Blogs

When it comes to email marketing does anyone really care about ROI?

staff — Thu, 17 Nov 2011 20:53:22 +0000

Blog author:

James Newcombe

Legal Technology News (www.law.com) recently featured an article by Adrian Dayton and Adam Stock which asked the question: how much are firms paying for each set of eyeballs that look at their website? Their article encourages law firms to measure the ROI of their website traffic based on recent cost-per-visitor research.

My question to law and other professional services firms is: are any of you having these same conversations about email marketing? Isn’t it obvious that client or prospect engagements with email campaigns are significantly more valuable than unknown website visitor statistics?

Surely you can learn more about your clients and prospects whilst generating a greater return from email marketing? After all, you already have your clients’ email addresses and email marketing technologies provide far greater reporting statistics and real client intelligence than website traffic or IP tracking.

The lack of attention given to email makes me wonder if lawyers and business development managers actually know about the effectiveness and potential of email marketing? I suspect they don’t.

An even more interesting question law firms should ask is: do we actually know the return on investment from our email marketing?

While the rest of the market is obsessed with social media and if it can win new business, every firm continues to miss huge opportunities that already exist with email marketing. Email should be the most valuable weapon in marketing’s arsenal. It is proven to win new business, yet its never been used effectively by professional service firms. Why, when it has statistics and proven methodologies to assist in building / enhancing long and valuable relationships with clients?

Are firms looking for a return from email marketing?

If marketers aren’t actually calculating the cost of email marketing, or at least setting objectives for every email campaign, then I’d argue it’s not really marketing. It’s throwing money out the window.

So how can firms stop the hemorrhaging? I believe they need to do three things: Interpret, Action & Share.

Interpret: It is critical that marketers dedicate time to review the valuable email analytics available post campaign. Identify which clients engaged, what content was most interesting and how much time they spent reading it. Ask yourself: what does this data mean to my lawyers or BD teams?

Action: marketers need to segment their marketing lists, targeting each with relevant content. There will be opportunities to include snippets of similar content for cross selling purposes, but first you must give your clients what they want.

Share: it is vital to share marketing’s interpretations and what this means to their lawyers, accountants or consultants. They need to be informed of the impact their content has — both positive and negative. This can shape future topics, improve contact data and identify clients that require personal follow-up

It’s important to calculate the cost, set real objectives and measure the return of each email campaign, then review, adjust and repeat. Simple.

Email marketing can win new business but requires a solid strategy to achieve any success.

Lessons for Legal Email Marketers

staff — Wed, 26 Oct 2011 15:53:53 +0000

Blog author:

James Newcombe

In a recent post from one of my favorite marketing news sites Clickz, Rick Buck addressed a number of superstitions and myths that haunt the world of email marketing.

Here’s a short summary together with my take for legal marketers who missed Rick’s excellent post.

The first myth concerned subject lines. Despite the majority of legal marketers' subject lines being extremely safe (and not that thrilling) I’ve always sensed many have spent too much time worrying about certain words that could get them caught in a spam filter. As Rick correctly states “…in today’s deliverability climate whether or not emails get delivered is based more on overall IP reputation than specific words in the emails themselves.” Just concern yourself with whether your subject line will motivate your recipients to open the email. ‘The Lawyer’ often entices me with their subject lines like ‘BLG, Gaddafi and a spot of office bother’ unlike ‘Above the Law’ with their ‘Above the Law Daily – October 17 2011’ subject line (Much imagination needed here!). I won’t comment on law firm subject lines here but I'm sure you can get my point. Have a look at your own subject lines and ask yourself "would I open my own email campaign with its current subject line?"

The second myth is more critical and this concerns ‘List Growth’. The demand for list growth has led to some questionable practices in many markets according to Rick and this certainly is the case in legal marketing. In the BtoC and low value BtoB world many still trade email lists with other businesses. I’ve not heard of many law firms doing this however, many have said they’ve purchased marketing lists in the past. A practice that just won’t die in legal marketing. It is strange that naturally risk averse businesses have been taking serious risks with their own email marketing. When using purchased lists it is highly likely that your spam complaints will spike because the people getting your email don’t know why you (or your partners) are speaking to them. The answer is simple - don’t buy lists!

