Government teams today face a complex challenge: delivering faster, clearer and more inclusive communication while operating with limited resources. The pressure to do more with less has never been greater.

Smarter use of AI and automation is opening new possibilities. By streamlining engagement, improving accessibility and ensuring information is timely and relevant, these tools give government teams the opportunity to not only increase efficiency but also strengthen public trust.

Why this matters now

• AI could contribute $116 billion to the Australian economy over the next decade.
  
• Half of small businesses in ANZ already use AI for marketing and content.
  
• Demand for 24/7 customer service is rising steadily, growing 3 per cent each year.

The shift is clear: expectations for real-time, personalised, and accessible communication are accelerating. In this article, we explore how government teams can automate communications and apply AI responsibly and effectively to deliver trusted, local engagement.

A smarter approach to government communication

Many communications teams face challenges with managing large databases, streamlining messages for both internal and external stakeholders, and ensuring engagement rates remain high.

By making use of automation and data segmentation, government teams can improve response rates, reduce workloads, and ensure personalised messages reach the right audiences at the right time.

Below are some of the key challenges for government communications teams and how trusted email and SMS platforms like Vision6 by Constant Contact can help.

Challenge 1: Managing and storing large volumes of data

Government teams manage vast amounts of contact data. Everything from staff and supplier records, to community groups, service subscribers and event registrations. Without a centralised, structured system, maintaining accuracy and compliance quickly becomes complex and time-consuming.

✅ Solution: List and data management can be simplified with secure tools like Vision6 by Constant Contact. You can work with multiple lists across teams and business units, or manage everything in one master list with segments to target contacts. Uploading new data over the top of existing lists ensures only new contacts are added and updated records overwrite old ones.

Vision6 also makes it possible to automate list updates using third-party integrations such as Salesforce or Microsoft Dynamics 365, or build a custom cross-platform solution with the use of our powerful API. This saves hours of manual work and allows you to focus on personalisation and segmentation instead of spreadsheets.

All contact data is stored locally in an Australian Tier IV Data Centre that is ISO 27001:2022 compliant, with Single Sign-On (SSO) available for simplified access and stronger governance.

Challenge 2: Cutting through the noise in crowded inboxes

A common challenge for government communications is ensuring important messages are noticed without overwhelming communities, staff or stakeholders with too many updates. High volume messaging can quickly cause fatigue, disengagement, and unsubscribes.

✅ Solution: Advanced segmentation allows you to target specific groups based on fields in your contact lists such as location, service area, past interactions or any combination of these. This ensures messages are relevant, personalised, and delivered only to those who need them. The result is higher engagement, fewer unsubscribes and reduced inbox fatigue.

Challenge 3: Spending too much time creating messages

Communications teams often spend hours creating multiple versions of emails or SMS messages for different audiences. This leads to inefficiencies, increases the risk of errors, and makes reporting more difficult.

✅ Solution: With dynamic content, you can build one email that adapts automatically to different segments. There is no need to create five separate versions when one can deliver tailored content to each group. This improves open and click-through rates while reducing unsubscribes and complaints.

AI Content Assistants in Vision6 can also help draft and refine content while allowing full customisation to match your team’s tone of voice.

Challenge 4: Maintaining consistency across departments

Government teams often struggle with brand consistency, especially when multiple departments or individuals are responsible for communications.

✅ Solution: Drag-and-drop email builders and branded templates make it simple for any staff member to create professional, consistent messages. With Vision6, you can schedule recurring updates such as newsletters, service alerts or reminders, and set up automation workflows for welcome series, surveys or engagement campaigns that run on autopilot.

Challenge 5: Measuring the impact of communications

Without clear reporting, it is difficult to understand whether messages are being read or acted upon. This limits the ability to refine strategies and demonstrate success to leadership.

✅ Solution: Vision6 provides detailed reporting on open rates, click-throughs and engagement. These insights help improve campaigns and make it easier to report impact to executives. They can also be used to build more advanced automation workflows, showing content to audiences based on real behaviour.

Compliance and governance: Balancing innovation and responsibility

Government teams have a unique opportunity to set the standard by embedding strong governance and ethical practices from the outset:

• Establish clear guardrails. Policy frameworks should protect public trust while enabling safe, scalable innovation.

• Ensure human accountability. AI can inform and support decisions, but ultimate responsibility must always rest with leaders.

• Embed ethics and inclusion. Responsible AI principles should be applied early, with multilingual and inclusive design ensuring communication is fair and accessible to all.

• Be transparent. Openly disclosing where and how AI is used builds confidence.

• Protect privacy. Compliance with the Privacy Act 1988 and privacy-first design must be non-negotiable.

• Test safely. Sandboxing in controlled, low-risk environments helps teams learn before wider rollout.

• Invest in capability. Building AI literacy across teams fosters both confidence and caution, ensuring adoption is sustainable.

Key takeaways and opportunities for communications teams

• Websites must evolve. Thanks to AI-powered search, people now expect instant answers without digging through government websites. AI can be seen as a “front door” to information, while the website remains the “trusted house”, making accurate FAQs and content more important than ever.
  
• Personalisation is expected. Timely, relevant updates are now the norm. Teams using chatbots, automation, and targeted advertising can deliver 24/7 service, reach the right audiences, and support team members to focus on priority issues.
  
• Local and secure = confidence. ISO-certified, Australian-hosted platforms give government teams assurance that data sovereignty, security, and compliance are a priority.
  
• Data-driven engagement. By combining research and feedback tools with automation, teams gain real-time insights into community needs and sentiment, allowing them to refine strategies and build stronger trust.

The future of government communication

By streamlining data management, applying segmentation and personalisation, and using AI and automation to improve efficiency, government teams can strengthen engagement rates while reducing workloads.

With smarter communication solutions, every message can be timely, relevant, and accessible, helping build stronger connections with staff, stakeholders, and the communities you serve.

Take the next step in elevating your communications strategy. 

Start a free 30-day trial of Vision6 by Constant Contact, or book a call with our team to see how leading government departments are already transforming engagement with secure, compliant automation.

The post Local, Targeted, Trusted: How Government Teams Can Automate Communications With Confidence appeared first on Vision6.

At our recent Constant Contact APAC Marketing Lab, Jon Marburger, our email marketing expert, revealed the top six best practices for email deliverability.

Leading a team that monitors an astonishing 100 billion emails each year, Jon also cultivates vital relationships with industry giants like Google and Yahoo, ensuring emails reach their destination effectively. When Jon talks email, we take notes—because he knows how to make every message count!

In this article, we explore the key email deliverability strategies, featuring Jon’s expert insights and actionable tips to help you reach your subscribers more effectively.

The Journey from Delivery to Email Deliverability

1. Maintain a Clean, Up-to-Date Email List 

The foundation of good email deliverability starts with a clean email list. Over time, subscriber lists accumulate inactive, outdated, or invalid addresses that can harm your sender reputation. When you send emails to these addresses, it can result in high bounce rates, signalling to email service providers (ESPs) that you’re not maintaining a quality list. This may result in your mail being flagged as spam, or even blocked entirely. 

Best practices for maintaining a clean list include: 

• Regular List Hygiene: Periodically review your email list to remove inactive or invalid addresses. This means identifying and removing hard bounces (permanently undeliverable emails) and soft bounces (temporary issues) after a certain number of attempts. 

• Engagement-Based Segmentation: Segment your list based on engagement levels. For example, create a segment for highly engaged subscribers and another for those who haven’t opened an email in the past 3-6 months. 

• Double Opt-In: Ensure your subscribers genuinely want to receive your emails by using a double opt-in process. This requires subscribers to confirm their email address by clicking on a link in a confirmation email, which reduces the risk of fake or mistyped addresses. 

2. Use Authentication to Build Trust 

Email authentication is one of the most critical aspects of email deliverability best practices. It verifies your identity as a sender and helps ESPs distinguish your emails from spam or phishing attempts. Without proper authentication, ESPs  may mark your mail as untrustworthy and send them to spam folders. 

