Expedite Media Group is proud to offer our clients this cost-effective and innovative marketing software. As wireless text messaging (SMS) has become a mainstream means of communication, reaching consumers on their mobile phones via SMS marketing has become an increasingly integral component of marketing strategies across various industries.

By utilizing consumer cell phones, businesses, schools, political campaigns and restaurants can distribute content of their choosing—ranging from promotions and updates to security alerts—to their subscribers. Start sending out SMS marketing messages for as little as $50.00 per month. Please contact your account manager for more details.

Commonly made mistakes in e-mail marketing
If you’re new to e-mail marketing, you’re probably anxious about sending out bulk e-mails to your customers. Before you plunge right in and start blasting out campaigns and explode the growth of your e-mail list, we’ve put together a list of questions or mistakes that we commonly see with e-mail marketing.

You MUST have permission from every single one of your recipients.

People that have requested e-mail marketing from you results in fewer spam mistakes, better deliverability, decreased legal liability, and most importantly better opt-in and click through results. Make sure all of your recipients are opted-in or double opted-in.

The biggest mistakes happen when marketers are in a rush.

Slow down. Take a step back. E-mail marketing is not the same as sending a quick e-mail to a colleague. It takes a good amount of planning, testing and measuring.

• Plan well developed subject lines- these things are critical to your open rate and perhaps one of the most important factors in your campaign plan. You have to create subject lines that make people care enough to open it.
• Make sure your list is clean- recipients should be totally opted in otherwise e-mails go out to customers who have never opted in, forget who you are, do not remember ever signing up for your e-mails or who haven’t heard from you in years.
• Always provide an unsubscribe link
• Always sign each e-mail- including your name, address, company name, telephone number or e-mail address.

Try not to assume that everyone wants to hear from you.

 If they don’t specifically ask for e-mails from you, and you put them on your e-mail marketing list your sending unsolicited commercial e-mails. They will report you for spamming. A sales pitch blasted to an entire list of people becomes spam.  You should only send e-mail campaigns to a list of recipients that specifically requested e-mails from you.

Double check the list before sending.

E-mail marketing lists should be permission- based. As a client of ours you would be breaking our terms of use, and the CAN-SPAM law when you do that. We can be liable for spam when sending on behalf of someone else. Even legitimate e-mail marketers hurdle through spam filters- this does not mean you will make it through the filters your audience and their service providers have set up. Use common sense if a list is permission based or not.

Thinking customer e-mailing instead of building a loyal customer relationship.

E-mail is all about getting permission from customers, sending them stuff they want to read, and listening to their feedback. As some marketers would say, you don’t just “blast” out e-mails. It may take a long time to build a relationship with customers to increase your bottom line. Approach each subscriber as though you’re approaching a friend.

Small businesses aren’t always experts when it comes to writing good content.

Instead of thinking how another company would write an e-mail, stop and think what would my customers find useful in my e-mail. When it comes to e-mail marketing, using all CAPS is the same as sometimes saying, “Look at these obnoxious words NOW”.  Spam filters will panelize you for words screaming at your customers, using pushy sale phrases, brightly colored fonts and any other spam content. A company stands out when your creativity or personality shines. Don’t be like a car salesman; people want to associate with those that seem honest and sincere.

Focusing too much on building a large list size over quality.

Although growing your mailing list is important, try to refrain from doing it at the expense of quality. Try to spend time frequently cleaning them up, especially imperative before a campaign or publication. An effective way is to segment your list by customer value and activity level as well as the permission factors of opting in.