We’ve always heard the sayings “it’s the little things in life that mean the most” and “a picture is worth a thousand words .” Both of these sayings direct to quite simple things that mean much more than the item/act alone. For example, these could be the small conveniences in life like heated seats in a car, or even tiny things from day to day that brighten a mood such as a little surprise note on your mouse saying how fun you are today (also related: building up my ego).

How many times have you heard of an idea or seen a new product and your first thought was “I’ve thought of that before!” or “I could have done that!” MANY of these ideas are simple, so simple that you feel dumb you didn’t think of it first. To go even further, many of these “I’ve thought of that” products can even make your life easier.

Example #1: Yanko Design has created an iPhone case playing off the use of elasticity. Check them out, you’ll wish you would have thought of it.

Example #2: A reusable water bottle (you’re welcome, environment) by Vapur that rolls up for easy storage and transportation when not in use.

Daily, I am inspired by the minds of others, the way others think, the knowledge others possess that I can’t fully grasp. On the other hand, I’m proud of the things that come easy to me that others just don’t understand or seem to generalize. These simple products that others have created keep me guessing, and thinking of the next big idea that I can bring to the table. I have yet to come up with my “ah-ha” product/idea, but I assure you I’ll be working on it.

What products do you regret not being the creator of?

I really don’t like surprises.

I was recently the recipient of a day full of surprises. Hijacked by my employees as we spent a day together roaming Indy in a party bus in celebration of Willow’s 20th anniversary. Talk about surprises. It certainly wasn’t what I had planned for the day…being snagged, dragged and tagged all over the city. No details shared. Where were we going? Why are we stopping here? What’s in the coolers? It was all on a need to know basis and I certainly didn’t need to know. Well, at least until they needed me to provide commentary on the significance a particular landmark played in Willow’s history.

Don’t get me wrong. It was a wonderful day. A trip down memory lane for me and a chance to share more about Willow’s history with them (since most were in diapers when the company was started.) It was great team building (ask someone about our scavenger hunt at Lowe’s) and some of the best bonding I’ve done in some time with the shrubs. But that didn’t make the surprises any easier. The team said it’s because I wasn’t in control. Maybe…

Some people simply have a desire to know what’s coming next. They want to know what to expect. But other people don’t mind being surprised at all. Our natural way of dealing with uncertainty is referred to in psychology journals as a “personal need for structure.” It would make sense then that those with a high need for personal structure probably won’t like surprises. Others are more comfortable with surprises. They’re easy going and take it all in stride.

As shared on PsyBlog, Psychologists generally believe that those who do like surprises are generally more creative. The ability of one to be open to uncertainty makes their minds more open to new possibilities. It seems then that uncertainty breeds creativity.

But because I don’t like surprises I’m not creative? Well, a study done in 2010 by some researchers at the University of Amsterdam says there is hope. They found that when participants weren’t afraid of being wrong, their need for structure didn’t stop them from being creative. The problems came when anxieties set in and got in the way of creativity. So simply set the fears aside. When we do, those that don’t like surprises and need structure can still be highly creative. Let go of the fear of being wrong. Let go of some structure and allow your mind the freedom to be creative.

In my recent post on click through rates, I touched on the total number of clicks versus unique clicks in email communications and what the most recent industry statistics are. This post continues that conversation, but contains information on some reasons why your CTRs may be low.

If your email marketing campaigns are typically showing under 2-3% CTRs, some of the causes likely include:

• Poor permission or opt-in processes. This includes pre-checked boxes, not making it clear what type of email they will be receiving, automatically adding someone to receive your email marketing when they’ve actually signed up for something else such as a whitepaper, etc.
• Poorly written email subject lines that do not direct and motivate recipients to take an action.
• Poor email delivery rates. If a lot of your email messages are getting blocked or filtered and you don’t know it, your CTR will obviously be affected.
• Poor email open rates. If few people open your email, fewer recipients have a chance to click.
• Poor email design and layout. If they can’t easily find where to click through or aren’t motivated to by your layout – you’ve got trouble.
• Lack of links. Quite simply, the more links the better. Make it so that email readers are continuously stumbling over text and graphic links like they do signage in a retail store.
• No reason to click. If your email newsletter has a single or multiple articles in their entirety, then don’t expect them to click. You haven’t given them any reason. If you are sending a promotional email and you don’t include a deadline for the offer, or convey a discount, special offer, limited supply, etc., few people are probably going to take action.

