Image via CrunchBase

Spam Samaritans not only use their email accounts to communicate, but also contribute to stamping out spam for others. Last weekend my mother-in-law was describing how she abandonend her Yahoo! email account and migrated to Gmail, because it was, “all full of SPAM and couldn’t be read.” What she didn’t realize was this behavior hurts Internet Service Providers (ISPs), marketers and spammers alike.

• Internet Service Providers (ISPs) need feedback to improve your email experience. Without users logging complaints and marking email as spam, ISPs don’t have the input to protect users from abuse.
  • Many ISPs are beginning the practice of delivering messages to the spam/bulk folder and monitoring if users correct them. Without user intervention, email marketers begin to have reputation issues, which impairs their delivery.
  • Abandoned email addresses aren’t deleted, many ISPs will reclaim the account and use it as a spam trap to root out offensive senders. This jeopardizes legitimate marketers who continue to send emails, because they don’t know the account is abandoned.
    
• Marketers will use A/B testing, opens, clicks and conversions to refine their messages and improve user engagment. Even if you choose to unsubscribe from their messages, marketers want, and need you to interact.
• Spammers just want to get messages delivered! They don’t care if it hits your inbox or the spam/bulk folder. By ignoring the onslaught of unwanted messages, they get what they want. Users can only correct the issue by marking these messages as spam, and alerting the ISPs to the issue.

The morale of this story is spending a few minutes to review good and bad spam helps make email better for you and other users. Don’t ignore those emails from spammers or marketers. By unsubscribing, marking email as spam, or removing email from the bulk/spam folder, you’re improving the email experience for everyone.

Help my mother-in-law out, and make the email world a better place… Be a spam samaritan!

This post was written by Bill Dawson

Bill is a technology and email marketing expert. Bill works with some of the largest organizations online, including Zappos and Walmart. He and his wife, Carla, own and operate their own agency, 4 Dogs Design.

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I haven’t been down to Tampa in a while, my parents live 50 miles south in Bradenton. Landing in Sarasota was a bit funny (it’s a huge retirement community) – the first drama I witnessed was a guy yelling for his wife, Helen and wandering aimlessly around the baggage claim.

Tampa is a different world. While Miami is for the dancing and night life, Fort Lauderdale is for drunk college students, Orlando is for the kids, and Sarasota for the ol’ folks – Tampa is an incredible city that’s marketed itself well thanks to the strategies deployed by Jeremy Fairley and team. Tampa has elements of all the other cities but I think it’s a bit more beautiful on the gulf coast, accessible with a close airport, and still has all the charm that Floridians have perfected over time.

Tourism and social media isn’t a simple task. Tourists don’t spend money with tourism agencies – they spend it with the restaurants, hotels, events and venues that they support. Tampa Bay & Company has been successful because they continue to spread the word on the region. They recognize that their job is to get businesses and visitors here, but then the industry has to step up. I’m writing this post from the incredible Sheraton Suites Hotel by the airport.

Full disclosure: I’m in a complimentary suite and was greeted with a wonderful cheese plate as I opened the hotel room door. On the cheese plate was a kind, personal, note from the Director of Sales & Marketing here, Colleen Beck.

Geek moment: I can actually use the suite’s television as a second monitor through a little A/V panel on this desk… how cool is that?!

Those small details are what makes Jeremy’s teams’ efforts worth while. Why would Jeremy invite me down here and why would Sheraton comp a room like this? Because they recognize that I’m their targeted market. I’m in business. I’m a traveler. I attend conferences. I am an influencer. I work with a lot of businesses. As Zappo’s Chief Marketer, Aaron Magness, states, “Customer Service is the New Marketing!“.

And I want to come back to Tampa Bay.

I’m sure some of the reason to have me is to help educate their clients and businesses as well. Do I feel used? Yes, wonderfully used, thank-you. This is social media marketing works, though. You set expectations with people with your marketing, you over-deliver with your products and services, and then you allow social media to take over. Social media will amplify your message.

Here’s my message today: Give Colleen a call to find out why you should have your next conference in Tampa and have your visitors stay at the Sheraton Suites.

I hope this post amplifies the efforts of Tampa Bay. After a cold, snowy winter in Indianapolis, I’m pretty happy warming up to a Gulf Sunset hanging around at Sheraton Suites. I’m excited to get on campus at the University of Tampa tomorrow as well. If you’re at the breakfast, please stop by and say hello after the panel!

This post was written by Douglas Karr

Douglas Karr is the founder of The Marketing Technology Blog. Doug is President and CEO of DK New Media, an online marketing company specializing in social media, blogging and search engine optimization. Their clients include Webtrends, ChaCha and many more.

