Email Marketing 103
Hello and welcome to Email 103. In case you, for some clearly inexcusable reason, missed 101, it's here. God forbid you missed 102 as well, but that's right here.
OK, that's that over with. Are you sitting comfortably? Then I'll begin.
I'm Damian and I run AdultMarketing.co.uk. I do one off and contract marketing work helping people like you make more money. I've set up entire email strategies from scratch for people like Playboy UK and also helped people just come up with some creative ideas that lead in an increase in revenue. Whatever you are doing with your email now, I guarantee I can help you make more money. And if you're not mailing, I can help you get set up.
OK, so you have a site and you want to get people to come back to it. This could be an amateur free site, a pay site, any site where there is a member and he has become inactive on the site. First off, you need to segment that list. Slice that shit up good: People that have just stopped visiting the site. People that have had a payment fail (ie maxed out credit card). People that have chosen deliberately to cancel their membership.
It's not a massively complicated thought to realise that all three of those types need a different approach to get them to come back. Let's look at each one separately. Because if we looked at them altogether, it would just get awfully confusing.
Ghetto Ass Trailer Trash
The Ghetto Ass Trailer Trash can't afford to pay. His card was maxed, or there was some other problem with the payment. You need to lure him back with alternate payment options. For all you know, he still loves your content, but for some reason his credit card is full and he needs an alternate payment method. Create an email campaign that clearly explains all the alternate methods of payment. Debit card, Premium SMS, PRS, check, and companies like uKash who excellent and offer simple cash payment services all over the world. Now, these mails needn't be dull accounting email, they can still be creative and interesting. Remember at all times why are you are sending this email. It is to extract cash from someone for something they don't really need. So, if you put:
"Please find below a list of alternate financial options you may wish to peruse to win a go situation on the membership issue"
What if you did a comic strip about a horny guy finding alternate payment methods so he could wank to his favourite porn?
A video where a guy has his credit card cancelled, but then luckily finds 20 quid cash so he can STILL wank over porn!
A poem.
You get my point. This email is essentially a financial transaction email. But you can still have a little fun. The takeaway here is to offer alternate billing methods.
Lazybones
The lazy member took out free membership to a free site and just can't be bothered to visit again. He didn't like what he saw. So, do you just keep sending the same weekly "these people checked out your content and/or profile and/or winked at you" emails, or do you try to get creative?
Obviously, you try and get creative.
Think about play (for more on how to incorporate play, check out California Contractor Bond - Texas Contractor Insurance SEO -), and how you can incentivise them to return to the site. How does farmville do it (here is how farmville does do it 6 Devious Ways Farmville Gets People Hooked | Cracked.com) ? How does 4square do it? Little rewards for performing mundane actions. But that very basic human reward pleasure is enough to make you perform the tasks. What could a free site/UGC/dating etc site do?
- create a point based reward system. Post a pic x points. Comment on a pic y points. etc
- have badges like 4sqaure. Most Profiles Viewed. Most pics uploaded. Make badge icons they get on their profiles
There are lots of ways you could encourage interaction and then all you need to do is send emails out to explain that proposition. Much more interesting than your standard 'please come back' creatives.
This segment contains people that just can't be arsed to come back to your site. So, if you essentially bribe them to and send an interesting creative to achieve that, then you will see them coming back.
Quitters
The people that leave you with an active cancellation really don't want to give you money any more. Or so they think. Remember this. They have a credit card. They pay for porn. They paid for your porn. Almost certainly the lowest hanging fruit there is. So how do you lure them back? You plan a 6 month campaign to win back their affection using a variety of different creatives, but they all essentially boil down to this:
Make them feel bad for going, like they have dumped a hot girl.
"Oh Bob, I really miss you, why did you leave me?"
This approach works really well when you have data about what sort of girl or niche the member was into. Then you can personalise the email with that information making it much more likely he will respond using dynamic content.
