Top Right Blog

By now you've probably heard about the big announcement coming out of Facebook. 

If not, there's a short video about it on the Facebook blog here:

http://www.facebook.com/note.php?note_id=452288242130&id=20531316728.

The basic breakdown is that Facebook is making "messaging" easier. What Facebook makes clear is that this will not replace email. They simply make email, sms, chat, and messages all connect in one place, all sent by simply typing and pressing "enter." They've reduced the complexity and made it so that sending messages is more like a conversation and less like email.

Does it kill email? No

Does it change the way we interact with email? Yes

The most immediate impact is around inbox management. Facebook, like Google, is also filtering it's inbox so that certain messages go to specified locations. This is the next step in inbox communications. Google has priority and facebook calls it social, but either way, it means that things are changing.

An "in-depth" review over at insidefacebook shows that a lot of the screen shots and UI of facebook messages are very similar to gmail - http://www.insidefacebook.com/2010/11/16/in-depth-review-facebooks-new-message-inbox-product/

Also, it expands on how this might not have any immediate impact, but it does make one point that could be huge for advertisers in the future: "Having a centralized, persistent record of the distributed conversation will also make Messages useful for organizing groups, perhaps better than Facebook's Groups product which doesn't encompass SMS or record Group Chat."

Over at emarketingandcommerce.com, there are some early predictions that you can digest - http://www.emarketingandcommerce.com/article/what-facebook-messages-means-for-email-marketers/ 

For now, all we can do is wait to hear more and remain in the middle. Don't look on in horror as you watch the world as you've known it change forever, or remain complacent while you recite old adages like "the only thing to fear is fear itself."

Like slabs of thinly sliced meat to Lady Gaga, we're on it. Be on the look out for more posts on the impact of prioritization on email, and even more importantly expect to hear about it from our success team. 

"The hardest thing about effective email marketing segmentation is getting started. Do it anyway."

-Two Approaches to Get Started With Segmentation, by Stephanie Miller

 It seems so simple, but really, just three words were all it took: "Do it anyway."

The quote above is from an article by Stephanie Miller posted on the ClickZ.com site, and those two sentences were the driving force behind our (finally!) revisiting this blog, and had us face to face with the perfect way to tell our customers and potential clients just how we feel about sending segmented emails.

You see, this poor blog has been dormant for months; waiting for us to find "The Big Post" to revive it, bring it back to life. Our heads full of ideas, we imagined this sort of Frankenstein-like moment, in which characters suddenly spring to life after a long monologue and a lightning bolt, where just moments before they had been completely unanimated.

The role of the lifeless character is easily filled by this blog; however, unlike Hollywood's desire to trigger outrageous effects or drown the viewer in emotional overdrive, the Top Right blog is being reanimated after reading those three simple words: "Do it anyway."

It's so simple. No more waiting, just get started.

The same concept we try to help our customers and potential clients with, that first step to sending segmented emails, was the answer to our own problems all along. Just as we realized that returning to our blog should wait no longer, you too should stop waiting for that big moment, that ideal combination of weather patterns and words, and simply get started.

"Do it anyway."

Over the course of the next week we will be posting about how easy sending segmented emails can be with Top Right, and how we will make that first step, that big, giant leap into this process, seem like a much more achievable stride.

Being an email marketer in the heart of Silicon Valley is tough. Shiny object syndrome pervades the culture here and people show interest in the latest and greatest over the tried and true. I've had people refer to it as "shag carpet" - so yesterday.

Social is all the rage when people aren't even sure how or if it's going to be effective. I have to admit, that's what makes living here great - we figure things out.

What Top Right is figuring out is how to help lots of people take full advantage of email marketing. In many ways I view the problem as people not figuring out how to set the clock on the VCR. If you don't set the clock, you can't set the VCR to record stuff you want to record when you aren't home. And, isnt that one of the most compelling benefits? Remember that?

The email equivalent is "batch and blast". That's what the large portion of email marketers are doing today - blasting away. They haven't set their clock to do automation and targeting...

None the less, that hasn't stopped the growth and prevalence of email marketing as a tool. Today the WSJ did a profile on ExactTarget. They highlight that the little ole email marketing company from the cradle of tech innovation - Indianapolis, Indiana - is doing $100 Million in sales. Constant Contact had over $129 Million in sales in 2009.

I guess lots of people still like shag carpeting.

We just posted a how to on inserting "friend" into the first name field so you can address people on your list with something other than blank.

I subscribe to quite a few emails just to see what's going on. Some of the emails, like the company that I use an example below are actually interesting to me. Most of the time I love the content and find it useful and educational.

So, I am not picking on these guys at all. It just so happens that it's a good screenshot of an example of using "Dear blank" when you can use "Dear Friend" or "Dear Customer" or whatever it is you want to say. it just seems to me that if you can use your powerful email tools to make your emails more relevant, than you should. It's not hard but not every tool makes it easy to do...

We just wrote up a good tutorial of how to insert whatever name you want to call the subscribers on your list that don't have first names. So, whether you want to call the subscribers "Friend" or "Valued Customer" or whatever you'd like, here's how to do it.

I just posted a mini case study on how to create an a/b test for follow on emails. It's for more advanced users of the system. Even if you aren't you should take a look as it might give you some ideas on programs you can run.

First I want to thank the client for letting us use screenshots of her program. Here's what she's doing. She sent out a cyber monday promotion on Tuesday, 11/24 to her entire list. Rather than send out just one follow-on email, she wanted to test whether Friday would do better than Monday. So, she's using distribution groups to "stage" the follow on emails - half on Friday and half on Monday. You can check out the mini case study on how we did this on our online help system. Click here.

I'll update this post with some results as we get them over the next few days.