Social Email Queen

This week I head to Knoxville to attend Social Slam and participate on a great panel discussing strategies to attract and energize an online audience. In preparation for our panel discussion, my esteemed panelists (meet them below!) and I wanted to provide attendees (and those who aren't able to attend #soslam) some actionable tips to help you better engage with your social audience.

Dino Dogan, our fearless leader and moderator. Founder of @Triberr. Lousy martial artist. Recovering engineer. Singer/songwriter. Blogger. Quiet reader. Loud speaker. Global force for badassery. Hi.

Follow Dino: http...

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It's that time of year again where interactive marketers (in addition to music fans and film buffs) head down to Austin, TX for South By Southwest. I love "South by" for its spontaneity, awesome networking, and exchanging of great ideas among my fellow interactive marketing peers.  

Just like in past years, we'll be painting Austin ORANGE in a variety of ways so you can connect with both our Mobile and Social teams! Here's how you can hang out with us down in Austin: 

Saturday March 9, All Day!

Mobile Saturday with UrbanAirship: Our own RJ Talyor, VP of Mobile Products, will be hanging out and...

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Serve the individual. Honor their unique preferences. Deliver them timely, relevant content.

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As a marketer (and an even crazier breed -- a social media marketer), it's hard to imagine my life without out my smartphone. Tweets, texts, emails, and push alerts all mean my smartphone is in my hands (or close by) at all times. But as I dive into our Subscribers, Fans & Followers: Marketers from Mars research, I've realized I am far from the average consumer. 

"Marketers should not let their own biases blind them to the importance of reaching out to the 49% of consumers who don't own smartphones."

Our research broke down the differences between marketers, consumers with smartphones, and...

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This week we are holding a special Twitter chat on Wednesday, January 30 at 2pm EST to coincide with this week's exciting mobile announcements! This virtual chat is hosted directly on Twitter by following @ExactTarget and the #ETMobile hashtag.

We are excited for this special chat with guest, R.J. Talyor (@rjtalyor), VP of Mobile Products, who is responsible for mobile product strategy and innovation at ExactTarget.  R.J. will be coming to us live from the Mobile Marketing Association Forum: The Power of Mobile in the Marketing Mix (#mmaf2013) to discuss his insights on mobile marketing best...

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The popularity of our 140 Twitter Marketing Tips got me thinking about one of our submissions: 

People don't buy from logos. People buy from people. You social engagement should reflect that.

As a B2B social marketer, I often get asked if B2B can actually leverage social media. Even if you are responsible for a B2B social strategy, you are still marketing a product or service to a PERSON.  

As a result (and maybe even more so) B2B brands have to humanize their brand and social provides an easy way to do that. Some ways ExactTarget does this: 

• Our Twitter Background. While our Twitter avatar is...

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It's hard to imagine but this is our 3rd consecutive year at #SXSW! And this year we are making it a whole weekend of ExactTarget! We are bringing a little of that Connections spirit down to Austin and would love to hang out! 

 

How to Get Connected with ExactTarget at SXSW: 

Friday, March 9th 3:30pm CST – SoLoMo Redefined Panel with Jeff Rohrs

Our own Jeff Rohrs with Urban Airship & Google 

http://schedule.sxsw.com/2012/events/event_IAP12898

 

Saturday, March 10th – Building Mobile Audiences at Thirty Thousand Feet

Jeff Rohrs and Friend of ET Morgan Stewart with Urban Airship Mobile Panel 

 

Sunday,...

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With 110 twitter accounts, 20 tweeting astronauts, an Image of the day posted to Facebook and more, NASA's social media strategy is all about extending the space "experience".

On Sunday, March 9 at SXSW Interactive, our own Erik Sowa, director of engineering in our Social Media Lab, will join Stephanie Schierholz, former head of social media at NASA, to share exclusive insights on what is was like to plan and attend NASA’s Tweetup for the last shuttle launch. During the interactive session “NASA’s Mission Possible: Tweeting Thru Space”, Erik and Stephanie will discuss: 

• translating audiences into...

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Google has announced the launch of Google+ Pages which allows brands and businesses to create a presence on Google+. With Google+  Pages, brands can now publish and manage conversations on Posts as well as upload Photos and Videos. There are a few unique features I am keeping my eye as they evolve the platform: 

• Direct Connect: A key differentiators from other social networks is that Google tools, like search or Gmail, are integral to how we interact online.  A Google+ Page feature is Direct Connect that makes it simple for people to connect with a brand page by letting people enter '+'...

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We at ExactTarget are proud of our orange culture so you can imagine our excitement (or maybe it was just me?) when Pantone named Tangerine Tango, the 2012 Color of the Year.  While not the official ExactTarget Orange (Pantone 143 U), we hope all Friends of ExactTarget are excited to celebrate the holidays with a sense of orange spirit!