What is dynamic content
The email should be dynamic. That is, you should have segments of the mail that change depending on certain variables. You can design the same template, but have the body copy change, or one paragraph in the body copy change, depending on who the person is. Could be the sex of the person for a dating site's email. Could be headlines, images or offers.
A decent bit of email software will allow you to talk to a database and insert content dependent on conditions. So, what data can you get in order to make this work?
Rewind - what data do you already have, what should you start asking for?
At Playboy, I simply got people on sign up to say if they preferred butts or titties and if they liked blondes or brunettes. The emails they were sent would dynamically pop in a blonde with big knockers if that is what they asked for. Although almost painfully simplistic, it works.
The secret of good email marketing is 3 things. Personal, anticipated and relevant. Clearly, with a winback campaign, it cannot be truly anticipated. So, we are already on the back foot, but it sure as hell can be personal and relevant. You also have a lot more data than that preference. Age. Location. And all the data touch points from their interaction with the site. What content they view the most.
So think about how you use this information to your nefarious benefit. Say someone just downloads girl girl videos from your site. Send them emails with two girls in. I know, it sounds ridiculous I can get paid to tell people shit like this, but the most basic dynamic personalisation is not being done by any adult company I know of. If you know they watch male humiliation spanking videos, send them an email with the right sort of copy. "Listen to me, worm, I know you are pathetic and useless, but I need someone or something to laugh at. So get your tiny cock and fat ugly belly back to MadameGFY.com now. I SAID NOW, BITCH". You see my point. Make the email fit what you know about the ex customer. Could be that they are subs, but it could equally be that they love huge tits. Whatever. Doesn't matter. Just make the content and the copy fit what you know they are into, and lo! your email response rate improves.
Conclusion
You have customers that are no longer customers. They are ex-customers. They are not resting. They are not stunned.
They have ceased to be. They are no more, they are bereft of life, off the twig, kicked the bucket, shuffled off their mortal coil, run down the curtain, joined the bleeding' choir invisible. THEY ARE EX-CUSTOMERS.
Now, what are you going to do to get them back?
Hello and welcome to Email 103. In case you, for some clearly inexcusable reason, missed 101, it's here. God forbid you missed 102 as well, but that's right here.
OK, that's that over with. Are you sitting comfortably? Then I'll begin.
I'm Damian and I run AdultMarketing.co.uk. I do one off and contract marketing work helping people like you make more money. I've set up entire email strategies from scratch for people like Playboy UK and also helped people just come up with some creative ideas that lead in an increase in revenue. Whatever you are doing with your email now, I guarantee I can help you make more money. And if you're not mailing, I can help you get set up.
OK, so you have a site and you want to get people to come back to it. This could be an amateur free site, a pay site, any site where there is a member and he has become inactive on the site. First off, you need to segment that list. Slice that shit up good: People that have just stopped visiting the site. People that have had a payment fail (ie maxed out credit card). People that have chosen deliberately to cancel their membership.
It's not a massively complicated thought to realise that all three of those types need a different approach to get them to come back. Let's look at each one separately. Because if we looked at them altogether, it would just get awfully confusing.
Ghetto Ass Trailer Trash
The Ghetto Ass Trailer Trash can't afford to pay. His card was maxed, or there was some other problem with the payment. You need to lure him back with alternate payment options. For all you know, he still loves your content, but for some reason his credit card is full and he needs an alternate payment method. Create an email campaign that clearly explains all the alternate methods of payment. Debit card, Premium SMS, PRS, check, and companies like uKash who excellent and offer simple cash payment services all over the world. Now, these mails needn't be dull accounting email, they can still be creative and interesting. Remember at all times why are you are sending this email. It is to extract cash from someone for something they don't really need. So, if you put:
"Please find below a list of alternate financial options you may wish to peruse to win a go situation on the membership issue"
What if you did a comic strip about a horny guy finding alternate payment methods so he could wank to his favourite porn?
A video where a guy has his credit card cancelled, but then luckily finds 20 quid cash so he can STILL wank over porn!
