8. Are Best Practices Really “Best”?

“We know best practices, but we don’t always follow them. When everyone follows best practices, you’ve merely redefined mediocrity.”

Part of the email signature from Andrew Kordek, Co-founder and Chief Strategist at Trendline Interactive

In 2008, DJ was promoted to a new role within Bronto. His title read “Director of Best Practices & Deliverability.” The evolution continued. With that kind of title, preaching anything other than best practices would have been somewhat of a challenge—and quite hypocritical. If you wanted to know the “best” way to grow your email list, the “best” way to ensure your emails were delivered, opened, read, and clicked on, DJ was your man.

In those early years, 2005–2008, many of the best practices that were floating around included things such as

• Never include ALL CAPS in a Subject line.

• Never send an email with one big image.

• Never use the words “free” or use punctuation in a Subject line.

• Never send all-text (“ugly”) emails.

• Never (ever!) buy an email list.

• Subject lines should be no more than 50 characters in length.

• The unsubscribe link should always be at the bottom of your email, in the footer.

• Double opt-in is the best way to collect email addresses.

• Never send an email late at night or on the weekend.

Notice that nearly all of these best practices include the words “always” or “never.” Absolutes. Extremes. Black or white. Right or wrong. More on this view later.

In 2009, DJ moved to another email service provider, Blue Sky Factory. In his new role as Director of Community, he began to soften up his “all best practices all the time” line of thinking. He started to become aware of clients who did not follow all of the rules, clients who intentionally (or unintentionally) broke the rules of email marketing and yet still, somehow, found success. It was around this time DJ created and adopted a new theory on email best practices.

In this chapter, we’re going to share with you our combined theory of best practices. It’s one that takes into account “rules” and breaks them but still helps you apply best practices. Our philosophy accounts for what other people have tested and declared the “right” way and shows you how to prove them right or wrong and develop your own best practices...because that’s what ultimately makes you a better email marketer.

Best Practices Are Practices That Are Best for You

In January of 2009, Morgan Stewart (then of email service provider ExactTarget) wrote:

“I am exhausted by the overuse of the term ‘best practices.’ It’s a crutch and frankly, when people use it incorrectly, it makes me want to poke them in the eye.”¹

We are in no way advocating poking people in the eye; however, we agree with what Stewart said. It’s a phrase that’s overused and, in some ways, outdated. When you perform a search for the phrase email best practices, some of the information returned is, frankly, old. Some of the “rules” that were in play five years ago are no longer applicable, yet thanks to high search rankings, they continue to surface.

In that same writing, Stewart continued:

“There is no one size fits all answer. The only honest answer is, ‘it depends.’ It depends on your business, it depends on your goals, and it depends on your value proposition. It just depends!!!”

We agree.

The problem is most marketers hate that answer. Sometimes you just want to be told what to do. You want the case study that corroborates what you believe to be true. You want the easy answer. You want to just hit the easy button and make it all work out just fine. “It depends” forces you to test some of those best practices to uncover what is best for your audience. “It depends” makes you do a bit of work to see how your subscribers will respond.

“It’s important to remember that not all best practices are as black and white as many experts present them to be,” wrote Spencer Kollas, director of delivery services at StrongMail.² “In fact, after working with some of our customers we found through testing that not all best practices help them achieve their business needs and goals. On the contrary, some have actually seen better results by not following a conventional best practice.”

That last sentence is what this section of the book is all about: individuals and companies seeing “better results by not following a conventional best practice.” As DJ started to believe in 2011, many email marketing rules are meant to be broken. The key to breaking them and still being successful is to properly test.

Test and Test Often

Most email marketing solutions have testing capabilities built right into their applications, yet for some reason they are not used as often as they should be. Does testing take more time then just hitting send one time? Most likely yes. However, testing forces you to think about alternatives. We recommend testing as often as you can as what works today may not work tomorrow. The payoff is usually worth it.

We encourage you to test Subject lines, copy, and creative. Test buttons versus links and big images versus few images. Try a test of an HTML email against one with mostly images. Try including a screenshot of a video with a big play button on it. In one test use ALL CAPS, and in another use all lowercase. The testing possibilities are endless.

However, before you go on a testing spree, be sure you’re mapping your desired goal with the strategy or tactic that influences it most. In other words, if you are not happy with your email list growth, test various strategies and opt-in forms—single versus double opt-in, long forms versus short, offline versus online. If you are hoping to increase your open rate, it’s important to test the From name and/or the Subject line. If click-throughs are not as high as you’d like them to be, be sure you are mixing up your email creative by testing emails with different content blocks and/or images. If conversions are suffering, consider testing the call(s) to action in your emails.

If your email provider has the capability to do multivariate testing, you can set up a test with a few different variables and determine the “winner” based on the combination that leads to the more desirable outcome (more email opt-ins, higher open rate, more click-throughs, more conversions).

Sometimes it makes sense to test with your best customers, those who engage with your emails the most, spend the most money, or sign up for the most events. Try a new tactic on a portion of that list to see how it impacts their behavior. Other times, it may be better to run tests with your least engaged audience, those who are not opening, clicking, or converting. Test to see if subtle (or dramatic) changes will alter their behavior.

Testing can be very case-by-case specific. What works best for your audience may not work for others. What works for you today or tomorrow may not work next week or next month.

Either way, our view is simple: Whenever you see the words “always” or “never” tied to email marketing advice, it’s probably worth investigating further. Test these “best practices” and see what happens. Look at your key metrics (you do have metrics, right?). Do open rates plummet? Do unsubscribes or complaints shoot through the roof? Do you get more click-throughs and conversions?

What to Expect

Now that you have all the tips and tricks to grow your email list and have passed your (email) anatomy lesson, it’s time to move to the rebellious part of this book. It’s time to unlearn everything you’ve ever heard, read, or been told about email marketing best practices.

The next three chapters take a deep dive into many of these email marketing best practices in hopes of convincing you to break some of the rules—flip them on their heads—and see what happens. We’ll provide examples of companies and individuals who have found success doing just that.

However, you don’t have to break all the rules, all the time. Instead, just be open to trying a few of these “rule breakers” to see whether they can work for your audience.

Chapter 9, “My Word! You Must Read This Now!,” covers why longer Subject lines might actually outperform shorter ones. You also learn why it’s okay (maybe even good) to use ALL CAPS, the word free, and even to drop in some punctuation in the Subject line of your email.

Chapter 10, “The Perfect-Looking Email,” continues with the “pretty” theme and dispels the myth that sending an email with one big image is a bad thing. We’ll also look at the opposite end of the spectrum, showing examples of companies who send all (or mostly) text emails and then find that they outperform HTML emails. We’ll dispel the myth that the unsubscribe link belongs in the footer. The chapter closes by talking about emails that you may find ugly, yet actually perform.

Chapter 11, “The Best Way to Grow Your List,” provides examples of people who use the dreaded, evil popup to collect email addresses—and grow their list at an incredibly fast rate. The chapter covers double opt-in versus single. Is one better than the other? You’ll also see examples of companies that send email without explicit permission and still find success. Chapter 11 ends with a discussion about companies that send nonpermission emails and touches on when it’s okay to buy an email list. This topic is certain to be the most controversial one covered in the book.

Now it’s time to break some rules.

Endnotes

1. Stewart, Morgan, “Your opinion is not ‘Best Practice!’ (and mine isn’t either).” January 21, 2009. http://blog.exacttarget.com/blog/morgan-stewart/your-opinion-is-not-best-practice-and-mine-isnt-either.

2. Kollas, Spencer, “Why you should ignore some email best practices.” July 25, 2011. http://www.imediaconnection.com/content/29599.asp.