At AWeber, we want to provide the best service possible. We want you to have the best deliverability possible; the best performance. In a nutshell: complete satisfaction. Our Best Practices Manager, Kristie Sullivan, helps us help you meet these goals. Kristie helps customers maintain their accounts by providing tips for proper list management. Part of [...]

When you deliver exactly what subscribers are expecting, you keep them comfortable, giving them a positive experience with your brand. Therefore, it’s important to make sure their expectations match what you plan to deliver. You can start setting the right expectations for your campaign from the get-go, during the sign up process. But have you [...]

Did you know that zombie email addresses might be sucking the life out of your email deliverabilty rate? This isn’t a teaser for some email marketing horror flick. These zombies are throwaway email addresses that can then end up on your list and prevent your emails from getting to the real subscribers. This can create [...]

Sometimes it feels like a hassle to manage subscribers on more than one email list. How can you make sure that the right customers are getting the right information from the right list? Let me introduce you to automation rules. When you need to send the same weekly newsletter to more than one list or [...]

Dr. Jeffrey Lant popularized the rule of seven for advertisers: It takes seven interactions with your brand for a customer to remember you and make a purchase. It’s easy to adapt this principle to your email marketing by branding your campaign. Every interaction you have with your email subscribers should stay consistent with the rest [...]

If you have people unsubscribing from your list at about the same speed you’re getting new ones, then your list isn’t going to grow. Fortunately, there are things you can do to fix that. After I worked with customers to optimize their email campaigns, I was able to put together a list of effective email [...]

Subscribers and email marketers alike are creatures of habit. We find comfort in the ordinary and expected daily course of action.

Most of us probably even follow similar morning routines. We wake up, drink our coffee and get a move on with our day – squeezing in a few minutes to check our email either before or after we reach the office.

Believe it or not, those self-imposed procedures that we follow repetitiously have a lot to do with how we respond to the email marketing efforts of the companies we follow.

Some companies understand this and set proper expectations for their readers, while others aren’t quite there yet. Keep reading to see who gets it right, and how you can do the same with your own email marketing campaign!

Why Set Expectations?

It’s important that subscribers recognize your messages and form an attachment to the times and formats that you send them in. You want readers to expect certain things in your emails because when they do they tend to open, click and share the emails with others.

Long after you send your first autoresponder to your subscribers, you continue to create expectations whether you try to or not. Before a subscriber signs up, you create expectations by offering samples of your newsletter or explaining exactly what a subscriber will receive on the thank you page.

A few months later, your subscribers aren’t going to remember what you promised to send them. Most likely they won’t bother to return to your website to find out, either. So, what should you do?

Keep It Consistent

Recognition is a huge component of successful email marketing. Everything from the subject line and from line to the template that you use is important when setting expectations. You want your readers to identify your emails when they see them in their inbox.

Jay, who runs our webinars, gets emails from Tiger Direct on a regular basis. He loves gadgets, and loves getting them at affordable prices even more. Normally, Tiger Direct sends heavily styled messages that show glossy laptops and TVs like this one:

The other day, however, this plain text message landed in Jay’s inbox:

He happened to click on it, but really had no idea who the message was coming from or what it was regarding. It was even signed by the company’s president, Carl Fiorentino, but since none of the other messages mention his name, Jay was clueless.

While plain text messages certainly have many helpful benefits, when they show up out of the blue they can still be overlooked and ineffective. Make sure that your emails are consistent. Whether they are plain text or HTML, the appearance of your messages will become a trademark that your readers will recognize.

Set a Routine

We talk about the importance of sticking to the schedule a lot, yet this is an approach I’ve never encountered before. Daily Worth, a site dedicated to helping women manage their finances responsibly, keeps their schedule crystal clear for readers and email subscribers.

In each message that they send, they include an image at the top of the email to indicate the subject matter of the message. The content is the same every week on the specified day, making it easy for subscribers to identify the message and decide whether or not they want to continue reading.

You can easily do something similar with your own campaign, creating an image that mirrors your content schedule. Just be sure to include the day, the content and what they can expect to receive the next day.

How Do You Set Expectations?

Do you set expectations at sign up with your web form? Carry that through to your newsletters?