A poem.
You get my point. This email is essentially a financial transaction email. But you can still have a little fun. The takeaway here is to offer alternate billing methods.
Lazybones
The lazy member took out free membership to a free site and just can't be bothered to visit again. He didn't like what he saw. So, do you just keep sending the same weekly "these people checked out your content and/or profile and/or winked at you" emails, or do you try to get creative?
Obviously, you try and get creative.
Think about play (for more on how to incorporate play, check out California Contractor Bond - Texas Contractor Insurance SEO -), and how you can incentivise them to return to the site. How does farmville do it (here is how farmville does do it 6 Devious Ways Farmville Gets People Hooked | Cracked.com) ? How does 4square do it? Little rewards for performing mundane actions. But that very basic human reward pleasure is enough to make you perform the tasks. What could a free site/UGC/dating etc site do?
- create a point based reward system. Post a pic x points. Comment on a pic y points. etc
- have badges like 4sqaure. Most Profiles Viewed. Most pics uploaded. Make badge icons they get on their profiles
There are lots of ways you could encourage interaction and then all you need to do is send emails out to explain that proposition. Much more interesting than your standard 'please come back' creatives.
This segment contains people that just can't be arsed to come back to your site. So, if you essentially bribe them to and send an interesting creative to achieve that, then you will see them coming back.
Quitters
The people that leave you with an active cancellation really don't want to give you money any more. Or so they think. Remember this. They have a credit card. They pay for porn. They paid for your porn. Almost certainly the lowest hanging fruit there is. So how do you lure them back? You plan a 6 month campaign to win back their affection using a variety of different creatives, but they all essentially boil down to this:
Make them feel bad for going, like they have dumped a hot girl.
"Oh Bob, I really miss you, why did you leave me?"
This approach works really well when you have data about what sort of girl or niche the member was into. Then you can personalise the email with that information making it much more likely he will respond using dynamic content.
What is dynamic content
The email should be dynamic. That is, you should have segments of the mail that change depending on certain variables. You can design the same template, but have the body copy change, or one paragraph in the body copy change, depending on who the person is. Could be the sex of the person for a dating site's email. Could be headlines, images or offers.
A decent bit of email software will allow you to talk to a database and insert content dependent on conditions. So, what data can you get in order to make this work?
Rewind - what data do you already have, what should you start asking for?
At Playboy, I simply got people on sign up to say if they preferred butts or titties and if they liked blondes or brunettes. The emails they were sent would dynamically pop in a blonde with big knockers if that is what they asked for. Although almost painfully simplistic, it works.
The secret of good email marketing is 3 things. Personal, anticipated and relevant. Clearly, with a winback campaign, it cannot be truly anticipated. So, we are already on the back foot, but it sure as hell can be personal and relevant. You also have a lot more data than that preference. Age. Location. And all the data touch points from their interaction with the site. What content they view the most.
So think about how you use this information to your nefarious benefit. Say someone just downloads girl girl videos from your site. Send them emails with two girls in. I know, it sounds ridiculous I can get paid to tell people shit like this, but the most basic dynamic personalisation is not being done by any adult company I know of. If you know they watch male humiliation spanking videos, send them an email with the right sort of copy. "Listen to me, worm, I know you are pathetic and useless, but I need someone or something to laugh at. So get your tiny cock and fat ugly belly back to MadameGFY.com now. I SAID NOW, BITCH". You see my point. Make the email fit what you know about the ex customer. Could be that they are subs, but it could equally be that they love huge tits. Whatever. Doesn't matter. Just make the content and the copy fit what you know they are into, and lo! your email response rate improves.
Conclusion
You have customers that are no longer customers. They are ex-customers. They are not resting. They are not stunned.
They have ceased to be. They are no more, they are bereft of life, off the twig, kicked the bucket, shuffled off their mortal coil, run down the curtain, joined the bleeding' choir invisible. THEY ARE EX-CUSTOMERS.
Now, what are you going to do to get them back?
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