Sunday, 30 April 2017

#SproutChat Calendar: Upcoming Topics for May 2017

We have a wide variety of topics to discuss in May at #SproutChat. Whether we’re talking about social team collaboration, employee advocacy programs or “social media savagery,” you can expect to learn and network with industry professionals.

See a topic that catches your attention? The “add to calendar” will add a meeting notice with all of the Twitter chat details to your schedule.

Wednesday, May 3: Collaborating With Multiple Social Team Members

Collaboration can be a great thing, but how do you maintain consistency when multiple team members work on a social account? During this #SproutChat we’ll focus on social team collaboration and discuss best practices for ensuring that wires don’t get crossed and brand voice remains consistent.

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Wednesday, May 10: Employee Advocacy With Sprout All Star, Jen Kirk

While it may seem like a no-brainer, sometimes businesses need a reminder that employees can be their number one brand champion. Happy and engaged employees can be a brand’s most prized advocate, but how do you encourage this behavior? We’ll chat about this and more with Sprout All Star, Jen Kirk of Jenius Consulting.

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Wednesday, May 17: Darryl Villacorta Discusses Social Media Savagery

In a social-first era, more and more brands are coming out of their shell and becoming a little more brazen in their activity. But just what is social media savagery and is it an effective strategy? Sprout’s Social Media Manager, Darryl Villacorta, discusses during this week’s #SproutChat.

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Wednesday, May 24: Engaging & Growing an Audience With Hashtags

Hashtags are a powerful way to engage your audience and tap into relevant conversations. That’s why brands are utilizing hashtags. But how do you know if you’re using the most relevant ones?  This can be particularly challenging Instagram. We’ll discuss all things hashtag from analytics to the difference between branded and community hashtags.

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Wednesday, May 31: Geolocation on Facebook With Sprout All Star, Jeff Higgins

For consumers, word of mouth recommendations can be more powerful than brand awareness. During this #SproutChat with Sprout All Star, Jeff Higgins, we’ll talk about Facebook’s move towards hyper-local reviews and recommendations.

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This post #SproutChat Calendar: Upcoming Topics for May 2017 originally appeared on Sprout Social.



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Friday, 28 April 2017

Atlas of Reddit’s /r/place makes sense of beautiful chaos


Reddit’s massive /r/place art experiment remains one of the most remarkable collaborative endeavors I’ve ever seen on the internet. Screw you, museums: this is really modern art. It’s dizzying to look at it and try to make sense of the many, many, different references, pictures, flags, and symbols painted into /r/place. Luckily, an enterprising group of people put together an atlas. When Bryan wrote about it, the /r/place canvas was still being worked on. It was one of many April Fool’s gimmicks we’d picked through that day in order to find something that sounded like authentic news. It looked like an amorphous mass…

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#SproutChat Recap: Metrics That Matter

Without looking at metrics, there is no way to tell if a marketing campaign is working. As a marketer, uncovering which metrics correlate with your overall business goals will help you tell a complete story to your clients or stakeholders. But before you can measure your social ROI, you need find out which social metrics matter.

This week at #SproutChat, Sprout All Star and Director of Digital at Atomic RevenueSteph Nissen, provided tips on pinpointing the most valuable data and presenting it in a way that impacts.

Different Metrics for Different Platforms

Marketers know that different social platforms are used to achieve different goals. However, cumulatively tracking engagement across channels can be an easy way to gauge overall performance.

Create Metrics Based on Specific Business Goals

When setting up metrics for a new campaign or client take a step back and examine the larger business goals and objectives. Take an audit of how the client’s social platforms are are performing and what content is resonating most. Use this information to determine your campaign benchmarks.

Track Metrics to Inform Strategy

Utilize metrics to their fullest extent by looking at where there are opportunities to fine tune and optimize your social strategy. Sprout offers a robust suite of social media analytics tools to help you measure your efforts and get you closer to reaching your business goals.

Create Social Goals That Can Be Tied Back to ROI

Social goals should be tied to specific business goals such as sales, traffic or brand awareness. Create campaign brief that provides a clear understanding of what you are using social to accomplish and what success for your campaign looks like.

Clear & Concise Reporting Is Best

Communicating metrics to a client or executive stakeholder can be challenging. Be sure to put yourself in the client’s shoes and present data that tells the full narrative. Remeber the story is not in the data, it is in the analysis.

