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Tuesday, July 10, 2007

Marketing Strategies That Empower Success

Essential Rules for Effective Email Marketing


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This is the first in a series of discussions in email marketing. I hope you`re looking forward to uncovering the secrets that it holds. In today`s "Marketing Strategies that EMPOWER Success" discussion , we are going to consider the BASICS OF EMAIL MARKETING.

Now I know what you`re thinking: Basics don`t sound very exciting or "empowering." But the basics are the foundation upon which everything else is built. Miss these and you may end up spinning your wheels for the next 12 months.(Wouldn`t you rather be spinning stories about how you made your first million?)

So find a comfortable spot, put up your feet and let`s get ready to rumble!

Essential Rules For Effective Email Marketing

If you want an email campaign to succeed, you don`t want to offend anyone when sending your messages. Turn off a consumer with your email and you can be sure they`ll tune out your message. Don`t let this happen to you!

A message that earns respect makes sales. That`s why our first topic for discussion is email etiquette. (Later in the course, we`ll talk more about how to write an email salesletter.)

Train yourself to always -- and I mean ALWAYS -- stick to the rules below when crafting your email message.

RULE #1 - ALWAYS WRAP YOUR LINES AT 65 CHARACTERS OR LESS

Whenever you write an email, always format the lines so that they`re 65 characters, or less, across. To do this, you may need to do a "hard return" by hitting "Enter" at the end of the line.

Wondering why to limit your lines to just 65 characters?(Good question! It shows you`re thinking.) There are two reasons that "less is more":

  • The first thing to remember is that looking at a computer screen for a long time causes EYE FATIGUE for many readers. The shorter span of characters across the screen makes reading easier and more appealing to the recipient of your email message.
  • The other reason to go short instead of long is this: some email clients AUTOMATICALLY ENFORCE LINE-WRAPPING at 60-65 characters on received messages. If your email is wrapped at 70, the content will arrive all "chopped up." This makes it unattractive...and worse -- unappealing.

Tip within a Rule #1: Email clients such as Outlook Express allow you to SET THE LINE-WRAP to any character-width you choose. That means you won`t have to hit Enter each time after typing 65 characters. Makes life easier!

Tip within a Rule #2 - You can type 65 asterisks or dashes in a Notepad file to create a template. Then paste your email below it to see if any lines extend too far to the right.


RULE # 2 - BE CAREFUL USING ALL CAPS

How many times have you changed the TV channel to avoid listening to a screaming car salesperson? No one likes a screaming salesperson...and no one likes a "screaming" email message, either. Odds are, when someone has over-amped the volume of their message by using too many capital letters(not to mention too many exclamation points and other punctuation) - you`re going to be turned off.

On the Internet, email messages written in all caps are considered yelling. It`s okay to write some sentences and some words in all caps, but don`t go overboard. (As you can see in this message, I`ve tried to use capital letters to help break up sections of the content from time to time)

Tip within a Rule: Consumers buy from a source they trust. Emails in all caps are perceived as "shady" or uneducated, and have an appearance that damages the credibility of an offer.


RULE #3 - WATCH YOUR Ps & Qs (Spelling and Grammar)

Would you be influenced by an email selling you something that had noticeable spelling and grammar mistakes? Sure you would...and the influence would be negative, not positive! When a consumer reads a sales message that`s filled with errors, they think to themselves, "Good grief, this person doesn`t even take the time to get his emails right. His product is probably the same quality as his emails."

When you`re in business, YOUR IMAGE IS YOUR REPUTATION and your reputation is the reason people buy from you or the guy down the block. It`s essential that you create an image of INTEGRITY, CREDIBILITY, and HONESTY in the mind of your prospects. Sending emails filled with errors doesn`t hurt your professional image...it destroys it. (Ouch!)

That`s it for now, but I`ll be back with Lesson #2 faster than you can say, "I want to be EMPOWERED"

Sincerely,

J M Nor
http://www.Nor-OnlineBiz.com
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Form Submissions Without Submit Buttons

By William Bontrager

When you want a form that can be submitted without requiring the rather prominent submit button, this article shows you how, with several methods:
  1. Submitting a form with a regular link.
  2. Submitting a form when a checkbox is checked.
  3. Automatically submitting a form.

This article contains step-by-step instructions with code examples. I think you'll find it easy to follow.

The article assumes you already have a working form that is submitted to a CGI program in the conventional manner, with a submit button. When you see "/cgi-bin/script.cgi" in the examples, substitute the URL of your CGI program.

If you don't already have form and CGI program, consider Master Feedback from http://willmaster.com/master/feedback/ to have the submitted information sent to you via email, or Master Form V3 from http://willmaster.com/master/formV3/ for a program that can also store form information in a database on your server.

Submitting a Form With a Regular Link

With this method, you can cause a form to be submitted when the user clicks on a regular link, which can be a text link or an image link.

