support the idea that there are opportunities for video to enhance a message, just like images in email have; but just because you “can” use video, doesn’t mean you “should” use video. I have seen some very successful applications of video – one example is when a popular airline launched new cabins on their entire fleet. An email was sent that included video highlighting all of the new features on the aircraft. The message had great conversion, but this is an example of leveraging video to support a very specific and relevant cause. If it enhances the message content, then go for it, but don’t include video just because you “can.” If your video has no relevance to the message or the experience for the recipient, then it has no place in your email.

Video vs. Metrics

As marketers are turning more to email as a cost-effective and trusted marketing channel during this down economy, we are all looking for ways to differentiate our messages. But I have to say, of all the conversations I had last week on this topic, there is one comment that I heard that is just unfounded and nearly impossible to support: “Video in my email drove higher open rates.” What?! Without some serious ESP (and not the Email Service Provider kind) by your recipient, there is little possibility they knew that video was in your message when it hit their inbox; unless, of course, the subject line alluded to the video – but I would argue that it was then the subject line that drove the higher open rate. I don’t doubt that leveraging video that is highly relevant to your topic will drive higher conversion or will impact your success metrics, but to say undoubtedly that video increased open rates is really a stretch.

Video IN Email vs. Video “in” email

I’ve seen case studies that talk about the lift realized when video was featured in email versus text and images, which is a pretty valid claim if applied appropriately. However, I am still waiting for someone to prove that the ability to play video within your email client is more effective than linking a video image to a browser to actually play the video. I somehow doubt there is a marked lift in response. I admit, I am a pessimist when it comes to physically including video in email and am anxiously awaiting someone to convince me otherwise. What’s the benefit? There is little reason to ever want to auto-play a video upon opening a message, especially if there is sound in the video.

So we’re clear, I am not saying there is no place for video in email, but I am suggesting that you approach it with a cohesive plan and a realistic expectation of what the video will bring. If you approach this adventure with eyes wide open, then the experience should be pleasant.

Kara Trivunovic has over 10 years of email marketing experience. She is currently the Director of Strategic Services at StrongMail Systems. Their dedicated marketing and transactional email solutions eliminate the limitations of traditional email service providers and custom-built solutions, enabling businesses to deliver more relevant, timely and cost-effective messages.

Tags: Email Marketing, Email Metrics, Kara Trivunovic, Leveraging Video in Email, StrongMail Systems
Posted in Email Marketing, Guest Articles | No Comments »

Does Being Environmentally Friendly Boost Sales?

Monday, June 22nd, 2009

Online Marketing with RSS Ray and RSSRay.com announces a new episode that you do not want to miss.

Show Date: June 24, 2009 at 1 pm Eastern, 10 am Pacific

Gay Browne, Founder of Greenopia

Show Topic Does Being Environmentally Friendly Boost Sales?

Show Guest: Gay Browne, Founder of Greenopia

About Gay Browne: Gay Browne developed Greenopia to provide a resource to help people like herself make choices to green their lives on a daily basis. Founded in 2005, Greenopia has developed guides for Los Angeles, the San Francisco Bay Area, and New York City with plans underway for a 20-city rollout that includes Chicago, Denver, Seattle and Portland, among others. Greenopia’s web presence creates a local green community where consumers can browse Greenopia’s listings.

Sample Questions for Gay Browne:

Why do you think more and more companies are starting to go green?

In what ways can companies become greener while still remaining competitive?

Do companies who are more environmentally friendly see an increase in sales?

Show Topic: Creating Credible Email Marketing Messages That Motivate Consumers

Kara Trivunovic, Director of Strategic Services of StrongMail

Show Guest: Kara Trivunovic, Director of Strategic Services of StrongMail

About Kara Trivunovic: Previously the Founder and Principal at The Email Advisor, LLC, Kara Trivunovic has over 10 years of email marketing experience. She is currently the Director of Strategic Services at StrongMail. Their dedicated marketing and transactional email solutions eliminate the limitations of traditional email service providers and custom-built solutions, enabling businesses to deliver more relevant, timely and cost-effective messages.

Sample Questions for Kara Trivunovic:

Should emails be personalized to individual customers?