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A truely effective campaign provides information relevant to your target customer, comes in regular, but not annoying intervals, and moves the prospect toward a purchase decision.

Sometimes, however, over eager business owners or marketers try to accelerate the process, by sending too much information, too soon, or too often.  The result? Exactly the opposite response, as your prospect not only fails to buy, they tell you to go away, permanently!

As an email marketer, I am usually pretty patient, but recently, Ratepoint wore out their welcome.  How? Well it started innocently enough, with a postcard, an email and an offer for a free trial.  Then there was the phone call during which I asked a few questions. Before the conversation ended I told them I was unlikely to use their product because I was a reseller for Constant Contact and their was no compelling reason for me to change.

Instead of taking the polite no, they moved me into an entirely different group and I became a prospect.   There were more postcards,  more email and more phone calls.  As their sales people became increasingly annoying, demanding to know why I hadn’t activated my trial,  I found it harder and harder to remain polite.  (Lets face it, I am from NY and on a good day it is hard for me to remain polite)

If I would have ever considered trying their product, I am unlikely to now.  The lesson?  Too much marketing is not a good thing.  If someone indicates they are not a prospect, let them opt out, and move on.   Water may erode mountains, one drip at a time, but it won’t move someone to buy.

This post was written by Lorraine Ball

Lorraine Ball twenty years in corporate America, before she came to her senses. Today, you can find her at Roundpeg, a small marketing firm, based in Carmel, Indiana. Along with an extraordinarily talented team (which includes Bonnie the dog and Clyde the cat) she shares what she knows about marketing, networking, pr, social media and business planning. Committed to contributing to a vibrant entrepreneurial economy in Central Indiana, Lorraine is focused on helping small businesses, become big businesses.

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Developing great communication skills will set you apart from the rest of the pack. Think about what skills you need:

• Masterful Listening Techniques – Do you really know what your customer needs and why? What is his pain? Can you hear it in what he says and in how he says it?
• Tone-Setting Body Language – Do you know when to mirror your customer’s body language? Does your body language set the tone for better or more frequent communication with your customer?
• Just-Right Intonation and Rate of Speech – Does the way you talk inspire energy and action from your customer? Or do you find your customer drifting off to other topics or bored with your product/service? Does the customer “get it” that your product or service resolves his pain?
• Powerful, Persuasive Voice Control – Do you sound influential? Does your voice put people at ease so they freely open up to you about their pain? Or do you sound tense, nervous, disorganized, whiney, slow, or bored?

You already know the message you want your customer to hear. That’s the easy part. And no matter how often you say your 60-second pitch or go through your sales material, there are people who will not connect with that message; they just won’t “get it”. One of the reasons is because, in general, your message will only resonate when WHAT you say and HOW you say it match.

HOW you say your message makes all the difference

And there is an art to this. Before you head off to that next big call, think about the feeling you want to leave with your customer; the emotion you want to share. For example, consider that you might want to start with a warm, friendly message and follow up with a confident, powerful, or influential message.

Each feeling you want to convey can be portrayed by

• Descriptive word
• Mental picture or image
• Matching body language

Prepare for your call by making sure your style of communication (the HOW) matches your message. To start off with a warm, friendly message:

1. Think of a key word which evokes warm, friendly feelings: “tender”, “calm”, “sunshine”, “cozy”. Repeat that one key word to yourself several times with emphasis until you feel it.
2. Picture the mental image. Visualize hugging a child or your spouse, wrapping up in a blanket by the fireplace, walking along the beach in the bright sun. Make the picture clear and vivid.
3. Change the sound of your voice by changing your body tone and placement. Smile. Talk expressively with energy. Move. Make your movements BIG.

And to continue with power and influence:

1. Think of a key word which evokes a sense of power and influence: “strong”, “firm”, “confident”
2. Picture yourself in that manner. Imagine being the greatest story teller, or the greatest of all coaches, a uniformed commander, THE expert speaking to an audience glued to your every word. Now visualize yourself giving your intended message. Picture yourself calm, in control, in the zone.
3. Body Language: If you want to be powerful and influential, stand up. Perfect posture. Use strong hand gestures. Don’t walk around much. Maintain good eye contact. Don’t look at objects in the room; only people. When speaking on the phone, don’t let your eyes wander. Make eye contact with a picture of a person…speak to her.

This post was written by Ellen Dunnigan

Accent On Business founder and CEO Ellen Dunnigan is a nationally-recognized and proven coach with specialized training in voice, speech, and English improvement. She holds a master’s degree in Speech-Language Pathology and has been certified as clinically competent by the American Speech-Language Hearing Association.

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