Don’t-Go-It-Alone eMarketing Blog

Just in case you hadn’t turned on your laptop lately, or walked out the front door in awhile, we thought it would be helpful to let you know that it isn’t the 1950’s anymore. Things are moving fast, people are getting bombarded with messages and information at lightning speeds, and businesses now have to cater to a global clientele in order to keep up.

The further we venture into the 21st century, the more we’ll see not only just how important email marketing and online presence will become – but we’ll also begin to see how essential it is to get your message across in the right language as well. We live in a global economy – and it’s hard to sell a product when users can’t understand the language that you’re speaking to them in.

A client of ours, Parametric Technology Corporation, or PTC, is one shining example of how to cater to multiple audiences the right way, by using email marketing. Several years ago, PTC approached ListEngage with a problem: they wanted to send a monthly newsletter to customers around the world, but they didn’t necessarily have a language of choice database for each subscriber. Here’s where we came in: ListEngage helped PTC to design a process that allowed the creation of one newsletter in 10 different languages that would be emailed to subscribers by country. People in Italy would receive the Italian version and their audience in China would receive the Chinese version .

But what if a reader in China received the email in Chinese and wanted to view its content in English? ListEngage helped PTC streamline this problem by creating a “language bar” at the very  top of each email which links  a specific language to a web page version of the newsletter that is posted as a HTML document  in that particular language. So, if a reader in Italy wants to read the newsletter in Spanish, all they have to do is click on “Español” and their  newsletter will pop up for reading right there. The multi-language emails are great for readers and even better for PTC who can connect with more prospects and possible customers with just one click of a button.

PTC “Maintenance Minute” readers can currently enjoy their emails in English, German, French, Italian, Spanish, Chinese, Korean, Taiwanese, and Russian.  And though ListEngage doesn’t have the talent to read and translate in 10 different languages, our platform and employees certainly have the expertise to coordinate the “heavy lifting” of getting emails like these out the door in a timely fashion.

James Winokur, Director, Business Development Global Maintenance Support had this to say about the email creation process and ListEngage’s efforts: “[ListEngage] now helps us with all aspects of the 10 language versions of the Maintenance Minute that we send out world-wide on a monthly basis. ListEngage has had a huge impact in our monthly production of this newsletter endeavor and has made this… a success for us.”

Imagine it’s December 31, 2010…

Has your business done better than you had hoped? Worse? Held steady for the last 11 months or so? Have you achieved everything that you wanted to? Do you even have the right tools to measure your successes tangibly?

Whether you’re just getting started with an e-marketing plan in 2010, or you’re well on your way to launching the next viral marketing campaign on YouTube– well, there are still several things every business should keep sight of from Jan. 1 to Dec 31 every year! And if you “keep your eye on the prize”, measure, and follow the 10 easy steps we offer below, it’ll be quite easy to look back on Dec. 31, 2010 and be 100% Regret Free!

If you’re looking for measurable returns on your e-marketing in 2010 (and beyond!) then keep reading, as we unfold the:

Top 10 e-marketing Tips for a Regret-Free 2010

1) Listen: Get in the conversation with customers, prospects, and competitors, and actually incorporate their ideas.

2) Define your social media goals: and get moving! Or pretty soon the social media train will have left the station!

3) Stay on top of your Data: 27 – 30% of your list goes bad every year. It’s your most important resource so stay on top of it. If your data is bad nothing else really matters.

Read All 10 e-marketing Tips for a Regret Free 2010

With 2009 about to draw to an end, we here at List Engage just wanted to take a moment to congratulate our clients, friends, and fellow businesses on growing and thriving through the unprecedented economic climate of 2009– and to wish everyone a happy and healthy 2010!

With businesses looking to expand their eMarketing and social media budgets in 2010 — on everything from email marketing design and services to developing niche followers on Twitter — List Engage has something to offer any business, big or small. Why not make one of your resolutions to join us on the cutting edge of eMarketing success in 2010!

2009 has been a dark year for marketing budgets. As the economy tanked, so did every big company’s dreams of plastering market campaigns across every medium available.

Fortunately for e-marketers, email and social media marketing budgets defied the odds, and most actually grew in ‘09.

Take a look at the Marketing Sherpa chart, to see the average email marketing budget decreases versus increases across 8 financial sectors.

To read the entire article, go here.

A new study has looked in detail at how the 100 most valuable brands in the US work with 11 different social media channels and has discovered a correlation between social media use and financial performance.

When the researchers sorted the brands into groups with similar profiles, the ’social media mavens’ (those with the most social media breadth and depth) on average grew 18% in revenues over the last year. The least engaged companies saw an average decline in revenue of 6% over the same period.

The report’s author, Charlene Li, is quick to point out that “We are not claiming a causal relationship — but there is clearly a correlation and connection. For example”, she continues, “a company mindset that allows a company to be broadly engaged with customers on the whole probably performs better because the company is more focused on customers than the competition.”

The study found that companies that scored well generally have dedicated teams, however small, active in the social media channels they utilise, and that the most successful teams evangelise social media across the entire organization to pull in a broad range of stakeholders. These companies view social media as an indispensable tool to help them achieve results, and their approach is conversational. This differs from the approach of traditional communications and early corporate blog experimentation, says the report, which emphasises messaging and talking points.

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(Excerpt taken from Internet Retailing. To read more: follow this link for the entire article on the link between social media use and firms’ profits)