How are retailers using reviews and recommendations in their email marketing campaigns?

How can you determine the right emails to send to the right customers?

How to Listen: Live on wsRadio.com or available by Podcast on iTunes or by RSS Feed.

RSS Ray’s Comments: “Gay Browne is the perfect person to talk about how going green can significantly improve your business results.” stated RSS Ray, host of “Online Marketing with RSS Ray.” RSS Ray went on to say “Email marketing is one of the most profitable ways to grow your business and Kara is the right person to explain how to do it right.

Tags: Email Marketing, Environmentally Friendly, Gay Browne, Going green, Greenopia, Kara Trivunovic, StrongMail
Posted in Email Marketing, Guest Announcements | 1 Comment »

Revealing the Value of Loyalty Programs

Wednesday, March 18th, 2009

Matt Wisk, president of MyPoints, offers 6 tips on leveraging your brand and targeting the consumer for the best return on your investment.

MyPoints Logo

The internet boom in the early 90’s brought us interactive – a brand new channel for marketers, adding possibilities for outreach, brand awareness and loyalty beyond the established print, radio, and TV channels. Now, interactive is an essential element of nearly all campaigns and smart marketers know being online is simply not enough.

An effective interactive marketing campaign reaches consumers wherever they’re spending their time online. A mix of viral marketing, targeted websites, email marketing campaigns, and consumer incentives can build a highly-engaged audience – and though every brand has its own sales objectives and approaches to be successful, they all share a common goal: brand awareness, and eventually, loyalty.

While trying to keep up-to-date on the latest in interactive tools, some marketers have an outdated view of the power of incentive and loyalty programs. If the incentive is generic and untargeted, any spike in traffic rarely results in a return shopper, and the return typically does not result in sustained brand awareness. Marketers have also cited the lack of proven ROI, fear of a ‘new’ model, and concerns about customer and corporate privacy issues as reasons for slow adoption of loyalty programs.

For best return on investment, there are essential elements for your program:

Clearly define a goal – Getting in front of eyeballs is one thing, but to generate the best leads, which will convert to sales and longstanding customers, a specific goal is necessary.

Narrow your target market – Know who your audience is, where they go to make decisions, and what factors they consider when buying your product.

Broaden your use of Web tools – Banner ads might get your brand in front of millions of consumers, but to convert to customers, leverage newsletters and postcard-style emails, surveys, promotions and other means of getting in front of potential buyers.

Pay to reach your target (and only your target) – Locate hard-to-find consumers online using a short, customized questionnaire, which will drive pre-qualified consumers to your doorstep.

Focus on your subject line – Never underestimate the power of a strong subject line. Use the subject line to state a powerful benefit, pique curiosity, and force the reader to open up the email to take the action you want.

Opt-in Emails – With opt-In emails, interested consumers will be notified about certain events or updates, and will venture back to your site more frequently to learn more about the deal, event, or saving.

The points-based system created by MyPoints makes the difficult task of changing customer loyalty and behavior much easier, and more measurable. Because customers see clear value, in the form of redeemable points, they’re actively involved in helping advertisers learn about how best to serve them and other people like them, ultimately helping brands drive sales, awareness and leads; build their databases of loyal customers and acquire new ones; and take advantage of Web 2.0 tools.

Matt Wisk is the president of online loyalty marketing service, MyPoints. They provide advertisers with an effective means to reach a large online audience with targeted marketing campaigns. The MyPoints program also enables consumers to earn points-based rewards by responding to email offers, completing online surveys, shopping online and engaging in other online activities.

Tags: Consumer Incentives, Customer Behavior, Customer Loyalty Programs, Email Marketing, Interactive Marketing, MyPoints, Viral Marketing
Posted in Customer Relationship Management (CRM), Email Marketing, Guest Articles | No Comments »

How To Use Automated Marketing Systems To Catapult Sales And Profit

Thursday, October 2nd, 2008

Learn How To Use Transactional Based Email Marketing With Set It and Forget It Simplicity

If you ask many business owners what their most important asset is, they may name you their equipment, their employees or maybe their name or location. While all of these are important, if you want to make more sales and profit, your most important asset is your customer and prospect data base.

