Team Dotdigital – Dotdigital

What we did on Juneteenth

Team Dotdigital — Wed, 08 Jul 2020 17:49:18 +0000

Here’s what some of them learned, about society, and themselves, and what they would like to share with you:

Vernon Bennett, Account Executive

Juneteenth is more than a date to mark off on a calendar. It’s the start of an ongoing battle for equality. The right to live a life in “The Land of the Free and Home of The Brave,” shouldn’t be based on the hue of your skin. Juneteenth is a day that Black’s like myself celebrate our independence. A day we redefine ourselves and rid our people of the layers of dark, vile, and incredulous labels of our oppressors. It’s a day that we reclaim our roots that were stripped as we built a new nation for Whites who fled from Europe. Juneteenth is a day we celebrate and educate The World on Black culture as we preserve our heritage. I celebrated this day with a march throughout Manhattan and ended in Seneca Village – the site of one of the most flourishing communities of African Americans in the country that was sadly destroyed to build Central Park. Blacks were joined by others as we chanted cultural hymns, danced, shared oral history, and enjoyed traditional African American dishes. As always, Blacks extend an open invitation to ” the cookout,” where we shared our experiences of racism and roundtabled solutions to end it with non-Blacks in NYC. Education is wealth. The more we are educated on a broken system, the easier it’ll be to correct it. While New Yorkers have a reputation of being aggressive and lacking empathy, I was blown back by the amount of support from non-Blacks. This was amazing, the fight to end racism can’t end until society admits it exists and collaborates to end it. Racism is taught! Prejudice is taught! We must all take a stance for humanity and quit sharing, embracing, and allowing racism to exist. Racism is multifaceted, it does shapeshift, and we must shut it down any time we encounter it. Have conversations, be receptive to outside opinions, and understand the effects of racism. Racism is founded on beliefs of superiority that have assigned privilege based on skin, acknowledge the privilege, and destroy it! This means acknowledging systemic oppression in education, healthcare, and in the workforce. No more microaggressions! Diversify management! Black Lives Matter.

Tam Bond, Delivery Operations Manager

I spent the run-up to Juneteenth and the day itself educating myself about issues of racial inequality. I think one of the things that hit me hardest was the experience of Black women in feminist spaces. I came to feminism pretty late on in life. I had unrecognized and deeply internalized misogyny until my mid-20s. When I landed with a bang having read Caitlin Moran’s “How to be a Woman”, I discovered an amazing sisterhood of women who shared all these experiences I thought were unique to me. Feelings of being “weird” or an outsider, that had left me open to multiple abusive relationships, dissipated almost overnight. There was suddenly this huge safe space for me to share with others. But this space is not safe for Black women. In her book, “Why I’m No Longer Talking to White People About Race”, Reni Eddo-Lodge speaks of the discomfort and racism she encountered on entering white feminist spaces. She talks about the expectation in those arenas that race is her problem, is Black women’s problem, and not the problem of white women. Her words are full of completely justified disappointment, hurt, and anger. I can’t fully empathize with this experience, because it is not my own, but I feel so sad that Black women do not enjoy that same sense of community and belonging which I found in progressive feminist forums. We frequently talk about allyship. The LGBTQIA+ community often discusses the importance of straight and cis people being allies. Feminists emphasize the importance of male allies in dismantling the patriarchy. It’s important for people in power to be allies to those who do not share in that power privilege. White women have privilege, white feminists have privilege, and we are not currently leveraging that privilege to help Black women and women of color. I have not been leveraging my own privilege to help women of color. My goal has previously been to be“not racist”, but I have learned from reading “How to Be an Anti-racist” by Ibram X. Kendi that this is not the opposite of racist. Instead, I must do better and be anti-racist. I will loudly question why my feminist spaces have no Black women or women of color. I will call out racist microaggressions for what they are: racist abuse. I will proactively engage in conversations that are uncomfortable for me because my comfort is not more important than racial equality. And I will shut the hell up and listen to Black women and women of color, and raise up there voices where I can. To paraphrase Maya Angelou, now that I know better, I will do better.