There are three key email authentication protocols that you can implement to improve deliverability: 

• Sender Policy Framework: SPF ensures that only authorised IP addresses can send emails on behalf of your domain. This prevents spammers from using your domain to send fraudulent emails.

 • DomainKeys Identified Mail: DKIM adds a digital signature to your emails, verifying that they haven’t been altered in transit and they’re actually coming from your domain. 

• Domain-based Message Authentication, Reporting and Conformance: DMARC builds on SPF and DKIM by adding a layer of reporting and enforcement. It allows you to tell ESPs how to handle emails that fail SPF or DKIM checks.

3. Optimise Email Content for Deliverability 

While it’s essential to create compelling email content, it’s equally important to ensure your content doesn’t trigger spam filters. ESPs use sophisticated algorithms to analyse emails and determine whether they look  suspicious or resemble spam. 

Here are a few tips for optimising email content for deliverability: 

• Avoid Trigger Words: Certain words and phrases can cause your emails to be flagged as spam. Examples include “free,” “urgent,” “win big,” and “limited time offer.” While these phrases may seem enticing for marketing purposes, they can harm deliverability. 

• Limit the Use of Symbols: Overusing symbols like exclamation points or dollar signs can also trigger spam filters. Keep your subject lines and body text professional and free of excessive punctuation. 

• Balanced Text-to-Image Ratio: While images can enhance your email’s visual appeal, too many images and not enough text can raise red flags with ESPs. Aim for a balance between images and text.

• Alt Text for Images: Always include alt text for your images. This ensures that even if the images don’t load, the recipient can still understand the message. 

4. Focus on Subscriber Engagement 

Engagement is one of the most important factors that ESPs consider when determining whether to deliver your emails to the inbox or the spam folder. If your emails consistently generate low engagement (e.g. low open rates, clicks and replies), ESPs may assume your content isn’t relevant or desired by your recipients. 

Here’s how to improve engagement and, by extension, deliverability: 

• Personalisation: Personalising your emails with the recipient’s name, location, or previous purchase history can make your emails feel more relevant and increase open rates. 

• Segmented Campaigns: Sending the same message to your entire email list is no longer effective. Instead, segment your list based on factors like demographics, behaviour, or purchase history. This allows you to send highly targeted emails that are more likely to resonate with each group. 

• A/B Testing: Continuously test different aspects of your emails, like subject lines, content and CTAs, to see what works best. This helps you optimise future campaigns. 

5. Monitor Your Sender Reputation 

Your sender reputation plays a major role in whether your messages are delivered to inboxes or spam folders. ESPs assign a reputation score to every sender based on factors like bounce rates, spam complaints and  engagement metrics. If your reputation is poor, your emails are more likely to be blocked or sent to spam. 

To maintain a positive sender reputation, follow these steps: 

• Keep Bounce Rates Low: A high bounce rate indicates that you’re sending emails to invalid or outdated addresses, which damages your reputation. Regularly clean your email list to keep bounce rates down.

 • Monitor Spam Complaints: If a large number of recipients mark your emails as spam, it will negatively impact your sender reputation. Make sure your emails are relevant and not overly promotional.

 • Engage with Active Subscribers: Focus your efforts on engaging with subscribers who are actively opening your emails. Repeatedly contacting disengaged or inactive subscribers can hurt your reputation.

6. Ensure Compliance with Industry Regulations 

Compliance with email marketing regulations is not only a legal requirement but also crucial for maintaining email deliverability best practices. Laws like the Australian Spam Act 2003, General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) and the CAN-SPAM Act outline specific rules for obtaining consent from subscribers and handling unsubscribe requests. 

To ensure compliance: 

• Obtain Explicit Consent: Always get permission from your subscribers before sending marketing emails. This is typically done through an opt-in process, where subscribers knowingly agree to receive emails.

 • Include an Unsubscribe Option: Every marketing email must include an easy-to-find unsubscribe link. Failure to do so can result in penalties and a drop in deliverability. 

• Respect Privacy: Be transparent about how you use subscriber data and always respect their privacy. Sending unsolicited emails can lead to spam complaints, which harms your deliverability. 

Email Deliverability Best Practices Decoded

Deliverability is critical to the success of your email marketing campaigns. By maintaining a clean list, using proper authentication, optimising content, focusing on engagement, monitoring your sender reputation, and ensuring compliance with regulations, you can significantly improve your deliverability rates. 

Following these best practices will help ensure your emails reach the inbox and achieve the desired results.  Remember, deliverability is not a one-time effort — it requires ongoing attention and optimisation to maintain long-term success. 

Now that you’ve mastered the essentials of email deliverability, what’s next?

Dive into our articles on crafting high-performing Welcome Emails and boosting Subscriber Engagement to take your email strategy to the next level!

About Jon Marburger, Director of Email Deliverability, Constant Contact

With a background in physics, Jon specialises in email compliance, delivery and deliverability at Constant Contact. Jon is an expert on IP and domain reputation monitoring, compliance tooling and email analytics. Since 2020, he’s been co-chair of the Senders Committee as part of the Messaging, Malware and Mobile Anti-Abuse Working Group (M3AAWG), where voices from all sectors of the email industry work together to make sending safer.

The post Maximising Email Deliverability: Best Practices for Success appeared first on Vision6.

Find out how these top five important customer engagement strategies can help innovative companies to not only compete, but thrive.

1. The Power of Omnichannel Engagement

At our APAC Marketing Lab, omnichannel engagement emerged as a key differentiator for businesses aiming to build deeper relationships with customers. Unlike multichannel strategies, which involve operating on several platforms, omnichannel engagement ensures that all channels work together seamlessly.

This allows businesses to provide a cohesive, integrated customer experience, regardless of whether the interaction occurs online, via email, SMS, social media, or in-store. For example, brands such as Ideal Introductions have seen significant improvements by integrating their email and SMS campaigns. By using Vision6 for SMS, they’ve been able to drive over $15K additional monthly revenue and increased engagement tenfold.

Renée Chaplin, VP – APAC, Constant Contact, emphasised that “consumers expect consistency. They want to move from one channel to another without friction, and they expect businesses to recognise them as the same individual, no matter where they engage.”

In fact, companies with strong omnichannel strategies retain 89% of their customers, while those with weak strategies retain only 33%. This highlights how important it is to create a unified brand experience across every touchpoint.

Recommendations

To implement an effective omnichannel strategy, businesses should:

• Ensure their email, SMS, and social media campaigns are aligned in tone and messaging.
• Use data to personalise interactions across channels.
• Invest in platforms that offer centralised control for managing multiple channels seamlessly.

2. Personalisation: The Key to Building Loyalty

Personalisation has quickly moved from a “nice-to-have” to an essential part of customer engagement strategies. As customers are bombarded with messages from multiple brands, personalisation becomes the key to cutting through the noise and building long-term loyalty.

80% of consumers are more likely to make a purchase when brands offer personalised experiences, according to Epsilon.

Linda Prescott, Managing Director and CEO of Ideal Introductions, explained that personalisation helps businesses build emotional connections with their customers. “We’re a personal matchmaking agency and we meet everyone personally. SMS is a quick way to let people know that you’re thinking about them.”

Bonnie McCoy, General Manager of Customology, echoed this sentiment, sharing how her team uses data to deliver tailored messaging to customers at scale. “You can’t compete if you’re not doing the basics of personalisation. But the next step for brands is making sure that their customer journey outside of the in-store journey matches their brand values. So personalising all of the communication so that they’re not only relevant to your brand messaging but also to the buying cycle,” she said.

As an example, Bonnie highlighted tyre brand Bridgestone Australia’s personalised benefits program, which keeps customers engaged over the long tyre purchasing cycle. By checking in regularly, Bridgestone not only maximises the value of each customer’s investment but also stays top-of-mind when it’s time for them to buy new tyres.

Recommendations

To improve personalisation efforts, businesses can:

• Segment their audience based on customer behaviour, interests and preferences.
• Use customer data from CRM systems to personalise emails and SMS messages.
• Implement tools that support advanced segmentation and tailored messaging.

