It’s competition time!

We’re running a new competition on Facebook:  It’s time to show off your hard work – by submitting your email newsletters for voting!

How to enter:

1.     Email one of your newsletters, or a screenshot of your newsletter (whether the most recent or just the one you think looks super impressive), to carmia@graphicmail.com. 
2.    We’ll upload a screenshot of your newsletter to an album on our Facebook page called “May the best newsletter win!”
3.    Get your mom, friends and colleagues to go to our fan page, view the album and vote for your newsletter, either by commenting on it or clicking on the “Like” button.

The newsletter with the most votes, wins!

What’s up for grabs?

First Prize – An iPod touch, a customized newsletter template created especially for your business by our design team and 5,000 free GraphicMail credits

Second Prize – A customized newsletter template created especially for your business by our design team and 5,000 free GraphicMail credits

Third Prize – 5,000 free GraphicMail credits

Sounds cool doesn’t it?  Wish I could enter… Submit your newsletter now.

Want to check out the competition? View the other entries by going to our Facebook page.

We introduce: the  Inbox Preview, BETA version

There so many different email programs out there (like Outlook 2007, Gmail, Hotmail, Yahoo, and so on) - do your campaigns render correctly in all of them?  And what about all the smartphones and the iPad? Well, you can setup lots of email accounts and servers to check your campaigns yourself, and get a bunch of smartphones too, or you can click a button in GraphciMail  and we'll do all the testing for you. We have just launched our Inbox Preview tool (beta version)!

Introductory Offer

Test it – we give you your first 3 tests free of charge!
Then decide what bundle is best for you – we offer them in 10, 25, 50 and 100. So if you want to preview 10 newsletters, buy a bundle of 10, if you want to preview 100, get a bundle of 100 – it all depends on how often you send and how many tests you want to run.

Get a bundle of

•    10 for   $10
•    25 for   $23.75 (5% discount)
•    50 for   $40 (10% discount)
•    100 for $ 80 (20% discount)

These rates are once off, i.e. you buy the amount of previews you need, and if you want to test more newsletters at a later stage, you simply buy an additional bundle of 10, 25, 50 or 100 from within your account. Believe me, this is the best investment you can make for your email marketing campaign.
You only get one chance to make a first impression with your clients – use Inbox Preview to make sure all of your subscribers get a looker of a newsletter.

How do I use Inbox Preview?

It couldn't be easier to do...

1)     Go to the inbox preview menu which is a sub item under “newsletters” in your GM acount
2)    Select the email you want to run the test on. (It will take a couple of minutes to run the test as GraphicMail sends emails and takes snapshots of the inboxes for you.) 
3)    Go and see the thumbnails of the various email clients. (To see it in greater detail, just click on a thumbnail.  You can then see if you need to make any changes.)
4)    Make the necessary changes and test again.

Remember this tool is to help you save time on testing your emails, but you're responsible for fixing them. We do offer troubleshooting services or we can build templates for you, but this is not included in subscription costs.

Any questions? Comments? Issues? Contact our support team at info@graphicmail.com or call 1-800-590-0028.

Integrating email and social media marketing has proven effective: Social media gives you access to a wide audience and expands your reach, while email enables you to communicate with clients on a more personal level and build your consumer relationships.

A lot’s been said about increasing your email subscribers through social share tactics, but eMarketer recently published a study indicating that many marketers also do the reverse:  They use email to increase their social media followers, specifically their Twitter and Facebook followers.  About 71% of email marketers promote their Facebook and Twitter presence through their email newsletters and 63% offer subscribers the option of sharing the newsletter socially.

Just another example of how email and social media marketing strategies can complement each other.

GraphicMail offers smart ways to integrate your email and social marketing.  Adding social widgets to your email footer enables your subscribers to share your newsletter with their social connections, whilst social share enables you to publish your email newsletter to your own Facebook and Twitter account.

When I’m at a party and tell people I work in email marketing, I’m immediately labeled the “spam devil”.  You see, even though email marketing has a sterling reputation among marketers as an effective marketing channel, the average Joe (even though he subscribes to a number of newsletters himself) associates email marketing with those countless “120% OFF!”, “Get a FREE iPad” and “Urgent: Get your 80% DISCOUNT NOW” emails cluttering up his inbox.

It’s the sales push.  Email marketing is definitely there to promote your product or service, but the fact of the matter is that no one constantly wants a sales pitch shoved down their inbox every five minutes.  I recently had to answer the question “What is an email newsletter?”, and while answering I realized again how much more there is to a newsletter than people expect.  An email newsletter is so much more than a promotion call-out.