We will be back next week chatting about team collaboration. See you Wednesday, May 3, 2017 at 2 p.m. CDT on Twitter! Until then, be sure to join our Facebook group to connect with others in the community.

This post #SproutChat Recap: Metrics That Matter originally appeared on Sprout Social.



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Wednesday, 26 April 2017

Twitter is growing, but its bank account isn’t


Twitter is finally showing signs of life after months — years, even — of flatlining. The social media behemoth today released its quarterly report for Q1 2017, which didn’t, at first glance, look very encouraging. It still can’t seem to turn a profit. Its quarterly losses total about 7-percent. Revenue was higher than expected at $548 million, but that’s still a total loss of $62 million. Still, that’s the smallest net loss the company’s posted since before 2015. It’s certainly better than last quarter, where they posted a $167 million in net loss. The site also boasts 328 million monthly users, which is…

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Get Started with Email Automation in 6 Easy Steps

AutomationConvertsBlog

Email automation — everyone’s doing it! Or at least they should be. Ninety percent of marketers say email automation is key to success. And yet, according to Forbes, less than 10 percent of companies use marketing automation. If you’re not already familiar with the benefits of email automation, it’s time to get on board. Automated emails are great for building a relationship with your audience, driving engagement and increasing conversions. Ready to find out how to get started with email automation? Read this post to get 6 easy steps.

1. Start collecting subscribers.

Before you can get started with email automation, people need to sign up for your autoresponder series. A robust, permission-based list of subscribers is key to running a profitable automated email campaign. By placing sign up forms on your blog, website or social media channels, you can begin generating leads and building the right audience for your emails. On your forms, be sure to explain what subscribers can expect from your emails and how they’ll provide value. For example, this sign up form from theSkimm explains the value of subscribing by mentioning that it'll be "easier to be smarter," because you'll be receiving the top news stories of the day. It then sets expectations by explaining that you'll receive an email from them every morning. Screen Shot 2017-04-26 at 11.14.53 AM After people subscribe, make sure your emails live up to their expectations. If you don't, you'll likely alienate subscribers, decrease engagement and hurt your email marketing efforts. Ultimately, your sign up form should make opting into an email list as easy as possible. I also recommend throwing in freebies — like ebooks or coupon codes — to create an extra incentive for signing up. Creating an effective sign up form may seem daunting at first. But with concise copy, an eye-catching design, a clear call-to-action and a dash of creativity, people won’t be able to resist signing up for your automated email series!

2. Send relevant automated emails with segmentation.

Think back to the last time you sent an email to an entire subscriber list. Maybe it yielded some results, but perhaps it would’ve performed even better if you’d targeted a specific niche within your contacts. Enter segmentation — one of our favorite ways to run successful automated email campaigns. With segmentation, you can divide subscribers into highly-specific subgroups based on criteria like age, geographic location, occupation and interests. You can then send them automation series designed for their unique needs. For example, for our free, 7-day email course "What to Write in Your Emails", we use an automation series to automatically deliver the course emails. We wanted to segment the subscribers who received this course into two separate groups – our customers and non-customers – so we could send them different automated emails aligned with their specific needs. To accomplish this, we asked people to identify whether or not they were a customer on the sign up form. We then set up two different automation series in AWeber that triggered based on their answer. If they said they were a customer, they received our customer automation series. If they said they were not, we sent them the other series. Screen Shot 2017-04-26 at 11.38.12 AM Beyond sending more relevant, targeted emails, segmentation tends to get more conversions than messages directed at a wider audience. According to the Direct Marketing Association, targeted emails can drive up to 77 percent of your overall email ROI. For email marketers, it’s a win-win!

3. Embrace personalization.

There’s a lot of buzz about personalization —  and for good reason. According to Marketing Land, personalized emails see an open rate that’s nine percent higher than those written for larger audiences. They also saw a 41 percent higher click-through rate. Subscribers don’t just want relevant and authentic content. They expect it, which means your content needs to speak to them directly, answer their questions and align with their unique interests. Personalization goes well beyond including someone’s name in a subject line. There are tons of great ways to utilize personalization in your automated emails, including:
  • Targeting users with relevant educational courses.
  • Linking campaigns to move subscribers to a new automated email series when another one ends.
  • Creating multiple email campaigns for different incentives.

