Six Email Marketing Terms Every Business Owner Needs to Know & Understand © Chris Bloor

If email marketing is an important part of your business, or you want to make it one, there are six terms you need to know and understand:

1.  Autoresponder. This is the name for e-mails that are automatically sent for you, by your autoresponder service provider. The computer program usually sends these e-mails in a timed sequence. It is an efficient and effective way of remaining in regular communication with both prospects and customers.

2.  Bounce Message. This is also known as a deliver status notification message. If an e-mail doesn't arrive at it’s destination you will receive a message from your autoresponder notifying you of this. To cut down on these bounce messages, you should tell people at the time that they sign up for your e-mail list to add your e-mail address in their address book.

3. Click-Through Rate (CTR). This is a very important term because it is the CTR that determines the success of your e-mail campaign. Your autoresponder service provides these statistics for you. The CTR is the number of readers who clicked on your link then divided by the number of e-mails that were sent (impressions). For instance, if you sent 100 e-mails and one person clicked on the link, your CTR was one percent.

4.  Opt-in and Double Opt-in. An opt-in is crucial in e-mail marketing. When a person signs up for a bulk e-mail list, like yours, their e-mail account will treat it like spam unless they have given permission for this e-mail to arrive. They give this permission when they sign up with your opt-in form. A double opt-in is when they receive an e-mail asking them to click on a link to confirm that they really did give permission.

This ensures that no one can sign someone else up for a mailing list without their permission. It is very important that you use an opt-in form when building your e-mail list.

5.  Open Rate. This tells you how many people opened/viewed your e-mail. This is tracked through a transparent tag in your e-mail that is invisible to your reader. You can use this information to help you determine how successful your campaigns are. If an e-mail had a low open rate it probably means that you need to change your subject line.

A subject line needs to be alluring to the reader and shouldn't resemble a spam subject line in the slightest. Just like a headline is the most important part of the sales letter, the subject line is the most important part of your e-mail and greatly affects your open rate.

6. Spam. Ugh. We all know what that is. It's junk e-mail and forbidden by ISPs. It's crucial that you take measures, such as opt-ins, to ensure that your valid messages don't get caught up in spam traps.

As you choose an autoresponder service, look for all the above terms on their website and make sure they provide opt-ins, reports about CTRs, etc. Then you will be on your way to having successful e-mail marketing campaigns.

If you need help marketing your business online, contact me - chris.bloor @ yahoo.com (remove the spaces)