Email Marketing Lessons Learned from Someone Else's Mistakes

Age : 45 Joined : 08 Mar 2008 Posts : 1850

Last week, I had what I'm pretty sure could be classified as a once-in-a-lifetime email experience.

A prominent South Florida business magazine sent an email to its entire mailing list. I had never received email from them before, and I'm pretty sure I didn't opt in, but I'm used to unsolicited email. That wasn't the once-in-a-lifetime part.

A few minutes later, I received an email from someone named Michael, reaming me out for spamming and demanding that I remove him from my list and never email him again. Hmmm....

A few minutes after that, I received another email from someone named Nicole, saying that she never sent me any spam and why was I being so rude?

So, it was clear. This reputable magazine had made a fatal mistake: they set up their email list as a listserv, or mail group. When Michael angrily responded to the initial email broadcast, his response went to the entire list (instead of simply being read by the list administrator, as Michael had intended). Nicole, who was also on the list, got Michael's angry response and replied to it-- her reply went to the whole list as well. No matter who replied to the email, their response was automatically forwarded to the entire subscriber list. And so the deluge began.

No self-respecting Guerrilla Marketer could sleep at night if he/she didn't jump on such an opportunity. So, I wrote back:

So, am I to understand (based upon Michael's tirade) that any emails sent to this address are automatically forwarded to the whole list? Cool!

So, before the folks at the magazine catch on and fix this problem, I should sieze the moment and introduce myself to all of you.

My name is Avi Frier and I am (in case this email didn't clue you in) a specialist in Guerrilla Marketing. If your company could use more business (and who's couldn't?), I can teach you how to use Guerrilla Marketing to increase your profits by better targeting your audience.

My company, VisionBurst, can also help you with all of your design needs:
Web sites
Logos
Brochures
Advertising pieces

This pitch was followed by my web site addresses and contact information. I clicked "send", got up from my desk, and left the office for the evening.

I was not the least bit prepared for what followed.

When I sat down at my desk the next morning, I had a voicemail waiting for me from the owner of a telecom company. He had left the message the night before, within one hour of my email: "Alright, you got me. Call me so we can talk about my marketing."
I also had quite a few email responses waiting for me...
Four of the emails were from people who wanted more information about our marketing services, including: a VP of a major, nationally known bank (whom I met with today); the I.T. director from one of South Florida's largest commercial real estate firms; the President of a major P.R. firm requesting information on web site design for her clients; and the Director of Sales and Marketing a major chain hotel who wants to sit down with me in February.
Eighteen emails were from people just writing to commend me on a job well done in siezing the opportunity. Some wrote back to me with pitches for their own companies. More power to 'em!
Three emails were from people berating me for taking advantage of a situation and accusing me of being a spammer myself. A closer look and I discovered that all three were in the marketing business, just like me. So I concluded that they were not nearly as upset with me for spamming as they were with themselves for not thinking of it first.
One email came from someone asking if I was the same guy he met at a party the previous week. I was.
An incredible and unexpected byproduct of this situation: I use Outlook for my email, and I have a setting that automatically requests a "read receipt" from everyone I send an email to. I didn't even think about this when I sent my initial email, but so far I have received over 1,200 read receipts from people who were on the magazine's list and received my message. This means I also have their email addresses. While I don't intend to add any of these people to my mailing list without their permission, others might not be as ethical as I am. Learn how to protect yourself from this in the "Lessons Learned" section below.
Later on that morning, my assistant took a phone order (complete with faxed signed agreement and credit card details) for a new logo design for a South American air freight company. That's right, as a result of my little email, a logo designed by VisionBurst will soon be emblazoned on the sides of 747s flying in and out of Latin America's major airports.
So, for those of you keeping score at home, the magazine's error and my response (which cost me nothing and took less than five minutes) generated one new client, four hot leads, 1,200 email address confirmations, 18 pats on the back, three complaints from my competitors, and immeasurable exposure and branding.

Lessons Learned

So what can we learn from the magazine's mistake and the way in which I capitalized upon it?

Protect the privacy of your subscribers
Never, under any circumstances, should your email list be set up in such a way that any recipient of your emails is able to contact the rest of the list. It drives me absolutely insane when people send an entire email blast using the "CC" field, leaving everyone's emails exposed, and enabling anyone on the list to email everyone else with a simple click of the "Reply to all" button. At the very least, you should use the BCC option; at best, you should use an email marketing program (like the one that sent you this email. Hit "reply" if you'd like to learn more about it.)
Protect your own privacy
You can stop Outlook from automatically sending Read Receipts to everyone who requests one. Here's how: Click Tools, then Options. In the Preferences tab, click the button labeled "E-mail Options..." Next, click the button labeled "Tracking Options..." At the bottom of the Tracking Options screen, you have three options:
-Always send a response
-Never send a response
-Ask me before sending a response
Choose the one you want and click OK. I opt for "Never" but "Ask me" isn't bad either. Avoid "Always."
Never waste an opportunity to market yourself.
How many opportunities a day do you have to tell potential customers what you can do for them? And how many of these opportunities do you completely miss out on?
Now, I'm not saying you should use "Reply to all" in every opportunity and broadcast a commercial to the unsuspecting recipients of the latest chain letter. You'll annoy and alienate your friends and colleagues (Come to think of it, that might be a quick and easy way to get your friends to stop sending you annoying chain letters).

What I'm saying is that when you have the opportunity to send a quick message to your target audience (an elevator pitch), don't waste it.

Email marketing is a fantastic and cost-effective way to reach out to your clients and potential clients, but you need to make sure you're doing it right. Feel free to contact me if I can help in any way!