Anna Charmantzi, Digital Marketing Specialist

Juneteenth is a date to commemorate the struggles of Black people and to educate ourselves on the black history around the world along with the stereotypes and perceptions we all consume every day. I personally didn’t know about the Juneteenth until it was mentioned by the company. Therefore, I used the day to watch multiple documentaries about the history of the slaves in America, the American Civil War, and about black society today as well as perception. It was enlightening for me to find out how recent the history is and also understand the racism and prejudices that black people face. I learned more about how Black people are being depicted in America as criminals, the fights that Martin Luther King had with the Civil Right Movement with his non-violent actions, and the bus boycott to fight segregation. It is disheartening to think that this happened less than 70 years ago, but it is up to us to raise the standards even more and become a better side of ourselves by speaking up to any racist event we are in front of. The future lies in our own hands! It’s up to us on how we will handle it!

Victoria Dovey, Product Marketing Executive

My first mission of the day on Juneteenth was to examine the UK’s part in the history of slavery and racism. Whilst I knew about it a little from my own reading (including the wonderful ‘Why I’m no longer talking to white people about race’ by Reni Eddo-Lodge), this was something that was, like so many others, never taught to me in school, which is frankly unacceptable. I am heartened to see calls in articles, petitions, and parliament for a ‘Black Curriculum’, talking about Britain’s true colonial past, but also including more black voices in our history, literature, science, and art classes. It’s long overdue. I used Reni’s book as a springboard to find out more about matters such as the ways Britain’s slave owners continued to benefit financially from their involvement, long after they cut ties with it, our own history of bus boycotts, and even our history of race-related violence which continues to this day. Do not let anyone tell you we do not have a problem with racism in this county. It’s so very evident with just a little research. Quick tip for other white people out there who want to learn more but struggle with non-fiction: reading fiction by Black authors, contemporary or historical, still gives you great insight and understanding of Black experiences. Some of my favorites are James Baldwin, Nella Larsen, Toni Morrison, Roxane Gay, Zadie Smith, Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie, and Ralph Elison, but I’m taking it upon myself to download more audio and ebooks from Black authors this year to read more outside of my comfort zone. The next thing I wanted to focus on and examine in myself was white feminism. People think intersectional feminism – that is, feminism that is inclusive of all races and gender – is a new thing, addressing a new problem. But in the 50s, 60s, and 70s, Black women were very vocal about the fact that they had to choose between the civil rights and the women’s rights movement. They did not have the privilege to champion both. Civil rights were more pressing because it’s what put their lives more in danger. Black women today tell us the same thing. That feminism, in many forms, is not inclusive. No matter your gender, you can be a feminist, and as feminists, we need to listen to Black experiences, and not react defensively. Emotion does have a place in the discussion about race. It’s a very emotive subject for anyone with an ounce of empathy, let alone anyone who has experienced racism in an instance or over the course of their life. But a friend once told me that many white women will appear to be on your side as allies until challenged, where they become defensive and start to attack you. They feel ‘threatened’. She told me this had been her experience as a Black woman countless times, from even some of our mutual friends. I am an emotional person. But after hearing this, I have found it’s best to keep a cool head when discussing race to minimize this risk of becoming defensive if I am challenged. It’s something I believe I still need to do better on so I can listen more effectively to Black experiences. I am very aware of the inherent privilege of the above too. The stereotype of the ‘angry’ Black man or woman frustratingly persists and shuts down productive conversations for so many people. So when I say I am learning to leave emotion out of my discussions, that is not to tell anyone else they should do so too. Just to say that as a white woman, I recognize my emotions are often not helpful in the conversation, even though these issues upset me without bounds. One of the most immediate things we can do is speak out, and be seen to be speaking out against racism. Because far-right voices are shouting loudest in society right now, and most often. I don’t want children to hear them and think that that’s what represents us as a society. We need to shout louder. We need to shout more often. We need to speak out about what’s right so that our kids don’t grow up without knowing what it means when we say, Black Lives Matter.