4. Engage new subscribers with a welcome email series.

Engaging people as soon as they join your list is one of the most compelling reasons why you should get started with automated emails. By sending a series of three to five friendly and helpful welcome emails, you can begin nurturing new leads the moment they subscribe. Welcome emails are great for getting subscribers excited about the content you’re sending. By teasing some of your highest performing blogs, ebooks or social media posts, you can show subscribers that joining your list was a smart decision. First impressions are lasting impressions, so it’s crucial your initial welcome email sets the right tone with subscribers. Make sure you introduce yourself and provide contact information. Write to subscribers the way you’d write to a friend, deliver your lead magnet if you promised one and be transparent about what kind of content you'll be sending. And finally, thank subscribers for joining your list. Here is the welcome email theSkimm sends right after you fill out their sign up form. It's concise and to the point but sets expectations and introduces theSkimm's fun and conversational writing tone. Screen Shot 2017-04-26 at 11.53.22 AM

5. Send subscribers valuable content for free.

Are you a self-proclaimed foodie with an affinity for Italian cuisine, or are you a devout yogi with several years of teaching under your belt? It doesn’t matter what you’re an expert in. If you’re a thought leader in a certain area, use automated emails to share your passion and knowledge with the world! Send free and valuable content (like recent blog posts) to answer your audience's biggest questions. Giving away content that addresses a specific problem helps build trust with subscribers, allowing you to maintain healthy relationships with them. The trick is to use content to solve people’s problems. If you establish yourself as an authoritative source, subscribers will keep coming back to you in the future.

6. Link campaigns together to increase your ROI.

Let’s say you have a series of four automated emails set up for when people first subscribe to your list. Once that email series ends, try adding subscribers to another automated series to keep them engaged. With Campaigns, AWeber’s email automation platform, you can automatically move subscribers from one series to another to improve engagement with your messages. Using Campaigns, you can tag all the subscribers who reach the end of your first email series, moving them into a second series automatically. After the second series ends, you can move them into a third series, fourth series, fifth series and so on. Linking email campaigns together provides several benefits. But most importantly, it will help you:
  • Send the right content to the right people
  • Create a more personalized experience based on how people engage with your emails
  • Engage subscribers over longer time periods
  • Encourage past customers to make future purchases
(Interested in learning more about Campaigns? Check out this post to learn about the many ways Campaigns can help increase email marketing engagement and conversions.)

Work smarter, not harder.

Email automation is a small investment that could have a serious impact on your business. When used properly, email automation can create a deeper, more personalized relationship with subscribers, save your time and increase conversions. Ready to get started with email automation? Sign up for your free trial of AWeber today!

The post Get Started with Email Automation in 6 Easy Steps appeared first on Email Marketing Tips.



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Tuesday, 25 April 2017

Reddit is changing, and Redditors aren’t happy about it


Reddit announced earlier this year that it was working on a site redesign, and one of the biggest changes is the elimination of custom community styles via CSS. Moderators who have coded their beautiful subbreddits with CSS for years are protesting vigorously. CEO Steve Huffman spoke with Reddit moderators directly on r/modnews. He insisted the rollout would be slow, as doing otherwise would be “suicide.” He also mentioned that this was primarily done for Reddit mobile users, as they account for half of the site’s traffic and most CSS designs don’t translate to mobile. He said, “We’d love for you…

This story continues at The Next Web

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How to Write a Blog Post Your Audience Can’t Resist Sharing

Monday, 24 April 2017

Instagram is down


Instagram is down for some users. The outage affects both the web and mobile versions of Instagram. Currently the largest usage areas — North America, Europe, Asia, South America, and the Middle East — all seem to be affected by the outage, although we’re not sure yet what the problem is. We’ve reached out for comment, and will update this piece as needed. For now, just hop on Twitter and explain your lunch in 140 characters. Good to know I'm not the only one who comes to Twitter to check if #instagram is really down or if it's just me!! http://pic.twitter.com/SxZ90N575W…

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5 Social Media Best Practices Every Marketer Must Follow

LinkedIn just hit the 500 million user mark


LinkedIn, the Microsoft-owned professional networking site, today announced it had passed a major milestone, with over 500 million users registered. That’s pretty impressive growth when you consider that it had 400 million members in October, 2015, and 450 million members in August, 2016. Although, when compared against the stratospheric growth of Facebook and Whatsapp, it’s less impressive. That’s not the whole story though. While most Facebook users engage with the service on a daily basis, LinkedIn users are more sparing, with only 25 percent visiting the site each month. As TechCrunch pointed out, LinkedIn has ceased to report earnings since…

This story continues at The Next Web

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Friday, 21 April 2017

#SproutChat Recap: Targeting Social Content

When managing any social community, targeting your brand’s content is no easy task. However, tailoring messages for a niche audience and investing time and resources into growing and nurturing small communities can prove to be exceptionally difficult.

