[Editor's Note: Make Priority Inbox work for you.] Melanie Attia - DM News - 9/1/10 This week Google revealed its Priority Inbox. It's great in theory, but it's based on algorithms having to do with replies, not abstract decision-making. So what does that really mean for e-mail marketing programs, where people opt in, read and incorporate into their daily lives but do not respond? Read the full story.

[Editor's Note: Steps towards a relationship.] Stephanie Miller - Cliclz - 9/1/10 Does anyone else lament the commoditization of "friend" amid our socially connected, digital lives? I can like you on Facebook, follow you on Twitter, subscribe to your e-mail program and join your community. ...

[Editor's Note: Make it easy for customers to share your e-mails.] Jessica Shieh - DM News - 8/31/10 Although I wouldn't consider myself a “shopper” per se, not a day goes by that I don't receive some form of communication from at least 10 different retailers offering me their latest and greatest deals. Of these countless e-mails, I probably actually read about two a week. A subject line announcing “Free Shipping!” or “20% Off Boat Shoes!” catches my eye and I open the e-mail. That's where it ends. ...

[Editor's Note: People want e-mails that show the marketer wants to understand them.] Andrea Orvis - DM News - 8/24/10 You may know that your e-mail list includes stay-at-home moms, in-store shoppers and bargain hunters, but there could be another influential segment hiding in plain sight: preference seekers. ...

[Editor's Note: Keep your e-mails fresh.] Jeanniey Mullen - ClickZ - 8/17/10 I've been working at my company for two and a half years. During that time, I've had a number of learnings that shape my f ...

[Editor's Note: AARP looking to interest loyal members with e-mail promotion.] Shahnaz Mahmud - DM News - 8/2/10 AARP is conducting an e-mail marketing campaign to promote its series of AARP The Magazine Road Show events. ...

[Editor's Note: Focus on making our e-mail messages worthy of the inbox.] Stephanie Miller - ClickZ - 8/4/10 It's never been a question of knowledge, really. E-mail marketers have always known what to do to create amazing customer experiences. We know we need to segment, customize content, personalize the experience, and pull back on generic promotions. The reason why most e-mail marketing doesn't do those things and resembles broadcasts more than dialogs is that we just never put our full effort into it. Pressure was low because the channel is inexpensive and broadcasts to the file earned plenty of short-term revenue. ...

[Editor's Note: Connect e-mail marketing with in-store efforts.] Shahnaz Mahmud - DM News - 7/6/10 Given that e-mail is the choice form of communication for many consumers, it's no surprise that its influence on offline sales, brand advocacy and discovery is high. ...

[Editor's Note: Survey to produce a series of columns.] Stephanie Miller - ClickZ - 6/30/10 You and your fellow ClickZ readers want to be more relevant to your e-mail subscribers, but you also have a lot going on. There's technology to master, data to marshal and use, metrics to define, and segmentation strategies to define. Oh, and don't neglect deeper engagement, list growth, and inbox placement while you're at it, please. ...

[Editor's Note: Sure, if the e-mail is relevant to them, they will read it.] Jeanniey Mullen - ClickZ - 6/21/10 A few nights ago, I was on a red-eye flight from San Francisco to New York. I usually f ...

[Editor's Note: Any contact with customers is an opportunity for e-mail subscribers.] Simms Jenkins -ClickZ - 6/17/10 I recently discussed how many leading websites make it difficult to find and/or sign up for their e-mail offerings. I want to continue the theme of missed opportunities and now bring attention to the fact that many companies fail to leverage some of their best opportunities to capture data. ...

[Editor's Note: What you should do and what you should not do in e-mail marketing] Jeanniey Mullen - ClickZ - 6/7/10 Last week, I had the fortune of speaking on a Shop.org Webinar titled, "Is Email Marketing Dead?" I thought it was a bit of a silly title and an even sillier question to ask. Of course, we know e-mail isn't dead, especially if you are in retail. ...

[Editor's Note: E-mail can give big return on small investment.] Denise Deveau - Financial Post - 5/25/10 Ask Michael Sangregorio how his restaurant ended up on all the top 10 listings that matter and he'll tell you getting the word out has been easy. In fact, it costs him only $20 a month. ...

[Editor's Note: Mobile phone e-mail use will go up but not all phones are the same.] Jeanne Jennings - ClickZ - 5/17/10 The Radicati Group recently projected that more than 1 billion consumers will be accessing e-mail on their mobile phones by the year 2013. This is compared to fewer than 200 million that did so last year. ...

[Editor's Note: Part 2 of posting on leveraging the dual power of search engines and e-mail] Dane Christensen - LYRIS - 4/19/10 In my previous post I described a method for using information gathered from your pay-per-click (PPC) campaigns to target follow-up email marketing sent to the leads captured. The basic idea is that the keyword the visitor searched on, the ad they clicked, and the PPC campaign and ad group with which the keyword and ad are associated all tell you something about the visitors’ interests. ...