Beatrice Ellefsen, Head of Customer Success, APAC

I spent my morning listening to a friend over coffee, who has a chat group with her family, one of whom is white, living in South Africa, and who lived there during apartheid. His views have been skewed by the politics of his surrounding demographic, living as he does in a white gated community, where he has been for over 50 years. As I explained why we were taking a day off work, my friend opened up about some of the things he’s shared (including the “all lives matter” sentiment) and how she’s tried to help gently educate him. I don’t think we changed the world over that chat, but I hope that our discussion has given her the strength and feeling of support to keep on trying to conduct meaningful conversations, rather than giving up on him as being “of his time”. It’s sometimes easy to ignore, and not challenge racist views, particularly among our friends and family, and you’re not going to change their mind with a meme – we need to start having more open discussions like these, as it takes time to shift someone’s entire world view. I also watched the film 13th, following a number of internal recommendations for it. As someone who has neither lived in the States nor understands much of its politics or history, I was shocked to learn how well-ingrained racism is in the police system and prison systems there. That so much private industry benefits from the labor in prisons was horrific to hear and has made me review my frequently shopped brands. The director used clips of music I’ve known and enjoyed for many years, but I realized I’d not properly listened to the voices. Many artists are vocal critics of the police, and justice system, but in the context of the struggle Black people face living in America I’ve found myself listening to these lyrics as real stories, not “just” as music. I spoke to my partner over dinner that night, an Aussie, who then helped me understand a bit more about how similar systemic racism is replicated in Australia. In Australia, 2% of the population are of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander descent, and they represent 28% of the total Australian prison population and among children, the number incarcerated is closer to 50%. What I started to learn more about, is that in Australia, this has it’s roots not in slavery, rather in the background of the colonization of the Indigenous nations, and of the systemic abuse of the stolen generations and their families. Discussing this with other Australians, I learned how many people mourn that this is not taught in schools, that the invasive white history dominates teaching, and yet nothing changes. Over the following weekend, I re-read “Why I’m no longer talking to white people about race” written about the experience of the black writer living in the UK. I’d encourage everyone reading this to take a look at her blog from 2014 which inspired the book, which reminded me of the racist bias in my own early schooling in the UK was, and equally full of conquering “white savior” rhetoric. I always knew this, but never really thought about it, until I realized how this must shape my own bias. I’m still just scratching the surface of what I’ve not acknowledged or challenged before, and it’s made me see that there is so much more learning to do, and beyond the learning, is action. Every country has it’s own issues, but understanding the difference I think will help us understand the voices and the actions that need our support.

Tim Langford, VP Operations, CPaaS

I’ve become more educated (from watching 13th, When They See Us, as well as re-watching a Trevor Philips OBE lecture) and aware of how much the horrors of racism can get into the fabric of society due to this bold initiative I see racism as one symptom of the common and widespread tendency we all have to judgment. I’m by nature more of a scientist than an artist and my view is that to stop something we need to understand its root cause and work on that, otherwise, there is a tendency, like ‘whack-a-mole’ for it to pop up somewhere else in a different guise. The root of racism it seems to me is judging someone as different to us, separating from them and sitting in judgment, almost always without knowing the whole situation. I also see it as a horrible dark side of the natural human tendency, desire, and need for community – to associate with people we feel we have something in common with – i.e. to have a meaningful community there must be people who are not in our community. Discussions need to be kept alive and real since there is the ever-present danger of a new initiative like this descending into virtue signaling and I suggest, in effect the ‘religion’ of anti-racism. By religion I mean where we feel we know more, are more enlightened than those outside our ‘community of anti-racists’ and oops… judge them for being less enlightened while being proud of our views. In this context, I see religion as the cause of many of the world’s conflicts. Fighting judgment with judgment keeps the cycle going. So, if judgment is the cause, how do we address it? Privately I suggest, not necessarily through publicized acts, but by looking inside – I suggest possibly through for example meditation, therapy, as much as possible a genuine debate where we are willing to really look into uncomfortable truths about ourselves or views we disagree with, without taking offense but to learn. Above all by being willing to come to friendship with our own dark side – since we all have one. A poem that sums up the root of this far more eloquently(and shockingly) than I could is ‘Please call me by my True names’ you can read it here.