In this week’s #SproutChat, Alex Bimonte, Sprout All Star and Marketing Communications Specialist at Modernizing Medicine, shared her best practices for targeting social content when focusing on a niche audience.

Quality Over Quantity Always Reigns True

It’s easy to distribute the same message across all of your brand’s social platforms and include a CTA to “sign up now.” However, audiences can see right through this strategy. Delivering targeted content that is truly relevant to your audience is an integral part of a successful social strategy and shows that you really understand your audience. Sprout offers a few publishing tools that can target your social posts to a tailored audience at the most efficient time.

Tailoring Messages Proves You’re an Expert

Spending time crafting tailored messages shows your audience that you are in tune with what they are looking for. The more relevant the social content that you’re sharing is, the more likely your audience is willing to click through and engage.

Niche Platforms Can Prove to Be Valuable

Tap into niche networks that are targeted to your audience’s interests. Engagement on smaller networks is often more robust and successful when compared to blanket messages on larger social networks.

Take Time to Grow Your Social Communities

A community within a social network may seem unnecessary, but a niche community that is hyper targeted or local can see high engagement levels. That’s why many brands are picking up on this trend and focusing more efforts on cultivating these smaller communities.

Metrics Should Be Dependent on Goals

When spending time on marketing to a niche audience, keeping metrics relevant to your goals allows you to track the effectiveness of your targeted messages. For example, if you’re trying to drive traffic back to your site, UTM tagging can help determine if your targeted content is successful. Use Sprout’s analytics to measure your efforts.

We’ll be back next week to discuss Metrics that Matter with Sprout All Star Steph Nissen! See you Wednesday, April 26 at 2 p.m. CDT on Twitter. Until then, join our Facebook group to network with other members of our community.

This post #SproutChat Recap: Targeting Social Content originally appeared on Sprout Social.



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El verdadero engagement en las redes sociales

Cuando nos abocamos a elaborar estrategias de redes sociales para nuestros clientes surgen entonces una serie de objetivos que lograr. Obtención de KPI´s muy específico como likes, leads y seguidores están dentro de los más comunes. Sin embargo, los desafíos en redes sociales son cada vez mayores y ahora de lo que se trata, es de vincular nuestro negocio a emociones positivas en nuestros fans como fidelización, satisfacción, valores compartidos y sentido de permanencia. Y no hablamos de otra cosa que lograr el tan buscado engagement. Ese engagement que en las redes sociales es el grado de fidelidad o compromiso que tiene el consumidor con una marca. Y con el concepto engagement no solo nos referimos a su literal traducción del idioma inglés que representa “compromiso”, sino a esa capacidad de un individuo u organización de entablar vínculos fuertes e interactivos con su audiencia.

Antes de hablar de qué hacer o qué medidas tomar para incrementar nuestro engagement de la marca en las redes sociales debemos analizar que métricas podemos utilizar para saber si el ROI que nos hemos establecido será viable.

Muchos se preguntarán ¿Cómo se mide una relación o un sentimiento?

Es difícil. Sin embargo, Sprout Social nos arroja métricas que nos permitirán tener la certeza de estar logrando el engagement buscado. Requerimos de métricas profesionales que eviten confundir el concepto y los indicadores. Hay profesionales del marketing que reducen el engagement al número de seguidores obtenido en redes sociales. Y ahí empiezan a surgir los errores.

Las métricas que nos pueden ayudar son las siguientes:

  • Número de “Me gusta” en Facebook
  • Número de veces que tu contenido se ha compartido
  • Menciones (positivas, neutrales, negativas)
  • Impresiones de imágenes y videos
  • Número de followers en Twitter
  • Número de miembros en tu grupo de LinkedIn

 

¿Qué acciones debo tomar para incrementar el engagement?

Sprout Social tiene opciones como “Sprout Queue” o “ViralPost” que te harán optimizar tus publicaciones en los mejores horarios en redes sociales y con ello, la participación activa de tus fans y followers. Obvio, para ello hay que planear estrategias que fomenten y estimulen la comunicación entre la marca y sus seguidores. Estas medidas, previamente analizadas y disponibles para ponerlas en marcha, también forman parte del concepto engagement, y son de vital importancia para gestionar perfiles sociales de éxito.