We’d love to hear how you keep subscribers informed and ready for your next messages! Let us know in the comments below.

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Saying “thank you” is something we’re taught to do as children. This important lesson is something that can be carried over to your email marketing campaign as well. And what better time to start than right after someone joins your list?

The thank you page is the page that a potential subscriber will land on after filling out your web form, making it the second point of contact you have with them. It’s an opportunity for your business to make a good impression, set expectations and get subscribers on their way to becoming customers.

Here are 3 businesses that do a great job thanking their potential subscribers while also answering a few questions for their subscribers: what happened, what happens next, and what they need to do now.

Wilmington Travel Helps Prospects Activate Their Email Subscriptions

Perhaps the most important feature of a thank you page is the instructions for what the potential subscriber needs to do next. You want to make the subscriber experience as easy as possible so they can start receiving your messages.

Philip Patete runs the email campaign for Wilmington.net and has a creative solution for making sure instructions are clear:

Including an image of what exactly the potential subscriber needs to look for in their inbox and what they will need to click on can make the whole sign up process easier. Notice how features of the image are highlighted so the potential subscriber will be able to see the from address, subject line, and what they will need to click on.

You can do this too by taking a screenshot of your confirmation message, and then use image editing programs such as Skitch or GIMP to highlight certain areas.

It’s also important to set subscriber expectations in the thank you page. If subscribers know what to expect from the start, you will have a more engaged list with less people unsubscribing or complaining. The Wilmington thank you page handles setting expectations by incorporating them with their instructions:

The potential subscriber understands what needs to be done next and knows when they can expect to receive the information they requested.While these potential subscribers need to confirm in order to get a guide, you can also set this up to remind them that they need to confirm before they can begin seeing the value of being on their mailing list. Our next example also makes sure to set expectations in the thank you page.

BarnYarns Breaks Down Their Email Content and Sets Frequency Expectations

Iain MacPherson runs the email campaign for Barnyarns.co.uk, and this thank you page does an excellent job with setting expectations.

Part of their thank you page includes a description of what the potential subscriber can look forward to in their newsletters:

The potential subscriber already showed interest by signing up to the mailing list, so adding further details about what they’re going to be getting helps build anticipation. They even take it one step further by including how often they send newsletters:

Potential subscribers are aware of what they can expect from these newsletters and how often they can expect to get them. This means there won’t be any surprises for subscribers that could lead to unsubscribing or marking an email as spam. Our next example takes this concept one step further by incorporating the most recent newsletter in the thank you page.

Invested Central Gives Out a Sample Newsletter

Chris Hopkins runs the site http://www.investedcentral.com, and he sets expectations by allowing potential subscribers to get a sneak peek at what the newsletters look like:

Giving subscribers a look at what they can expect to see is a great way to start off on the right foot. They’ll also be able to see the value your messages can have for them, making them more likely to confirm.

You can get a web based version of your message when you check off the “Social Media/Sharing” checkbox at the bottom of the Broadcast edit page.

Of course, in order for your potential subscribers to get these valuable newsletters you need to make sure you’re in their address book, otherwise you may end up in the spam filter. Take a look a look at how Chris handles this:

We’ve talked before about the importance of getting in your subscriber’s address book, and the thank you page is just one of many good places to remind them.

Thank You Page Keys:

• Make sure you say “Thank you!”
• Setting expectations always helps
• Give subscribers directions
• Make the sign up process as easy as possible

What else do you think a thank you page should say and do?

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Did your New Year’s resolution involve overhauling your email marketing campaign?

Maybe you resolved to get on the ball and send more often. Or maybe you suspect you’ve been overwhelming your readers, so you plan to send less.

Either way, you’ve got some decisions to make. Do you tell your readers to expect the change in frequency? If you do, where, when and how do you tell them?

Let’s take a look at how Threadless handled a recent frequency change. Would you do things the same way?

The Announcement

When Threadless increased their frequency from 2 emails per week to 3, they let subscribers know.

Better Off Alone?

There’s a lot going on in this message, with the swirling vortex and all. Many readers may have skipped right over that lovely yellow box. Should Threadless have announced the change in a separate email?