3. AI and Automation: The Future of Marketing Efficiency

As businesses scale, managing customer engagement becomes increasingly complex. That’s where AI and automation come into play, offering an efficient solution to streamline customer interactions without sacrificing personalisation.

According to Forrester, 50% of businesses will use AI to serve customers in 2024. By automating repetitive tasks, such as scheduling emails and sending SMS alerts, companies can focus on high-value activities like strategy development and customer relationship management.

Nicola Votier, CMO of Poolwerx, discussed how her team is focused on improving their tech stack across national, regional and local campaigns, to enhance their digital, customer-first strategy. AI does play a role, especially in terms of reputation management and reviews. 

“As a franchise business, we’re looking for consistency across our brand, consistency across our in-store experience, consistency in our residential and commercial services,” she explained.

With over 500 territories spanning retail stores and mobile vans, Poolwerx operates one of the largest franchise networks in the world—making the pursuit of brand alignment a significant challenge.

Replay: Fireside Chat with Poolwerx’s CMO

Recommendations

To leverage AI and automation effectively, businesses should:

• Use automation tools to manage repetitive tasks, such as follow-up emails and reminders, without safeguards in place to ensure brand consistency.
• Leverage AI-driven content generation such as AI Content Assistant to save time while maintaining personalisation. Instead of spending hours brainstorming, users can simply input a prompt, choose a tone of voice, and receive compelling content options in seconds.
• Continuously analyse customer behaviour and refine automated workflows to improve engagement.

4. Data-Driven Marketing: Transforming Data into Actionable Insights

Collecting data is just the beginning. To excel in customer engagement, businesses must convert the raw data into actionable insights that fuel effective content and marketing strategies.

APAC Marketing Lab guest speaker, Jaydon Munn, serves as Marketing Manager at GIVIT, an innovative not-for-profit that inspires generosity to meet real need in the community. Jaydon noted that data segmentation plays a vital role in cultivating repeat donations. 

By expressing gratitude for past contributions and including the specific donation amount in the message, supporters are reminded of their generosity and feel truly appreciated by GIVIT. This approach significantly increases the likelihood of future donations.

Bonnie McCoy of Customology, also spoke to the importance of A/B testing and control group testing to measure success against KPIs relevant to the business’s goals.

She also highlighted that KPIs will vary for each stakeholder in the business, depending on whether they measure campaign revenue, impact on bookings, or foot traffic.

With data-based decision-making rapidly becoming the modus operandi in today’s business world, many organisations struggle with managing and making sense of their customer data. 

This is where robust analytics and reporting comes in, so businesses can not only track their campaign performance but also gain insights into customer behaviour.

Alongside quantitative studies, Consumer Futurist Amanda Stevens suggests forming a customer advisory board to gain valuable feedback. “Find eight or ten customers, a diverse cross section of your customer base, and make them advisors. Meet with them once a month as a sounding board,” she said. Here are some key questions to consider asking your advisory board:

• What features would you like to see in our loyalty program?
• How often would you prefer to hear from us?
• What offers would you find appealing?
• When is the best time for us to send you a text message?

Recommendations

To optimise data-driven marketing, businesses should:

• Regularly clean and update customer data to ensure accuracy.
• Use segmentation tools to create targeted campaigns based on past customer behaviour.
• Leverage reporting features to analyse campaign performance through dashboards and make data-driven decisions at a glance.

5. The Resurgence of SMS in Digital Marketing

While email remains a powerful marketing tool, SMS is making a strong comeback, particularly in industries that demand real-time customer engagement. With open rates of 98%, and 95% of messages read within three minutes, SMS offers an immediacy that few other channels can match.

Andrew Craig, CEO of Chatti, shared insights on how SMS is being used along the customer journey to create excitement.

“Transactional SMS is so important. Before the sale, it’s getting the customer excited about their purchase or perhaps it’s a restaurant booking. After the sale, it’s thanking the customer for their business or checking that they received their parcel,” he said.

Whether it’s a promotional message or an urgent update, SMS can drive higher response rates and strengthen the customer relationship. 

For service businesses facing no-shows, a simple SMS the day before can confirm attendance or offer to reschedule, ultimately helping to reduce lost revenue and improve customer retention.

Practical Takeaway

To maximise the potential of SMS marketing trends, businesses should:

• Use SMS for time-sensitive messages, such as appointment reminders or flash sales.
• Combine SMS with email campaigns to create a comprehensive customer engagement strategy.
• Personalise SMS messages to make them more relevant to the recipient.

Replay: Embracing the Next Wave Panel Discussion

What’s Next: Shaping the Future of Customer Engagement and Marketing Trends

The future of customer engagement lies in creating personalised, omnichannel experiences powered by data, AI, and automation.

By staying ahead of these marketing trends and leveraging the right tools, businesses can build deeper relationships with their customers and stay competitive in an evolving market.

Want to stay up to date with the latest customer marketing trends?

Sign up for our eNews below or follow us on LinkedIn to receive exclusive insights about email and SMS marketing, automation, AI content generation and more.

Plus, as a thank you for being a valued reader, check out the top takeaways from our Email Deliverability Masterclass at Marketing Lab, with best practices shared by email expert Jon Marburger.

The post The Future of Customer Engagement: 5 Key Marketing Trends Driving Innovation appeared first on Vision6.

BRISBANE, AU, September 18, 2024 – Small-to-medium businesses (SMBs) in Australia and New Zealand are feeling the brunt of inflation more than the United States (U.S.), United Kingdom (U.K.) and Canada, according to a 2024 study conducted by global digital marketing and automation platform, Constant Contact. 

The company’s Small Business Now: Holiday Crunch report found that, in response to inflationary pressures, 60 per cent of A/NZ consumers are reducing spending at SMBs – the highest of any region polled. According to the report, 43 per cent of A/NZ SMBs have had to increase costs to combat inflation – slightly below the global average (44 per cent).

“Small businesses make up almost 98 per cent of businesses in Australia and New Zealand, and supporting them right now will genuinely help some of these businesses survive the economic storm,” said Renee Chaplin, VP Asia Pacific, Constant Contact. 

“Big businesses have the economy of scale to weather inflation and decrease costs in the face of competition. But small businesses are rarely in this position and instead need to find ways to stay top of mind and connect with the community to keep them coming back.”

A/NZ SMBs less reliant on end-of-year spending than other regions

Unlike the U.S., Canada and the U.K., A/NZ SMBs are less reliant on spending over the Christmas and New Year period to boost spending. 

U.S. businesses are significantly more dependent on Q4 (Oct-Dec) and, therefore, feel the most pressure to drive revenue during this time than other regions. However, in A/NZ SMBs report to have the most evenly distributed dependency throughout the year, with just 29 per cent feeling the most pressure to drive revenue during this period (Q4) – the lowest among polled regions. A/NZ businesses report a fairly even distribution in pressure throughout the year, with 23 per cent in Q1 (Jan-Mar), 25 per cent in Q2 (Apr-Jun) and 23 per cent in Q3 (Jul-Sep).

“It’s reassuring to see that the Christmas and New Year period isn’t ‘make or break’ pressure for small business as is the case in other regions,” said Chaplin. 

“Although, it’s clear that SMBs are missing an opportunity to further drive revenue in what is typically the busiest spending season of the year for many industries – particularly at a time when, regardless of inflation, people are looking to spend more than usual. 

“It comes down to marketing and being prepared in areas like labour and training for staff. SMBs in Australia and New Zealand seem to be lagging behind their global counterparts.”

CEO and Founder of the Small Business Association of Australia, Anne Nalder, believes this can be attributed to the culture in Australia and New Zealand.

“The ‘she’ll be right’ mentality in this region is a part of who we all are, but it doesn’t bode well when it comes down to a small business owner assessing how their business is going, and whether they’ll be able to survive some of the hardest times we’ve seen for businesses in this country in thirty years,” said Nalder.

“Small businesses do need to be taking opportunities to educate themselves, train their staff and promote their business. Communication is essential to being competitive, and many small businesses don’t prioritise it enough.”