 

Te comparto algunas acciones generales que a nosotros como agencia nos han funcionado

  1. Conocer bien a tu seguidor

Únicamente identificando cuál es el tipo de target al que vamos a dirigir nuestros contenidos en redes sociales y seguir como miembros activos de la comunidad, podremos satisfacer sus gustos y necesidades, los cuales estarán muy relacionados con lo que tu empresa tiene para ofrecer.

  1. Trabaja en seleccionar a los usuarios cuyo perfil se ajusta al de tu público objetivo

La recomendación de siempre es no perder el objetivo que es alcanzar un grupo férreamente unido a la marca, que participe, poniendo sus comentarios y, finalmente, adquiriendo los bienes o servicios que tenemos para ofrecerle. Olvídate de buscar gastar esfuerzos en conseguir cifras elevadas de seguidores. Esto no te sirve de nada.

  1. Escucha y habla con tu comunidad

Mientras más interactúes con tu comunidad más visitas recibirás a tu timeline. Un principio básico es dar tú el primer paso e interésate por ellos si quieres que inicien un diálogo o conversación con tu marca.

Considera para motivar la conversación el realizar preguntas o cuestionamientos relacionadas con el contenido que vas a publicar. Si te limitas a publicar el contenido sin ninguna motivación a la acción, estarás limitando en gran parte el engagement que se pueda llegar a generar.

  1. Organiza sesiones de webinar

Muchas veces se piensa que hacer webinars es riesgoso para la marca. No hay que temer. Si ya está tu marca en redes sociales, ya está expuesta al escrutinio. Es muy probable que muchos clientes quieran hacerte preguntas, así que una excelente manera de ayudarles es organizar sesiones webinar donde puedas resolver sus dudas. Atendiéndolos así te ayudará a lograr ese “compromiso” que buscas de ellos.

  1. Publica historias

Lo bueno de este tipo de contenido es que presenta una situación o problema, una solución y cómo llevar a cabo, paso a paso la misma. Las publicaciones de este tipo suelen ser habituales para las empresas que venden algún producto o servicio, que toman en consideración las preguntas que el público hace frecuentemente para ofrecer una respuesta.

 

Veamos acciones específicas para las dos principales redes sociales:

Facebook

Más vale calidad que cantidad. Aunque es una premisa general, es conveniente considerarla como básica en Facebook. Si tu cliente te pide cantidad de seguidores, demuéstrale que miles de fans sin calidad (que lo sigan, que interactúen, que sean leales) no ayudarán a mejorar el engagement de su marca. Comparte experiencias de la empresa. Las experiencias de la empresa contadas en primera persona como información de valor (lanzamientos, casos de éxitos, estudios, etc.) pueden gustar mucho a los fans, y podrás conseguir que se sientan identificados con tu marca.

  • Evita los posts largos. Según datos de estudios realizados, los posts de menos de 80 caracteres tienen un 25% más de mayor engagement. Obvio, hay casos que la estrategia de la campaña exige alargarse en la información, pero procura que no sea la constante.
  • Elige la mejor hora para publicaciones. Nosotros aquí también nos apoyamos en las métricas que nos arroja Sprout Social. Es fundamental que determines las horas en las que tus fans de tu target están conectados en Facebook. Así evitarás desperdicios de inversión e incrementarás el engagement en un target mucho más definido.
  • Organiza concursos o promociones. Muchas veces es cuestionada esta estrategia sobre todo, por la gran cantidad de caza premios que existen. Pero no temas, hay mecánicas para impedirlos. Una buena idea de concurso o promoción puede darte muy buenos resultados en Facebook y no solo para conseguir leads, sino que beneficia en engagement y el branding también.

Twitter

  • Sólo contenido de valor y en menos de 140 caracteres. Aunque a veces 140 caracteres es una limitante, es recomendable que tus tweets no lleguen a ese máximo pues estarás restando clics y engagement. El contenido de valor es el que es útil a tus seguidores; es aquel de excepcional calidad que algo les aportará.
  • Usa hashtags cortos. Utilizar hashtags aumentará el alcance de tu publicación y por consiguiente conseguirás más RT’s y favoritos. Cuanto más popular sea y mayor correlación tenga con nuestra temática, más alcance y más tiempo durará el ciclo de vida del tweet.
  • Utiliza infografía para complementar tus tweets. Ideal es que incluyas infografías, bien hechas y bien diseñadas que no sean confusas. Las infografías pueden mejorar el engagement en Twitter hasta en un 150 %.
  • Usa calls to actions. Para recibir y, sobre todo en redes sociales, hay que pedir. Utiliza call to actions para pedir RTs, con el objetivo de preguntar e incitar a la interacción a tus seguidores. Seguro que si lo pones en práctica con más frecuencia mejorarás notablemente el engagement en tus estadísticas.
  • Apoyarte en los mini influenciadores aumenta el alcance. Es cierto, que a veces lograr el apoyo de los influenciadores tiene un alto costo económico, no así si identificas a los mini influenciadores, que son personajes de nicho que aunque no tengan miles de seguidores, pueden llegar a tu target en forma más directa. El reto es encontrarlos y lograr su apoyo mediante por ejemplo, un intercambio de tweets en sus respectivos timelines.

