Spam Complaints

Email services (Yahoo, Gmail, Hotmail, etc.) are getting more spam-adverse every day. If the people you send emails to mark your message as spam, the email services will take notice.

Email services put up with a certain level of users being spam-button-happy. But if they get too many spam complaints from your email recipients, then they’re not only going to stop sending your emails through to those people–they’ll stop delivering your emails to everyone.

Furthermore, you won’t just get your email address flagged as spam, but they will reject anything coming from your IP address. All the major servers will do this: Yahoo, Gmail, MSN/Hotmail, etc.

Email Content No-No’s

It all starts with the content of your email. Some words and phrases will potentially get your email rejected, regardless of whether it’s actually spam or not. Things to avoid in the subject line and content of your email:

1. FREE. The word “free”, especially in all caps, is a BIG RED FLAG. That’s one reason you see emails break up the word “FREE” into F*R*E*E and FR-EE. Email providers have caught on to this trick. The word “free” isn’t necessarily bad, but phrases like “free membership,” “free money” and “financial freedom” are BIG RED FLAGS as well.

2. Punctuation. More than two !! in a row is going to get you marked as a spammer.

3. ALL CAPS. Sometimes you want to put a little emphasis in your message. Occasionally using ALL

4. CAPITAL LETTERS is not bad. Just don’t leave the “caps lock” key engaged all the time. Take a step back, and then type your message using lower-case letters just like you would do in any other normal communication.

5. MLM. It’s unfortunate, but mentioning “MLM,” “multi-level marketing,” “network marketing” or “business opportunity” will get you marked as spam.

6. Flagged Terms. Terms like “make money,” “make millions,” and multiple “$$$” are all red flags. Any mention of cheap medication, erectile drugs and other common spam fodder will definitely get you thrown into the spam category.

7. Images. If a significant portion of your message is built from images, then providers are going to assume you are trying to slip something past them; spammers often try to hide the content of their message using words in an image.

Pick the Right Email Provider

Often, users will sign up with what looks to be a perfectly legitimate email provider, only to find out that all their messages go straight to spam. Is this because the user is a spammer? No. It’s because they use an email provider that has been flagged as producing a lot of spam. For example, if you manage your email list through a paid service that sends a lot of spam (somebody else’s spam), there is a high degree of likelihood that everything coming from that provider will be marked as spam (including your emails).

1. Make sure your email marketing manager or partner requires (or at least highly encourages) double opt-ins. This will cut down on spam significantly.

2. Ask how they deal with too many spam complaints. For example, the strategic partners used by Richter7 are all very good about keeping spammers out of their systems. They will actually call somebody if they get more than .1% spam complaints over several emails.

3. Ask what is being done to keep in good graces with email services like Yahoo and Gmail. For example, one of Richter7’s main partners actively maintains a good relationship with all the email services to keep any emails sent through them “whitelisted”. Because of this relationship, our clients get the benefit of the doubt when it comes to accepting or rejecting emails.

It’s Easy to Get Your Email Delivered

This may all seem like a lot, but the main thing to remember is to write valuable, relevant emails, send them to people who want to hear from you and use a reputable partner.

Spying on your competition is legal and ethical. It is a time-honored tradition to determine what works and what doesn’t. As the theory goes, let competitors spend the time and money. Then by observing them, you can create something that will have an ROI much quicker than if you started from scratch. With that, you save yourself months of trial and error trying to perfect your online marketing strategies and tactics.

Learn From Your Competition

You probably already know who your competitors are just by reputation. You want to study these companies first because you are probably going to be in direct competition with them; these are the people that you want to outperform.

The first step is quite simple: to beat them, you want to join them. Opt in to as many of their communications as possible:

1. Subscribe to their email lists;
2. Join their site;
3. Join their community; and
4. Read their blog.

Scrutinize Their Strategy

Every business, in order to operate, has to communicate with their customers. Follow these communications; they are the best place to find a gold mine of information and will help you learn what is already working for them. Some things to look for include:

- Your competitor’s marketing message;
- Where they are advertising;
- What types of advertisements are working; and
- What types of customers they are targeting.

With this information, you can quickly shape your marketing strategies at a fraction of the cost and time of your competitors.

But it doesn’t end there. If you are just following in your competitors’ footsteps, then you are only going to be as good as they are. If you want any chance of outdoing them, you will need to expand outside your current list of competitors. If you are local, look at national competitors. If you have a national presence, consider international industries.

Gather Competitors’ Information

So, your competitors with the most high-powered back links, largest customer base, website age and authority are typically ensured a position in the upper echelon of retailers and search engine rankings for multiple keywords and key phrases (such as Wikipedia). Taking on these behemoths is going to be a long-term strategy. But in relationship to a less competitive industry, it may be more wide open to someone with a budget, a great marketing strategy and a well thought-out competitive analysis strategy.

Simply put, if you want to find out why Company A ranks so well for Term B, you need to launch your own investigation online using various methods for extracting their information.

Narrow the Focus

But where do you start? With all the mountains of data available, where is the right place to begin? The key to making this happen is to do it in an organized and effective way.

1. Pare down the mountains of data into small amounts of information.
2. Avoid information overload and analysis paralysis.
3. Quickly analyze the data.
4. Form actionable strategies.

Final items to consider:

1. Watch their ad spending;
2. Watch their top performing keywords;
3. Keep on top of who they are hiring through job posting and LinkedIn;
4. Watch bookmarks through tools such as Delicious; and
5. Watch for changes to their website with tools like Versionista.

