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The Nightmare Before Christmas

Friday, October 23, 2009 by Karen Balle

When my nephew was much younger, we watched The Nightmare Before Christmas together on VHS until the tape broke.  He even thought his name was Jack the Pumpkin King!  The soundtrack will be stuck in my head for the rest of my life. 

Not only is this one of the best movies of all time, but it's a wonderful commentary on the state of email marketing during the holiday season.  I don't just mean that trying to get email delivered is a nightmare starting around Halloween or that marketers find themselves in somewhat different situations than they're used to during the rest of the year.  The flow of the movie and the soundtrack fit with how email marketing happens during the holiday season.  It happens every year. 

There's a dramatic uptick in all email marketing, be it legitimate email marketing or spam, that starts when the weather gets cold.  Some years, it triples or quadruples normal email volume.  And that means slower mail servers, more filters, more complaints, and slower response times.  It also means overworked, cranky mail and abuse admins.  I know.  I've been one of those cranky abuse admins.

The rules surrounding email deliverability, which are confusing enough, get more complicated during this time of year.  It feels like every company you have ever driven past and every partner of theirs is vying for your attention.  There are a lot of little things that you can do, from holiday ramp-up strategies to promoting special holiday-only marketing campaigns that draw customers in.


I'll leave you for now with this very important thought.

Engagement is more important than ever.  If you don't get the attention of your recipients, you'll find your email in the spam folder or blocked during your most crucial sales period.

As I've been writing this, the song "Making Christmas" has been running through my head.  It makes me want to ask which mindset do you have for your email campaigns, going into this holiday season?

"Snakes and mice get wrapped up so nice with spider legs and pretty bows. 
It's ours this time."
(Your focus is on your ideas of what your recipients should want.  You reach years back into your subscriber database.  You send out email to people who didn't give you permission.)

Or
"This thing will never make a present.  It's been dead now for much too long.
Try something fresher, something pleasant."
(Your focus is on what your customers are really interested in.  You're interested in actively engaged subscribers rather than the number of subscribers on your list.  You use dynamic content to create a one-to-one experience for your customers.)
 

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