 

 

 

This post El verdadero engagement en las redes sociales originally appeared on Sprout Social.



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French voters bombarded with fake news days before election


The first round of the 2017 French presidential election will be held next Sunday, on April 23. The French election is seen as one of Europe’s three pivotal elections this year that will determine the continent’s future. Europe has already dodged one bullet, when the flagrantly racist Geert Wilders didn’t win the Dutch elections. However, automated accounts are currently bombarding French voters on social media with fake news and misinformation, so Europe isn’t out of the woods yet. According to Reuters, two studies that were published this week suggest that Russia might be tampering with European elections through misinformation. This supports the claims by European…

This story continues at The Next Web

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Thursday, 20 April 2017

Optimice los esfuerzos en las redes con los comentarios en anuncios de Facebook en la bandeja de entrada inteligente

Simplifique os esforços sociais com comentários em anúncios do Facebook na Inbox Inteligente

Streamline Social Efforts with Facebook Ad Comments in the Smart Inbox

Verizon is Retiring their Email Addresses – Here’s How to Keep Your Subscribers

VerizonAOLpost

It’s official. Verizon is saying goodbye to email and will on longer support “@verizon.net” email addresses for customers. As a result, Verizon is currently in the process of closing all “@verizon.net” email accounts or migrating them over to AOL over the next several weeks. Verizon customers who want to keep their “@verizon.net” email address will be required to move it to AOL (which was acquired by the telecommunications giant back in June of 2015). Email addresses for customers who make the switch will be changed to “@aol.com.” Any customers who do not ask to have their address moved to AOL will have their email accounts closed.  

What does this mean for your subscribers?

Any subscribers with “@verizon.net” email addresses will become undeliverable and inactive – which can hurt your engagement rates and deliverability if you leave them on your list. As a result, you’ll want to send an email to your subscribers asking them to update their subscriber information, or add a secondary email address as soon as possible.

Communicating with your Verizon subscribers

Although you can send all of your customers this email, I recommend sending a targeted message to a segment of subscribers with a Verizon email address. This way, it's relevant to everyone and not just a portion of your list.Let’s take a look at how to find these subscribers and what you should say to them. While searching for Verizon users will differ depending on the email marketing platform you use, here’s how to do it in AWeber. First, go to Subscriber Management where you can find all of your subscribers. Then, search for subscribers based on the email address domain “@verizon.net”: SearchVerizonSubscribers Once you have your Verizon subscribers, name and save them as a new segment: SaveSubscriberSegment Now that you have your segment created, you can create your email and send to that segment when it’s ready! If you have multiple email lists, you’ll need to create this segment for each one.

What to write in your email

When you email your subscribers, be sure to explain why you’re asking them to update their information. You can link to trustworthy resources such as this support article from Verizon and this one from AOL so they can learn more. When you ask them to update their information, provide instructions on how to do so. Then add links to the page where they can make the change.

After sending the email

Hopefully, your subscribers will have updated their information! You can review this by performing the same search for subscribers based on the “@verizon.net” filter. If there are subscribers who haven’t updated their information, you may want to give them time to do so. If you’re an AWeber customer, any email addresses that are undeliverable for 60 days will be automatically unsubscribed from your list. This way, you don’t have to worry about it negatively impacting your deliverability for long!

Don’t forget to update your own information!

After asking your subscribers to update their email address, be sure to do the same. If you have an “@verizon.net” email address, migrate it over to AOL if you wish, or close it and create a new email address with a different provider. Then, update your subscriber information on any lists you’re opted-in to. If you have any accounts associated with your email address (such as social platforms or your email marketing provider!), be sure to update your email address there so you can log in, stay connected and continue receiving email updates. For more information on this update, check out these support articles from Verizon and AOL.