You can survive most business disasters, except the loss of that. And this is something that no insurance company settlement will ever recover.

Why is it so important? There’s gold in that list! If you set up an email marketing system with your lists you can mine that gold and make more sales and profit than just about any other thing you can do with your marketing dollar.

Capturing the email address of all your customers and prospects then becomes about the most important business activity you can undertake.

How can you go about getting the email address of your customers and prospects? Offline it is as easy as having a technician collect the email address when filling out a service ticket, or training your people who answer the phones to ask for that information on any phone inquiry. Online, it’s even easier.

The concept of an ‘ethical bribe’ is offering a free report, trial offer, or discount coupon in exchange for their email address to anyone who lands on your website. This is how great lists are built. When you have a list of people who are interested in or are currently buying your products and services, you can communicate with them systematically and get new sales or increase the frequency of which you current customers buy from you. You can use the same system to upgrade sales and cross sell to the people on your list. For instance if you purchased a computer printer online, that company would follow up with email offers for ink and toner, service contracts, or other related supplies over a period of time. Now they may not buy from every offer, but when it comes time to buy these supplies, they will buy them from the company that has kept communicating with them. This is transactional based email marketing!

How It Works

In the past, there was a lot of manual work involved. Someone had to load all the new leads onto spreadsheets, someone else had to remember to send the appropriate email out at the right time. Today, it can be completely automated. There are many software programs that will do all this for you! ( See Reference section at the end of this article) Some of these programs you buy and load onto your computer, others are web based, and you access them through the internet with your user name and password. Here are some of the reasons why continual email communication works with getting prospects turned into customers:

Most website visitors don’t order on the first visit.
They don’t know enough about your offer to order the first visit.
Busy with other projects.
Might not have the money to purchase immediately.
Still evaluating other products or services and haven’t made a decision yet.
Build brand awareness.
Build credibility and trust.

One of the best, easy to use systems is an auto-responder. What that does is whenever someone buys from you or asks for a free report and hits ‘submit’, they get back an immediate programmed email response thanking them for their order in the case of a purchase, and can suggest related products or services that compliment that purchase. This can be followed with a series or sequence of timed emails that go out to that customer reminding them to re-order, or show them related products they may be interested in.

In the case of someone requesting your ‘ethical bribe’, an auto-responder goes out thanking them and letting them know how to access what you offered. That gets followed up with a timed sequence of emails that continues the discussion and make offers of products or services that your company provides.

Once this system is set up, and all the emails are written, this can all be automated and customers and prospects get instant acknowledgment even when your business is closed for the day, no matter what they do; order a free report, buy a product, or even leaving a request for more information. This benefits the business and the prospect!

How You Can Get Started Today

Here are the steps you need to take to take advantage of transactional based automated email and the increase and sales and profit it brings.

Contact one of the software services that offer auto-responders and email marketing. There are many, and the costs vary based upon the frequency and number of customers and prospects you will email.
List all the transactions that are offered by your website or websites.
Create the auto-responders for every action the customer can do on your website, such as make a purchase, request an appointment, order free resources, or request more information, that provides immediate acknowledgment, or describes exactly what they must do to access what they have requested.
Create the sequential email marketing campaign that follows purchases to cross sell, up sell, and advertise related products.
Create the sequential emails for prospects requesting information or ordering your ‘ethical bribe’ that turn prospects into customers.
Load these emails and the date sequence into the email marketing software.
Put the code for each auto-responder onto the proper landing page on your website.
Set up systems to capture the email address of all your customers and phone inquiries and manually load these into your databases.
Prepare for a big increase in business!

Setting up this system is not easy, and there is a lot to do. Just writing the correct copy to send in each email is difficult if you don’t have the experience. Know when it is appropriate to get outside experts to help you.

No matter how time consuming, or the initial investment of setting this up, it is worth the effort many times over in terms of growing an extremely profitable business with a steadily increasing number of loyal customers.

References

There are many email marketing system software with auto-responders that you can find on the internet. Here are some of the popular ones.

