Customer Support Tips & Tricks

As the Director of Customer Support and someone who has been with BizActions for over eight years now -  I have watched the company grow from eight people to twenty eight, watched the system transform from its early stages of basic functionality into the robust platform it is today and witnessed the needs of our customers change and expand with the desire to do more than just  send an email newsletter.  I must say it has been quite a ride and one that I am proud to be a part of.  When I first started back in March of 2001, I was one of two Customer Support Representatives who worked closely with new accounts to help them get up and running.  Most of what we did was implementation training and what we like to call reactive support.  Although we did those things very well at that time, as a company we began to see the light, so to speak, with regard to Customer Service. 

Over the years as the needs of our customers began to evolve and our product began to grow to meet those needs, we recognized the importance of top-notch customer service and how that was the key to guiding our customers down the right path to reach their own goals.  Early on we began to take on a proactive approach with our customers.  We decided it wasn’t good enough to just answer phones and emails, especially with the type of product/service we offer.  We began a more proactive approach where we reach out to our customers regularly and establish a healthy rapport.  We try to get a feel for how the system is working for them and what we can do as their support reps to guide them.  And now today, our support team includes six hard-working reps who play an integral role in how users benefit from all our service has to offer.

My posts will provide the insight I gain in my day to day Customer Support experience on the many facets of using email newsletters and email blasts regularly to communicate, market and brand your company effectively.  I welcome any and all thoughts or suggestions.

Julie Robertson
BizActions LLC
Director, Customer Support

People always ask when the best time to launch their professional email newsletters is during the week and while there are no hard-and-fast rules to follow here, there is some general logic you might consider. 

Years ago when I was helping our customers with their e-newsletters, everyone seemed to think that Wednesday was the best day to launch during the week.  In fact, that became our busiest launch day across the board.  Being right smack in the middle of the week, everyone felt that Wednesday might be the most productive day where recipients are more likely to open and read information they receive in their inboxes.  Many people steered clear of Monday mornings and Friday afternoons thinking they wouldn’t get a lot of activity during those times.

While the Monday morning and late Friday approaches still seem reasonable today, the Wednesday scenario is less so if you apply some simple logic.  If you choose Wednesday and the majority of senders also think Wednesday is the most popular day to send email, then your message will be sent among many.  As a result, the message could quite possibly be ignored since the recipient will have so many items in his or her inbox to choose from.  However, if your email newsletter is sent during another day of the week, when perhaps there is less traffic to compete with in recipients’ inboxes, your message may have a greater chance of being read. 

Take “snail mail” as an example. When you get mail from your mailbox and you have 20 different pieces of mail on one day as opposed to another day when you only have two pieces, in which scenario do you think one of those pieces will stand out to you.

More recently, I have heard that Friday mornings are a great time to launch.  That seems logical to me considering that is probably one time during the week where you catch people in great moods, open to new ideas and information and perhaps ready to absorb an important message the sender is trying to convey. 

Again, there is no absolute here, and email newsletters are launched all days of the week at various times.  What also works better for one business, may not work as well for another.  Of course you can’t predict how many emails a recipient might receive at the exact time you are launching your message.  However, if you use a little bit of logic, you can put yourself in the shoes of your recipient and see how certain days and times might be more sensible.  Additionally, you could test various launch days and track your responses.  Don't be afraid to test the waters and find out what will be the most effective launch day for your messaging.

Solutions
BizActions helps you build your business one impression at a time. Within our complete communications platform and integrated into our powerful CPA email newsletters, we provide business development, lead generation and branding solutions for CPA firms. Communication is the key to relationships. Relationships are the key to business success. As the leader in business-to-business messaging, we have the experience to help you accomplish your goals. We know what clients respond to and pride ourselves on being at the leading edge of technology and client communications. BizActions is the ONLY e-marketing system that includes original, professionally-written, industry-specific content in such areas as accounting (U.S., Canada, Australia), law, financial services, human resources, estate planning, banking, employee benefits and much more. Discover how our dynamic, effective and flexible suite of synergistic solutions like our Online Resource Library can help you. Our Online Resource Library is a custom-branded stand-alone website that houses hundreds of resources for your clients - all while increasing your firm’s SEO. Our e-marketing solutions can help generate opportunities for your firm so that you may remain top of mind and build your business one impression at a time. Learn more by visiting our website, or follow us on Facebook and Twitter.