Successful newsletters offer something of value to its subscribers; whether it’s product information, industry insights, or relevant news, updates or events regarding your business or product.  See, sales emails don’t build customer relationships.  Yes, they do drive sales; but a customer relationship ensures long term sales, rather than a once-off sale.  And your newsletter can build that relationship – by adding value to your recipient.

Yes, a promotion is always a good way to boost your newsletter response (and sales) – but not if you use the same cheap trick every time.  If you offer subscribers a 50% discount week after week, doesn’t that mean that the product is actually priced 50% higher than it should be, and that you’re simply selling it at “discount” to generate more sales? Similarly, if you punt a promotion on a particular product once a week, and it’s not a product your recipients need on a weekly basis, they might get fed up and unsubscribe.  At the very least they’ll begin to ignore your emails.

Promotions are more effective when sent occasionally.  So, by all means, intersperse your newsletters with the occasional sale, promotion or discount – everyone loves a freebie! – but make sure you also offer something more.  Push your sales in your newsletter, but try do it more subtly, or at least ensure that there is a balance between your sales push and some valuable content that will be of interest to your subscribers.
Sending quality newsletters will ensure that your recipients come to trust your emails, making them even more receptive to your occasional sales pitches.  In our own GraphicMail newsletter we do sometimes call out promotions, deals or competitions, but the newsletter primarily consists of tips on how our readers can improve their campaigns or updates on new features or changes that’s important for our clients to know.   (If you don’t subscribe to our newsletter yet, by the way, you can subscribe by scrolling right down to the bottom of this page and entering your email address in the subscribe field.) 

If you’re not sure whether the content in your campaign is too salesy, why not sign up to a few good campaigns to view examples of impressive, well-received newsletters.  Also, think about which newsletters you subscribe to yourself, and why it is that you never unsubscribe from them.

All in all, the key is to keep your content balanced and think about what you can offer your subscribers that will keep them coming back for more.

Has your campaign stagnated?  Your open rate seems lower than you’d like and it just stays the same, no matter what you try to improve on it.  The problem might be your mailing list…

I’ve said a lot about mailing list management in the past, but recently a new focus has come up – both in the industry and on our own mailing lists:  What to do about inactive subscribers?

We all have them – those subscribers who repeatedly receive your newsletter, but never react to it.  They don’t open it or click on your links, but they don’t unsubscribe or launch a spam complaint against you either.  They’re either not interested in your news or products anymore and just too lazy or unaffected to unsubscribe; or they just haven’t been interested in your product of late but know that they may want to purchase or do business with you again in future.

Question is:  What do you do about them?  Should you do anything about these passive recipients?

Yes!  Inactive subscribers make it difficult to track how well your campaign is doing.  If they’re just temporarily inactive it’s worth keeping them on your list till a later date, but if they’re going to remain inactive they’re lowering your open, click-through and social share rates and negating the positive effects of your campaign.  Of course, even though emails are low-cost, it also means you’re wasting send credits on subscribers from whom you might never generate any revenue.

Not only that, but ISPs are taking steps to take recipient engagement into consideration when filtering spam.  This means that, when you do bulk sends and a very low percentage of your recipients respond to the email in any way, it raises the risk of your emails being spam trapped.

However, just because someone doesn’t open every single one of your newsletters doesn’t mean they never will…so how do you know whether they should still be on your mailing list?

A few things to try…

Revamp!  Perhaps a subscriber doesn’t engage with your campaign anymore because their needs have evolved – but it could also be that your content is no longer relevant because your newsletters have shifted focus. 
Review your newsletter content to ensure that it’s relevant to your subscribers and test variations of your newsletter or subject line to see what works best for your mailing list.  Try some new ways to get them interested again: Ask them to update their details on your system (that way if they’re really no longer interested, they might just unsubscribe out of their own); launch a promotion or promote other channels they might follow you on, like Facebook, Twitter or SMS updates, as these might provide them with an easier alternative if they no longer prefer email.

If this still doesn’t work it’s time to…

Get brutal.  Once you’ve done your best to get inactive subscribers involved again, it’s time to start making some cuts on those who still show no interest.  Now, I’m not a fan of hacking at a list that might still contain some recipients who are future potential clients, so I advise you to think carefully about who needs to go.  Rather than cutting someone who hasn’t been active over your last two or three sends, set up a timeframe that suits your business.  For instance, if you run a guest house it’s likely that past guests feature quite heavily on your list.  Your time frame might be one of a few years – after all, not everyone revisits the same holiday spot every year, but that doesn’t mean they don’t want to come back in four years’ time. 