A Webber www.Aweber.com

Constant Contact www.constantcontact.com

Infusion Soft www.infusionsoft.com

Exact Target www.exacttarget.com

Contact Pro www.contactpro.com

Elite Mail www.eliteemail.com

Strong Mail www.strongmail.com

If you need help setting up your own automated marketing and email marketing system RSS Ray can help. Contact us today by filling out our privacy assured online form or by calling (877) 837-8803.

Tags: Auto-Responder, Automated Email, Automated Marketing, Email Marketing, Online Marketing
Posted in Email Marketing | 3 Comments »

Integrate Your Digital Marketing Channels to Create the Ideal Online Consumer Experience

Monday, September 22nd, 2008

Online Marketing with RSS Ray and RSSRay.com announces a new episode that you do not want to miss.

Brian Deagan, CEO of Knotice

Show Date: September 24th, 2008 at 6 pm Eastern, 3 pm Pacific

Show Topic: Integrate Your Digital Marketing Channels to Create the Ideal Online Consumer Experience

Show Guest: Brian Deagan, CEO of Knotice

How to Listen: Live on wsRadio.com or available by Podcast on iTunes or by RSS Feed.

Guest Biography: Brian Deagan co-founded Knotice with the simple objective of helping marketers communicate more effectively with their customers. Knotice is the third technology-based company Mr. Deagan has guided in the past decade. Since the early 1990’s, he has leveraged his pragmatic approach to emerging technologies and his experience in the software industry to develop, market and sell enterprise business solutions to a wide range of industries, while maintaining a heightened focus on marketing automation and creative services application software. Prior to Knotice, he served as Chief Executive Officer of 600 Monkeys until the company was acquired by Niku Corporation in Redwood City, CA, where he served as the Director of Vertical Markets.

Sample Questions:

1. How important is testing and optimization to successful digital marketing?
2. Tell us about microsites and effective landing pages
3. What are the essential elements in any good personal relevance marketing campaign?

RSS Ray’s Comments: “As a marketer, being able to combine all aspects of an online marketing campaign into one platform is incredibly useful. I’m looking forward to learning more about Knotice in this week’s interview.” stated RSS Ray, host of “Online Marketing with RSS Ray.”

Tags: Digital Marketing, Email Marketing, Integration, Marketing Channels
Posted in Email Marketing, Guest Announcements, Mobile Marketing, Online Marketing | No Comments »

Turning Browsers into Buyers

Monday, September 22nd, 2008

Brian Deagan, CEO of Knotice wants you to start increasing your conversion rates. In this exclusive article he wrote for RSS Ray, Brian explains how companies can use integrated online marketing systems to boost their conversion rates and their bottom line. Be sure to catch RSS Ray’s interview with Brian this Wednesday at 6 pm EST, 3 pm PST on wsRadio.

Knotice Logo
It’s all about the conversion. Especially in today’s uncertain economic times, online advertisers are more diligent than ever about chasing the conversion and making the dollars they spend online more valuable. The inherent difficulty in this quest is finding an efficient way to do it – in terms of both time and money. Research analysts from all over agree that the online marketing landscape is fragmented, with companies forced to engage multiple systems to provide a complete approach for their online marketing.

This historically piecemeal approach looks like this: A company uses one vendor for email, another for onsite targeting, another for mobile marketing, a different vendor for content management, yet another vendor for planning and workflow, a completely different vendor for optimization, etc. The results of this approach are understandably poor from the consumer’s perspective. The consumer receives disjointed communications and little to no consistent relevance and personalization. But, the approach doesn’t really work for the company, either. It is extremely inefficient for a company to coordinate and integrate multiple vendor relationships, not to mention the innate monetary cost (both out of pocket and paying for redundant capabilities with multiple systems) and opportunity cost.

With this piecemeal approach fully ingrained in the marketplace, the debate has gotten even more complicated with CRM companies and web analytics companies claiming to solve it. The analytics providers are saying “we have the data,” while the CRM providers are saying “data is just one of many things we do.” The Achilles Heel in their claims is that neither company has the ability to do what’s needed – marry the data to the content. Without the data and content working together the consumer will continue to receive online marketing communications that are not timely, not targeted and not optimized. And, they will not convert.

