5 Tips for Testing Emails [Video]

The following is a screencast of a presentation I gave this week at the Email Roundtable in Vancouver sponsored by Silverpop. The Email Roundtable happens in various cities and is an intimate event where email marketing professionals get together to network, discuss the latest developments and trends in the industry and share tips on optimizing email campaigns.

Can't see video? View the post at Get Elastic.

In the presentation I mentioned a few websites, tools and blog references and as promised they are listed below:

SplitTester.com - calculator to determine if test is statistically valid
http://splittester.com/

Istorez.com - browse by topic/holiday/season, retailer, category
View entire campaigns of competitors, get inspiration, build swipe file of design, copy and headlines
NOTE: Istorez.com no longer exists.

Sample Size calculator
http://tinyurl.com/sample-size

Track offline conversions
http://tinyurl.com/offline-tracking

At the event, I was asked to clarify what "honeypot addresses" are but did not address it in the video, so I'll do it here. A "honeypot" address (also known as a spamtrap) is an email address designed only to receive spam. Sometimes this is an account someone uses to fulfill the email field requirement in certain forms to receive certain offers (admit it, you've got one). It can also be an old address that has been abandoned for a while that is deactivated, and then re-activated to catch email senders who continue to send to old lists. More details here.

Later in the evening, the group discussed email cadence (the frequency which you email) and how long is too long to wait to email someone. The Bronto Blog has an interesting article on the issue of "email shelf life."