The post Verizon is Retiring their Email Addresses – Here’s How to Keep Your Subscribers appeared first on Email Marketing Tips.



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Tuesday, 18 April 2017

Social Media Automation Rules No Brand Should Break

Campaign URLs, an Updated Content Manager, and New Featured Templates

Facebook’s Messenger Platform 2.0 will be your one-stop-shop for work, play and social


Messenger is more than just a chat app. We use it to share video, play games, and chat in real time. Indeed, it’s become a veritable commercial platform, supporting payments and transactions, and is used by businesses to provide real-time support. With that in mind, it’s hardly surprising that much of the focus at the Facebook F8 conference was on Messenger, and the company’s plans for the platform. On stage at the McEnery Convention Center in San Jose, David Marcus, VP of Messaging Products, laid bare the company’s vision for messenger. It’s exciting. You can tell, because Facebook isn’t launching…

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4 Email Newsletter Ideas for Bloggers

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An email newsletter is a great way to promote the awesome content you publish on your blog. According to a study from Radicati, a message is five times more likely to be seen in an email compared to Facebook. Not to mention, email is 40x more effective at acquiring new customers than Facebook or Twitter. However, coming up with fresh and engaging content to send subscribers day after day, week after week and year after year can be harder than you think. Writer’s block happens to the best of us, but don’t get discouraged when you need some fresh ideas for your emails.  To help you plan your next newsletter and send content subscribers will love, read on to get four ideas you can start using today.

1. Repurpose your best legacy content

Writer's block can strike at any moment. If you struggled with what to write on your blog, that could put you in a difficult position when it comes to crafting your email newsletter. For times when you’re light on content, your oldie-but-goodie legacy blog posts should be your best friends. Repurposing older, high-performing blog posts in your newsletter is a great way to source content, save time and drive new traffic to your best work. Consider using your evergreen content (the type that isn’t time-sensitive), such as how-to information and answers to frequently asked questions. If there’s any recent industry news that your post could tie back to, even better. Add that fresh spin to your legacy content in your email newsletter to emphasize its timeliness and importance. In a recent newsletter for our blog, we featured a post, "51 Open-Worthy Subject Line Ideas" that was written months ago – and it resulted in one of our highest performing emails ever! AWeber 51 Subject Line Ideas | Newsletter Ideas for bloggers By repurposing this blog post, we were able to breathe new life into it and double our average click-through rate.

2. Interview an industry thought leader

Are you ready to channel your inner journalist? Interviewing an expert in your field is a great way to entertain, educate and engage your readers, while adding a fresh perspective to your email newsletters. Interviewing influencers can be intimidating, especially if you’ve never conducted an interview. But stepping out of your comfort zone and reaching out to an influencer in your field can do wonders for your credibility and readership, especially if your guest has a large audience. There’s an art to conducting a stimulating, engaging interview. Learning to interview effectively may take some practice, but as long as you research your subject, plan your questions in advance and set up interviews ahead of time, your discussion should be an interesting, exciting addition to your blog’s email newsletter. If you’re feeling particularly creative, try recording these interviews and turning them into videos or podcasts to link back to on your blog. Interviews make for great interactive content, allow you to reach new audiences and help drive engagement for your email newsletters.

3. Feature loyal readers and customers

Just as you can interview and feature high-profile "celebs" within your industry, try doing the same for your loyal readers. In many cases, your readers might better relate to the success story of a person who doesn’t have as much klout as an influencer. Their success might feel more attainable, even if it's not on the same scale as an influencer. On our blog, we frequently share success stories from our customers after conducting in-person interviews. This is helpful because we get to meet and learn about all of the awesome things they’re doing with email marketing to support their businesses or projects. It also inspires our readers who hope to do the same. After posting the customer story, we include it in our weekly blog newsletter, like this one featuring photographer Jared Polin: Jared Polin | Newsletter Ideas for Bloggers | AWeber Pro Tip: Include visuals to further entice your newsletter subscribers to click through to your post. Don’t have a fancy DSLR camera? Use the camera on your mobile phone to capture high-quality images. Then try one of these free design tools to edit your images to perfection. Need a quicker way to feature customers? You might want to consider sharing user-generated content from your subscribers, such as social posts. In Paleo Pete’s email newsletter, he shares Instagram images tagged by his readers and encourages them to keep it up: Paleo Pete | Email Newsletter Ideas for Bloggers |AWeber