The glue holding together the concept of meaningful interactive channel integration is the marriage of the data and the content. Data is only valuable if it’s actionable. When data joins forces with content, it becomes useful in new, compelling ways for the marketer – who now has the tools necessary to create an ideal online consumer experience.

So, I’m excited to appear on RSS Ray’s radio program on September 24th to discuss the value in integrating interactive marketing channels, and the positive effect it has on both the online consumer experience and the conversion rate for marketers. If you’d like to find out more about Knotice prior to my appearance, visit our website (http://www.knotice.com) or our blog (http://lunchpail.knotice.com).

See you on the radio!

Tags: Conversion Rates, crm, Email Marketing, marketing communications, Online Marketing
Posted in Customer Relationship Management (CRM), Guest Articles, Online Marketing | No Comments »

The Best Free Marketing Tools to Improve Your Website Results

Thursday, August 14th, 2008

By: RSS Ray

Ask any contractor what he needs to do a job right and the first thing he will tell you is he needs the right tools. Online marketing is no different. If you want to get excellent results with your website you will need the right diagnostic tools to test, measure, and improve everything you do. Online marketers need tools for establishing a search engine optimization campaign, using web analytics to understand websites, preparing the latest keywords for a pay per click campaign in Google AdWords, preparing email marketing campaigns, and a whole lot more. Here is the best of the best free tools for online marketers.

The usefulness and design of these tools tends to range from downright awful, to absolutely amazing. Price ranges can also vary widely, but thanks to the efforts of a number of innovative companies and individuals, many of the very best tools are absolutely free.

Today we are going to take a look at twelve tools that are the absolute best of the best free tools for online marketers. Thanks to creativity, design, and in some cases a whole lot of money, these tools are the most innovative and useful tools you will find in 2008.

#1 Google Keyword Tool

Drawing from the largest collection of search data in the world, the Google keyword tool has always been an incredibly useful way to discover hundreds of new keywords for your search engine optimization and paid search (PPC) campaigns. As of a few months ago, Google managed to up the ante even more by providing monthly estimates of the search volume for each keyword it suggests.

Anyone looking to do keyword research online would be wise to start by using this tool for keyword suggestions, ad competition data, and information on average search volume. To make things even better, Google allows you to put the keywords you like right into your account so that you can target them with an AdWords campaign.

#2 SEO Book Keyword Suggestion Tool

Like the Google keyword tool, The SEO Book Keyword Suggestion Tool provides tons of suggestions for other keywords you might be interested in. However, unlike Google’s Tool, this one also gives estimated values for all three major search engines. Additionally, the tool allows you to easily use a number of other tools from Google, Yahoo, and others to get a lot more information on each keyword it suggests.

It’s unclear how accurate the search data is as it seems to differ significantly from Google’s numbers, however, with the numerous options and many helpful suggestions this tool makes, it should be a part of every serious online marketer’s toolbox.

#3 SpyFu

SpyFu is an incredibly useful tool that might make you wonder “is this even legal?” followed quickly by “how can that be free?” Eventually you will realize you don’t care either way as you dive into the nitty-gritty of your competitors’ ad campaigns.

By entering in the website address of nearly any competitor, you can see exactly what their daily ad budget is, how many clicks they are getting through their ads, and even how their spending has changed on a monthly basis. You can even see which keywords they are targeting and exactly what ad they are using for each keyword.

SpyFu goes even more in-depth by showing every word that a website ranks in organically, as well as that website’s top competitors both organically and through paid search. Needless to say you’ll be hooked.

#4 Compete.com

Compete.com is most often referenced for keeping track of the search engine wars. Those in the know are constantly checking to see if Google is at 74% market share or 78%. Fortunately, that same technology that tracks the search game is freely available to anyone who happens to visit the Compete.com website.

By entering in the URLs of up to five websites you can see monthly or daily graphs of traffic volume, customer engagement, and website growth. What this means is that in only a few seconds you can see the visitor count, length of visitor stay, and growth of your largest competitor in a series of easily downloadable graphs. What’s more you can compare all of this data against your own website so you can see how you stack up.

