Next time you’re looking at an email campaign, an online ad, or any sort of call-to-action-type direct-marketing “thing,” just ask yourself one question:
“If I weren’t a marketer/client” would I open this email/click on this link etc..?”
If the answer is “No” – and you would consider yourself to be a likely candidate for this product or service, then no offence, you need to ask youself why you think your consumers would be likely to take the “fill in the blank” action you are asking them to do?
If you would find that email subject line “spammy” or boring, why do you think it is so important to use it in your newsletter or e-promo? Who exactly are you trying to target that wouldn’t for even half a second ask themselves if they find your subject line appealing and non-spam like in nature?
Tamera Kremer recently posted a brilliant blog post about her p-SWOT theory which takes my rant to a whole new level of thinking. If you involve your customers and prospects at every stage of the game they’ll be your friends for life.
All too often we get caught up in the coolness of the idea, or the latest and greatest trends and forget that before we were marketers… we were all consumers.. Wait – that hasn’t changed. No matter how you slice it, ultimately, we’re all consumers first and nothing will ever change that.
Rebecca Atkinson (Muller) is a freelance web marketing/analytics consultant with more than seven years of direct experience helping businesses create and implement online marketing and communications strategies. Her clients come from all industries including finance, technology and not-for-profit. She specializes in helping her clients determine how to improve their advertising programs, focusing on visitor behaviour – beyond the inital click-through. Full bio available