“Don’t pin the success of your email campaigns on the time of day or particular days of the week you send them”, according to Rick. This is true. I am still puzzled why some legal email marketers still send campaigns 5pm on a Friday in a state of panic. I wish this is a practice that would go away and my team would be happy to help marketers make the case to their attorneys why this is not always best practice. Perhaps some of my clients know something I don’t about that time of day but I can’t think many clients would appreciate a legal alert during their Friday happy hour! On the whole however, it’s more important to focus on the relevance of the content rather than the send time. If it’s relevant people will open it.

Rick’s last myth concerns the practice of over emailing inactive subscribers. Law firms are huge culprits when it comes to sending too many emails to clients who have never opened any emails previously. According to Rick “If they haven’t opened your emails in the last 9 months, they aren’t going to start now”. In the case of law firms I believe there are many things marketers could try before they give up on a client subscriber – firms just don’t try in most cases. If you must continue to send emails to inactive subscribers (we know your attorneys will ask you to) then try to make changes to the subject line, content and time of day you send the email. These are very simple solutions that don’t require too much effort. Please pay attention to the reporting data of your email campaigns and test what changes could be made to increase engagement. My team and I have had success with firms by helping them deliver re-engagement campaigns to clients. Where in essence, you simply ask your clients/subscribers to tell you what they want to receive.

Here’s the link to Rick’s original post title ‘What haunts email marketers’ http://www.clickz.com/clickz/column/2116052/haunts-email-marketers

Cheers,

James

Campaign for the People against Canned Content!

staff — Fri, 17 Jun 2011 20:41:09 +0000

Blog author:

James Newcombe

I have taken it upon myself to campaign against US accounting firms who still resort to sending canned content to their high value clients.
After attending this year’s AAM Summit in Chicago and speaking with several attendees, clients should be warned that a lot of firms plan to continue sending them Canned-SPAM!

I subscribed to email newsletters from the firms I met at this year’s conference. I consequently received virtually identical newsletters from a number of different firms featuring the same canned articles. Rather than naming and shaming, I have included screen shots with no reference to the individual culprit firms below.

I’ve highlighted in orange the canned content that appears in both these firms’ newsletters. It is puzzling because the two firms in question provide different services in very distinct markets. The canned article in this case covered Intellectual Property concerns when expanding one’s business into China. I hope that they are appropriately segmenting their lists to ensure that only an appropriate section of their clients (those considering expanding into the Chinese market) are receiving this relevant content – but I doubt it.

One observation was clear; both firms use the same email marketing provider. I’ve noticed that this provider’s clients send emails with the same design, merely selecting different colors for headline blocks as you can see. The designs do leave a lot to be desired. Concep recently held an Email Best Practices Webinar, which discusses design tips and the proper use of email templates as well as strategy. Click here to view the webinar.

The examples below are not the first and they certainly won’t be the last we see of canned content for some time to come.

There are certain steps accounting firms should take to address issues with content. A few firms I’ve spoken to are looking for experienced writers who could work with marketing and individual partners. If you cannot get your CPAs to write then hiring a ghost writer to help could be a worthwhile option.

Personally, I’ve always been against canned content as it provides little or no value. I have the pleasure of working with a number of law firms who know the benefits of applying a real, personal approach to the content they send their clients. Apparently accountants don’t have the same skills “dealing with numbers all day” as one marketing manager recently told me. Perhaps that’s not giving accountants enough credit. I understand potential implications to the billable hour but content creation and subsequent email campaigns are business development – when it’s done right it can generate new business!

Contrary to popular belief there are accountants out there who can write just as there are accountants and firms with personality! For proof check out this hilarious video titled “I got a feeling – more than just a job” by WithumSmith+Brown http://www.withum.com/popupvid_music-video.html - Their Managing Partner and CEO, Bill Hagaman even dedicates time to blogging http://ceothinks.com/ Good on ya Bill!

I often wonder what accounting firms expect their clients to do after receiving canned newsletters. With no author or real person at the firm for clients to follow up with after reading an article, these firms are simply blasting content out the door. Un-targeted, irrelevant marketing will not help bring new business opportunities through the door.

Time and time again, marketers seem to forget that email addresses are real people: they are your firms’ clients. An accountant wouldn’t shout out irrelevant news stories or make useless analogies in a face-to-face meeting with a client so why should a firm do the same in its email communications?