Hopefully you found this information useful for your email marketing efforts. And for those of you who did read the entire article, we have a special treat for you…the answer to Willow’s first most frequently asked question…“so what’s the story behind the Willow tree?”

One of the most frequently asked questions at Willow is “so what’s the story behind the Willow tree?” Unfortunately, this blog post doesn’t answer that question. But it does address the second most frequently asked question at Willow, “What kind of click through rates (CTR) should we expect in our email marketing efforts?” Great question, especially since it relates directly to your clicks being converted to leads.

There really isn’t a national average or percentage that can be used with any accuracy. Why? Well, this is a bit of a loaded question since there are so many factors that come into play. Most of our efforts for clients are focused on a business-to-business target audience. Those rates can differ greatly from a consumer audience. But that’s simply the start…Is your list good? Have you segmented your list? Is your mailing personalized? What’s the offer? Is it relevant? How often have you sent to this audience?

But even more significant is how many links you do have in your email. Are you providing content such as articles? This can be the entire article within the body of the email or a teaser or snippet that requires email subscribers to click through to a website to read.

It’s important to understand the statistics your email marketing service provides in reports as well. Are you studying total click throughs versus unique clicks? Make sure you understand how the click through rates were calculated by your email marketing provider. Many recipients will click on multiple links placed in your email. This results in more clicks. Unique clicks are where only one click per person (or email address) is counted. CTR reports based on the total number of clicks versus unique clicks will be very different. If your report is based on total clicks, your numbers will be about two times higher than those based on unique clicks. At Willow, we study both, but benchmark a client’s history based on unique CTR’s.

Lyris is a leader in digital communications and has compiled some industry statistics that may be helpful to use as a guideline in your email marketing efforts. To follow are some averages click through rates based on unique clicks:

• Business to Business (B2B) email newsletters typically range from 5% to 15%. If your CTRs are consistently below that level then among other things, you are probably providing content of little value to your email subscribers. Or you may have most of the content within your email, not giving subscribers a reason or means to click through to your website.

• Business to Consumer (B2C) promotional email marketing campaigns often range from about 2% to 12%. Email campaigns with less than a 2% CTR may be a result of over mailing and questionable email opt-in processes.

• Highly segmented and personalized email lists (B2B and B2C) are often in the 10% to 20% CTR range. Also, email messages with very strong content but sent to unsegmented lists, like many news or trend-type e-newsletters, are often in the 10%-15% range.

• Trigger or behavior-based email campaigns (emails that are sent to recipients based on some behavior they showed, such as clicking on a product link, coupon, visiting a specific web page, etc.) are often in the 15% to 50% range.

So now you’ve seen a few guidelines on how to enhance your email marketing efforts. Be sure to check back and read Part 2 to find out reasons why your CTRs may be low. You may also have the chance to find out the answer of the infamous Willow tree question…

According to Google, “Fresh” is the new black. Google made a couple more tweaks to its search algorithm to ensure that they always deliver the latest, relevant content.

Here is a snippet from their blog post: “If I search for [olympics], I probably want information about next summer’s upcoming Olympics, not the 1900 Summer Olympics (the only time my favorite sport, cricket, was played). Google Search uses a freshness algorithm, designed to give you the most up-to-date results, so even when I just type [olympics] without specifying 2012, I still find what I’m looking for.”

What does this mean for you? Fresh content is key! We can no longer rely on keyword stuffed pages to get great results. Users are looking for content that is relevant and up to date, and the easiest way to do this is to incorporate a blog or a newsroom on your site and post articles to it regularly.

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