A/NZ region slowest to think about Christmas/New Year period spending and marketing

The report found that A/NZ consumers begin to plan on spending over the Christmas and New Year period at the last minute.

The report found that 72 per cent of A/NZ consumers typically only start thinking about end-of-year spending from October onwards, with 26 per cent beginning their end-of-year spending plans in October, 28 per cent in November and 18 per cent in December – the latter of which is the highest among polled regions. 

“The opportunity is there for SMBs to drive revenue at a time when local customers are looking to spend in what, comparatively to the world, is a relative flurry,” said Chaplin. “But much like their customers, A/NZ SMBs are leaving things to the last minute when it comes to marketing and promotion.”

SMBs in the ANZ region tend to start marketing for this busy end-of-year rush later than in other regions, according to those surveyed. 

In fact, nearly half (48 per cent) of ANZ SMBs surveyed wait until Q4 (18 per cent in Oct, 20 per cent in Nov and 10 per cent in Dec) to start preparing their marketing for the peak spending period of Christmas and New Year. By way of comparison, just 40 per cent of SMBs in the U.S., 31 per cent in the U.K. and 41 per cent in Canada start marketing preparations as late in the year. 

“When customers do have money to spend, SMBs need to have those customers thinking of them first,” said Chaplin. “Now granted, ANZ consumers typically start to think about holiday shopping later than other regions, but that’s no reason to wait. In tight economic times, being first to market and working hard to be top-of-mind is not only smart, it’s good business practice.

“A focus on customer service should also be a priority for small businesses in the lead up to peak spending periods, which can often be an afterthought,” said Nalder. “This stems from the owner level down, and it can really impact a business if they don’t get this right — so it’s important to make the time and invest in training of employees.”

Lack of Marketing Budget Amid Inflationary Environment

In some cases, the reason for a lack of marketing may come down to financial constraints and budgets, particularly amid an inflationary environment. 

Budget limitations were cited by 38 per cent of A/NZ businesses as the biggest barrier to marketing ahead of and during the Christmas and New Year period – slightly above the global average of 37 per cent.

“Inflation is clearly having an impact on small business owners who are looking to reduce expenses by trimming the fat where they can,” said Anne Nalder. “It’s important for marketing to continue; this isn’t the time to go into a holding pattern. Embracing new technology to fill gaps in knowledge, or to do the work an owner doesn’t have time to do, can really help companies stay top of mind and compete against the corporations with more people and bigger budgets.”

Research conducted last year revealed that less than half (49 per cent) of shoppers at a small business receive an email after making a purchase, and 27 per cent never hear from the business again. 

“To survive in tough economic times, particularly when competing against big business who have the economies of scale to discount heavily, SMBs must stay top of mind and communication and marketing is essential to that,” said Chaplin.

To learn more about the findings from Constant Contact’s Small Business Now report, download the report.

STUDY METHODOLOGY:

Study Methodology:
Constant Contact’s Small Business Now report analyses insights from decision-makers at over 1,600 small businesses – 284 across A/NZ – from companies with 250 employees or less. The study was conducted in Australia/New Zealand, Canada, the United Kingdom and the United States, and results were aggregated to determine global trends. All stats are representative of their associated demographics. The businesses surveyed included those in retail, hospitality, health/wellness, financial and law, technology, real estate, non-profits, professional services, public services, construction/manufacturing, entertainment/recreation and transport SMBs, among others. 

It also combines data from over 3,000 consumers – 511 across A/NZ – aged 18+ in each of these regions. The survey was conducted by Ascend2 Research in August 2024.

ABOUT SMALL BUSINESS NOW

Constant Contact’s Small Business Now series offers a real-world look at what trends and challenges are impacting small businesses and their customers. It combines thorough research with insights from marketing experts to educate small businesses and provide recommendations about what they need to know to be successful. 

ABOUT CONSTANT CONTACT

Constant Contact makes digital marketing easy and effective for small businesses and nonprofits around the world. Whether just starting out, or managing complex multi-channel campaigns, SMBs benefit from our powerful SaaS platform that delivers a simplified marketing experience with less time spent and better results. With cutting-edge technology, best-in-class deliverability and award-winning customer support, we help the small stand tall.

The post Australian & New Zealand Small Businesses Feeling Brunt of Inflation as Consumers Spending Less appeared first on Vision6.

The challenge lies in finding effective ways to do more with less—limited budgets, resources, and people—all while navigating an increasingly uncertain economic landscape. How can you rise to meet this triple challenge?

Let’s dive into the top 5 strategies that will empower you to thrive in business and amplify marketing impact, without stretching your budget.

As a bonus: we’ve included an on-demand recording of our recent Small Business Growth Series virtual event, featuring Renée Chaplin, VP – APAC, Constant Contact and Dominique Lamb, Queensland Small Business Commissioner. Dominique shares the key takeaways from a report into the life cycle and the mindset of small businesses and how to achieve stability as a business owner.

Setting the Scene: Market Insights

As part of Constant Contact’s recent Small Business Now report, 1300 small business owners were surveyed across Australia, New Zealand, the UK, the US and Canada to help uncover the realities facing people in business today. 

The survey shows that ANZ SMB owners, like most people, are generally time poor, with 59% always or regularly procrastinating on marketing tasks.

• 58% are spending less than one hour per day on marketing
• 83% are concerned about the current climate of economic uncertainty
• 50% are spending less than $15k per year on marketing (with some as low as $1500)

This makes growing a business difficult in any economic environment, but what can business owners and marketers do to keep growing?  

Marketing Insight #1: Personalise and Humanise your Brand

Strong connections are the foundation of your business. Connect with people where they are, ask questions and understand what they need, at the right time.

Conducting your own market research through surveys and industry insights will help you get the inside story. Then, it’s up to you to personalise your product or service to provide the solution. Don’t forget to speak like a human, not a brand.

Marketing Insight #2: Experiment with AI and Marketing Technology

The benefit of technology is its ability to make our lives easier, with 60% of SMBs already adopting AI in their business and 85% seeing a positive impact on the efficiency of their marketing. 

Of course, any change can be scary, especially when you don’t have the time or skills to get started. It can help to think of AI as a new employee and learn how to work together over time. Stop procrastinating and delegate time-consuming tasks to AI and marketing automation, creating more energy to work on your business rather than in it. 

Content generation has never been easier than it is now. Make AI and marketing automation work for your business and remember, technology is only as good as the person using it. Ask the right questions and personalise any AI generated content to keep it relevant and ‘human’.  

• Try this: Each month, experiment with automating a business process or task with AI.  Break it into small steps and map it out, whilst playing to your strengths and using AI as a resource. For example, you could start by following your customer journey from awareness to action and using these insights to create a new Welcome Email automation. Of course, you can also join an upcoming Power Session to upskill in marketing automation, in less than 20-minutes.

Marketing Insight #3: Build Serious Brand Loyalty and Business Trust

Growth is about more than just revenue. Every human touchpoint has the potential to enhance your brand value, build business trust, and extend your reach.

• Try this: Understanding what drives loyalty and trust is key. Tap into customer insights to create a valuable “how-to” guide or checklist. Ask for permission to connect, and leverage SMS—where open rates can reach up to 98%—to engage customers in real time and strengthen your business relationships with both customers and industry partners.

People do business with people they know, like and trust. So, give them a reason, value and urgency to support your business through its evolution, as highlighted in our recent Small Business Growth session.

Watch On-Demand: Fireside Chat and Live Q&A

“Small businesses want to thrive… They want their profitability to be strong. But growth doesn’t necessarily mean employing more people… becoming bigger, spending lots of money, doing lots of things. It could actually mean getting efficiencies within their business, whether that’s via marketing, whether that’s the use of AI.”

Dominique Lamb, Queensland Small Business Commissioner

• Want to hear more insights from Dominique Lamb? Check out the Queensland Small Business Commissioner’s new podcast series: ‘Small Business Big Stories‘, exploring the entrepreneurial spirit and personal journeys of small business owners.

Marketing Insight #4: Always Remember Your Why

How are you communicating the ‘why this’, ‘why now’ and ‘why you’ of your business?