4. Provide exclusive offers

Offering incentives to subscribe to your blog’s newsletter is a great way to build your audience, but it’s also an effective way to keep them happy after they've signed up. Adding exclusive freebies, coupons or sneak-peeks into your next newsletter can help you promote a product, strengthen subscriber loyalty and drive traffic to your blog or website. Putting the finishing touches on a new ebook? Offer it to your blog subscribers first in your newsletter  – and let them know! Use this time to collect feedback and gauge interest in it before launching it into the wild. This way, you can delight your existing fans and make improvements to your ebook to increase the appeal and value to newcomers. Or if you offer a paid product, consider sending the occasional “Thank You” discount or freebie to convert your readers into customers.

Send newsletters that knock your subscribers socks off

A well-written and designed email newsletter can help expand your blog’s audience and build relationships with readers. Writing a compelling email that connects with your audience may seem challenging at first, but with the ideas listed above, you should be able to create fresh, creative newsletters subscribers can’t wait to read. For more ideas on what to write in your emails, sign up for our free, seven-day email course, What to Write in Your Emails. As a special bonus, you'll also get 20+ free email content templates! AWeber_ What_to_write_in_your_emails  
 

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Monday, 17 April 2017

Complete Guide to Hashtag Analytics

Dear AWesome Customers: Thank You!

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It’s no secret we love our customers. After all, they constantly inspire us to provide them with remarkable experiences! That's why we push ourselves seven days a week to partner with our customers and help them grow their businesses and audiences with email. And now we’re particularly excited to announce that we've received some additional acknowledgement for it, which is why we’re feeling rather thankful!

National Customer Service Association

NCSA-AllStars-LogoAWeber's Customer Solutions Team was recognized by the National Customer Service Association as the 2017 NCSA All-Star Service Team of the year! It’s such an honor to receive this recognition. As a runner-up in 2016, we pushed ourselves even harder this year to really go above and beyond for our customers. While customer service individuals, teams, and organizations across the US can be nominated for this award, all had to meet certain criteria to be considered. This includes delivering consistent excellent service, going above and beyond normal job duties and living out their organization’s core values. You can imagine how stoked we are to have been chosen as the winner! During the ceremony, speakers talked about the touchpoints brands have with customers and how they impact relationships. Every contact with a customer can build up or break down trust, and it’s important to keep that in mind. As a member of the AWeber team, there isn’t a day that goes by where I don’t feel that connection. It just goes to show that the relationships built between our team and our customers are truly meaningful. Between the connections we have with customers and our shared passion for email marketing, we're able to create remarkable experiences every single day.

Chris Henrich, Director of Customer Solutions, says, “What an incredible honor! This recognition serves as an affirmation that our philosophy of creating genuine partnerships with customers is hugely impactful. Our customers and this team are amazing.”

Stevie® Awards for Sales & Customer Service

Stevie2017_BronzeWinnerBig news from the 2017 Stevie Awards for Sales & Customer Service too! This year, AWeber walked away with not one, but two awards. We received a bronze award for Innovation in Customer Service and another for Customer Service Department of the Year. The Stevie® Awards for Sales & Customer Service is like the industry’s version of The Oscars, so to simply say we’re pumped about this isn’t enough (even though we are!). Jeni Heffner, one of our AWesome Customer Solutions team members headed out to beautiful Las Vegas to accept the awards on the company’s behalf. “I’ve been fortunate to work on AWeber’s Customer Solutions team for four years,” she said. “One thing is for certain, we love what we do. It’s the relationships we have with our customer that make our team so special.” Did you know our 2017 bronze Stevies make AWeber a three-time Stevie award winner? That’s right! In 2016, the Customer Solutions Team won a Gold Stevie for Best Service Industry – Contact Center of the Year. “I think it’s a representation of how much focus our team has,” said Jordan Premick, Customer Solutions Supervisor at AWeber. “If we didn’t believe we could truly make a difference for our customers, we wouldn’t have gotten the award.” “To be recognized two years in a row is an incredible honor,” AWeber’s Director of Customer Solutions, Chris Henrich, said. “Also, we’re ecstatic to share this achievement with our customers around the world. Without them, this wouldn’t be possible.”

Looking Ahead

While we’re still recovering from impromptu dance party-related soreness, we want our customers to know how much we appreciate them! We strive to make every experience remarkable, but we couldn't do it without them. So from the team here at AWeber, thank you! AWeber_CustomerSolutions_GIF

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