Are you interested in using reporting data a little more aggressively to mine for opportunities that you might be missing, but you just can’t seem to find the time? BizActions offers Email Alerts, a feature that allows you to set specific criteria for contacts who might be reading various types of content within your custom email newsletters.  This means, you choose what is significant to you or your team in terms of readership data, and our system does the rest.

As an example, perhaps a new client has just hopped on board with your firm or company and the partner or sales rep in charge of that client would like to learn a little more about that person’s interests. What is that contact reading most frequently?  Simply set an alert so any time that individual clicks on any article on the newsletter an email is sent to the partner’s inbox or a notification is sent to the desktop reporting Dashboard.  Once the information is in front of the appropriate person on your team, your firm or company can use that information during meetings you might have scheduled with the contact, since you will now know a little more about what that client’s interests are. It couldn’t be easier. Just set the specific criteria and wait for the results.

Solutions
In this day and age, when finding good customer service is almost impossible, we pride ourselves on our friendly and knowledgeable dedicated Customer Support Representatives (CSRs). Our support team will help you get your email newsletter creation underway and customized just the way you want it. The flexible design options in our system allow you to match your newsletter to the colors, graphics, logos, photographs and branding of your website or blog. If you don’t have a website or blog, we can help you develop a new brand for you to build upon. One of our CSRs will assist you in getting your contacts turned into members, aid you in analyzing your initial launches, help you along the way toward effective email management and provide ongoing tips on how to maximize your e-marketing presence. Our goal is to consistently exceed your expectations with world class service and product offerings so that you will remain a BizActions Sponsor (client) for the rest of your career. If you have any questions or would like to know more, please contact BizActions at 866.240.8477, visit our website, or follow us on Facebook and Twitter. We have all the tools you need to expand your e-marketing reach.

A new upgrade has been added to the BizActions Upload Tool so you no longer have to break down lists larger than 1500 rows. Simply put together your list, no matter how many rows of information you have, and upload it. It's that easy!  Our system will automatically divide the lists for you into the appropriate smaller batches so the file can be processed.

The Member Upload Tool allows you to upload large groups of contacts (10 or more) at once quickly and easily. Whether you are working on your Employee Benefits Newsletter, Human Resources Newsletter or a B2B Email Campaign, adding to and effectively managing your database is crucial for success.  If you are an email marketing professional tasked with managing your firm's BizActions database, this new option should save you time.

Please note that upload files are processed in the order in which our system receives them. It is very likely most uploads process within a few hours, but it is also possible that at times, depending on the size and number of lists in the upload queue, the processing time can take longer.

Please feel free to contact your BizActions CSR with any questions about this new change

The time for spring cleaning has arrived! No, I am not talking about your home, although that could be important too. I am referring to spring cleaning your database. Did you load in your database for the first launch of your professional email communication, intend to do some additional updates later to add other pertinent information, but just never found the time? Perhaps you haven't had time to take a look at your bad email listing. With a new season upon us, now is the perfect time to think about doing a little cleanup. Below is a checklist you can use as a guide for your database spring cleaning!

Internal client list - Billing, tax organizers, alerts, business customer surveys, etc.  Review each list with a department head or IT. Plan a strategy to expand your email addresses. Partner, owner or management contact list - Help them mine their contact databases.  Print each list and identify key contacts for the list. Make it part of your employee's routine - Train all employees to collect email addresses. Get permission to send the newsletter at every point of contact. During the busy season accounting firms touch 70 - 80 percent of the client base. Contests - Develop a contest with the managers and staff. Reward those who provide the most emails. Firms have awarded thing such as: iPods, gift certificates to book stores, restaurants, movie theatres and one firm gave away - a day off as a prize. This type of program does not cost much and will engage the entire company or firm to participate.

First, are all contacts in your database who should be?  Check out the side bar for some tips on growing your database.  For example, if you would like to send a successful CPA newsletter, be sure that all clients of your firm are in your database.

Assign one person to manage your database. While it might be helpful to have a few people on your team working on various email newsletter creation tasks, keep the database responsibility centralized to one person. This will make things easier.

Download your database regularly, perhaps once a month or every other month. Scan your database to look for members that might be floating around not assigned to the right classifications set up in your system or the right contact at your firm.