Some law firms' email marketing metrics never took a dip!

staff — Tue, 24 May 2011 17:51:14 +0000

Blog author:

James Newcombe

I’ve recently become a fan of Tom Matte, of The Matte Pad. I’ve been listening to him online for some time and we met at this year’s LMA conference. He’s a nice chap and everyone would agree that his lunch time presentation was very entertaining!

Last week, Tom tweeted his blog post from January titled ‘Legal Marketing: Email marketing and trends in open rates’. He references research by an agency that claim to be experts in legal marketing and email.

The agency’s research states that law firm email marketing open rates have dropped in the last two years.

Between July 1 2008 and June 30 2010 their 25 most active law firm open rates averaged just 21%. As Tom states this is down from 28% two years ago and email overload is apparently to blame.

Personally, I think poor email practices have always been to blame for poor open rates.

Agencies fail to advise their law firm clients that high value relationships deserve high value communications, especially when a channel like email is concerned. The inbox is a cluttered environment but its recipients’ instant, emotional reaction that plays the largest part on whether your email gets read. Content, design and the relationship of course are critical!

While we’re on the subject of open rates I have to say that some of us never experienced a drop. I’m pleased to share Concep’s client stats between June 2009 and December 2010; our average client generated a unique view rate (open rate) of 28%. I’m pleased to say this trend has continued so far throughout the first half of 2011.

Appropriate targeting and segmentation are to thank for the impressive open rates, as well as engaging subject lines, design and timing. More importantly however, these firms actually review campaign metrics and then act on the results and levels of engagement they see.
Firms need to steer clear of washing their hands of an email campaign once it’s been sent and then wait around till the next update, newsletter or event invitation – look at your reporting and if you’re not sure what to do ask your agency or another so-called expert.

I wish people would stop referring to email marketing campaigns as “Email Blasts”, it sounds terrible. Your clients wouldn’t appreciate hearing you refer to the “high value, relevant content” you send them as blasting. When I hear the term “Blast” I see a scatter gun approach to marketing you’d expect from old fashioned, low value BtoC marketing communications.

Your clients are worth millions of dollars, so spend some time and money on high value email communications!

Follow me on twitter at twitter.com/jamesnewcombe

Why do law firms stay in abusive relationships? Get help!

staff — Fri, 20 May 2011 19:43:46 +0000

Blog author:

James Newcombe

Dictionary.com defines an abusive relationship as “a state of affairs between two people characterized by wrong or improper action”.

Just as with some very unfortunate spouses, law firms can find themselves in abusive relationships.

Many firms suffer from wrong and improper behavior at the hands of their digital agency or web technology partner.

One agency in particular (who shall remain nameless) is a repeat offender. Clients (and there are surprisingly a lot of them) consistently complain to me about poor quality service, high staff turnover and technology not doing what they were promised during the sales process.

These wrong and improper actions sound like divorceable offenses if consistently repeated and unresolved. Sadly, it seems that providers of website design and infrastructure can often be so entrenched they appear to be immoveable objects. It all sounds so simple in the beginning because they have their own CMS and they work with other firms. When has the easy option in any endeavor ever reaped the greatest results?

Like any unfortunate spouse locked in an abusive relationship, getting out means investment in time, effort and sometimes money for a divorce. Law firms and their relationships with wrong and improper providers are much less arduous to terminate and there are an ever increasing number of alternatives.

When you finally “man-up” and make the decision to get a divorce, don’t just go with the next provider who spouts “We’re the agency for law firms”. Following the pack feels like a good idea, but this approach will always get you into trouble. Remember “Everyone uses them” is not a valid reason to work with somebody.

Below the Dictionary.com’s definition it reads… “If you feel you are in an abusive relationship, take is seriously. Talk to someone; get help!”

Couldn’t put it better myself…

Follow me at twitter.com/jamesnewcombe

Worst-Pratice Guide to making your next technology purchase

staff — Fri, 01 Apr 2011 21:33:26 +0000

Blog author:

James Newcombe

In light of the forthcoming presentation ‘Evaluating Emerging Professional Services Technology Trends’ taking place at the LMA 2011 conference in Orlando, I wanted to discuss some mistakes law firms continue to make when purchasing new technologies.