#5 Quantcast

The depth of demographic information that Quantcast provides about nearly any website is simply staggering. The tool was made as a way for media buyers to discover valuable websites to advertise with based on traffic, user demographics, and ad type offered. Even if you are not interested in buying ads, this free tool will provide you with incredibly detailed demographic information about your own website as well as your competitors’.

Quantcast is able to provide some incredibly detailed data for most well trafficked websites including data on visitor gender, age, ethnicity, parental status, income, and education. Additionally the site provides monthly traffic data and classifies visitors into addicts, regulars, and passersbys.

Another feature that Quantcast offers is the ability to see other sites that visitors like, visit, and search for. This is excellent for marketers doing keyword research or link building.

#6 Xinureturns

Xinureturns is relatively simple compared to some of the other tools on this list but its usefulness should not be underestimated. By entering your URL into the tool you are given a complete assessment of your website in just a few minutes.

The tool starts by checking your Meta tags, your domain info, and your HTML and RSS validations. Once it is sure that everything is set up properly, it starts to check your rankings at various sites and directories, any social bookmarks that point to you, and all of your indexed pages. Finally you are shown the number of backlinks you have with several search engines including a few you might have never heard of.

This tool is incredibly useful for those of us who like to know exactly how our site is doing at every second, and it also allows you to identify any shortfalls that can likely be easily overcome with just a little bit of work.

#7 Google Analytics

What can be written about Google Analytics that has not already been said a hundred times before? In releasing this tool free to anyone who wants it, Google has created a host of super informed marketers who can quickly asses any issue on their website and compare it to the entire past history of the website.

By adding a simple piece of code to their website, anyone can track the exact way that their visitors are interacting with their pages. Google analytics provides traffic data, number of pages visited, average time on site, the location of visitors, and even where the traffic is coming from. The program also allows you to track conversions and a lot of other information about how users interact with your site.

Any competent online marketer should have this powerful free tool on each and every website he or she works on. The information it provides is critical to maximizing conversion rates and eliminating wasted opportunities.

#8 Ranks.nl Keyword Analyzer Tool

The Ranks.nl Keyword Analyzer Tool is the best example of a spider simulator I have come across as an online marketer. In addition to showing you how search engines view your site, this tool breaks down the keywords you are using by density, prominence, and location. The tool also has a keyword cloud that shows you visually the prominence of various keywords on your site.

Using a tool like this one allows you to make sure that you are correctly targeting the right keywords in natural search by including them often enough in your copy. It also helps by showing you some words that you are not targeting well enough or that you had not thought of targeting.

#9 Google Website Optimizer

The Google Website Optimizer is the last of the free Google tools on this list, and also maybe the most important. Using this tool, marketers can test each individual aspect of their website to see how conversion rates can be improved.

The tool makes use of A/B split testing as well as multivariable testing to measure each and every part of a landing page in order to find how best to convert visitors into sales or leads. Marketers can test such aspects as pictures, headlines, text, free offers, and anything else they can think of.

By serving visitors different versions of a landing page, Google is able to demonstrate which features are helping the bottom line and which are hurting it. Marketers can then take this data and create the landing page that will offer them the highest overall sales.

#10 Website Grader

The Website Grader is the like a report card for search engine optimization practitioners. In each of five categories, the tool assesses any website’s success in implementing proper SEO strategy. Each category including on-page SEO, off-page SEO, blogosphere, social mediasphere, converting qualified visitors to leads, and competitive intelligence, receives a score and at the end of the report a final score up to 100 points is assigned. The final score is a fairly accurate measure of how well a website is optimized.

In addition to being aesthetically pleasing and easy to use, this tool is an incredibly useful way to discover any optimization strategies that you might have not implemented. It is also a great way to track your progress in search engines, social networks, and blogs. Thanks to its automatic saving feature, you can compare your current results against and previous website grades you have received from the site. This way you can see how you have progressed after making the changes that it recommended.

#11 Constant Contact

Constant Contact is by many accounts the gold standard of email marketing. With over 300 customizable templates available to quickly and easily create a professional looking email newsletter, promotion, or invitation, the online software is, without a doubt, essential to any marketer looking to increase profits with email marketing.

