I recently attended the Marketo Summit 2012 in San Francisco.  While I really enjoyed the opportunity to learn more about Marketo’s marketing automation software, I also was thrilled at the number of sessions focused on general marketing tips, tricks and best practices.

Some of the takeaways served as reminders, but many were inventive new ideas with case studies and testing to back them up! One of my favorite sessions was “Writing Better Emails and Landing Pages.” While crafting better emails for lead generation and lead nurturing is an age-old marketing topic, the presenter did an excellent job of really providing outside the box ideas for moving marketing emails from delivery, to open, to click thru!

Without further ado, here are some key takeaways from that session:

Email Marketing Timing:

• Send emails early in the morning if possible.  Studies have shown that emails sent first thing in the morning are more likely to be read.
• Schedule automated emails to be sent in a more human-like fashion. For example, rather than scheduling an immediate follow up email from sales prompted by a case study download (e.g., “Thank you for your interest in our services – would you like a demo? ”), schedule it to send out the next morning.  This makes the email appear less automated and more personable.

Email Marketing Subject Lines:

• Keep your subject line to eight words or less – this keeps subjects short and sweet and more likely to be opened!
• Use brackets in your subject line when possible to call out your offer.  This goal is to make it stand out in an inbox e.g., “[Webcast Tomorrow] Register Now!”.  Differentiating your email is key.
• Address your recipient directly in the email and subject line – e.g., “What You Need to Know about Marketing Automation” versus “What CMOs Need to Know about Marketing Automation.”
• Want to avoid being marked as spam? Don’t use “free” in the subject line.

Email Marketing Content:

• Use bullets or numbered lists at the top of your email – people skim emails and you want your message as clear and concise as possible.
• Always use clickable links versus URLs.  What does this mean? It’s the difference between “Visit our website” (hyperlinking to the site) versus “www.launch-marketing.com.” The first is a clear call to action and much more compelling.
• Don’t use URL shorteners in your clickable links in emails. Sites like Bitly are awesome for Twitter or other places where you are limited to a word count, but using a shortened URL in your email links could mark it as spam and affect deliverability.
• Always use a greeting/salutation such as “Hello [First Name].”  This makes your email appear more personal, and less like spam.
• Here’s a new one – include typos in emails intentionally!  This typo tactic is used often by sales teams when sending out automated emails. Their goal is to appear as if they were typing the email at 7am at their desk and they happened to make a few typos as they were following up with each prospect individually.
• Last but not least – have ONE call to action.  The best way to ensure your most important link is clicked is by providing only one option to click!

I hope you found these tips as insightful as I did.  If you have any to add, let me know – I’d love to add them to the list!

Interested in more B2B marketing tips and tricks? Read these tips to increase demand generation email response rates.  Also, follow Launch on Twitter & Facebook!

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Day 1 of the Marketo Summit started off with a lively ballroom full of 1400 excited attendees looking forward to a jam-packed agenda of exciting keynotes and breakout sessions.

Below are a few of our favorite highlights from Day 1:

• Marketo CEO and founder Phil Fernandez kicks off the morning with marketing and sales strategies for thriving in “A Brave New World”.  He also announces the launch of two new Marketo products: “Marketo Social Boost” and “Marketo Social Promotions”.
• Sue Bostrom, former CMO of Cisco, delivers a motivating keynote with tips to succeed in a “Brave New World” and asks the thought-provoking question “Where do you want to see your company in the next 3-5 years if it was featured in a popular magazine/blog?”.
• Marketo announces that you can now rename anything in Marketo, not just folders – huge applause throughout the room!
• Jay Baer’s lunch keynote “Destroying the 7 Myths of B2B Social Media”.  Lots of great myth-busters and loved his quote “If you think your customers aren’t using social media that is because you are not using social media.”  So true!
• Chocolate covered strawberries in the afternoon break – enough said.
• The afternoon “Advanced Nurturing Deep Dive” breakout session was a full-house and received a flurry of twitter action on the #mus12 hashtag.
• Visual note taking by Image Think  was going on throughout the presentations – very cool way to capture the sessions!

• It hasn’t happened yet, but we’re sure tonight’s upcoming gala at The Winery on Treasure Island will be another highlight to add to this list.

We can’t wait to see what tomorrow brings!

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