My colleague Matthew Parfitt, alongside Kelly Geisinger of Bingham McCutchen and Paul Dunnay of Networked Insights, will be discussing the following on Wednesday, April 6 at 10:45am at LMA 2011:

• How do you match technology with the firm’s overall strategic objectives?
• What is your research process for identifying solution providers, consultants and agencies that can best assist you?
• How do I ensure I’m making the most of the technology available to me and delivering the right content to the right person at the right time?

Kelly and Paul will be providing practical insights to help marketers understand the latest technology and how to select the right solution for the firm’s strategic goals. I’m sure you’ll agree it’s a great subject and no doubt will prove to be a real hit with the audience!

For now I’d like to discuss some of the humorous mistakes some law firm marketers have made when it comes to spending their firm’s money on technology.

My advice is to look at these and structure your new vendor meetings and procurement processes around the opposite.

• Don’t just purchase an email marketing technology just because one of your marketing executives has used it at a previous firm. This may save on minimal training costs but how about assessing more than one technology or provider? Make sure you compare the features, functionality and strengths vs the weaknesses. Believe it or not this was a real excuse I received last year. I can’t imagine any other industry where this would be acceptable, but it appears to be acceptable to law firms.

• Don’t just purchase a technology because it’s what other law firms use. Conduct your own due diligence by comparing technologies being used successfully in other verticals. Believe it or not, there is a whole world outside of legal, where BtoC firms are “killing it” with social media and more traditional digital channels.

• Don’t put all your faith in a sole consultant who claims to be an expert. Take their advice with a pinch of salt and still conduct your own research, product demos and prospect meetings. I know one such consultant who claims to objectively evaluate and advise law firms on CRM implementations yet repeatedly recommends the same platform regardless.

• When you’ve taken the time to prepare a website RFP, actually meet with more than 2 providers. Agencies rarely receive adequate web RFPs from law firms; any response your law firm receives will only be as good as the RFP, so ensure that objectives are clearly defined.

• We know Executive Committees usually make the ultimate decision but what do attorneys and partners really know about digital marketing and websites? As a CMO or Marketing Director, do as much as you possibly can to influence their decision: that includes sitting down with multiple vendors. Meet the people, get to know them and discuss what they could really do for your firm. Real business (like the work your attorneys do) is done face to face!

I’ll try and put together a summary of the recommendations that come out of the ‘Evaluating Emerging Professional Services Technology Trends’ after the conference.

I look forward to seeing you all in Orlando and have a safe trip! Don’t forget your sunscreen.

Canned SPAM - easy to open but difficult to digest?

staff — Mon, 14 Mar 2011 20:29:56 +0000

Blog author:

James Newcombe

Moving to New York from London was always going to be an exciting challenge; I knew there would be differences in how business was approached on the two sides of the pond. However, three years of working with top UK and European accounting firms could not prepare me for the unique challenge of digital marketing for accounting firms in the US.

The difference between the two markets is remarkable in relation to:

• Email Marketing service providers – dominance of one technology provider
• Content – ‘canned’ vs. thought leadership
• The value accounting firms place on email marketing – difference in investment both in time and dollars

Firstly, the dominance of a single technology provider in the email marketing space was astonishing. Things are very different in the UK, where accounting firms partner with digital agencies who provide more than just technology and there are a few to choose from. As such it takes savvy procurement from the firm and real consulting from an agency to kick-start a valuable, ROI-driven relationship.

Like my fellow (and slightly more successful) Brit Sir Richard Branson felt when he first looked into founding Virgin Airlines, I thought the sheer dominance and overreliance on one company is not in the best interest of accounting firms.

Things have to change and I hope to help accounting firms make better use of their marketing dollars! Sir Richard put it better than me when he said to airline customers, “You now have a choice!”

Secondly, what has happened to thought leadership in accounting firms, where has it gone? In the case of UK accounting firms and every single one of my US law firm clients, they produce their own marketing content.

In US legal marketing, one hot phrase circling online and at events I’ve been attending is ‘clients hire the attorney not the firm’.

Clients hire people they like, especially in the case of attorneys and accountants. Their opinion and expertise is worth thousands of dollars, for this reason most successful firms place a great amount of value on their marketing.

Rather than advising firms on the values of writing their own content, the dominant email technology vendor is actually capitalizing by selling ‘canned content’. Opportunities are being missed to establish more valuable relationships in the world of US accounting firms.