Once you sign up for an account with Constant Contact, you can easily import an existing email list or you can use their software to begin creating a new email list from scratch. With your list created, you can build a professional looking email such as a newsletter using their template wizard and set it to go out at a predetermined time and date. Once your email has been sent, the program provides you with analytics on open rates, click through rates, and more.

Unfortunately, Constant Contact is not a free tool; however, they do offer a 60 day free trial to get started.

#12 AWeber

AWeber allows you to send out professional looking emails to your email lists; however unlike their competitors at Constant Contact, AWeber also allows you to set contacts into an email cycle that sends emails to specific customers at specific times. By building an email sequence, each new name that you enter into the program is sent a new email every day, month, or however long you choose to set each cycle. This way you can be sure that the right promotions or programs go to the right email address at the right time. For instance a new customer might get a special introductory offer right away while a lifelong customer will receive a special offer for valued customers on that same day.

Where Constant Contact only allows you to send out the same email to your entire email list, AWeber will likely have each of your contacts receiving different emails on different days. It is because of this distinction that Constant Contact is popular for newsletters while AWeber is much more popular for a continued sales cycle.

Unfortunately, AWeber is not a free tool; however, they do offer a free trial that is well worth your time to check out.

If you need help with using any of these tools, or with starting an online marketing campaign for your company, we can help. Call us today at (877) 837-8803 or contact RSS Ray to learn what you can do to skyrocket your success online.

Tags: Email Marketing, free tools, marketing tools, Online Marketing, pay per click, Search Engine Optimization, Web Analytics
Posted in A/B Testing Programs, Competitive Intelligence, Email Marketing, Increasing Website Traffic, Link Popularity and Link Building, Multivariate Testing, Online Marketing, Online Testing Programs, Paid Search Advertising (PPC), Search Engine Advertising, Search Engine Marketing, Search Engine Optimization, Search Engine Tools, Web Analytics/Web Metrics | 1 Comment »

How to Increase Your RSS Subscribers Using Email

Friday, December 21st, 2007

Here’s an interesting article from Wednesday’s show guest, Matt Browne of Integral Impressions about their new product, Nourish.

If you publish content on a blog or news website, you likely know that your RSS subscribers are your bread and butter. Sure, you’ll appreciate anyone who’s willing to read your article. However, it’s your RSS subscribers that have the season pass to your content. Those are the people you know you’ll be putting your articles in front of every time you publish one.

Savvy marketers are always looking out for better and more efficient ways to increase their subscriber count. One way to increase your subscriber count is to simply increase the number of potential subscribers and let the numbers work themselves out. You can do this by allowing your readers to subscribe to your RSS feed through email. What’s more, you can now do this quickly and easily using Nourish.

What does Nourish do?
Nourish is a new web service which allows you to take any RSS feed from content you publish, like from a blog or news website, and convert it into an automated email newsletter your readers can subscribe to.

Why is this important?
RSS is a fantastic technology which allows your readers to subscribe to your content and consume it on a regular basis. However, only 4% of Internet users knowingly sign up for RSS syndicated content, and only 12% are somewhat aware of the term RSS. In contrast, almost all of Internet users use email regularly.
By offering your RSS content via email as well, you significantly increase your potential subscriber base.

What’s so special about Nourish?
Nourish takes a minimalist approach to the problem by only focusing on the most important aspects of an automated, RSS-driven email newsletter. Rather than being good at many things, Nourish looks to be great at one thing. The result is a simple and usable application that allows you to complete all the right tasks quickly and efficiently.

Some particularly useful features include:

1) Flexible scheduling
2) Ability to combine multiple feeds into a single campaign
3) Open-rate and click-through-rate tracking
4) Paid accounts have the ability to build fully-custom templates
5) Free accounts available (ad supported)

Who’s behind Nourish?
Nourish was built by the folks over at Integral Impressions. Integral Impressions specializes in providing Internet Marketing products and services. They are the people behind other useful applications such as Outlandish and EasyCropper.

Nourish is a great solution for bloggers and other content publishers who want to offer their readers more choices to subscribe to the content they create. While RSS is a great technology, it just hasn’t achieved the level of adoption that email has. By offering an email-based alternative to potential subscribers, you significantly increase your chances of hooking them.