 Some unique ways we are getting into the #OrangeHoliday Spirit at ExactTarget: 

• Raising $10,000 at our holiday party for @MakeAWish allowing us to grant the wish of 14-year old leukemia patient Danielle
• Orange Holiday Decorations here at the Social Media Lab - Tod...

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So you've recognized you need to jump on the social media train.  You've gotten your accounts set up and you've started to gain some fans and followers.  But you feel like you can be doing more? 

You can. 

Just as important as it is to allow your subscribers to share your great email content thru SWYN (Share With Your Network) features, you should be converting your fans and followers to be subscribers! In our study 'Subscribers, Fans and Followers: The Social Profile" we saw only 4% of consumers are a Subscriber, a Fan AND a follower! 



If you've engaged someone to follow or friend you, you...Read More »

I’m going to let you in on a little secret – I love grilled cheese sandwiches. It truly is the perfect sandwich. Simple and basic, yet grows up as you do. As a kid, I ate the basic grilled cheese: American on white bread. Now, as an adult, I’ve moved up to more “sophisticated” grilled cheese sandwiches – with tomatoes or bacon or gourmet cheeses.

I love grilled cheese because it’s the one thing from my childhood that I still find comfort from as an adult, yet the sandwich has grown up as I have.

All of this grilled cheese talk reminds me of social media. Think about it – having a Twitter handle...Read More »

If you have read anything about social media, the first thing you can do when starting out is to “Listen.”

But it’s really not enough just to listen anymore. 

Now don’t get me wrong, you definitely need to be listening.  Listening to what your customers are saying about you will help you formulate how you respond and find trends in what people are saying about your brand.

Just like with email marketing you have to be relevant and engaging or people will unsubcribe via unfollowing/unfriending you.  No one wants to talk to a brick wall and even worse no one wants to get a constant stream of...Read More »

Last week was a tremendous week here at ExactTarget with the acquisition announcement of CoTweet.  This acquisition sent a lot of buzz through the press (we really have been all-a-Twitter!), Twitter and even my inbox! I couldn't be more excited about the future of interactive marketing.

I've used CoTweet since the spring of 2009 to listen and engage with ExactTarget's Twitter conversations.  Honestly, after going thru multiple processes and using multiple different applications - it is the only platform truly built for businesses to manage their Twitter conversations.

Email Marketing Meet... Read More »

Our own Chip House, VP of Industry & Relationship Marketing virtually sat down with me for our latest Twitterview on 2010 Resolutions. We talked deliverability and how marketers should be more engaging in 2010: 


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Feburary is unoffically Email Design Month here at ExactTarget.  (Hint: If you aren't subscribed to Insight you can opt-in to our own email marketing newsletter - There will be some Email Design info coming your way this month!) 

Today I was excited to have a Twitterview with ExactTarget's Justine Jordan, Manger of Design Solutions on our Email Design Twitter Account @ETDesign.

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Today I had the pleasure of Twitterviewing Linus Gregoriadis, Research Director at Econsultancy about our collaborative research, Marketing Budgets 2010: Effectiveness, Measurement and Allocation Report. 

There is alot of great info on email marketing and social media! If you missed the live version here's what we talked about: 

@ExactTarget: According to the report marketers are shifting their budgets to digital channels.  Why?

@LinusGreg: The shift to digital is an on-going trend. The wider use of online to boost brand reputation is giving this fresh impetus


ExactTarget: Would you say this was... Read More »

In email marketing it's all about Channel Preferences! So did you know there are three different ways to get ExactTarget Customer Service from our Client Success Center: 

3Sixty Back Office
My favorite! If you are a member of 3sixty, you can click the Back Office Button and Sumbit a Case, Request an Update on a Case and also monitor case comments. 

Email to Case
Send an email to help@exacttarget.com and a case will be automatically created in our case management system.  You will get an email reply identifying your case number.

Good Old Fashioned Phone Call

• US Customers can call 866-558-9823
• UK...

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We are going strong on our email marketing resolutions so far, and this week I got to sit down and Twitterview (a twitter interview) the one and only Joel Book, our Director of eMarketing Education. 

In our latest whitepaper, Five Resolutions Every Marketer Must Make in 2010, Joel provides insights into how email marketers should get back to the basics in 2010.




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The following post is from Brooke Francesi who runs email marketing at Aptera, an ExactTarget customer. Aptera is a custom software development and web design firm.

With a new year, a new decade, and a lucky seven anniversary on the horizon, Aptera is looking forward to 2010, especially what is holds in store for our e-mail marketing program. Unlike other marketing avenues, it’s a relatively painless process to analyze the overall success of your e-mail campaigns and adjust where needed. That’s exactly what we’ve done to create our resolutions for 2010.

More effective segmentation:
While our...Read More »