Review your bad emails  Try to fix the ones that you can.  If you choose to, you can delete the remaining bad emails left behind.

Export your prospect list. Are some now clients and do you need to update their records to flag them properly?

Did you originally load everyone in as one contact type? If so, take the time to go through and classify your contacts properly. While this may take a little time, it will benefit you in the long run and allow you to pull more meaningful reporting information.

Are there segments of your database you would like to send targeted email newsletters? If so, utilize the user-defined fields that can help you slice and dice your database in different ways.  After all the key to sending an effective business email is being able to target the right people in your audience with the right content.

Happy New Year!   It’s that fantastic time where you can look ahead with that fresh and hopeful approach toward your marketing initiatives for the upcoming year.   If you publish an email newsletter, perhaps you might develop strategies to send more targeted email newsletters this year and really hone in on the needs of your contacts.   And, if you are a BizActions user and would like to maximize your usage in 2011, be sure to check out a number of features and items we released or updated in 2010 and make sure you aren't missing out on anything.  Also, check out a brand new feature at the top of the list that allows you to clone your email radar messages.  Below is the 2010 BizActions Year in Review list.

Email Radar Cloning Tool - Talk about new...this exciting feature was just released last week! If you use Email Radar for B2B email campaigns frequently and like to reuse templates you have grabbed or created -- no more copying and pasting for you. Just use the link titled Clone this Email, make any edits you would like, save and go!  Just select List/Edit/Clone Emails from the Custom Emails menu option.

Share This AND Social Media Banners - Are you using the Share This feature? If not, we encourage you turn it on under Setup, Optional Content Items. Just look for the On/Off option titled Article Navigation Link. A Share This link will then appear below every article on your newsletter allowing your readers to share that article on their own social media sites. Don't forget to plug in your own Social Media URLs also so your recipients can follow your firm or company on your sites as well. Also, looking for social media banners to use on your business email newsletter? Look for the Social Media category now available in the templated banner inventories.

Mass Delete Feature - Do you need an easy way to delete a large group of contacts from your database, perhaps bad email addresses? Look no further. Just use the Member Upload tool and run your list through as an update with the column delete_member placing a 1 in that column for all deletes. Our system will take care of the rest so that you can ensure effective email management with your database.

2nd Timely Opps Article - We now offer a 2nd Timely Opportunities article option. That's right, there will be weeks from time to time where our content team decides to include a 2nd timely article in the professional email newsletters. If you want to ensure you are getting the most timely info we offer, then we would recommend also turning this feature on under Optional Content Items. Please note we will not run a 2nd timely article every single week.

Mobile App - Need to get into BizActions and disable your launch from your cell phone? Just login to the new BizActions mobile app on your phone at www.bizactions.com/mobile where you can do a handful of tasks to manage your account while on the go.

Enhanced POC Options - Just this year we released a number of new features for POCs, which can be extremely beneficial for those of you using targeted email newsletters. You can change your subject line, template, colors, custom content header, etc so that each POC newsletter is unique and set up the way that you want.

Configure Niches - A new option was added to the main toolbar on the newsletter titled Configure Niches, where recipients can choose specific niche categories they would like to receive. This only applies if you have purchased and are using Niches and this feature is also driven by an On/Off switch under Optional Content Items.

Content Center Next Article - Are you someone who likes to take the time to review the articles in the BizActions categories within the Content Center? If so, then check out the latest feature there that highlights which article is next in line to be delivered within that category.

Dashboard - In February, we released the newest version of our Dashboard, which now allows you to toggle between multiple POCs and the admin version with ease.

Content Class Website Signup - Do you use the BizActions website sign-up form?  If so, be sure to checkout the option that allows you to automatically assign a content class to the form you select. You might want to select an industry specific content class to attach to your sign-up form if you are placing that option on a page that focuses on that industry, for example.

One of the biggest, if not the biggest, benefit to using our service is the content that is included.  BizActions users have access to around 40 categories of general content in addition to any specialty niches they might have purchased? Our Content Classes feature allows users to target the most applicable content to the right people in their database.

Think about this for just a moment. If you are an individual client of a CPA firm and you are receiving articles about how to run your business more effectively or tax strategies for business owners, are you going to think that the firm has your best interests in mind or is one who knows its clients' needs? Don't take that risk. Through sending targeted email newsletters, you can present yourself as a company who understands their clients and strives to keep them connected with the issues that are important to them. Content Classes provides this capability easily. 