Pro: A statement that arrived solo would be sure to be seen. Plus, it would become the natural topic for the subject line, so subscribers could observe the addition even without opening the message.

Con: On the other hand, giving the announcement such serious real estate might annoy some readers. They signed up for these emails to see fun t-shirts, and they get a schedule announcement? Disapproval or even unsubscribes could result if the message doesn’t meet their expectations.

Knowledge Is Power…Too Much Power?

The box gave the facts about the extra emails, then gave readers the option to decline them. Should Threadless have forgone that second step?

Pro: With the veto power granted here, subscribers can control which messages they receive. (You can do this for your own subscribers, if you like.) This gives them a sense of ownership over their subscription, which may mean they’ll appreciate these emails more.

Con: But what if they choose to opt out of the extra emails? Will Threadless miss out on potential sales? And what if readers evaluate their preferences and decide, “Actually, I’ll just unsubscribe?”

Out? In? Which Way to Opt?

Notice that readers were invited to opt out of the extra emails, not into them. For general list subscription, that’s widely considered a bad practice. How about for frequency changes?

Pro: Subscribers who don’t open the message, see the box or change their preferences will start getting the extra emails, giving Threadless more opportunities to persuade them to buy.

Con: For those subscribers, the extra messages will appear seemingly without request or warning. If they notice, and if they mind, they may feel annoyed and unsubscribe.

How Do You Change Frequency?

Have you ever changed how often you send your marketing emails? Did you let subscribers know beforehand?

Did you offer them the option to choose which frequency they’d prefer, perhaps by switching lists?

How else could you handle the situation?

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“I didn’t sign up for this!” An impulsive and angered hand clicks the “Mark as Spam” button.

Spam complaints can tell you a lot about your email marketing campaigns. One thing they can indicate is that it’s unclear to your subscribers what they are signing up for and how when they’ll receive your messages.

So how can you minimize spam complaints from the get-go?

Keep reading to find out how a few of your fellow email marketers do it by setting expectations!

When evaluating the cause of a spam complaint, the first step is to take a look at your web form.

It’s absolutely crucial to set expectations throughout the life of your email campaign, starting with your web form.

Your web form must explain exactly what your subscribers will receive, the benefits of subscribing, and when subscribers can expect to receive your messages.

Let’s take a look at how Print It Party, a party decor site, sets expectations with their web form:

To make certain that important details are not overlooked, they place information not only in the header of the form, but above the form as well. With your own form, if you can’t explain in full detail what subscribers will receive in just the header, include a description near the web form on the page.

This web form includes the benefits of what the subscriber will receive – “free printables and contests, extra-hip party tips and secrets and new products alerts.” They make their newsletter sound special and exciting while describing exactly what is to come.

Using a subscriber counter has shown to be a successful tool in gaining subscribers. A potential subscriber viewing the counter will see that others are benefiting from your newsletter. This establishes your information as a reputable source.

Battlefield Equipment, an equipment rental site, sets expectations using this method.

Battlefield Equipment’s subscriber counter builds trust and sets expectations about the quality of their “Battlefield Equipment eNewsletter.” Potential subscribers can see Battlefield already has a significant following and they will be more inclined to trust that the messages and content they will receive are valuable.

Just as Techbite describes when subscribers will receive messages, Battlefield notes that subscribers will get “seasonal” specials. If you do not send each week or month on a specific day, you can still use detailed words to describe “when” messages will go out.

Including an image on your email sign up form can increase recognition and help you to maintain consistency throughout your campaign.

Take for example the web form on the homepage of the brain games and fitness company, Braintraining. Braintraining’s form includes imagery and lets subscribers know they respect their privacy.

Their attention-grabbing lightbox form includes an image of the Brain Training Power Pack. Including this picture allows subscribes to visualize what they are going to receive.

The form also contains a link to Braintraining’s privacy policy. Include a link to the privacy policy in your own web form to assure subscribers that you are sending a safe and private newsletter.

These forms do not simply say “Sign Up for My Newsletter.” They include valuable and descriptive information to begin an honest relationship with subscribers.

You can see a little detail goes a long way in setting expectations. To prevent potential complaints, make it your priority to set expectations right off the bat.

How do you set expectations at sign up?

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