Real Point Blog

Is email marketing dead?

Ian ODonnell — Wed, 18 Aug 2010 22:11:54 +0000

With all the buzz about social media, it's easy to ignore email in your online marketing mix. Is it worth spending your time writing an e-newsletter? Or should we just spend our time updating Twitter and Facebook?

The answer is a resounding yes, and like so many things in online marketing it works even better when combined with social media. A recent survey of 500 million emails found a threefold improvement in click throughs when social media sharing links were included in email newsletters.

So we thought we would share a few tips for successful email marketing.

Be focused

It's very tempting, as it's so cheap and easy, to send to everyone on your mailing list. But don't! Segregate your mailing list to those for whom it's most relevant, and write in a way that will appeal to them rather than generically. Not only will this improve response but it will also decrease the risk of "overload" by recipients receiving way too many emails from you, many of which they find completely irrelevant, causing them to add you to their spam list.

Have clear calls to action

What are you wanting to achieve from your email campaign? Make sure that the email you're sending makes the response you're looking for easy to achieve.

Work alongside your social media

Writing an article in your newsletter, make sure that your recipients can comment on your blog or Facebook discussions. Can they share the article from your newsletter with friends on their social network, do you always feature buttons to allow recipients to become fans or followers? Considering all of these things when putting together your email will improve the success of both your email and your social media campaign.

Build relationships and prove expertise, don't just sell

Don't just use your email to hard sell your latest product, email is great for building relationship and especially for proving expertise. Providing great content not only proves your expertise in your industry, but also increases the chance of your email being forwarded on and kept for future reference.

Test, test, test

If checking your website across different browsers causes you headaches, it's nothing to checking the appearance of your email newsletter, especially since Office 2007. Check out the email standards project website for more information. So make sure you check your email's appearance in as many viewing platforms as possible including web based email. Also, as with any marketing, test different subject lines and content, both to reduce the risk of being spam blocked and improve open rates.

I hope these tips have reignited your enthusiasm for email marketing. If you need help getting an email marketing campaign off the ground, or to improve the performance of what you're doing now, give us a call.

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Challenge yourself

Ian ODonnell — Mon, 31 May 2010 21:51:44 +0000

Do you like challenges? I love them, I enjoy the chance to stretch myself, pushing myself a bit harder. It could be creatively - making a client stand out from the crowd. It could be technically - developing a website that pushes the boundaries of what's possible.

However, next week it's not a client who's setting me a big challenge, but myself and it's my legs being challenged not my brain. I've always enjoyed cycling, but the last few years I haven't kept up the training, so to get myself back into shape I set myself the big challenge of cycling round the North coast of Scotland. My Dad's joining me (who hasn't let himself get out of shape) and we'll be cycling around 400 miles over some pretty hilly terrain. If you want to give us a bit of extra encouragement you can sponsor us via JustGiving.

So how does Real Point's skill set fit into this? We've set up a blog for the ride which makes use of several social media services. We're also using an iPhone app, Cyclemeter, which allows us to live update our Twitter feed with our progress. We plan to use the iPhone to update all aspects of the blog while we're on the ride - from taking photos and uploading straight to our Flickr feed, updating the blog using the WordPress app, keeping followers up to date with Tweetdeck, which allows us to quickly up date Twitter, Facebook and Linkedin.

So if you've got a big challenge, why not see if the creativity at the Real Point office can help you? And if you want to know more about effective use of social media on the move, just give us a call.

But most importantly - what big challenge are you going to set yourself?

Kings of the Castle at Warwickshire & Coventry FSB awards

Ian ODonnell — Sat, 15 May 2010 12:20:18 +0000

A great night out on Friday for Real Point, we recently entered the Federation of Small Businesses (FSB) Warwickshire & Coventry Awards in the staff training and development category, and Friday was the big revealing at Warwick castle.

The big question, who were going to be Kings and Queens of the castle?

Well, Real Point didn't quite make it as King, so does that makes us knights? We came runner up in our category. But it was great to see friends and clients also doing well in the awards, and a fantastic time was had by all. If you haven't entered any business awards, why not? It's a great chance to get some press coverage for your business, one of the business owners who I spoke to had already increased business from coverage in his local paper.

And in case you're wondering, Broad Lane Vets from Coventry, were crowned business of the year. For the winners in each category, visit the FSB website.

Words and Geography

Ian ODonnell — Sat, 01 May 2010 14:35:31 +0000

This weekend was the re-opening of the Midlands Arts Centre in Birmingham, a centre for creativity located opposite Edgebaston Cricket Ground. It's a great place; you can drop in for a coffee, watch a film or play, see the latest collection in the gallery or try your hand at DJing and pottery making.

What really caught my eye was the wall art in one of the galleries, a collection of words suggested by members of the public that represented Birmingham. Isn't it incredible that with just a few words you can instantly set the scene, you're left in no doubt with these what they represent.

