Heres a question for you. What did you use to send email before there was a program called Microsoft Outlook? I for one used a program called Eudora for windows. Not that many people know about Eudora but it was once the best email clients there was on the market way back in 1996. Fast forward ten years later and most of us are using the latest version of Microsoft Outlook. Outlook has been very good to me over the years and it will continue to be the main source on which I send and receive email on a daily basis. Microsoft Outlook has many strengths as an email client, calendar and task manager but it will not do some things that are almost required to be successful in email marketing. Microsoft Outlook falls short in sending out bulk or broadcast emails to ones client email list. If you are still using Microsoft Outlook to send email to your many distribution lists then you have an idea of this limitation. Here are the seven questions that you need to ask yourself to know that your business has outgrown Microsoft Outlook. 1. Distribution Lists Management If you are having trouble keeping your distribution list organized and you dont have a clue who is on or off them? You may have outgrown Microsoft Outlook. 2. Duplicate emails If you send out emails and are not sure if you sent the same email out more than one time to the same person? You may have outgrown Microsoft Outlook. 3.Using BCC over CC If you are confused or not sure when to use BCC (Blind Carbon Copy) over CC (Carbon Copy) then you may have outgrown Microsoft Outlook. 4. Follow up If you do have someone who signs up to be on your mailing list and you dont have a way to automatically get back to them based on the date or how long he or she subscribed then you may have outgrown Microsoft Outlook. 5. Email Campaign Reporting If you have no idea if the people you send email too even receive or even opened the email message then you may have outgrown Microsoft Outlook. 6. Personalization If you are unable to personalize your broadcast emails and cant send the same email message to the many people on your list by name then you may have outgrown Microsoft Outlook. 7. Segmentation If you have no way of determining who on you list fits the target market in which you are focusing your email messages then you may have outgrown Microsoft Outlook. So you may be asking if I have answer at least 3 out of 7 questions with a Yes then what am I to do? Well 3 out 7 means your company should be in the market for a third party broadcast email service or software. There are several broadcast email service and software answers. Two of the best hosted services are from Roving Software Incorporated and Broadwick Corporation. Roving Software puts out one of the most popular hosted services, Constant Contact and Broadwick counters with Intellicontact. Both are very similar in features and price. These two broadcast email services are ideal for the micro to small businesses who cant afford to outsource entirely but do want some of the responsibility of the sending of the email off their hands. One of the most noted software solutions to broadcast email is a company by the name of Arial Software. Their flagship software Campaign Enterprise gives professionals one of the most advanced permission email marketing programs in the industry. Last but not least there is one more alternative and that is a Microsoft Outlook Add-on. This is a software program that installs and attaches itself right on the Outlook menu bar. Summit 5 software has a great add-on called SwiftPage email. No matter which one you choose, all will be able to satisfy your needs when it comes to outgrowing Microsoft Outlook. Take time to test drive each alternative and see which one works better for your type of business. But who knows, once you try one of these alternatives you may find out that your growth spurt just has not happened quite yet. In that case just stay with what you know until it does happen and believe me it will. May you all continue to take your businesses 2 the next level of success. |