A number of AAM members here in New York have begun attending Legal Marketing Association (LMA) events and I’m not surprised. Accounting marketers clearly are seeing the value in both the content and ideas being shared by their counterparts in the legal industry. One trend that I can guarantee will never get off the ground is law firms outsourcing their expertise, opinion and content to foster relationships with clients!

Would you ever outsource your blog posts or purchase “canned tweets”? That would be like paying someone else to attend a networking event in your place and attempting to establish real relationships. That person would be an imposter and they wouldn’t get my business or earn my trust.

Some US accounting marketers I’ve had the pleasure of speaking with are aware of the industry’s short comings and its unhealthy addiction to “canned content”.

Wade Clark, Strategic Growth Officer of Carr Riggs & Ingram, knows the situation all too well. He recently told me that “9 out of 10 accounting firms are purchasing content that other neighboring firms are also using.” To me, if I happen to be a CFO and potential client, can you imagine my reaction if I received the exact same email newsletter from 10 accounting firms, all with just a different logo?

To illustrate, imagine that you walk into a store to purchase a bottle of water but all of the different water brands and their products look the same as each other. Which one do you buy? The closest, the biggest or the cheapest. Greater consideration is required when hiring an accountant; a firm’s marketing messages need to reflect this.

A friend who happens to be Director of Marketing at an accounting firm in Atlanta, like many purchases some canned content from his email marketing technology vendor. Right now he is unable to deliver email marketing messages to his competitors’ clients; why? Because his firm is pushing the same message as the next accounting firm based in Atlanta.

Can you imagine the new business opportunities currently being missed? There must be unhappy clients who are craving a better accountant and trusted advisor but they are not being communicated with. This presents a stunning opportunity for the first few firms who begin developing their own content and thought leadership.

This leads me onto my third observation, regarding the value some US accounting firms place on email marketing. From recent conversations I’ve had many grossly undervalue email.

I recently attended an Association for Accounting Marketing (AAM) chapter roundtable event and a number of marketers present admitted to spending a disproportionate amount of time and effort on a printed communication despite every piece eventually landing in a recycling bin compared to email newsletters and alerts. The same amount of time and effort should be spent on email marketing for a number of reasons:

1. This arrives in your key client’s inbox, a very personal environment, one of the first things many check as soon as they get out of bed (well, after Facebook).

2. Email recipients have emotional reactions to emails in their inbox and on mobile devices. What exerts the greatest influence before any purchase of any service? The answer is emotion. Ask yourself what you feel when you receive an untargeted, generic email – personally I delete it instantly and associate a negative experience with that brand. As Wade Clark reminded me on our last call one of his 4 pillars of Sales and Marketing is brand experience combined with credibility and confidence – connecting people to the brand and its professionals (and connecting that to expertise!) seems like an add on – don’t need it here maybe put it somewhere else?

3. We receive on average 44 email marketing messages a day. The exact amount we each receive varies of course, what we do know is that our inboxes are more cluttered than ever. More reason to spend more dollars and time on design that helps your firm stand out from the crowd and reporting analytics to gather real client intelligence.

4. Whether you’re 25 or 65 no one is immune to breakthroughs in technology, especially online. More grandparents are now on Facebook than students! And everyone wants an iPad! Our expectations have increased when it comes to design, interaction and engagement in all channels, yet email has been left behind for some reason.

5. Email isn’t a cheap communication channel. If you think it is you’re doing it wrong and you’re simply not getting the maximum return possible.

6. Clients want quality. This is why the Economist is one of the only printed publications that continues to increase sales and subscriptions while other print publications struggle. Why are so many firms satisfied with sending the equivalent of the local rag to their client’s inboxes, where they spend 90% of their day?

At the same AAM roundtable event I noticed that this dominant technology is not helping marketers generate real client intelligence. For many they simply rely on open rates, repeat views and click throughs to measure the success of email campaigns.

Knowing how many people opened your email is nice, however we all know that many repeat views are logged when a recipient simply brushes over an email in their inbox list or on their device. I wouldn’t pick up the phone or tell a partner to do so based on a client viewing an email 6 times.

What would benefit me as a marketer and benefit my partner’s relationship with his/her client is knowing that their key client spent 30 minutes reading their article (not canned content) on “Valuation and Buy-Sell Agreements”. Picture the scene:

“Mr Partner I’ve invited your favorite client and 5 others to a breakfast seminar to listen to your thoughts in person – all you had to do was help me write a short article and I did all the work!”