So do your words have power, to attract, repel or just switch people off? Make sure, on your next project, that it doesn't just look good but "sounds" good to!

Being sent to Coventry is no bad thing!

Ian ODonnell — Sat, 10 Apr 2010 20:27:16 +0000

This weekend was CovFest, local bands playing at venues accross the city centre and all ticket sales going to the

Snowball Charity. Coventry is Real Point's local city, so as a creative company do we have creative neighbours?
The answer is a definite yes. Some great music proving that the Coventry music scene didn't start and end with Two Tone. Highlights for us included Si Hayden, Kristy Gallacher and Verity Pablo.
So if you're looking for a creative agency then Real Point may be the one for you, and if you're looking for a creative city then Coventy should be on your list. Great venues, great music and great talent, it's probably no coincidence that we're neighbours!

4amProject 2010

Ian ODonnell — Sun, 04 Apr 2010 05:35:11 +0000

I once again set my alarm for a time way to early to be up on a Sunday morning and took part in the 4amProject, taking photos around Coventry at 4am in the morning on the 4/4. This time I visited the Canal Basin and Coventry Transport Museum, hope you like the outcome.

This is the second time I've taken part, last year's photos are still on Flickr, and the 4am Project's growing Flickr stream provides a fascinating glimpse of a time most of us never see, all around the world. So why not get your camera out and see what happen's where you live and work at 4am in the morning? Or if getting up then is just a bit too early, get some creative inspiration from the images of others.

FSB National Conference

Ian ODonnell — Sat, 20 Mar 2010 12:28:32 +0000

It's been an interesting last couple of days at the FSB conference 2010 which I have been attending. We have had some high profile speakers including Peter Mandelson and Alex Salmond who made good use of the platform to put forward their parties agenda for the coming election, the big question is just how much do we trust them to deliver?

Several speakers said just how important small business is to the economic recovery with one Labour MP saying that one of the best ways to make a difference would be if each small business were just to employ just one new employee. Which seems just a tad out of line with their planned increase in employer's National Insurance, a tax on on employing people, hardly an incentive!

Oh and by the way said same MP said that Twitter was a wste if time!

Sponsoring the Unusual and Creative

Ian ODonnell — Thu, 18 Feb 2010 20:21:45 +0000

The unusual and the creative, we love that at Real Point, so when given the chance to sponsor a photograph at a new photography exhibition at Coventry Transport museum, we jumped at it. The exhibition shows the Peugeot Ryton Plant during the final production period, a reflection on the end of an era in Coventry manufacturing, but certainly not the end of the creative and enterprising spirit that gave birth to the many motoring legends designed and built here.

The images are all taken by Lens Art, a local Coventry photography company. The colours of "Paint Shop - waiting for inspection" leapt out the page at us, making that our sponsorship choice.

Lens Art's website has photographs of BBC presenter Vic Minett at the Tracks of Emotion exhibition at the Coventry Transport Museum as part of the BBC series Peugeot: The Lion's Legacy.

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Twitter at work

Ian ODonnell — Mon, 15 Feb 2010 09:30:08 +0000

Many people see Twitter and other social media services as time wasters, still unsure of their benefit in the real world. But as Donato, Vankilter and myself can all testify, it works in the real world.

I met Andy, from Vankilter, a little while ago at the Solihull Business Breakfast, but as so often happens never got round to doing anything about seeing him to get the Kilt I wanted.

The other day, Donato, a business friend and avid Twitter user was at his shop and posted a picture of the kilts there. This prompted me to answer saying "I keep meaning to get a kilt", a few messages later and Andy phoned me, resulting in my visit to his shop and a kilt on order (Donato has also posted about this)

So next time someone asks, "why are you wasting your time on Twitter", answer "Because you never know just who might be interested".

The Price of Free - BBC Virtual Revolution

Ian ODonnell — Sat, 13 Feb 2010 22:44:43 +0000

Another interesting episode of BBC's Virtual Revolution, interesting not because I learnt a great deal, but because it shows again how polarised opinion can be. As I enjoyed the ability to engage in debate and comment through twitter as I watched the programme, it demonstrated that some:

Are happy to make the trade - free services for my personal information (I happily stake my claim here)
Are nervous about who holds the information, and in to whose hands it will fall
Are blissfully unaware of just how much information is being collated and how it is being used

It is this last group that perhaps most concern me. As our use of digital services increase, and as everyone, from my parents to the young people at my youth group, search and post online, how educated are we on what this means? For many of us watching Virtual Revolution, we are well aware and as such make informed decisons, but I do think there needs to be some work done to ensure that everyone makes as informed a decision.

As I commented during the programme, "What happens in Vegas, no longer stays in Vegas" but do we all fully realise and appreciate that?