Custom Email Software

Over the next several weeks, we will be sharing guest articles from experts in the realm of content marketing. This week, Josh Miles writes.

Josh Miles is principal and founder of Miles Design, a branding firm specializing in branding and website design for professional services and software firms. Josh is the author of the new Content Marketing Institute book Bold Brand: The New Rules for Differentiating, Branding, and Marketing Your Professional Services Firm.

“It will look like you guys are on everywhere, even if you’re not.”

Our media buyer always had a way of helping our clients make the...

Marketing automation is the intersection of many useful features and functions. It's a proven fact that marketing automation software gives marketers full visibility into aspects of the sales cycle that were previously a mystery. But the sheer number of buttons and tools can seem daunting if they're not old-hat to you just yet.

As you begin to build an effective marketing automation program, you can begin to gain a holistic view of your marketing activities. From there, you can streamline traditionally manual processes (like customer segmentation, email marketing, and campaign management).

Start ...

Join Kristina Huffman, Design Practice Lead, as she discusses and answers seven common questions about responsive email design:

What is responsive email?
Responsive design is a set of techniques in web design and development used to adapt a website to be readable on any screen and/or platform on which it's displayed. These techniques are being repurposed for emails. A responsive layout uses a piece of CSS3 code called a media query to detect the pixel size of the screen on which that email is opened. Based on the screen size detected, multiple stylesheets may be triggered to alter the layout and...

October 2012 was an exciting time for ExactTarget’s partner ecosystem. Not only was the Orange Partner Network program launched at Connections, but also in front of the 4,000+ attendees, ExactTarget was excited to present the Power of ONE Reseller Partner of the Year award to our Platinum partner, C.TRAC.

C.TRAC has taken ExactTarget’s passion and unwavering commitment to client success and worked it into their own daily business practices by truly embodying ExactTarget's core values. Combined with their innovative strategy, design, integration, database management, reporting services, and...

Everything was going fine. You had set up your email marketing campaigns properly, all of your subscribers were double opt-in, you were sending emails on the right frequency, and your content was exactly what you had promised.

As far as you knew, people loved this stuff.....

But then, out of the blue, Gmail and the other ISPs started blocking your emails! But why? Why? Because those subscribers aren't interacting with your email anymore. They've become disinterested. They've become what are now known as 'the un-engaged.'

Just sending email to your subscribers isn't good enough

Just sending email...

What is the easiest way to comply with ExactTarget's Anti-Spam Policy?

First things first... What is ExactTarget's Anti-Spam Policy? If you have a look at the policy, you'll find that we expect that our customers "will use our software only to send emails to customers and prospects that have directly consented (opted-in) to receive email."  In a nutshell, the answer is found in two simple words: "No surprises."

Clients often ask about the propriety of engaging in buying or renting lists, or engaging the services of an append house. All of these are against the Anti-Spam Policy.

To understand why,...

I recently read an article on TFB (The Future Buzz) which argued against the principle of using simple communications to reach out to the mass of your customers. I must admit, I wholly agree with assuming that you have a smart base of customers! It is definitely apparent that "dumbing down" messages does not guarantee that they will be engaged with by everyone, especially in today's digital age of smart and service-focused consumers.

The same blog post argues that using generic and simple messaging can portray your brand as "cheap" and "untrustworthy." I am not a businessman, but I am sure...

How many times have gotten stuck purchasing concert tickets for everyone in a large group because there's no other way to get seats next to each other? And what's worse, this creates a situation where each of your friends owes you money--which typically adds up to a considerable amount of cash.

That frustrating and painful ticketing experience may be a thing of the past by the next time your favorite act comes to town.

Interactive marketing software and social networking platforms have now made it possible for brands (like AEG's AXS.com) to vastly improve the ticket buying experience. Whether...

The months of January and February are well known in the film industry as a time to showcase movies that have been nominated for various awards. One work that has received a great deal of attention in the upcoming Academy Awards on Sunday, February 24, is David O. Russell's "Silver Linings Playbook." This is the story of a man recently released from a mental institution following an infidelity by his wife. Bradley Cooper, in this lead role, meets a widower with her own struggles, played by Jennifer Lawrence. The two bond over a ballroom dance competition, using each other as a source...

The Feeding Your Kids Foundation was a Power of One Award winner at Connections 2012. Since its inception in May 2010, this organization has powered messages to 12,000 families in 85 different countries, teaching parents how to feed their children healthier foods and instill better attitudes toward healthy living.

THE FEEDING YOUR KIDS FOUNDATION STORY
The Feeding Your Kids Foundation runs an international program to help children make better meal choices and develop a healthy relationship with food to avoid childhood obesity. As part of their work to educate parents, the team created a 42-day...