Which brings me to my next point – look at past purchase history.  If you run a business where subscribers tend to make purchases on a more regular basis, you might want to cut subscribers who haven’t reacted to your mailings in six months or a year.  People who have purchased from you in the past or also more likely to come back for more at some point than those who’ve never bought your products; even if they have been inactive of late.  Also keep in mind that, if you send out a weekly mailer, your periods of inactivity should be shorter than if you send out a monthly or bi-monthly newsletter.

If you want to be absolutely sure whether or not it’s worth deleting an address, you can also look at other channels of activity, for instance Facebook, Twitter or your Support/Customer service logs.  If someone has recently contacted you through one of these channels it shows that they are still actively participating with your brand, even though they haven’t read recent emails.

Subscribers, as precious as they are, can be detrimental to your campaign if they don’t show enough interest.  Take some time to consider how best to go about getting rid of inactive subscribers.  In the end, hacking at your list a bit will actually benefit your campaign.  And wouldn’t it be nice to see your open rates rise?

We often get clients asking us about image editing software.  “I don’t have Photoshop. What now?” Luckily these days there are really great image editors available online and many are free.  In fact a few are good enough to give some of the desktop apps out there a run for their money.  Some have advanced functionality like layers and layer effects and mimic the desk top environment found on advanced software like Adobe Photoshop. But let’s face it - your average email marketer, staring a send deadline in the eyes, doesn't want to sift through complicated software and help files…

So…  I have taken 6 of the top free online image editors and put them through their paces doing the kind of things an email marketer might require:  resizing, cropping, adjusting color & contrast, deep-etching, adding text and lastly saving our new image.

Note: All 6 editors are Flash based so you will need a Flash plugin to run them. All tests were conducted using an 800x600pixels image I found in my Sample Pictures folder on Windows.

Pixlr

Pixlr is a Flash based free online image editor. The interface looks and feels like a desktop image editor.  It supports pixel-level control, custom brushes, filters and  advanced functionality like layers and layer effects. A simpler ‘express’ version is available for beginners or those in need of a quick fix.

Resizing

Resize images using the Image Size menu function.

Cropping 

Crop images using the manual cropping tool. No precision cropping options .

Adding a border

No specific border tools or options. Add a border manually by making the canvas size bigger or adding a border on a layer above your image.

Adjusting contrast and color balance

Adjust contrast and color easily using Brightness & Contrast and Hue & Saturation menu functions respectively.

Selecting objects

Lasso and wand tools are available. The lasso tool only offers freehand and not polygonal selecting, so a steady hand is required.

Adding text with a drop shadow

Text is easily added as a new layer with the text tool. A simple click allows the text to be edited. A drop shadow can be added using the Layer Styles options on the text layer.

Saving images

Saving is straightforward using the Save menu function. Jpeg, PNG, Bitmap and a Pixlr format (PXD) allowing layers to be saved are available.

Final verdict

Usability is very good. Photoshop users will find it very familiar, while novices should find their way  around the basics fairly quickly.

Score 9 /10

Splash Up

Splashup is a Flash based free online image editor. The interface looks and feels like a desktop image editor.  It offers multiple image editing, pixel-level control and advanced functionality like layers and layer effects. A simpler ‘Light’ version is available for beginners or those in need of a quick fix.

Resizing

Resize images using the Image Size menu function.

Cropping 

Just click and drag to crop. No precision cropping options available.

Adding a border

No specific border tools or options. Add a border manually by making the canvas size bigger or adding a border on a layer above your image.

Adjusting contrast and color balance

Adjust contrast and color easily using Contrast /Brightness and Hue/Saturation menu functions respectively.

Selecting objects

A freehand lasso tool is available. Since no polygonal lasso selecting is available, so a steady hand is required. No magic wand tool option available.

Adding text with a drop shadow

Text is easily added as a new layer with the text tool. A simple click allows the text to be edited. A drop shadow can be added using the Layer Styles options on the text layer.

Saving images

Saving is straightforward using the Save menu function. Jpeg, PNG and FXO is supported. There are also options to save straight to Facebook, Flickr, Picasa, etc.

Final verdict

Usability is good. Photoshop users will find the interface familiar enough although some differences could frustrate those seeking familiar functions. This shouldn’t bother novices, who should find their way around the basics easily enough.