We have a number of firms that create extremely targeted newsletters aimed at the various industry segments within their database.  As a result, clients, prospects and referral sources receive information that is important to them and view the firm as one that is very much in touch with their needs. If you are utilizing an Outsource Newsletter service, ask yourself this very important question – “Are we sending the most meaningful information we possibly can to our readers?”  If the answer is no, consider re-evaluating your marketing tactics and strategies as they relate to the professional email communications you will be sending.  Whether you are sending a Financial Planner Newsletter, a Human Resources Newsletter or an Employee Benefits Newsletter, targeting your contacts with the information that means the most to them will provide you with the effective results you are looking for.

As a marketing professional, managing and growing your database is probably one of the most fundamental pieces of a well devised online marketing strategy. After all, you can have the best looking professional email newsletters with the best content, but if you don't have contacts to target with those newsletters, you've got nothing. At BizActions, we recognize the need to create, grow and maintain a healthy database.  It can make or break your marketing efforts.  The BizActions Member Upload Tool has always been a vehicle to both add new contacts and update existing contacts.

BizActions users are able to take advantage of the upload tool and keep on top of their database to ensure a fruitful delivery campaign.  A few great tips to keep in mind when managing a list of contacts are:

• If you are just beginning a B2B email campaign, start with the contacts you have, otherwise you may never move forward.
• Place one person on your team in charge of the database management.
• Export your your database once monthly to review new additions and updates.
• Segment your database in various ways so that you can review reporting information based on those groups and/or send those groups different types of targeted email newsletters.
• Review bad email addresses at least once per quarter and seek out the good emails if possible.
• Hire an intern from a local college to make calls to retrieve email addresses for those clients and other contacts you might not have emails for.

Remember, sometimes it's quality, no quantity.  So, while it's important to continue to grow your marketing database of contacts, it's even more important to maintain that database to ensure success when sending professional email communications. 

Don't gamble with the appearance of your professional email newsletter.  Have you ever wondered what your email newsletters look like in various email programs? Of course it is easy for you to know how your emails will render within the email client you use, but what about the many programs out there that your recipients might be using? Now, BizActions allows you to take the mystery out of your email formatting with Inbox Insight.

Whether you are sending a Human Resources Newsletter, Financial Planning Newsletter, or a B2B email campaign, you want to ensure that your recipients are seeing exactly what you intend them to see.  Inbox Insight allows you to send a copy of your business email communication through a testing platform where you can see how your email appears in various programs ranging from Outlook to AOL to Gmail.  You can then feel confident that your email newsletter articles are rendering properly, resulting in a professional appearance and reflection of your firm or company.

After nine years of working closely with marketing professionals at various types of companies, I find a common theme behind the goals for using custom email newsletters, whether they are sending business to business newsletters, financial planning newsletters, or payroll newsletters.  Most professional service companies want to keep their contacts well informed of timely and relevant information.  This can be extremely difficult when a firm or company is tasked with coming up with this type of content all on their own, which is why using BizActions makes it extremely simple.

Within the BizActions platform, in addition to the general and specialty types of articles that are automatically included in each newsletter for businesses and individuals, we also include a Timely Opportunity article. The timely article tends to be the most significant content on the newsletter and includes hot topics focusing on what is occurring now.  Some of the most recent topics we covered include the HIRE Act and the new Healthcare Reform Law.  Those are topics that are undoubtedly important to a large number of both businesses and individuals.  If your firm or company can get that type of information out to your contacts with minimal effort, you are sure to position your firm as one that is extremely well versed in a wide range of timely topics that affect just about anyone.  As a result, your contacts will see you as a company who understands the issues facing them

Because we run a new timely article each week and some of our accounts launch every
second week or less frequently, they miss those articles.  However, we make it simple and provide them with access so they can incorporate this important information in their next newsletter or send out an email blast much sooner. 

It is no surprise that time and time again, the most common goal for companies sending professional email newsletters is to send the most applicable and relevant information they can to reach their audience.

If you are an Email Marketing Professional and currently send any type of Business Email Newsletter to your contacts, then you probably want to see results as quickly and easily as possible.  In today’s fast-paced business environment, instant gratification can be key to capturing the information you need to find out if your marketing efforts are successful, what topics are of most interest to your readers and which readers might qualify as leads for potential business opportunities.