Author: Matt Brown
Matt Browne is the co-founder of Integral Impressions- a San Diego based interactive advertising agency specializing in Search, Email, and Web Application development. For more information visit Integral Impressions or call 888.882.2242.

Tags: Blogging, Customer Relationship Management (CRM), Email Marketing, RSS Marketing
Posted in About the Show, Blogging, Customer Relationship Management (CRM), Email Marketing, RSS Marketing | No Comments »

Turn Your RSS Feed Into a Next Generation Newsletter

Monday, December 17th, 2007

Tune in to RSS Ray this Wednesday to learn how you can turn your companies RSS Feed into a next generation newsletter via email. Matt Browne of Integral Impressions joins RSS Ray and will explain how thier latest product, Nourish, allows you to managemet multiple campaigns through your RSS Feeds.

Prior to starting Integral Impressions, Matt Browne had a decade of experience in information technology and over 7 years of dedicated study to online marketing, conversion rates, and behavioral analytics. Browne is widely recognized by his peers as an innovator having published research & editorials in MarketingSherpa, Marketing Experiments, Inman News, and Z-News.

Listen live this Wednesday 1pm Eastern/10 Pacific on wsRadio.com

Tags: Email Marketing, Ray Recommends, RSS Marketing
Posted in About the Show, Email Marketing, RSS Marketing, Ray Recommends | No Comments »

2007 SEMA Show – Use Electronic Marketing to Increase Profits and Decrease Costs

Wednesday, October 31st, 2007

October 30, 2007 – Brian Offenberger, a/k/a RSS Ray, spoke at the 2007 SEMA Show on how to use Electronic Marketing in your marketing efforts. Click here to find the full Power Point presentation.

Tags: Email Marketing, Marketing Education Resources, Podcasting, Search Engine Marketing, Videocasting
Posted in About the Show, Email Marketing, Industry News, Marketing Education Resources, Podcasting, Search Engine Marketing, Videocasting | No Comments »

Top Common Mistakes Made by Online Marketers

Tuesday, August 21st, 2007

Managing a marketing campaign can sometime become a pain. So what’s out there that can make campaign management a breeze? Introducing Revcube, an automated, real-time, cross-channel optimization platform.

On this weeks show the CEO of Revcube, Chris Raniere, will be talking with us. You defiantly don’t want to miss this show. Hear what common mistakes online marketers make, how to fix them, learn what an automated campaign is and how it can help you.

Find out what you can do to improve your online marketing campaigns live this Wednesday 1pm Eastern/10 Pacific on wsRadio.com

Tags: Email Marketing, Increasing Website Traffic, Multivariate Testing, Search Engine Marketing
Posted in About the Show, Email Marketing, Increasing Website Traffic, Multivariate Testing, Search Engine Marketing | No Comments »

Improve Website Conversions and Customer Retention

Monday, August 13th, 2007

Today’s online marketplace is more competitive than ever. Having a good product doesn’t ensure your website visitor will buy your product or become a repeat customer. Our second guest this week is Jack Aaronson, CEO of The Aaronson Group a full-service consulting company specializing in multi-channel user experiences.

By creating innovative user experiences through personalized interactions and relevant email marketing strategies, your website visitors are engaged, which will improve website conversions and customer retention.

Find out how to turn your visitors into buyers and keep them loyal this week on Online Marketing with RSS Ray 10am Pacific/1pm Eastern.

Tags: Click Through Rate (CTR), Conversion Rate Improvements, Customer Relationship Management (CRM), Email Marketing, Search Engine Marketing
Posted in About the Show, Click Through Rate (CTR), Conversion Rate Improvements, Customer Relationship Management (CRM), Email Marketing, Search Engine Marketing | No Comments »

How Email Marketing Can Increase Sales

Monday, July 16th, 2007

One great way of reaching your target audience is through the use of email marketing. This week’s guest, Luc Vezina is an expert in email marketing.

He will be discussing how his company, Got Corporation, helps other companies with their email marketing. Also, who should use it, how companies should develop an email marketing strategy, and how it can help increase sales.

Tags: Customer Relationship Management (CRM), Email Marketing
Posted in About the Show, Customer Relationship Management (CRM), Email Marketing | No Comments »