Score 8 /10

Picnik

Picnik is a Flash based free online image editor that offers a more fun alternative to the “desktop” style editors. It offers basic as well as more advanced functionality along with clipart, stickers and effects. A more advanced ‘premium’ version is available for those willing to pay a small fee. The default editor for many image and social sharing sites.

Resizing

Resize images using the Resize menu function.

Cropping 

Crop images using the manual cropping tool. No precision cropping options available.

Adding a border

No specific border tools or options.

Adjusting contrast and color balance

Adjust contrast and color easily using Exposure and Colors menu functions respectively.

Selecting objects

No selection tools available.

Adding text with a drop shadow

Text is added using the text menu function under the Create tab. No specific drop shadow tools are available.

Saving images

Saving is straightforward using the Save & Share tab function. Jpeg, PNG, Bitmap, Gif, PDF and TIFF formats are available. There are also options to save straight to Facebook, Flickr, Picasa, etc.

Final verdict

Usability is good. Picnik is a simple, fun way to edit images as long as you don’t require precision work or advanced text functionality. Features added goodies like clipart as well.

Score 8/10

Sumopaint

Sumo Paint is a Flash based free online image editor with an interface looks and feels like a desktop image editor.  It offers loads of features incl. advanced functionality like layers and layer effects. The app proves to be popular with creatives – just check out the images posted on its home page.

Resizing

Resize images using the Image Size menu function.

Cropping 

Crop images using the manual cropping tool. No precision cropping options available.

Adding a border

A stroke option under the Layer Effects will add a border. Borders can be added manually in a number of ways.

Adjusting contrast and color balance

Adjust contrast and color easily using Brightness & Contrast and Hue & Saturation menu functions respectively.

Selecting objects

Lasso and wand tools are available. The lasso tool offers both a freehand and a polygonal option for precise selections.

Adding text with a drop shadow

Text is easily added as a new layer with the text tool. Once text is placed it becomes a layer image which cannot be edited as text again. A drop shadow can be added using the Layer Effects options.

Saving images

Saving is straightforward using the Save menu function. JPEG, PNG and a SUMO format allowing layers to be saved are available.

Final verdict

Usability is very good. Photoshop users will find it very familiar even down to the shortcuts, while novices should find their way around the basics fairly quickly.

Score 9 /10

Photoflexer

Photoflexer is another Flash based free online image editor that offers an alternative to the “desktop style” editors. It offers basic as well as advanced functionality along with clipart, stickers and effects. It even has a “geek” tab where some fancy, experimental effects can be found.

Resizing

Resize images using the Resize menu function.

Cropping 

Crop images using the manual cropping tool. No precision cropping options available.

Adding a border

Select from a number of preset borders.

Adjusting contrast and color balance

Adjust contrast and color easily using Adjust and Contrast menu functions respectively.

Selecting objects

A Smart Cutout tool and Smart Scissors tool is perfect for precision selections.

Adding text with a drop shadow

Add text  using the Text menu function under the Decorate tab. No specific drop shadow tools are available.

Saving images

Saving is straightforward using the Save dialogue box. JPG and PNG formats are available. There are also options to save straight to Facebook, Flickr, Picasa, etc. or share your photo directly through email.

Final verdict

Usability is good. Photoflexer is a simple, fun image editor similar to Picnik but with a few more gizmos on offer.  A good alternative to the Photoshop style editors .

Score 8 /10

Photoshop Online Editor

Adobe offers an online editing tool in the form of Photoshop.com. An online “image library” style  application that offers image editing as just one of its options. Registration is required, and as such your last edits will be remembered when you log in.

Resizing

Resize images using the Resize menu function.

Cropping 

Crop images using the Crop & Rotate tool.

Adding a border

Select  from a number of preset decorative borders. No simple line options available.

Adjusting contrast and color balance

Menu options like Exposure, Saturation, White Balance, Highlight and Hue generate a number of thumbnails with varying intensities and exposures. All you have to do is pick one.

Selecting objects

No selection tools available.

Adding text with a drop shadow

Add text using the Text menu function under the Decorate tab. Click the Drop Shadow radio button for a simple dropshadow. Remember to always click “Finish” when done.

Saving images

Saving is straightforward using the Save dialogue box.  JPG format is available. Or choose to directly login to Facebook, Flickr, Picasa, etc and publish.