So with all this talking about spying on your competition through competitive research analysis, you may be asking yourself the question, “What tools and methods can I actually use to level the playing field?”

This is where Richter7 enters the picture. We have strategies, expertise and tools to help you not only catch up to your competition, but to quickly and effectively surpass them.

Here are a handful of tools and sites you can use to keep an eye, or rather an ear, on what is being said online. (By the way, they’re all free!)

Google Alerts >> http://www.google.com/alerts

Google Alerts are emails you can have automatically sent to you whenever there are new Google results for a specific search term. You can set the alerts to scan news sources, the web, blogs, video, groups, or some all of the above, and schedule how often you want to receive them.

Yahoo! Alerts also offers a similar service.

Technorati >> http://technorati.com

Technorati is the leading search engine for blogs, indexing millions of blogs and pieces of tagged social media. By searching for relevant terms, a brand can connect with the influential bloggers and consumers who are creating and participating in the online conversation. The site also rates the “authority” of a blog by analyzing the number of other blogs that link back to the original post. The service also provides charts and graphs and other analytical tools to keep tabs on trending topics.

Twitter Search >> http://search.twitter.com/

Twitter Search simple enables you to see the “tweets” or individuals posts on Twitter about a given search term. It also identifies the top ten trending topics being discussed on Twitter.

TweetBeep >> http://tweetbeep.com/

TweetBeep is a lot like Google Alerts, except specific to Twitter, with notifications that can be sent to your email hourly or daily. TweetBeep takes it a step further by allowing you to limit the notifications to tweets from individuals within a certain geographical area. It can also separate positive and negative tweets and identify if a tweet is asking a question.

TweetDeck >> http://tweetdeck.com/beta

TweetDeck has become the most popular Twitter desktop application because of its simplicity in organizing and managing different types of tweets into specific columns. You can set up as many columns as you want, each dedicated to showing the real-time tweets for specific search terms or hashtags. It is also helpful for managing multiple Twitter accounts simultaneously if you have both a personal account and a branded corporate account.

Twazzup >> http://www.twazzup.com

Twazzup is essentially a web-based Twitter Search on steroids. Not only does it show the real-time tweets for specific search terms, but it enables you to identify the top trendmakers or users tweeting about that topic. As a brand, this is powerful for identifying and reaching out to the most influential and active participants in a conversation.

WhosTalkin >> http://www.whostalkin.com/

This powerful search engine scans 60 of the Internet’s most popular social media platforms, including some platforms not addressed by some of the other tools such as Facebook, MySpace, YouTube, Flickr, news sites, and others. A simple search can help a brand identify which platforms are seeing the most conversation, and then connect with individuals.

Facebook Lexicon >> http://www.facebook.com/lexicon/

Facebook has been a bit more protective of its content, but is starting to open things up a bit more. Currently in BETA mode, Facebook Lexicon is a powerful tool that populates charts and graphs showing how frequently select search terms appear in profile, group, or event wall conversations. Queries can be run to reveal demographics talking about specific terms, volume by geographic location, associated terms, and other information to help you get a better picture of who is talking about you on Facebook.

There are also a number of paid high-end solutions that can dig deep into the conversations and reveal patterns and other data useful in building a robust social media strategy. Of course the ones listed here are by no means an exhaustive list for all the tools available that make listening possible and easy.

What other tools have you come across that have helped you listen to the online conversation?

Common Paid Search Mistake #1

Not too long ago, I lived in a cockroach-infested apartment where a transient stored his belongings in an Albertsons shopping cart outside my window and someone sawed halfway through my bike lock with a pocket knife.  For three months I paid rent hoping to find something redeeming in my new abode before cutting losses and moving out. Similarly, I’ve paid “rent” bidding on keyword terms, hoping to find value before deleting and moving on.

Richter7 recently launched a new paid search website on which we listed seven common paid search mistakes. Number one on the list is the failure to conduct proper keyword research.  While I was not very thorough in my apartment hunting research, there are many tools and tactics that have helped me (and may help you) become thorough in keyword hunting and avoid the first common mistake.  I’ve listed a few tips below.

Learn from your competitors

If you have established competitors, it’s likely they’ve put a lot of time and money into testing lists of keywords.  They are going to be two steps ahead of you but you can catch up and preempt them by watching what they are currently bidding on and what they’ve stopped bidding on. Review their keywords, bids, budgets, and text ads for clues as to what’s working for them and what’s not. Chances are, you’ll have similar results running your paid search campaign and their history can cut out the guesswork.

Choose keywords with commercial intent

Avoid spending your budget on tire kickers who have no intent to buy, sign up, or participate in what you’re offering.  Anticipate what keywords focused buyers are querying before they purchase.   For example, a person searching for “sports cars” is going to be a lot less likely than someone searching for “2009 Porsche Carrera.”

Review your server log

Choosing keywords to bid on can involve a lot of speculation, but if you have an active website receiving visitors, your server log will tell you exactly what search terms visitors typed in to land on your site.  If you’re not sure where to find your server log, contact your hosting provider for help.

Think negatively

A common mistake in the keyword creation phase is not researching possible negative keywords.  While the positive keywords drive traffic to your site, negative keywords will filter out the wrong visitors, decrease your bounce rate, and save you from paying for unwanted clicks.  For example, a company selling Elvis Costello posters would want to spend an equal amount of time adding keywords to find Elvis Costello fans as they would trying to weed out Elvis Presley fans  by adding negative keywords like “Presley,” “The King,” “jumpsuits,” “Hawaii,” “impersonator,” etc.