In a crowded business world, it’s difficult to stand out. So, it’s essential to remember your business purpose, ideal target market and how you can help them. Many businesses lose sight of the reasons they started amidst the day-to-day challenges of operating a business. 

• Try this: Putting your mission front and centre can become your greatest driving force and competitive advantage. Vision and shared values will attract the right people to your business and help to craft a winning brand identity.

Marketing Insight #5: Develop an Omnichannel Marketing Strategy

Each channel is an opportunity to connect your business with different people. 

Diversify your marketing and expand into social, SMS, and web that seamlessly integrates together. Don’t forget that customer service, collaboration and consistent messaging are important communication channels in your marketing toolkit.

Find out how to create a winning omnichannel strategy, it’s the best way to extend your reach and scale your business.

Where to Next: Future Growth

The reality is, everyone has the same 24 hours in each day. If you want to take your marketing from surviving to thriving, there’s no better time to learn how to use market research, customer insights and technology to free up your time and energy.

To recap, here’s the top strategies to focus on to amplify marketing impact:  

1: Personalise and Humanise your Brand

2: Experiment with AI and Marketing Technology 

3: Build Brand Loyalty and Business Trust    

4: Remember Your Why

5: Omnichannel Marketing Strategy

The end result? You can make working on your business (not in it) a priority, no matter how small the budget or limited the resources. 

Remember, we’re here to help you grow, so subscribe to our eNews below to join us as part of future conversations in our Small Business Growth Series.

Reports mentioned in this article:

• Understanding the life cycle and mindset of Queensland small businesses
•  The State of Small Business Marketing Report

The post 5 Essential Strategies to Amplify Your Marketing Impact appeared first on Vision6.

Read on for our Top 7 Lessons to make your branding goals actionable. Game, set, and match!

From Startup to Global Brand Success

Since P.E Nation’s inception in 2016, the brand has become synonymous with fashion-first activewear that doesn’t compromise on style. Pip and P.E Nation flipped the script on the traditional activewear product category, finding clear space in a saturated market. 

“We blurred the lines between function and fashion. That was a real disruption to the market at the time… and it became our point of difference.” Pip Edwards

Brand Lesson 1: Understand the Market to Find Opportunities

Before diving into a market, successful businesses first investigate new product development avenues, possible limitations and opportunities in the field. It’s important to take time to do market research and a SWOT analysis before you begin. Stepping back and being objective will help identify gaps in the market.

Brand Lesson 2: Define Your Brand Purpose and Lead with Vision 

World-class brands have a clear vision and reason for being. If your founder or leadership team are passionate about what they do and why, their enthusiasm and energy will help to convey a unique value proposition and point of difference. This helps brands to stand out in a crowded marketplace and instil customer loyalty.

• Tip: Interview the owner or executive team of your business and ask them to explain the brand purpose in their own words. Their personal, real-world insights may even inspire your next marketing campaign.

Brand Lesson 3: Deliver What Your Customers Need

With a clear ICP (Ideal Customer Profile) in mind, it’s possible to build out a brand vision and strategy based on customer needs. Ask yourself, what is your brand promise and why do your customers care? What problem/s are you solving?

For Pip and P.E Nation, they identified that the busy woman in today’s world couldn’t go from a workout to a lunch date or trip to the shops with the activewear available at the time. It was neither fashionable or comfortable or the products lacked quality design and construction for anything outside of the gym. This led to the brand uniquely positioning itself as “Fashion that moves with you.”

Brand Lesson 4: Create an Inspiring Brand Story

An authentic brand identity is created by people, for people. Let’s say your highest priority marketing goals are:

a) attracting new and repeat customers

b) increasing long term credibility and profitability of the business 

Whether you’re a B2C or B2B company, both of these goals still relate to connecting and engaging with people. Your customers are also your greatest brand advocates. So, it’s important to create a compelling brand story, one that resonates, engages and inspires. Furthermore, try to build strong enough relationships with your customers that they sell this story on your behalf.

• Tip: Even if you’re not the business founder or CEO, imagine for a moment that you are. Find out more about the origins and reason for the brand’s existence. Then, craft a story based on the real people and creative innovation behind the business. Strong brand personality + authentic storytelling = a winning brand strategy

Brand Lesson 5: Build a Business First, a Brand Identity Second

Although a brand is much more than just the numbers, the reality is that many businesses fail in the first five years of operation. Having a solid structure and processes to support business growth is the foundation of long term success. 

Pip explains that if numbers are not your strength, it’s important to find someone who can look after this area of the business or a mentor to help develop commercial viability.

“The commercials are so important… If you don’t have that base structure, cash flow, all of those things lined up you’re not a business. And at the end of the day, that’s what you’re building.” Pip Edwards

• Tip: Good marketers need to understand ROI and the key numbers of the business. Make it a priority to learn the basics – and ask your business leaders for support to create a win-win solution for everyone. Then get creative, building a high-quality brand identity that shines bright.

Brand Lesson 6: Think Big, Before Your Business Grows Bigger

“When you connect to that purpose and meaning, you are basically unstoppable.” Pip Edwards

To scale a business, the right structure and people are everything. Know your strengths and where there might be skill gaps in the business. Build a trusted team to support your brand vision and help you achieve your long term game plan and speak to your values.

• Tip: Depending on the size of your business, you may have to wear many hats at once, but making an effort to connect with others will pay off. Create a brand culture across the business that inspires your peers to help deliver the big picture vision. Like Pip, find your Ikigai (a reason for being) and surround yourself with the right support people so you can do your best work.

Brand Lesson 7: Collaboration and Brand Consistency is Everything

While collaborations might not be a traditional marketing channel, strategic partnerships with established industry players can extend a company’s reach and open up new opportunities. 

Case in point: P.E Nation’s collections with partners such as Reebok, ASICS and DC Snow have been a valuable way to elevate the brand to new levels.

And, being consistent with brand messaging builds trust, authenticity and business value. 

In order to stay true to P.E Nation’s brand DNA and pillars during a time of rapid growth and evolution, the team enlisted the help of an external brand agency to conduct interviews and research. Then, they turned these insights into a brand bible that continues to help the team convey their unique proposition, especially in the leadup to P.E Nation’s new brand era (launched at Australian Fashion Week in May 2024).

“Life isn’t static, and we are not static. We’re always in motion, and you need to keep cross checking what you’re doing to stay relevant… It’s a digital first world, and what was great last week can be different this week.” Pip Edwards

• Tip: A strong visual identity relies on a brand bible (also known as a brand style guide or playbook) where all of your brand assets live. This document becomes your central source of truth and a valuable business resource to get everyone in your organisation on the same page. You can also use it to help train team members so they can effectively translate your brand voice across different marketing channels.

Final takeaway

In our fast-paced, rapidly changing business world, this inspiring conversation with Pip is a reminder that a winning brand identity is much more than just a logo and colour palette. It includes passion, purpose, values and a clear voice that brings everything together.

To recap, here’s the top brand lessons we learned from our fireside conversation:  

1: Understand the Market to Find Opportunities

2: Define Your Brand Purpose and Lead with Vision 

3: Deliver What Your Customers Need   

4: Create an Inspiring Brand Story

5: Build a Business First, a Brand Identity Second

6: Think Big, Before Your Business Grows Bigger

7: Collaboration and Brand Consistency is Everything

Remember, on your brand journey, there are always people (and technology!) to help make things a little easier and support you along the way.

Subscribe to our eNews below to stay in the loop about our future events, and until then, thanks for reading and being part of the Vision6 by Constant Contact community.

The post 7 Ways to Create a Winning Brand Identity appeared first on Vision6.

BRISBANE, AU, May 1, 2024 – Small-to-medium businesses (SMBs) across Australia and New Zealand (ANZ) are the most likely country to put off marketing tasks, and they are also the most likely to procrastinate managing their email marketing campaigns, according to a 2024 study conducted by Constant Contact. 

