Are you having problems with your email campaigns losing appeal to your target audience? Have click rates started to drop? There are a few ways you can adjust your email message to increase the appeal to your target audience.

One of the most effective ways to increase email response rates is to give recipients a number of ways to interact with the email. Most email campaigns have a couple of links and that is the only action a reader can take. Think about adding an email address link for responses, a phone number or an SMS short code. If you want to get even more creative include a video message or a short survey that can be completed in the body of the email. Including coupons or special offer codes are other great ways to increase reader interest.

Make sure the email message is short and concise. We see so many email creatives that are overloaded in text. It is very difficult for the reader to find the message when there is so much to wade through. Keep the text simple and the graphics relevant and the reader will not be overwhelmed with too much information. The email should be used as a teaser to encourage individuals to visit your website!

Email marketing remains one of the most effective ways to reach a specific target. Increasing the effectiveness of email messages ultimately increases website traffic and conversions.

Posted by Betsy Larson, CollegeRecruiter.com on May 21, 2009 at 12:39 PM | Leave a Comment (0)

Are you suddenly having issues with your email campaigns being relegated to junk mail or SPAM folders? Try taking a closer look at your subject line. Do you have punctuation? Is a word all in CAPS? These are a just a couple of the things that virtually guarantee your email message will end up being flagged as junk mail. Here are a few quick tips to help reroute that email to the recipients inbox.

1. Eliminate puntuation. Particularly offensive to SPAM filters are quotation marks, exclamation points and dollar signs.


2. Do not include any words in ALL CAPS or us extra S p a c e s in words.


3. Keep the subject line as simple as you can while still conveying your message effectively. The greater the number of words, the greater the chance of it going into a SPAM filter.


4. Avoid certain words like free, guarantee, act now, apply. For a more comprehensive list, visit Top 100 Words to NOT use in a Subject Line.

Posted by Betsy Larson, CollegeRecruiter.com on May 20, 2009 at 10:25 AM | Leave a Comment (0)

Author and speaker, Tom Sullivan, said, "People buy difference, not similarity." Never has this been truer than in today's economy. After all, if you don't differentiate your products and services from the competition, they become a commodities and trade on the basis of price. Unless you want to be the low price leader, it's imperative that your clients perceive that you offer much greater value than your competition.

When we ask clients in our workshops to list the ways they differentiate their products or services, typically the only differentiator that they mention is their products and services. They get a good reality check when I point out that their prospects frequently can't tell the difference between their products and services and those of their competitors. This leads them to the sad conclusion that there is no difference, which is not the case.

Another speaker and author, Don Hutson, points out in his iLearning Global presentation "Sui Generis" (Latin for "one of a kind"), that there are seven ways in which you can differentiate yourself from the completion.

1. Product Differentiation. You must be continually looking for ways to make your products and services better.
2. Price Differentiation. If you're going to be the low cost provider, you need to be incredibly efficient because of the narrow profit margin.
3. Relationship Differentiation. If you build strong relationships with clients, they will stay with you forever. Create a marketing plan to continually stay top of mind. Here are three easy ideas:
- Send birthday, holiday, July 4th and anniversary cards.
- Never eat alone. Invite prospects and clients to lunch or dinner. This is such a great idea that Keith Ferrazzi and Tahl Raz wrote a book about it - Never Eat Alone: And Other Secrets to Success, One Relationship at a Time.
- Invite clients and prospects to sporting events, concerts and the theater.
4. Experience Differentiation. Create a positive experience for clients. A big part of the experience is providing excellent customer service. If you haven't already, read The Experience Economy to guide you in producing an awesome experience for your clients.
5. Process Differentiation. This is how you do what you do. At Pygmalion Inc. we created a unique seven-month program we term The Great Communicator Program™ that takes clients through three well-defined stages. How good is your process?
6. Technological Differentiation. Are you versed in Web 2.0? If not, you need to get busy. Connecting with clients and prospects on LinkedIn, Facebook, Twitter and YouTube is quickly becoming the preferred method, especially for the Millennials.
7. Marketing Differentiation. Having better marketing plans and selling skills can make a big difference. If you can outsell the competition, you are destined to win more business and dominate the market. You must be continually learning and building your selling skills.

Gary Hankins is a communication expert and President of Pygmalion, Inc. in Los Angeles, CA. As the author of The Power of the Pitch: Transform Yourself Into a Persuasive Presenter and Win More Business, he teaches clients how to influence the decision, close the deal, get the job or win the vote. Contact him at gary.hankins@pygmalion.com.

Posted by Candice Arnold on May 15, 2009 at 2:27 PM | Leave a Comment (0)

Testing your product or service is critical to your longterm business success. Many businesses jump right into product manufacture and distribution before they truly know if they have a viable product that the marketplace wants.

In the article "6 Ways to Get Fast Feedback" on 1000ventures.com, they give some great tips on getting started with market testing. Initially you will want to set some pricing parameters for your product. If it's a physical product that you are manufacturing, you can just go off a certain percentage mark-up above cost. Industry analysis will help with this decision. If it's an information product, the great thing is you can test different price points as well. Just be prepared to tell people a price when you approach them.

Once you have done some analysis of the market and have established some pricing parameters, start approaching would be buyers about the product and get their feedback. As the article above states, you can do this at trade shows, approach people you know who maybe interested and go to places where your target customer is going to be. Another great resource is to do surveys to get some initial feedback. I will caution that verbal feedback is one thing. People actually buying the product is another.