[Editor's Note: Leverage the dual powers of search engines and email. This is part 1, part 2 follows in next posting.] Dane Christensen - LYRIS - 3/1/10 There's no question that search engines and email remain the most frequently used Internet applications since the inception of the Web. It follows that these would be the most powerful online marketing channels - and indeed they are. Despite the fact that there is a plethora of ways to market on the Web, you could certainly build your entire marketing program on just the one-two punch of search engine marketing (SEM) and email marketing. ...

[Editor's Note: A roundtable discussion to download on always important e-mail marketing.] Carol Krol and Dianna Dilworth - DM News - 4/19/10 Marketers deal with many moving media parts today. E-mail ...

[Editor's Note:Tactics that can applied to any business.] Josiah Mackenzie - Hotel Marketing Strategies - 4/6/10 The same is true with email marketing: campaigns usually succeed or fail before the me ...

[Editor's Note: Turn searchers into customers.] Stephanie Miller - ClickZ - 3/31/10 Content is king again. Marketers create content trails for prospects and customers to discover our products and bra ...

[Editor's Note: Don't make these mistakes.] Keller Hawthorne - Fresh eVenture - 3/30/10 Way back in July 09’, about two months after officially launching my blog, I wrote a post titled “How I Attracted My First 100 Newsletter Subscribers.” In it, I described how to gain subscribers using your content, email management tool and website design. ...

[Editor's Note:.The two used together can make you stand out to your customers.] Greg Grdodian - DM News - 3/17/10 First impressions mean everything, especially in business marketing, but they have to be sustained. Your message should be reinforced—many times, and in multiple channels—until the decision maker you want to influence sees you as a recognizable brand. Elite sales and marketing executives share a common trait: their ability to identify how prospects want to do business, then customize their sales pitch to reflect those preferences. Unfortunately, many marketers force the person to view their message through only one of the two most important channels: direct mail vs. e-mail. That one-size-fits-all approach that leads to marketing oblivion can be avoided by direct mail in concert with e-mail. ...

[Editor's Note: Give customers ease of use and control in frequency.]

Dianna Dilworth - DM News - 3/23/10 Retailers are giving consumers more control over e-mail opt-outs, according to a report from Responsys. The Web marketing firm's latest “Retail Email Unsubscribe Benchmark Study” found that 35% of retailers let consumers reduce the number of messages they received during 2009. This number was up from 16% in 2008. ...

[Editor's Note: Keep up with new thinking in e-mail marketing] Wendy Roth - i Media Connection - 3/24/10 At the start of a new decade, email remains a vital and valuable channel. But it's not the same channel it was in 2000. Important changes have transformed email from a one-to-one channel to one-to-many and back again. We know much more about what works and what doesn't, and we have the numbers to back it up. ...

[Editor's Note: E-mail will remain an important marketing tool.] Ajay Goel - i Media Connection - 3/22/10 While some wonder whether social media will mean the end of email, the research suggests otherwise. According to MarketingSherpa's 2010 Email Marketing Benchmark Report, only two marketing tactics received an increase in budget in 2009: email and social media. ...

Editor's Note: What adjustments should e-mail marketers be looking at after three months into the year?] Morgan Stewart- DM News - 3/16/10 Nineteen percent of online marketing budgets are now allocat ...

[Editor's Note: Your email authors need to be PR people as well.] Jeanniey Mullen - ClickZ - 3/15/10 You may not know it, but your e-mail marketing team and customer service reps are actually honorary members of your PR team. Are they ready for this role? They need to be, because whether you like it or not, every e-mail you send is being evaluated in three ways: as a service statement, a marketing message, and a PR statement about your company. ...

[Editor's Note: Are you short changing your email marketing program?] Simms Jenkins - ClickZ - 3/11/10 One of the most persistent conundrums of e-mail marketing is its incredibly high ROI, yet it is often underfunded and understaffed. What's more, those managing e-mail marketing programs are undercompensated. EmailStatCenter.com, an e-mail metrics portal my company founded with the Email Experience Council, set out to take a deeper dive into how e-mail programs really looked under the hood. What we found is concerning, though not totally surprising. ...

[Editor's Note: Are video e-mails right for your company?]

Dianna Dilworth - DM News - 3/9/10 Video in e-mail is a hot topic on the e-mail vendor side, but I haven't seen a ton of messages from brands with videos in them. The trend is starting slowly. ...

[Editor's Note: Using your customers to fuel your marketing campaign.] Sam Decker - DM News - 3/9/10 Customer reviews and other forms of word of mouth make great fodder for e-mail campaigns. When measured against identical campaigns that don't include word of mouth, they generally drive higher click-through rates and sales. Two key benefits of e-mail and user-generated content include driving community participation and using trusted words of customers to market products. ...

[Editor's Note: If your e-mail program is ailing, find out what's not causing the problem.] Ed Henrich - ClickZ - 3/4/10 Your e-mail program is like a person: sometimes it's robust and healthy, and at other times, it's sick. Last year, my wife woke up with the right side of her face paralyzed. The ER quickly ruled out a stroke and then ruled out a brain tumor through a sequence of tests. Thus determining the cause was neither a stroke or brain tumor, but Bell's Palsy. ...