5 Simple Errors
Last Wednesday, I listened with increasing incredulity to a digital marketing presentation given by so-called professionals. Professionals who, within 20 short minutes, proved that (in their minds) nothing has changed since 1998. This damaging advice was being handed out to technology resellers by a major software house.
The venue auspicious, the PowerPoint slick but the content demonstrated a deep misunderstanding of digital marketing. These senior marketeers simply ‘do not get it’.
With great pomp and in hushed tones they unveiled an ‘emarketing’ tool, available to the assembled resellers, that would revolutionise lead generation.
A comprehensive critique would run to many chapters. Here are the five simplest errors:
What reputation?
An organisation’s most important digital asset is its reputation. Companies with a good reputation get their emails delivered. Those without get them caught in spam filters, at MTAs, at the ISP level and finally by firewalls and internal software filters. A good reputation strengthens your web presence. A poor one relegates you to obscurity. Classically trained marketeers understand the first A of AIDA, without good reputation management you will never achieve it.
These presenters did not simply misunderstand the importance of reputation management: it had never crossed their minds. There were no checks on database health or provenance. Anyone could send an email blast (Ugh!) from the tool (under a shared IP and domain name). If you keep bad company your reputation will suffer.
Share an email service with a spammer and you will be seen as a spammer. There was no management on this offered service because those offering it did not recognise the importance of self policing.
Encouraging bad practise!
Language can expose a lack of training and knowledge. Use of the phrases E-Shot and email blast not only demonstrate a crass misunderstanding of the digital environment, they also accurately describe extremely poor practise. Just because you can email thousands of individuals in one mailing does not mean you should. Mass mailings from one IP & domain alert ISPs to possible (probable) UBE activity. And your reputation takes a hit. During our briefing eShots were encouraged. The more the better, because then we will get more leads.
This is just nonsense. It might have worked in 2002 but you cannot fool all of the people all of the time and decision makers are not fools. eMail blasts deliver very little in the way of tangible leads. They do deliver diminishing returns.
Graphic misunderstanding
Ever since the introduction of exchange 2003 (in 2003!) graphic emails have been nearly useless. Unless the recipient has added your email domain to their ’safe senders’ list, graphics will not render. And whilst your clients may accept graphics from trusted suppliers, graphics will not be accepted for a third party email service. Especially if that service is not policing its reputation properly.
The size and position of the graphics on emails supplied by the ‘tool’ would have obscured any content, call to action or any other useful message resellers may wish to impart.
Get up close and personal
Digital marketing is great. It enables marketeers to deliver highly personalised communications. Relationships can be developed and leads nurtured. It can provide truly scalable relationship marketing. But like all relationships, work is needed to keep them fresh. Treat your warm prospects like numbers in a machine and you break the spell. Your hard work will be lost.
This tool had the option of ‘pre-selecting’ boilerplate copy. Yes, that is right. Stock phrases and paragraphs to be selected from a menu of helpful marketing spin. Lazy? Incompetent? Arrogant? I am not sure which term to apply: perhaps all three. Who conceived the idea of several resellers broadcasting re-hashed identical campaigns to the same prospects? It is laughable. The only saving grace is that even if the email did get delivered, the content would have been obscured by a non-rendered graphic!
Final insult
There is a common misconception amongst lay people that digital marketing is cheap. It is not. Certainly variable costs are low but highly personalised experiences require planning, creativity, deep technical skill and a lot of hard work. Good, experienced professionals are rare and their expertise is not cheap. Our presenters’ finale was the revelation of a bargain price for the use of the tool.
As with most things. You get what you pay for.
Dangers for us all
The most alarming thing about this presentation (it was given last week), is its potential impact. The size of the organisation (global corporation) and seniority of the presenters means that these messages and these methods will be seen as ‘normal’ and ‘good practise’ by the untrained and inexperienced. It certainly explains average email open rates below 20% (they should be above 60%).
Whilst the uneducated (or classically trained marketers who have not kept up to date) are in positions of power we will risk punitive anti-spam regulation and spend millions on reputation management technology and services. Perhaps the digital revolution is more cultural than technical and involves the re-training or removal of marketers who damage our profession.
Posted: November 26th, 2009 / 8 Comments /
8 Comments to 5 Simple Errors
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Which company was this? And does anyone else have similar experiences?
Biggles on
November 26th, 2009
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November 26th, 2009
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Huey Malaspina on
February 5th, 2010
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