Your product or service starts with a great idea. "6 Ways to get Fast Feedback" shares the story of Ross Perot to illustrate this. Getting a customer to front manufacture costs can be a great strategy to get started. However, you must have high integrity to make this work. If you take someone's money for a product/service, you better deliver the goods. Your reputation is critical in business and doing this wrong will kill it.

Last, take a look at the budget you have allotted to test. Many entrepreneurs try and skimp here to save some money. Unfortunately, handling this wrong up front is much more expensive than if you just went out and tested in the first place. Make sure you have a budget or resources available to do some market testing.

What avenues have been successful for you when testing an idea?

Brandon Allen is a business and vision coach with The Business Blueprint. Brandon focuses on helping businesses get clear on their vision, mission, core values and leadership. Brandon is the author of the small business blog Build Your Soul Purpose ( www.buildyoursoulpurpose.com).

Posted by Candice Arnold on May 14, 2009 at 12:09 PM | Leave a Comment (0)

We all know that happy customers are great for prospecting for new ones--through referrals and introductions, and also through getting testimonials that you can use in your customer communication materials. But there is one medium that I have yet to see leveraged to its fullest potential for this purpose: video.

Video is a powerful tool in capturing what a happy customer says about how you helped them (and in some cases, showing). More importantly, however, video can capture the emotion of those happy customers in a way that cannot be expressed in written word alone. This all can be accomplished by creating a Customer Showcase. Continue reading ...

Keith F. Luscher is author of the book Prospect & Flourish, and is a Marketing Representative with Principal Financial Group. Prior to joining Principal, he served professionals in the insurance and financial services industries as a management consultant. In that role, he advised producers on issues related to marketing and prospecting, and developed groundbreaking educational curriculum. Luscher is also a nationally known author, speaker, and expert in media, interpersonal communication and marketing.

Posted by Candice Arnold on May 12, 2009 at 1:08 PM | Leave a Comment (0)

Telephones have been around since at least 1876 and perhaps even 1,000 years before that but it wasn't until the 1990's that the telephone became a portable device. Cordless and cellular phones became popular and as the costs for cellular phones dropped, the need for a regular, land line also decreased.

Last week, the Centers for Disease Control released a study showing that we may have reached a tipping point. For the first time in history, the number of households which have only cellular / mobile phones was greater than the number of households which have only land lines. According to the study, some 20 percent of U.S. homes only have mobile phones while only 17 percent only have land lines. That ratio has changed dramatically. As recently as 2003 the number of mobile-only homes stood at just three percent while 43 percent only had landlines.

So where is this growth in mobile-only phones coming from? As you probably guessed, Gen Y. The study broke young adults into two age groups. In the first group, those between the ages of 18 and 24 years old, 33 percent reported living in households with only mobile phones. In the second group, those between the ages of 25 and 29, a whopping 40 percent reported living in households with only mobile phones.

Interestingly, the percentages of those living in homes with only mobile phones wasn't just determined by age. Other groups who are likely to live in homes without landlines include the poor, renters, Hispanics, southerners, midwesterners, and those living with unrelated adults such as roommates or unmarried couples.

Approximately 60 percent of homes have both landlines and mobile phones and two percent have no phones at all.

Posted by Steven Rothberg, CollegeRecruiter.com on May 12, 2009 at 7:31 AM | Leave a Comment (0)

It seems at times like hardly a week goes by when we don't add another blog. Many and perhaps most of the other premium job boards don't have even a single blog yet we have 12 blogs and we use blogging software to post our press releases and we run the Recruiting Blogswap, a free recruiting article exchange service where you can post an article to run for free on someone else's blog or you can receive articles for free to run on your blog.

Oh. Did I write that we have 13 blogs? Well, that's so last week. We now have 13 blogs. Please join me in welcoming the newest addition to our family: the CollegeRecruiter.com Insights by Consumer Marketers Blog. We'll use that blog to better communicate tips, strategies, and the occasional wacky article to clients of ours who want to stay current on how best to market their products and services to today's college students, recent graduates, and alumni.

Posted by Steven Rothberg, CollegeRecruiter.com on May 11, 2009 at 3:53 PM | Leave a Comment (0)

CollegeRecruiter.com has historically done a pretty good job of diversifying its revenue streams. When the economy is robust, we generate healthy revenues and profits from the employment advertising as well as the consumer marketing sides of our business. When the economy falters, the consumer marketing side of our business tends to support the employment advertising side of our business and allow us to live to fight another day even while some of our worthy competitors run out of cash and close their doors.

But even though we've done a pretty good job of understanding that the students, recent graduates, and alumni who use CollegeRecruiter.com are also consumers of products and services that have nothing to do with employment and we've helped the marketers of those products connect with the users of our site, we didn't have anyone on our sales team devoted to servicing our consumer marketing clients. That is, we didn't until this past fall. Betsy Larson, national account executive, and Sarah Ennenga, client services representatives, head up our strong and getting stronger consumer marketing business.

Over the coming weeks and months, expect to see a number of articles posted by Betsy, me, and others to this new blog. Our goal with this blog is to bring to light interesting and sometimes new ideas in the world of consumer marketing. You'll occasionally see references to products offered by CollegeRecruiter.com but this isn't a place where press releases go to die. Rather, this is a place where we will try to engage our consumer marketing clients in a conversation. Like most blogs, that conversation will often be pretty one way, but we'll welcome comments and contributions by those who have views which are important, whether they line up with ours or not. If you want to contribute a comment, just click on the link by the relevant article. If you want to contribute an article, contact our content coordinator, Candice Arnold.

Enjoy!!

Posted by Steven Rothberg, CollegeRecruiter.com on May 11, 2009 at 10:15 AM | Leave a Comment (0)