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I've been working in the email marketing space for many years. Periodically I see email promotions, or components of messages that trigger the, "why didn't I think of that?" reflex. On the rare occasion that I have those moments, I am compelled to write about them - and give kudos when they're due. So today, I pay homage to Southwest Airlines for providing me with a "why didn't I think of that" moment and for that I thank you.

This promotion almost completely makes a subject line strategy completely moot in driving open metrics for the Southwest Click 'n Save email program entirely, and in its place? Good 'ol fashioned bribery. It's genius! I mean, really, why didn't I think of that? It starts with a very direct subject line, "Winter fares on sale, plus a chance to win*!" I'll admit, you do have to open this message to see why this is so smart - but if you do, here's the treat: "Keep opening our e-mails and you could win free travel!" There it is, the bribe to continue opening their email. I love it!

Now, as I scrutinize it more closely there are some opportunities to take a great program and make it outstanding. For example:

• - Socialize this heck out of this email and ask subscribers to share this great promotion with their social networks

• - Leverage sites like Twitter, Facebook and even TripAdvisor to tell the masses - further minimizing the need for a subject line

• - Put it right in the subject line, "Open our email and you could win free roundtrip tickets*"

Southwest has done a terrific job at incorporating content that is viral, engaging and fun in their email campaigns but unfortunately are not actively asking their subscriber base to share it or pass it along. The assumption is that the recipient may share with others, but if you don't ask you can't really expect it.

The other question that looms (which triggers a series of other questions based on the response), albeit a terrific promotion, what's the objective? I assume it is either to drive more opens or drive more subscribers. If it is the former, there must be a direct and compelling correlation between open and conversions. If so, is that correlation minimized because the open behavior is less genuine? If is the latter - then why is there no direct call to share with friends?

Or maybe, just maybe - it is just a fun way to gain entry in to a sweepstakes and I am making it way too complicated - which is ALWAYS a possibility. What do you think? Like it, love it, indifferent?

MarketingSherpa ran an in-depth case study on StrongMail customer FootSmart.com today that is a good example of great transactional email strategy. I encourage you all to give it a read. The key take away from this study is that email marketing is a continually changing discipline. Your customer base is constantly morphing, so it’s important that your email marketing and transactional email strategies stay fresh and be revisited periodically. As our email marketing experts are fond of saying, you are never done testing – and the same applies to your program strategy.

Because their transactional email streams had a 30% higher open rate than their promotional email, FootSmart sensed an opportunity to monetize those unique views with a fresh approach to their transactional email strategy. By integrating StrongMail’s transactional email platform with their customer database, web analytics platform/product recommendation engine (CoreMetrics) and product reviews platform (Bazzarvoice), FootSmart was able to implement relevant offers into their transactional email based on past purchase history and consumer ratings and reviews. The results were impressive, with FootSmart projecting an additional $750K in additional revenue from the program in 2009. The revenue generated per each email from their cart abandonment program alone jumped from $1.95 to $4.00. Not only did this double revenue for this program, it’s significantly more than the $0.15 driven by a typical promotional email.

Here are links to the following resources:

Marketing Sherpa Article >>

Press Release >>

Full Case Study >>

If you’re not already leveraging your transactional email streams such as order confirmations, shipping notices, password reminders and welcome emails, to drive conversions, there’s never been a better time to start. StrongMail can help you launch a new program from scratch, or revitalize an existing program for greater returns.

As my first post on the Email Marketing Insight blog, I thought I would give you some background on me.

When I tell one of my three children to hold the railing when coming down the stairs or not to touch the hot oven, they are taking advantage of my years of experience negating minor burns and abrasions.

In my non-mommy role, there is hardly a day that goes by that I’m not explaining to a colleague, prospect or client the “why” of the methodology behind an email strategy or the technology that drives it. The moniker of “email expert” didn’t come without years of research, hundreds of hours of coding experience, industry conferences and countless debates on best practices with fellow email cronies. Did I also mention that I’m a very humble person? (smile) Title aside, I’ve earned my email chops and in the end, what’s in my head can help you. All you need to do is take notes and be ready for answers that you might not want to hear.

As email marketers, we are all at different stages of our career and the sophistication level of the marketer on the other end of the line often correlates with the amount of information that is digested and eventually incorporated. My role is more about taking a concept and serving it up in a way that is understandable from the tech folks to those looking at the bottom line. With the tug and pull of getting the most of your email program in the shortest amount of time, those little nuggets of goodness might get lost. Sure, search long enough and you can eventually find someone who will tell you what you want to hear; however, good things don’t come easy. Engaging with an email expert and giving them your ear can definitely make things easier.

I liken my role in the email world as more of an email doctor. I can help fix problems but also provide a bit of insight on the best plan to keep your email programs healthy and fit, as well as ideas on how to grow big and strong. So I might say “because I said so,” but know that I’ve got your best interests at heart. If you have got the time to listen, I’ll gladly explain why.

Social media is widely billed as the new paradigm for marketers. Everyone wants a piece of it, but many email marketers are still struggling with how to leverage this new channel to drive greater returns from their existing campaigns. Today, StrongMail announced the results of our first case study on the subject, profiling how personal financial site Mint.com leveraged the two channels together to drive new customer acquisition, and the results are impressive.

First a little background on StrongMail Influencer, a new product from StrongMail that enables email marketers to integrate social functionality into their email marketing campaigns and track the results. Influencer campaigns harness the psychology of the social web to determine what offers will inspire recipients to share a given brand with their friends or colleagues, and provides them with a rich social media interface in which to share. Using Influencer, email marketers can identify, motivate, track and re-market to their top social media influencers to exponentially increase brand engagement and response. Watch a Quick 2-minute Demo >>

Mint.com was trying to increase the size of their user base and wanted to leverage social media to tap the power of their already engaged opt-in list. Working with StrongMail, Mint.com was able to identify key motivators for social sharing among its users, and developed two offers and a control group for an A/B Test. After testing the offers, Mint.com quickly determined the winner, which surprisingly was an offer for free access to beta features. (The other offer was a free iPod for every three friends that signed up.)

Mint.com deployed the winning campaign to the rest of their opt-in list, resulting in a 48% unique open rate. Of those, over 10 percent became "Influencers" for the Mint.com brand by sharing the invitation with an average of 5 friends each, significantly expanding its reach. These invitations generated an unprecedented 61 percent click-through rate among friends viewing the invitation and every 2.6 invite clicks on the invitation led to one friend becoming a Mint.com user. Ultimately, Mint.com was able to generate over 8,000 new accounts as a result of this campaign. A copy of the full case study is posted here, if you would like more detail.

StrongMail is helping email marketers across a wide range of industries drive more value from their email marketing campaigns using StrongMail Influencer. Contact us today if you would like to discuss how we can help you effectively leverage social media to drive increased brand awareness, new customer acquisition, and new revenue.

As StrongMail spends more time working with email marketers to accelerate their program through the social web, we find ourselves constantly reminding clients that email is still the preferred channel for customer communications with brands.

Nowhere is this more true than in service-oriented or transactional emails. Read my latest MediaPost Email Insider post as a reminder about how critical it is to ensure that your transactional email streams are just as relevant as your Facebook Fan page!