Final verdict

Usability is good. The functionality on offered is basic though, so will prove frustrating if you are looking for something more advanced. It functions more like an online image library with some editing options on offer. A “decorate” tab offers some nice effects though.

Score 7 /10

I assume your customers are important to you.

They’re how your business makes money, after all.

We all know that the basis of a successful business often lies in how you treat your customers.  Sure, an innovative product or service will get you far, but if your customers feel that they’re needs aren’t being met, that you offer poor customer service, that your employees are rude or that you just don’t value their interests – sooner or later – they walk away. 

Your email campaign is just one way you reach out to your customers, but, as with any marketing campaign, you have to consider your customer touch points.  For the most part your email recipients don’t send you any direct messages.  They receive your email and if you’re lucky, they read it.  If you’re even luckier, they click through to your site, promotion or blog.

There are, however, two touch points when their actions send you a very clear message:  When they subscribe (“Hi! You offer something I might be interested in – I want to know more”) and when they unsubscribe (“Sorry, I’m leaving”).

MarketingVox recently reported that the number of email marketers who send out welcome messages to new subscribers is shockingly low – especially as welcome emails yield the highest open rate of all marketing emails sent.  Lay the foundations of your subscriber relationships by welcoming them into the fold properly.  Send a welcome message (it’s easy to set up an automated message using TriggerMail) and if you really want to knock the socks off them, offer them a special discount for subscribing.  Getting off on the right foot makes it more likely that they’ll open and respond to your future emails.  Another idea to ease subscribers into the habit, reassure them that your emails are worth reading and nurture the relationship through the first few emails, is to set up a series of welcome emails.  Perhaps send one to welcome them, send another a few days later to offer them a website tour or link to an introductory video, and even a third to let them know that they can also follow you on Facebook or Twitter. 
Just remember to personalize your welcome emails – there’s no better way to ensure your spot in a subscriber’s inbox than to let them know they’re valued as more than just one of the masses.

So what about when they unsubscribe?
You may feel like shoving them out the back door and concentrate on getting real subscribers, ones that stick around and buy lots of stuff – but really, this petty behavior will get you nowhere.  Just because a recipient unsubscribes for the moment (perhaps they have no need for your service or product at present, or they’re simply flooded with too many email and need to cut back) does not mean that they won’t subscribe again at a later date.  It could be that they already follow you on Facebook or Twitter, and would prefer, for the moment, to rather receive updates in snippets.
Make sure you confirm their unsubscribe with a polite message and perhaps mention that they can follow you on social networks.  Keep the channel open so you can pick up the relationship at a later date.

Just as you manage your customer touch points in store, remember that email is a valuable customer contact point – so keep the relationship on good footing and you might just be blessed with valuable, loyal, long-term customers.

New Help Center voting icons

I’m sure you’ve all had some questions about something in your GraphicMail account.  It happens when you’re working in a technical application with as many features as ours.

When you get stuck with something in GraphicMail the quickest way to go about solving your problem is to go to our Help Center.  The Help Center covers a range of topics offering step-by-step instructions on how to solve some frequently asked questions. We offer video tutorials, help documents and FAQs.

The problem is that we’re not sure how helpful the answers are to you as an individual user. We need your feedback so we can continuously improve on our Help Centre. So we’ve enabled you to vote for our FAQs!   Next time you have a question check out our Help Centre and tell us if our answer was helpful or not.  You can also leave a comment or additional question. We greatly appreciate our clients' feedback. 

So - to the polls! Make your vote count :)

Kick off the new school year with the right gear:

A 20% discount on all your extra send credits purchased during August (or, for trial users, 20% more credits when you sign up to a paid account during August); our FREE back to basics email marketing guide AND…

New back to school templates!

These are perfect for all your back to school promotional mailings.  Simply log into your account and find them in our template library.

Happy mailing!

If you haven’t spotted in on our home page, or read about it on our blog, I’m sure you’ve noticed the Facebook posts or the tweets – whatever the case, you could not have failed to notice our Back To School promotion!

We’re offering all our US and Canadian clients extra send credits at a 20% discount during the month of August!  For our trials users we’re throwing in 20% more credits if they convert to a paid account this month. 
Sounds good?  I think so!

But there’s more…

To kickstart your email marketing for the new school year we’ve included our FREE back to school email marketing primer.  Get back to basics on your campaign – from how to grow your list, design a killer newsletter and your test cheat sheet, we’ve included tips to boost your campaign. 

It’s easy to follow and simple to implement – download your free Back To School Email Marketing Primer here.