Should one or two new clients walk through the door based off that campaign – imagine the return on investment for the firm and marketing!

Can “canned content” or this dominant email technology vendor I’m talking about deliver a similar result? Maybe, once in a while at least as anything is possible. But I would question the value of that relationship; you reap what you sow as they say.

I urge you to ask for more…

Ask more of your technology provider for a start. I would insist on receiving strategic consultancy to get your email campaigns as effective as possible and more client intelligence not just analytics!

Ask for a digital agency who works with professional services firms with all elements of their digital marketing, including websites, email marketing, design, real CRM integration that’s live (not in development), CMS consulting and event management.

And lastly do the really hard job of differentiating yourself and the firm by developing your own content and thought leadership. We don’t buy our accountant’s or attorney’s expertise and service because of an email – we do because of their expertise, relationship and added value… So start putting that in your emails!

Social Media and Email Marketing = Perfect Partnership

staff — Fri, 25 Feb 2011 16:52:25 +0000

Blog author:

Anthony Green

It’s interesting to listen to the continual debate over the merits of email marketing and whether it has a future in the marketing mix. Naysayers tout the emergence of social media as the deathblow for email marketing but this could not be further from the truth. Social media is the perfect complement to the email channel (in fact social media is complementary to all web 1.0 channels). The principles that underpin social media are those that successful email marketers have adhered to since the channels’ inception: relevance, engagement and (taking) action.

Within the professional services sector, where I and Concep spend our time, there remains an awful lot of noise. There remains a mentality from Partners and Associates that whatever they have to say is worth sharing. The idea being if we send our content to all-and-sundry, some of it has to stick, right? Part of the problem has been the available technology and lack of education regarding best practice.

Other vertical markets within the B2B (and B2C) space are not immune from the issue of content “batch and blast” either. Yet in the legal industry, it is still very much the norm to blast out a client alert to a list of recipients and move immediately to the next task. The notion of a “marketing campaign” is lost and, although data such as opens and opt-outs might feed back to the firm CRM, no one is taking the time to look at the success of the mailing in its’ own right. Few marketers check reporting data to determine which links and files were of most relevance to the group of recipients (clients) on the whole. Or what pieces of content did these busy professionals take the time out of their day to seek more information on and how can we leverage this information? This intelligence is often right at the fingertips but no action is being taken, action desperately needed to turn an engaged recipient into a new business meeting.

Social media has made us all revisit the fact that marketing is no longer about “pushing” messages or content; it is about “pulling” subscribers, fans and followers toward our brand and engaging with them in relevant and meaningful dialogue.

A consumer brand’s Facebook page that simply pushes advertising messages and sales jargon to fans, with no thought to monitor responses and improve relevancy will be no more successful than a law firm that blasts client alerts with no attention paid to the engagement metrics that lead to improved relevance of content.

Until next week…

Goodbye Client Alerts... Hello 'Social' Email Marketing

staff — Thu, 24 Feb 2011 20:54:01 +0000

Blog author:

James Newcombe

Over the last few months there has been no shortage of articles discussing the death of client alerts. Now the resurgence of email marketing is the hot topic.

A number of legal marketers in particular have referenced the demise of email and client alerts. Just last week however, I was having dinner with a friend who happens to be in-house council for a large financial services firm. My friend told me how much he loves and values the client alerts he receives. He then made a very obvious statement that I think many have overlooked: he only receives alerts that he subscribes to from firms he trusts.

Social Media has been receiving a lot of attention lately. According to Nancy Myrland http://www.myrlandmarketing.com/ in a recent LMA Conference Group discussion on LinkedIn “Social Media are not tools to be used in isolation, but deserve our time and commitment to discover how they fit into existing plans, often right alongside other forms of media.”

Nancy is spot on and Social Media can be used in a variety of ways, two of those ways being to broadcast content and build relationships. Email marketing has also been described this way, long before Social Media was such a big part of our lives.

I’ve noticed that some law and accounting firms’ use of email seems to fall solely into the broadcasting category of late. When used properly however, email provides relationship building opportunities.

In his latest post “Why email deserves a second chance” Simms Jenkins references email usability research carried out by Nielsen Norman Group. According to their findings recipients have emotional reactions to emails they receive, this is in stark contrast to website usability where users lean toward functionality.