BizActions users can now take advantage of our updated, new and improved Dashboard.  The Dashboard is a desktop mechanism that allows users to get a quick glimpse of their readership data and database numbers with the click of their mouse.  Just pop it open and there you have it – a breakdown if the database from contact classifications to unsubscribes and bad emails, information about who is reading which articles in general or targeted newsletters and who is opening email blast communications that are sent as well. 

The newest features include the ability to review Email Radar reports and the ability to switch back and forth in a matter of seconds between multiple accounts.  As an example, if you are a marketing professional who has taken the time to set up separate industry newsletters, the new Dashboard makes it easy to switch back and forth to review data for each of those newsletter accounts.  This way if you are sending targeted email newsletters, you can quickly and easily review readership for each targeted group as opposed to all at once. 

With the New Year officially in full swing, now is the perfect opportunity to think through your email newsletter campaign strategies and options.  Whether you are sending a B2B Email Campaign or an Employee Benefits Newsletter, you will want to focus your efforts to accomplish your goals for the New Year. There are a few basic areas that can hold the key to building and maintaining an effective business email newsletter.

1. Database – First and foremost, it is difficult to run an effective email marketing campaign without a healthy database.  However, be sure to think in terms of quality, not just quantity. It is much more effective to have a solid database of good contacts that might be less in number, as opposed to an extremely large database consisting of mostly people who don’t know you, bad email addresses and purchased lists.  Create a strategy for capturing every single email address for all of your clients.


2. Design – With a New Year under way, this is the perfect time to think about redoing your email newsletter design. Be sure to have a graphics person help with this as opposed to just someone on your team with limited graphics experience.  As an example, BizActions fees for designing a brand new masthead for someone are minimal compared to the immeasurable value a professional design can lend to your firm’s appearance and credibility.  It is probably worth it to pay the extra money for something that positively and professionally reflects your firm’s image.


3. Message – Think about a strategy for the messages you would like to send this year and who you would like to target with those messages.  Also, make sure you are sending the most applicable content to the right people in your database.  You want to make sure your contacts view you as a firm that knows their clients needs and interests.  BizActions offers something called Master Accounts, where you can actually build separate newsletters for different segments in your database and your contacts can benefit from receiving information that makes sense for them.

Knowing the key components to an effective email marketing campaign can have a lasting impact on your results.

As the holidays approach and we are on the verge of a brand new year, perhaps you should rethink the design of your custom email newsletters.  Your e-Newsletter design can say a lot about who you are as a firm or company. You can better brand your company, showcase specific service areas and present yourself professionally with a new masthead or logo and a coordinating set of banner ads for example. Whether you are sending a Human Resources Newsletter, Financial Planner Newsletter or CPA client Newsletters, remember that the overall design is a reflection of your company.

Sometimes, something as simple as a fresh new look for your professional email communication can go a long way in terms of how your clients perceive your firm’s marketing efforts.  As an example, BizActions users who have been using our system for many years often times will consider a new template option and revisit the overall look and feel of their professional email newsletters.  Some of our accounts will do a “relaunch” of their newsletter to better brand themselves and reintroduce their firm’s presence.  Keep in mind that in this day and age, people are inundated with emails each and every day. Therefore, as busy recipients sift their inboxes regularly, a newsletter that looks visually appealing will often win out over other emails that lack that professional visibility.

When revisiting the design of your professional email commmunication, also consider that less is more sometimes.  In other words, you don’t want to send something that appears cluttered with too much information in a masthead or banner or perhaps too many custom articles that aren’t really necessary.  Sometimes, keeping it simple speaks volumes and gives off the “crisp” appearance many recipients prefer.  With just a few weeks left in 2009 and 2010 right around the corner, start thinking about your professional email newsletter and how you can make some minor adjustments that can go a long way.

Are you sending the most applicable information to the right people?  Whether you are sending a CPA client newsletter, a B2B email campaign or a Human Resources Newsletter, sending targeted content can be key in presenting your firm as one that knows its clients and understands what type of information is meaningful to them.  Anyone can send just any type of outsource newsletter that includes the same information for all recipients.  However, when your contacts open your professional email newsletter, will they scan it over and decide right then and there that most of the information is not meant for them or will they see those topics as relevant to their needs and interests?

