mobileStorm’s six messaging types for marketers are all conducive to our stance that multi-channel campaigns are best. We’ve also long suggested that marketers be multi-channel within a single message–for example, by including video in an email marketing message, which engages the recipient and also makes the message viral.

We’re so forward-thinking that it’s only been recently that the rest of the marketing industry has caught up, and realized that–like chocolate and peanut butter–video and email can be combined into one message to really entice consumers. Two great tastes taste great together, indeed!

• According to analyst David Daniels at Forrester Research, putting a video link within an email, such as a clickable screen shot, “can increase click-through rates by two to three times.”
• Mr. Daniels also notes in his recent report that between July 2008 and July 2009, 17 percent of marketing executives surveyed planned to use video in email. Marketers are getting competitive with video email!
• Meanwhile, Nielsen Online reported that in April of this year, 119 billion unique viewers watched 7 trillion total streams during the month; total streams were up 24 percent from a year ago, while streams-per-viewer are up 27 percent and time-per-viewer is up 58 percent. Consumers love watching online video!
• Technological advances make viewing video in an email more seamless for the consumer. For example, Gmail Labs now has a feature that allows users to turn on previews of YouTube videos. Once consumers set this on their accounts, they’re able to watch YouTube videos from inside the email message. As word spreads, marketers will reach increasingly more Gmail users with video emails!

So savvy marketers will want to beat the competition before it beats them. This requires them to: (1) post videos where they can easily be found, and (2) incorporate video into their email marketing messages. This may be easier said than done, but with mobileStorm’s technology and expertise, it’ll still be relatively easy. Read the rest of this entry »

(The following was written by Patrick Knight, Director, Client Deliverability, and myself.)

When you send out an email campaign, you need to know how many of your subscribers actually took the time to click on your message and open it. This measurement is called the “open rate.”

The open rate compares the number of people who opened an email message to the number who did not. It’s a percentage of the number of messages “delivered.” An open rate is dependent on a number of different factors. It could be affected by aesthetic reasons, or it could reflect your data management, which in turn may have to do with deliverability issues.

For instance, if your email is blocked by Yahoo!, and the majority of your subscribers have Yahoo! email addresses, the open rate for your email campaign may be disproportionately low.

On the aesthetic side, an open rate is influenced by things like the subject line, sender identification, HTML rendering (such as how the email is show on a mobile device), bulk folder delivery, relevancy of content, and timing of send.

Sometimes a message might be reported as having been opened multiple times. This may happen for a number of reasons. For example, email clients such as Outlook render HTLM within the preview pane, so that each time the user scrolls through his or her inbox and passes your message, it will count as an open. This happens because each time the user previews the message, the user is actually requesting the embedded image from your server, resulting in the report of an open. Ultimately, this would be counted as multiple opens versus a unique open.

Unique opens are somewhat like total opens. The important difference is that only one user is being counted or reported. For example:

• User #1—opens email 2 times.
• User #2—opens email 4 times.
• User#3—opens email 4 times.

This makes a total of 10 opens. However, there are 3 unique opens.

Whether or not emails are opened consistently is largely based on sender reputation, relevancy, and other factors mentioned earlier. Although open rates render inconsistencies, email is very much about building a relationship with your subscribers. As you achieve this through relevant content, setting and honoring expectations, creating trust with your brand, and following best practices, email open rates tend to increase. Read the rest of this entry »

Nearly 100 million votes were cast during this week’s American Idol finale, resulting in Kris Allen winning the competition for the show’s eighth season. Last night was also a win for SMS marketing, just as much as it was for Mr. Allen.

Why? Television experts have been saying that Idol ratings have been down this year, and that its popularity seems to have waned. Yet the 100 million votes–sent predominantly via text message–is a record high for the show. Even if there are fewer viewers, consumers are engaged with the brand more than ever.

This means continued success for the show, whose production company, FremantleMedia, is also a mobileStorm client. With texting, fans really become invested in the Idol outcome. Comment boards on news and entertainment sites right now are bursting with ways people say they are able to send as many messages as possible so that their faves will win.

Such proof that these consumers are so committed to the brand means that Fox will likely command a high price for its commercials, ratings be darned. Fremantle, too, will continue to get paid big bucks from Fox to keep American Idol on the network.

Consider also the claim that it’s much easier to text a vote into a short code than it is to call the show’s toll-free landline–and to ensure that that vote counts. As the business publication Broadcasting & Cable said in a report: “Text messaging is digital [unlike phone lines, which are analog] and simply doesn’t have the same traffic jams. A text message is also time-coded, meaning that all of the votes messaged during the two-hour period can be lined up like jets on a runway and eventually recorded.”

So after the upset of Idol frontrunner Adam Lambert, fans of future frontrunners will be spurred to send ever-more SMS votes.

(The following is an excerpt from the article “Email Conversion Rates: A Primer” by Director of Client Deliverability Patrick Knight, appearing in tomorrow’s edition of mobileStorm’s Outside The Inbox.)

Conversion data should be analyzed to know the effectiveness of an email campaign. Your conversion analysis can tell you how many of your recipients actually did exactly what you wanted them to do. Based on this number a marketer can better understand the audience, and create campaigns based on this feedback in order to make a future offering more effective.

Additionally, low conversion rates can be used as a key indicator of email deliverability issues. Since conversion rates are based on the number of messages delivered—not messages sent—inbox delivery of the message is of great importance, which ultimately can significantly affect return on investment (ROI). mobileStorm’s technology can provide click rates which can be used in conjunction with other metrics to determine a marketer’s conversion rate.

In the short term, marketers can use conversion data to make adjustments as needed, and find what best works for what they are trying to accomplish. In the long term, marketers can use this data to better understand their client base.

(Want to know more? Subscribe to Outside The Inbox, mobileStorm’s newsletter about digital marketing. Go to https://www.mobilestorm.com/newsletter/ today, and read Patrick’s article tomorrow!)