Like Jenkins I agree that this sounds a lot like how social media works (relying on emotion to generate engagement). Below are a few lessons email can learn from social media, which I’ve adapted to professional services marketers.

Brief and teasing Content
At Concep, we understand that successful emails create engagement through call-to-actions. By tracking recipients who click through, marketers can nurture and present new business opportunities to Partners. Your emails should include brief, short actionable items that appeal to multiple segments of your audience and encourage them to take action.

Variety of Articles
Firms shouldn’t rely on just a single topic; one-size-fits-all email doesn’t work according to Jenkins. I believe that in the interest of segmentation and client preferences it’s not always best to deliver anything that could be deemed as irrelevant content. Include a variety of articles related to the overall topic of the email. A variety of articles will provide valuable insight into what your clients find appealing. Too many firms deliver client alerts or newsletters with just one long article.

In our twitter feeds we have a huge variety of topics and authors to choose from. If every post discussed tax law and my focus was on a property law issue at the time I wouldn’t click through. Email, like social media, is based on an emotional reaction.

Socialize your Email Marketing
Content is often the enemy of email marketing and from my experience with US accounting / CPA firms, many wrongfully outsource their content creation and development to 3rd parties. But content is social media’s best friend and therefore email newsletters should include relevant, persuasive content and thought leadership with social sharing in mind.

Make it unique – stand out from the crowd
One criticism many law firms hear regarding email and client alerts in particular is that in-house council receive too many emails from multiple firms on the same subject. I’d simply suggest opting out if you receive too many.

This provides an opportunity for some firms as many of your competitors’ emails are boring and don’t have a unique brand or personality. Yours should be distinct from your competitors but also from your other communications. Make sure email provides value that cannot be found elsewhere, otherwise what is the point?

Don’t underestimate the emotional connection
Simm Jenkins and myself both receive Dunder Mifflin’s email newsletter. I thought his inclusion of an example in his blog was genius and I couldn’t resist it myself. (see below) This happens to be an email best practice nightmare, being text heavy with very few links and its design is old and dated.

Anthony Green (President, Concep) and I will testify that despite the appearance we read it every time it arrives in our Inbox. This is not because of the bells and whistles (or lack of) but the emotional connection we have to ‘The Office’. (Being English I have a greater connection to the original English version though).

Forget silver bullets... do the hard work of 'listening'

staff — Fri, 18 Feb 2011 18:34:49 +0000

Blog author:

James Newcombe

Recent conversations on social media lead me to believe that some marketers, like attorneys, wrongly see it as another channel for ad hoc campaigns rather than a means to listen, build trust and establish relationships with real people online.

Some firms’ initial attempts at using social media have been similar in approach to their email marketing and client alerts — simply ‘batching n blasting’ content to new and existing contacts, only this time via the latest convenient channel.

There are many consultants who can educate attorneys and accountants on the virtues of social media and the correct approach of listening and engaging one-to-one with a real person. My friend Adrian Dayton is one of the best. See his recent blog post titled ’How to motivate attorneys to become bloggers’, a great case study of theories put to practice.

This correct approach of listening, commitment and one-to-one engagement regarding social media needs to be applied to more traditional channels too. Email marketing and client alerts have long been abused and so too have subscribers. Many have been subjected to un-targeted content with no personalization or valued insight from professionals.

Some firms are doing it right, just like Bull Housser & Tupper in Vancouver, British Columbia.
According to Lynn Foley, Director of Marketing & Business Development…

“We manage our lists very closely. Some attorneys send alerts to thousands of people - one of our lists has just 72 people on it (like an attorney’s twitter profile). We make sure to always send the alert to the correct list. Then we look at open rates. Industry standards are about a 21-22 percent open rate, and we are at 35 percent. If our open rate is high enough, we put on a seminar about it.”

There are no silver bullets. Marketers and professionals need to listen to conversations taking place online and try to spark real relationships by adding value. The same approach can be taken to client alerts and other email communications.

Analytics derived from deep email tracking represent a conversation between the professional and their client. According to his latest post, Kevin O’Keefe ‘Real Lawyers have Blogs’ states lawyers and law firms ought to first focus on what is being said, as opposed to saying something. Monitoring a recipient’s engagement with content in an email is the same as listening to the other half of a conversation.