 

The Master Accounts feature within the BizActions platform allows you to create and manage multiple newsletters within one main account.  For example, an accounting firm might have a Construction newsletter, a Not for Profit newsletter and a Real Estate newsletter.  This type of set-up could be key to the company presenting itself as well versed on the needs of its clients and other contacts.  This type of positioning can result in a successful CPA newsletter campaign that meets the needs of all contacts in all industry groups or other defined groups.

 

 A few examples that our clients use for target marketing are as follows:

• Targeting industry groups
• Targeting multiple office locations
• Targeting different departments
• Targeting contact lists by sales rep or partner

The next time you are putting together your professional email newsletter, take a close look at the content you are providing and ask yourself if all contacts in your database will find their articles meaningful and relevant of it they will just view it is another professional email communication with little to offer their specific situation.

If you are using a newsletter content service of any kind, then you have probably given some thought to what day of the week you should launch to maximize your results.  Of course you want to reach as many people as possible and you want to reach them on a day and at a time when they are likely to open the professional email communication and even read some of the content you have included.  While there might not be one particular day and time that is the right answer for everyone, there are some ideas out there about what works best.

Working as a support representative for a professional email newsletter service, BizActions, over the course of 8 years, I have noticed a change in the perception of launch days in particular.  Early on, many of our users felt it was best to launch either Tuesday or Wednesday and those days have worked considerably well for many users of email newsletter services.   However, what people were noticing was that everyone sending just about anything including junk and spam mail and other types of emails were sending on those “busier” days as well.  It became apparent that people were more likely to be inundated with all types of email on those days, even other targeted email newsletters, especially in the middle of the week on Wednesdays. 

Some felt that recipients were less likely to open their custom email newsletters among the larger amounts of total emails they are receiving on those days.  Over the last few years, I have noticed more and more people launching their newsletters on other days – days that were originally less popular – Thursdays and Fridays in particular.  Someone once shared a good analogy with me.  If you open your mailbox and find 20 separate pieces of mail one day, and then open your mailbox and find only 3 pieces of mail the next day, in which instance would just one of those mail pieces have the best chance of standing out?   Again, you want to do what makes the most sense for your firm or company.  Tuesday afternoon might provide fantastic results for one firm, while Friday mornings might prove to be the most effective for another firm.  Think about your list as well.  If you are sending to an entire listing of business clients, sending a business email communication toward the end of the day on Friday is probably not the most effective strategy. Don't be afraid to change it up and try different days and times to find the best one for your purposes.

Including interesting articles, announcements, and other types of content in your professional email communications might seem like no easy feat. Like many, you might find it difficult to come up with meaningful topics that will entice and engage your readers and keep them coming back for more.  Whether you are communicating educational information to keep your clients up-to-date or soft news such as a recent promotion, quality content can play a crucial role in positioning your company at different levels. So, even if you are using a newsletter content service, what’s stopping you from using your own custom content to reach your recipients? If the answer is “we have no idea what to write about or include”... look no further!

There are a wide range of topics that can serve as the focus for custom email newsletter articles. When trying to come up with the perfect idea for an effective announcement or article, many people lose sight of the more obvious things that can prove to be just as compelling. Something as simple as a team member spotlight item, for example, can go a long way. Look around your office at your colleagues. Take notice of your firm’s culture and interactions with people, events that are occurring, etc. Sometimes the simplest of things can prove to be the most impressive in the eyes of your readers.

Showcase the various services your firm or company offers. Chances are your clients are only aware of the specific service you provide to them and not all of the services your firm offers.  One effective way to showcase your service areas is to include educational pieces that speak to those services with specific examples. Ask a professional at your firm to write an article that will educate your readers and provide them with insight on a specific topic.

Don’t be afraid to ask some of your clients if you can profile them in your professional email communication as well. Perhaps a business client has a recent success story to share. Interview the client, include a photo and ask the client for a testimonial if it makes sense for that article.

BizActions is a leading newsletter content provider that combines lead generation capabilities with custom email newsletter options so that firms can effectively get in front of their clients and prospects using relevant and applicable information.  Click here for the full white paper outlining 14 ideas for creating effective custom content, also known as Sponsor Content at BizActions.