The Small Business Now: The State of SMB Marketing report from Constant Contact, found that ANZ SMBs are cognisant they need to do more on the marketing front this year, with an uncertain economy spurring many of them to double down on marketing in 2024. ANZ SMBs are more likely than any other country polled to spend more time on marketing, increase their budgets, and the number of marketing channels they use in 2024. 

“Nearly 90 per cent of small businesses across Australia and New Zealand are concerned about the current economic climate impacting their businesses negatively this year, which might suggest they’d want to pull back on their marketing spend to reduce costs,” said Renee Chaplin, VP Asia Pacific for Constant Contact. “But the data tells us they intend to increase their marketing efforts in a bid to survive economic headwinds.” 

Constant Contact partnered with Ascend2 to survey over 1,300 SMBs across ANZ, Canada, the UK and the US for the study, which examined sales and marketing insights of decision-makers at Director level and above at companies with under 250 employees.

Macroeconomic conditions causing uneasiness among SMBs in ANZ

While just 27 per cent of ANZ SMBs feel “very concerned” that the current economy will negatively impact them – the lowest level of concern displayed across the four regions polled by Constant Contact – 56 per cent said they were “somewhat concerned” (17 per cent said they were “not concerned”). 

Combined, this total level of concern (83 per cent) is only behind the UK (84 per cent) among those regions polled. 

“This level of concern shouldn’t surprise many, as Australia in particular experiences higher wages and has just seen interest rates skyrocket,” said Chaplin. “The key to why interest rates have risen is to curb inflation – in other words, to reduce consumer spending. 

“This might explain why they’ve spent so little on marketing this year.”

When asked ‘how much do you currently spend on marketing each year’, 50 per cent of respondents reported they spend less than $15,000 per year on marketing, with 23 per cent reporting they spend less than $1,500 per year. 

“This lack of spending on marketing can become something of a self fulfilling prophecy,” said Chaplin. “Often small business owners lack the knowledge and time to effectively market their business. When faced with economic concerns, the instinct is to conserve cash, and often marketing is the first place SMBs look to cut back. 

“However, those that double down and invest in marketing during these times are able to increase loyalty to retain customers and attract new ones when they need it the most.”

Marketing has taken a back seat for local SMBs

Marketing is the most likely activity ANZ SMBs will delay undertaking, with 13 per cent saying they always procrastinate on marketing tasks – the highest among all polled regions – and 46 per cent saying they “regularly” procrastinate. Combined, 59 per cent of local SMBs always or regularly procrastinate; the most among polled regions. 

It’s perhaps no coincidence then that 58 per cent of ANZ SMBs spend less than one hour per day on marketing, tied with Canada for the least time spent per day. 

“Part of the reason local SMBs put off marketing more than any other task is because they see it as a challenge, which is understandable as it’s not an area of expertise for many SMB owners,” said Chaplin. 

Constant Contact’s study also found that customer retention is among the most pressing concerns for SMBs in ANZ, especially when compared to other regions. More than one-third cite retention as the top challenge for their business in 2024, and the second-biggest overall marketing challenge.

The study also found ANZ SMBs are most likely of any country to use email marketing (59 per cent) as their primary marketing channel, followed closely by social media (58 per cent). However, these channels work best when used in tandem with other marketing efforts, like SMS and events. ANZ SMBs understand this, as 85 per cent agree that using multiple channels in a marketing campaign typically leads to better results. Unfortunately, just 17 per cent say they are always running multichannel campaigns. 

As expected, the top issue preventing ANZ SMBs from adding more channels to their marketing mix is a lack of knowledge (37 per cent), which is higher than any other region polled. And 40 per cent of respondents acknowledged they need to work more efficiently to achieve marketing goals this year – again, the highest of any region polled. 

“Small business owners are usually much more passionate about their products and services than they are about marketing, but they still need to attract and retain customers to grow,” said Sarah Jordan, chief marketing officer at Constant Contact. “Our research shows that while most SMBs recognise the importance of marketing, they often lack the time and expertise to be effective, especially in the rapidly evolving digital landscape. Constant Contact is committed to providing easy, yet powerful, tools that automate marketing to help our customers achieve better results in less time.”

The tide is set to turn on the region’s marketing efforts this year

Amid the level of procrastination and lack of marketing knowledge, Constant Contact’s Small Business Now report found that SMB owners across the region are proactively looking to do more this year on the marketing front.

In fact, SMBs across ANZ are the most likely among polled regions to spend more time on marketing this year (51 per cent), increase their marketing budgets (46 per cent), and increase the number of marketing channels they use (47 per cent). 

Furthermore, 48 per cent of ANZ SMBs plan to increase their marketing budgets by at least 10 per cent YoY — second only to the US (54 per cent). 

“The key to success will be how SMBs spend an increasing budget and, more importantly, into what channel they focus that budget,” said Chaplin. “If they do this effectively, business owners might see marketing challenges decrease which in turn will help them better attract and retain customers, helping to ward off economic concerns.” 

To learn more about the findings from Constant Contact’s Small Business Now report, download the report.

###

ABOUT SMALL BUSINESS NOW

Constant Contact’s Small Business Now series offers a real-world look at what trends and challenges are impacting small businesses and their customers. It combines thorough research with insights from marketing experts to educate small businesses and provide recommendations about what they need to know to be successful. 

STUDY METHODOLOGY:

Constant Contact‘s Small Business Now report analyses insights from over 1,300 small business decision-makers at the Director level and above at companies with under 250 employees. Polls were conducted in Australia, Canada, the United Kingdom and the United States and aggregated to determine global trends. All stats are representative of their associated demographics. The survey was conducted by Ascend2 in February 2024.

ABOUT CONSTANT CONTACT

Constant Contact delivers everything small businesses and nonprofits need to build, grow and succeed. With powerful online marketing tools, contact management and sales features, and innovative AI capabilities, Constant Contact makes it easy to attract the right people, engage more customers, close more deals and grow.

The post Study finds 83 per cent of Australia and New Zealand SMBs concerned about economic conditions appeared first on Vision6.

Assign Specific and Measurable KPIs

For your omnichannel strategy to be successful, you’ll need to set some goals to strive towards. To develop those goals, use the SMART goal framework: SMART goals are Specific, Measurable, Achievable, Relevant, and Time-bound. The goal(s) you create for your marketing campaign will drive the kinds of content you create. 

Specific: What are you trying to achieve?

Measurable: What data will you collect to measure your success?

Achievable: Is your goal possible?

Relevant: Does your event goal align with your broader marketing goals?

Time-bound: What’s your timeline to achieve your goal?

Understanding the metrics you’re tracking is essential for effectively allocating resources and engaging the right channels in your omnichannel strategy. By identifying key performance indicators (KPIs) upfront, you gain insights into which channels are driving the most value and where to focus your efforts for maximum impact.

Key Performance Indicators: 

• Number of signups
• Website visits
• Number of downloads
• Shares on social 
• Revenue numbers
• List growth 
• Engagement on socials and email
• NPS score
• ROI
• Conversion rate

For example, if you’re tracking website traffic as a KPI, you’ll want to engage channels that drive visitors to your site, such as social media, email marketing, and search engine optimisation (SEO). If your KPI is email open rates, you’ll prioritise optimising your email campaigns and segmenting your audience to improve engagement.

Let’s consider an example: Suppose you’re launching a new product and want to track sales as a KPI. You might discover that social media ads drive the highest conversion rates, while email campaigns generate the most leads. Armed with this knowledge, you can allocate more budget to social media advertising and fine-tune your email marketing strategy to capitalise on its lead generation potential.

Optimise your Omnichannel Strategy Across Every Stage of the Customer Journey

To effectively navigate the intricacies of the customer journey, it is imperative to strategically integrate diverse marketing channels that cater to each stage of the process. 

Beginning with the awareness stage, channels like social media and content marketing can cast a wide net, capturing the attention of potential customers. As prospects move into the consideration stage, email campaigns or webinars can provide more in-depth information, nurturing their interest and guiding them toward a decision. 

The decision and post-purchase stages benefit from channels like personalised email follow-ups, retargeting ads, and customer support to solidify the relationship and encourage brand loyalty. By adding a marketing channel tailored to each stage, businesses can ensure a cohesive and targeted approach, fostering engagement and conversion throughout the entire customer journey. 