Oakley Signs & Graphics, a 2012 Power of One Award Winner in our B2B category, is a recgnozed leader in the real estate sign business. Oakley Signs uses the power of ExactTarget to drive email communications across multiple "micro-brands" that they managed to help increase their revenue.

THE OAKLEY SIGNS & GRAPHICS STORY

I'm excited to share that ExactTarget is expanding its award-winning Content Marketing team! We are currently hiring for the positions of Content Design Specialist and Content Development Specialist in our Indianapolis headquarters.

Content Design Specialist: Our newly created CONTENT DESIGN SPECIALIST role is custom-made for someone who can conceptualize, create, and optimize design for infographics, emails, eBooks, blog posts, presentations, interactive applications, mobile environments, and video animations. The right candidate will be a self-starter with proven design talent and an ability to...

Over the next several weeks, we will be sharing predictions on the future of marketing from 25 industry thought leaders. These predictions have been compiled in our new whitepaper, Inspired Marketing Predictions for 2013. Today, ExactTarget’s own Bryan Wade shares his thoughts.

The Year of the First Impression

When it comes to email, 2013 will be all about making that first impression of the email count, reaching your readers wherever they are, and making sure your message gets read. The changing landscape for where and how emails are being viewed opens the door for new innovations in email....

Each Thursday at 11am EST, marketers from around the world join the ExactTarget user community on Twitter for a conversation about trends and campaign ideas across the interactive marketing industry. We call this virtual coffee chat ExactTarget Café.

Our guest for a recent #ETCafe chat was Peter Chase (@peterrchase), Executive Vice President at Scribe Software Corporation. During the chat Peter shared his insights into leveraging data to drive more successful campaigns. This was Peter’s and his team's first time on the chat and we had some amazing conversation!

Here's a recap from our...

For residents of Cincinnati and the surrounding areas, Graeter’s ice cream is a staple. In fact, the fourth-generation family-owned company has been around for 142 years and boasts some of the most brand loyal customers.

When the company took the leap in 2010 to expand the brand nationwide through retail partners championed by Kroger, it needed a way to continue engaging its current customers while creating relationships with new customers. Graeter’s partnership with ExactTarget proved to be successful, allowing the company to connect with its patrons across the country through...

I had the chance to sit down with Ben Pickering, CEO of Strutta to discuss Facebook Marketing Best Practices and Strutta!

SM: So what exactly is Strutta? 
BP: Strutta is software that helps marketers create, build and launch promotions on Facebook. Our tools are self-service and allow brands to build and engage their audience through social media, identify top influencers and measure campaign effectiveness.

SM: That sounds impressive! Does your platform work with ExactTarget?
BP: We have partnered with ExactTarget and SocialPages to make it easy for customers to develop fully-branded contests and...

How do you better operationalize your social media efforts to be truly effective? According to Valeria Maltoni - Brand Strategist and Author of the Conversation Agent, its critical that you integrate people and technology effectively to succeed in social medial

1. People: to give your best to customers and partners, you need the best from your teams. Social media enables you to achieve a broader strategy and purpose by activating all employees on behalf of your brand. When everyone is involved, it’s not about who anymore, it’s about how.

Few assets are more valuable than a company’s customer base.  

Yet, most companies are more systematic about managing their office supplies than their customers.  Research continues to show the majority of companies don’t know enough about their customer’s preferences and needs, what products or services they use, if they are satisfied, or if they are thinking about defecting to the competition, and why.

The problem is NOT the lack of customer data. Rather, pockets of customer data exist throughout the company. The problem is that none of it is integrates to create “one version of the truth”...

I'm at the Mobile Marketing Association (MMA) annual forum in New York and couldn't be more excited to share that our new mobile software ExactTarget MobileConnect is here. Talking to mobile industry veterans, top brands and agencies about our newproduct is simply amazing.

ExactTarget MobileConnect is a mobile messaging solution that helps marketers to create, target, send and track SMS campaigns. What really sets MobileConnect apart from other mobile marketing solutions out there is that it seamlessly integrates with our cross-channel messaging platform, the Interactive Marketing Hub, to...

You are in the final stages of choosing ExactTarget as you new email service provider (ESP) and the realization that the task of either migrating your existing campaigns, or integrating a new ESP into your back-end system comes into focus. Whether you are using the services provided by ExactTarget or a consulting partner, here are the top 5 tips that we give clients to ease the burden on your team at the same time as speeding up the implementation. 

1. Define your marketing objectives and goals
   
   Prior to engaging with your assigned services team or partner agency, it is critical that you have...