This requires two steps.

First step, the form —

Give your form a name. This is done in the FORM tag itself:

<form
   name="MyForm"
   method="POST"
   action="/cgi-bin/script.cgi">

Second step, the JavaScript —

Create a link containing the submit command:

<a href="javascript:document.MyForm.submit();">
Click to submit the form
</a>

Optional third step —

You can remove the submit button or, to be kind to the few non-JavaScript browsers that visit your site, put it between NOSCRIPT tags:

<noscript>
<input type="submit" name="Click here">
</noscript>

The above will display the submit button only when non-JavaScript browsers visit the page.

Submitting a Form When a Checkbox is Checked

We'll use a checkbox to demonstrate how to cause a form to be submitted when the user does something with a form field. When the checkbox is checked, the form submits.

(Actually, the submission occurs when the checkbox is clicked, which would be a check if it was previously unchecked or would be an uncheck if it was checked.)

This requires two steps.

First step, the form —

Give your form a name and add the checkbox. The checkbox would probably have instructive text. Example: 

<form
   name="MyForm"
   method="POST"
   action="/cgi-bin/script.cgi">
<input
   type="checkbox"
   name="MyCheck"
   onClick="DoSubmission();">
   Check when done with form

Second step, the JavaScript — 

<script type="text/javascript" language="JavaScript"><!--
function DoSubmission() {
document.MyForm.submit();
}
//--></script>

Put the JavaScript anywhere on your page, in the HEAD or BODY area, above or below the form.

Optional third step —

As in the "Submitting a Form With a Regular Link" section, above, you can remove the submit button or keep it between NOSCRIPT tags for non-JavaScript browsers.

Automatically Submitting a Form

If you only want to log CGI environment variables, and/or set a cookie, a form submission without actually sending information to the CGI program could be appropriate. Otherwise, the form should have information to submit before it is submitted, whether automatically or by manual click.

In other words, we'll have to figure out a way to get information into the form before it's automatically submitted.

Information that's available to put into the form are things like the current web page URL and the time zone information from your visitor's computer. The latter is a way to determine which geographical time zones your visitors are at — except those who have incorrect clocks and/or time zone information specified for their computers.

This requires two steps.

First step —

Put a form with a name into your web page. There must be one hidden field for each item of information you want to automatically fill with information and submit, current URL and time zone offset are in our example: 

<form
   name="MyForm"
   method="POST"
   action="/cgi-bin/script.cgi">
<input
   type="hidden"
   name="ThisPageURL"
   value="">
<input
   type="hidden"
   name="TimeZoneOffset"
   value="">
</form>

You'll need to add a hidden field to let your CGI program know the URL of the "thank you" page it should use.

Put the form anywhere in the BODY tag. It won't be visible, but it will cause the browser to print a blank line.

Second step, the JavaScript —

Somewhere below the form, put the following JavaScript code: 

<script type="text/javascript" language="JavaScript"><!--
document.MyForm.ThisPageURL.value = document.URL;
var x = new Date();
document.MyForm.TimeZoneOffset.value = x.getTimezoneOffset();
document.MyForm.submit();
//--></script>

When the page is loaded, the JavaScript will automatically fill in the form with the web page's URL and the time zone offset information from your visitor's computer, and then automatically submit the form. After processing the form information, the CGI program presents a "thank you" page.

The time zone offset is the number of minutes plus (West) or minus (East) of Greenwich Mean Time.

Optional third step —

Because the automatic submission of the form will load a different page (don't have the "thank you" page be the same page, re-loaded, or it will submit the form each time the page loads, in an infinite loop), you may want to put your automatic form submission page into an IFRAME tag. The "thank you" page can then be an image or other content that you want to display on the page.

To make an IFRAME tag, put this into a web page (a web page different than the web page with the automatically submitted form): 

<iframe
   height="300"
   width="200"
   src="WebPageContainingAutomaticForm.html">
</iframe>

Adjust the URL so the web page containing the automatically submitted form loads into the IFRAME tag. And adjust the height and width to accommodate the "thank you" page.

The web page with the automatically submitted form will load into the IFRAME and, after automatic submission, load the "thank you" page.

(Netscape versions 4.# and earlier don't recognize the IFRAME tag. It's ignored, as if it wasn't there — no extra space, no content, nothing.)

Notes

If you decide to test several of the above examples on the same web page, give the forms different names. Otherwise, the browser is likely to become confused about which information belongs to which form.

Have fun with the examples. Once you're familiar with how they work, you can decide whether or not they can be adapted to your unique requirements.

Will Bontrager

Copyright © Bontrager Connection, LLC

About the Author:

William Bontrager Programmer/Publisher, "WillMaster Possibilities" ezine mailto:possibilities@willmaster.com

Are you looking for top quality scripts? Visit Willmaster and check out his highly acclaimed Master Series scripts. Some free, some for a fee.


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