Email Marketing

• Deliver personalisation at scale: Email is perfect for when you need to deliver tailored content and offers on a large scale. Dynamic content helps you tailor copy, imagery, and links that will resonate with customers on a certain service or plan.  
• Easily segment your audience: Leverage email marketing tools to segment your audience based on various criteria such as demographics, purchase history, or engagement level. You can even introduce your own preference centre so you can segment your audience by communication preferences. This way you’ll be increasing the effectiveness of your campaigns and improving overall engagement.
• Drive repeat purchases: Nurture relationships with existing customers by sending follow-up emails, product recommendations, subscription renewals or exclusive offers. By keeping your brand top-of-mind and providing value to your customers, you can encourage repeat purchases and foster long-term loyalty.
• Drive SMS opt-ins: You can add SMS opt-in as a CTA in email signatures, or send out an email asking for their communication preference. By leveraging email to promote other channels like SMS, you can expand your reach and create multiple touchpoints with your audience, increasing overall engagement and conversion opportunities.

Social media

• Increase your brand awareness: You can generate hype around your brand, by sending out promotional messages, announcements, or exclusive offers to raise awareness among potential customers and keep your brand top-of-mind.
• Ideal platform for purchase inspiration: Use social media to inspire potential customers in their purchase journey. Share visually appealing product images, user testimonials, and lifestyle content to showcase the value and benefits of your products or services, motivating users to consider making a purchase.
• Encourage user-generated content: Encourage your audience to invite, create and share content related to your brand. Prompt your followers to share their experiences, participate in contests, or leave reviews – fostering a sense of community and motivating users to consider making a purchase.

SMS Marketing

• Reduce abandoned carts: Harness the immediacy and directness of SMS marketing to send timely reminders to customers who have abandoned their shopping carts. A well-timed SMS with the right incentive can help turn a lost sale into a conversion.
• Remove friction in customer journey: Whether it’s sending order updates, providing shipping notifications, or offering quick and convenient customer support via SMS, integrating this communication channel ensures a seamless interaction. 

Automation 

• Save time and money: By streamlining repetitive tasks and communication workflows, you can allocate your team’s time more efficiently and reduce operational costs, ultimately improving your bottom line.
• Provide a seamless customer journey: By ensuring consistency in service across different touchpoints, you can provide a smoother customer experience. By automating interactions such as personalised messaging, targeted recommendations and order tracking notifications, you can ensure customers get timely, relevant information, enhancing their journey and brand satisfaction.

QR codes & Forms

• Make product or service info more accessible: By strategically placing QR codes on packaging, promotional materials, or in-store displays, businesses can seamlessly provide customers with detailed specifications, pricing, reviews, surveys and other relevant data instantly accessible via a simple scan.
• Create a personalised experience: You can personalise your entire customer funnel using QR codes by linking customer segments to relevant content. QR codes enhance customer experience by delivering tailored content like personalised landing pages, exclusive discounts, and targeted product recommendations.
• Encourage more signups with forms: QR codes are potential lead-generation magnets. You can use a QR code to direct visitors to fill out forms, take surveys, or provide feedback, helping grow your email marketing list and subscriber base.

By implementing these omnichannel strategies, you can drive more engagement, and maximise ROI across every stage of the customer journey.

The post The Anatomy of a High-Performing Omnichannel Strategy appeared first on Vision6.

Google, Yahoo, and Microsoft require all email senders (that’s you!) to adhere to new guidelines, transforming email authentication and deliverability best practices from a nice-to-have to a MUST-have.

What are Google, Yahoo and Microsoft’s new sender requirements?

To help protect inboxes from spam emails, Google, Yahoo, and Microsoft introduced a new set of requirements. These changes apply to all senders who send emails to Gmail, Yahoo, and Microsoft accounts.

For a detailed list of requirements, you can head over to Google’s and Yahoo’s Help Centres. But we’ve outlined some of the most important changes below.

If your emails reach any of these providers, you are required to:

• Authenticate your email domain by using security protocols like DKIM, SPF, and DMARC. More on that here. 
• Implement a one-click list-unsubscribe header and honour unsubscribes within two days. Vision6 takes care of compliance by adding an unsubscribe link to the bottom of all your emails and handles the one-click list-unsubscribe header required by major mailbox providers. 
• Maintain a spam complaint rate under 0.3%, which means no more than three spam reports per 1,000 messages sent. However, as an industry best practice we recommend keeping your spam complaint rates under 0.1% to protect your sender reputation.

How to stay compliant with the new restrictions

We get it – navigating sender requirements and compliance can feel overwhelming. But, fear not! These requirements play a crucial role in reinforcing trust in your email campaigns. 

They also act as a safeguard, preventing your messages from being flagged as spam, rejected, or undelivered. 

Luckily, Vision6 automatically handles some of these changes for you, however there are still things you need to set up. 

In this blog post, we’ve broken down six straightforward steps to help you prepare for upcoming changes and maintain compliance with ease.

1. Set up SPF and DKIM email authentication

Sender Policy Framework (SPF) and DomainKeys Identified Mail (DKIM) are the two essential forms of email authentication. 

SPF allows you to list all the IP addresses that are authorised to send an email on behalf of your domain. This helps servers like Gmail and Yahoo identify that the email domain you’re sending from is in fact coming from your established IP addresses. 

DKIM uses asymmetric encryption to sign and verify your email. This confirms that the email has not been altered on its way to the intended recipient. 

Set up your domain in your Vision6 account and it will automatically configure SPF and DKIM. 

2. Follow up with DMARC authentication for your domain

DMARC or Domain-based Message Authentication, Reporting & Conformance is the third foundation in authentication and defines the process of what to do with messages that fail SPF and DKIM checks. This could be a case of spoofing or someone pretending to send mail from your domain in which case your DMARC process can tell receiving inboxes to complete either of the following: 

• None: receiving inbox does nothing
• Quarantine: message goes to spam
• Reject: message is not delivered

So what do you need to do?

If you own your domain:

Firstly, you will need to check and ensure that your sender domain is set up and configured in our platform. See: How to Check Your Domain Set up.

​If you haven’t set up your domain, you can do so by implementing these steps. See: How to Set up Your Domain Records.

We recommend you employ your IT team to update your domain’s DNS records and set up self-authentication by instituting a DMARC policy with your domain provider. If you send emails in large volumes, this is a required step to help build your strong sender reputation.

Ensure that your domain provider has applied a DMARC policy to your domain. Vision6’s sender domain setup includes an automatic check for this record to help you get verified smoothly.

If you don’t own your domain:

The new requirements mean that we must authenticate each message using the domain found in the “from address”. So, if you don’t own your own domain and can’t set up this kind of authentication and DMARC policy, Vision6 will authenticate messages for you. 

For example, if you are sending from xyzdonuts@gmail.com, we will modify your “from address” to xyzdonuts=gmail.com@au.v6send.net. But don’t worry, subscribers will still see the original name ‘XYZ Donuts’ in the “from” field, so nothing will appear to change for them. 

However, we recommend that you refrain from using your freemail (such as gmail.com, hotmail.com, etc.) when sending bulk messages as this might still mark your emails as spam. See: Freemail Email Domain vs. Own Email Domain.

3. Don’t impersonate Gmail From: headers

From February 2024, Gmail’s default DMARC policy is changing from “none” to “quarantine”. This means that any email using free domains like @gmail and @yahoo, that are sent outside of these apps will go to the spam folder. 

It is best practice to use your business email address associated with your domain to help ensure that your emails get delivered to your intended recipients. If you do not have a domain yet, consider getting one soon to avoid any deliverability issues.

4. Make sure the domain in your “From” email matches your SPF or DKIM domain

This simply means that the “from” email address that you use to send emails, matches the domain authenticated with either SPF domain or the DKIM domain. 

For example, if the authenticated domain name (website) is vision6.com in DKIM set-up, your email address should match that domain name i.e. marketing@vision6.com.

5. Keep your spam rates below 0.3% 

Anytime your email is marked as spam, your spam rate increases. If your email spam rates continue to exceed 0.3%, your email messages will most likely go straight to spam inboxes and never see the light of day. 

We recommend keeping your email spam complaints under 0.1% as it aligns with industry standards. This ensures a healthy sender reputation, demonstrates a commitment to delivering relevant content, and fosters trust with email service providers such as Gmail and Yahoo.

Make sure you continually monitor your spam rate, which can be done in your Vision6 reporting dashboard. If you want more information on how to keep spam rates down and maintain a healthy sender reputation, you can read more here: How to get your emails in more inboxes (and avoid spam).

6. Make unsubscribing easy

Your subscribers should not have to jump through hoops to unsubscribe. The more complicated you make this process, the more likely users will report your messages as spam. To help keep your emails compliant, Vision6 automatically adds an unsubscribe link to the bottom of all your emails.

By following these steps and with Vision6 supporting you along the way, you’ll stay compliant and give your emails the best possible chance of reaching the inbox.

The post How to Stay Compliant with Google, Yahoo, and Microsoft’s Email Sender Requirements appeared first on Vision6.

It goes beyond  traditional strategies and aims to integrate various marketing channels all for a seamless customer experience. It’s exciting stuff and not as hard as it looks, so let’s get into it and find out how to best harness omnichannel marketing for your next campaign. 

What is omnichannel marketing?

Omnichannel marketing is all about creating the environment for a cohesive customer experience.  The idea is, that customers interacting with your products will get the same friendly user experience whether they come into your brick-and-mortar locations or are checking you out online… wherever that may be.

If you’re still feeling lost, it might help to understand what omnichannel marketing is not.

Multichannel marketing vs. omnichannel marketing

Multichannel marketing has a product-centric approach versus the customer-centric approach of omnichannel marketing. In other words, multichannel efforts operate in silos, with each channel functioning independently. In this context your marketing messages may differ across different channels.

Omnichannel marketing takes it a step further. The aim being to create a cohesive and interconnected customer journey. As an example, after an in-store purchase, a customer might be asked for their email address to get a receipt. This can serve as an electronic reminder of your brand while putting them on a list for any upcoming promotional emails. Ultimately, an omnichannel approach responds to the customers needs and adapts itself accordingly.  

However, be warned, having an omnichannel marketing approach is more than copying and pasting and hoping for the best. For a truly sophisticated omnichannel marketing strategy, knowing how and when to deliver your message is important. 

Why integrate email & SMS into your omnichannel

Anyone well-versed in marketing, can tell you that having an email and SMS strategy built into your campaign can supercharge your brand’s open and click-through rates. Email marketing remains a powerful tool for getting personalised content into your user’s inbox, and SMS marketing is an immediate way to engage with consumers on their mobile devices. Having these tools in your omnichannel marketing toolbox can help you meet your customers where they’re at.

Pro-tip: Consider automating an SMS for any customers shopping in-store…while a timely email or ad might be warranted for anyone who has shown some interest in an online product. 

Benefits of an omnichannel marketing strategy

Greater reach & increased sales

Increased reach typically leads to higher conversion rates and ultimately boost sales. Not only that, but with omnichannel marketing, you get a better look at the customer journey. So all in all, getting the word out across different channels spells good news for your brand. 

Optimised customer experience

You might have the most patient and understanding customer base in the world, and even they would have a hard time jumping through hoops to make a purchase. By providing the best experience for your customers, you play from a position of strength:

• It’s easier for your customers to navigate across platforms
• A cohesive message means there is less room for misinterpretation
• Having a consistent presence increases brand recognition and enhanced brand loyalty. 
• Positive customer experiences lead to positive comments, reviews and recommendations 

Pro-tip: Part of ensuring a great customer experience is making sure you have a plan for when things go askew. Having a dedicated team responding to customer concerns is a great place to start. 

Improved ROI

A stand-out omnichannel strategy isn’t just a savvy marketing move, it’s a great business move too. Putting in the yards now means a greater chance your business will see a higher return on investment (ROI). Not only that, but creating a streamlined approach to your brand’s content means that you have more time to focus on other things…Like optimising your business’ marketing spend and deciding which channels deserve more attention.

Competitive advantage

In a highly competitive market, having your brand standout is crucial. As it so happens, omnichannel marketing is a pretty easy way to make that happen. The good news being that most businesses still rely on multichannel marketing strategies. While the initial effort to get your omnichannel strategy off the ground may require a little more from you, the pay-off can be great. It’s worth noting that it only takes 3 marketing channels to yield a 90% higher customer retention rate, so imagine the results if you doubled down on your brand’s message, by combining social, email and SMS.

How to build a successful omnichannel marketing campaign

Create your website landing page

To really get your omnichannel marketing campaign to make some waves, you want to make sure your online presence is up to scratch, and this starts with a well-designed website. It’s a good idea to imagine your website as the central hub for your brand. Here customers can learn all about you, from your products and services to why you do what you do. 

Pro-tip: To give your website the best chance for success, make sure it’s visually appealing, user-friendly, and optimised for various devices and settings ie. light and dark mode, or customers using screen reader technology. 

Add a channel to accommodate each stage of the customer journey

To better understand the various stages of your customer’s journey it’s a good idea to determine which channels work with each stage. Social media is great for getting your name out there and creating brand awareness. Email is generally good at nurturing leads, while SMS comes in handy for transactional communication. By strategically incorporating channels, you can guide your customers seamlessly through the sales funnel at every step of the way.  

Keep consistent messaging across channels

Consistency is key in omnichannel marketing. Keeping your brand front of mind is made easier when you’ve put the thought into how to deliver your brand’s message across platforms. It shouldn’t matter whether a customer encounters your brand on social media, through email, or on your website, the messaging should scream you. At the end of the day, having a well established brand identity helps build brand recognition and trust.

Have a central landing page to direct traffic

Having a landing page on your website, blog or social channels not only makes your content and offers clear but it guides visitors towards taking a specific action. Whether it’s making a purchase, signing up for a newsletter or accessing exclusive content, it’s all there in one convenient location. Making it easier for customers to explore everything you’ve got on show. 

Report & optimise

When it comes to fine tuning your marketing campaign, it’s a good idea to check-in with how each of your channels are performing. With insights into how customers are engaging with your content, to customer behaviour and conversion rates you can better optimise your campaign and re-distribute your resources accordingly. 

When to use omnichannel marketing

Flash sales or new releases

Once you’ve leveraged your channels, your brand is in a good position to reach a broader audience and create a widespread social buzz. This kind of pull makes omnichannel marketing ideal for promoting flash sales and new releases. 

With a range of content making features, you can build anticipation for an upcoming sale or release a product teaser. This kind of hype can be bolstered by a well-timed email or SMS campaign designed to rehash all of the important details that might have been missed.  

Event promotion

Whether you’re hosting a physical or virtual event, an omnichannel marketing approach makes sure the announcement of your event makes all the necessary rounds on your channels. Depending on your audience you can use one platform to announce your event and  promote or remind guests through another. Instagram, like Facebook, now has an event feature which can be followed up with an automated SMS reminder for anyone who says they’re attending  or email invites to really maximise on attendance. 

Pro-tip: If you’re looking to create a buzz around your brand or an event (any promotion really) hosting a competition is one way to get people talking. You might like to giveaway two tickets to an upcoming event and invite people to enter via a link in your bio.

Re-engagement/Retargeting campaigns

Sometimes all it takes is a gentle nudge in the form of an abandoned cart SMS or email, or a target social media ad (or all of the above). Omnichannel re-engagement campaigns cover all grounds, from personalised emails, to targeted social media ads, and SMS reminders, reigniting interest and encouraging a return to your platform.

Final Takeaway

Bringing all your channels to the table and having them mingle is what we call omnichannel marketing. All your channels working together can help your business stand-out. Not only is it good for building customer rapport with consistent messaging, it can help your business unlock its full potential and maximise your impact in our ever digital landscape.

If you’re ready to take your business to new heights, Vision6 by Constant Contact is here to help. 

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