Gavin Laugenie, Head of Strategy and Insight

To me, June 19th was a day; just one day, not dissimilar to any other, It hadn’t been a day that I gave any additional thought to before. So why now, why celebrate the emancipation slaves in the United States? For me, this year was the straw that broke the camels back. Maybe it’s because I’d been cooped up inside for too long under quarantine, or perhaps I was tired of being tolerant and keeping things cooped up inside me for too long. I’ve realized that I tolerated a lot and tolerance is something that unknowingly becomes part of you. A show on TV that offends you; being pulled over because you look “suspicious.” Or that joke that a colleague makes that chips away at you slowly, but you never address it; because you might cause a scene and make them feel uncomfortable. So you swallow it and tolerate it. The rise of the BLM movement gave me precisely what I need to shake off my tolerance and start speaking up and out about how I felt and how things should change. When I found out that dotdigital would be giving us Juneteenth off to reflect I was skeptical. Would people use it in the right way? Would this just be a one-off and not celebrated every year? But then I was excited because Black or BAME people don’t have a public holiday in the UK. Of course, there are plenty of other public holidays here, but none that mark a date in history that black people can look at, and take a minute to reflect on. Fortunately (or unfortunately, however you want to take it) I had already been doing a fair amount of reflection this year. The needless death of George Floyd drove me to read articles and watch videos on slavery, its abolition, and its subtle transition to systematic or institutional racism. It was the starting point, or symbol many of us needed to start understanding why we live in a world where the difference in the color of your skin can spark injustice; hold you back (whether you know it or not) and inflict so much pain and suffering. Because I had been reflecting leading up to the day watching movies like 13th, reading books like”Why I’m no longer talking to white people about race” (some of my colleagues may remember seeing me with the book a little while back), or glued to my Instagram feed. I instead dedicated my day not to read up on the day or research, but to celebrate my culture, this mostly meant listing to A Tribe Called Quest and J Dilla. After all, the day is essentially a day of celebrating being Black, being you, and being free. If I’m honest, I still wound up reflecting that day; the occasion was too big for me not to. Black people are a long way from being free or equal, either we’re being stopped and searched or stopped, and shot. Prejudices and racism will remain until we stop saying “I don’t see color” because you have to see it to believe you don’t see it. But you can embrace it, and everything that comes with it. You can’t play our music, laugh at our comedians or jokes, and enjoy our food unless you love us and our blackness. So yes, Juneteenth is just a day. But what it stands for is so much bigger than the day itself. It’s a reminder that every day we need to continue to think about each other more, feel for one another more and embrace each other’s cultures and I look forward to doing that for many years to come.

Julia Neuhold, Product Marketing Executive

I spent most of Juneteenth working through Layla F. Saads book “Me & White Supremacy”. I say working through, because it’s not a book you read, it’s a book you do. She gives journaling prompts and open questions to push the white reader to really think about their place in and their part in upholding a society that treats white people as superior. Layla explains that before we can be truly anti-racist, we have to un-learn what we have learned growing up in a white supremacist country. I can highly recommend it to anyone, especially those asking “what can I do”? Spoiler alert: A lot. I am now learning how to better use my privilege.

1. Speak up.

Silence is complicity in white supremacy. Staying silent is not upholding a “positive atmosphere”, it’s damaging BIPOC around us, everywhere. Instead, I need to challenge, engage, and speak up as often and as loud as I can.

2. Amplify Black voices.

Using my platforms and my voice to elevate the voices of BIPOC inside and outside of my circles.

3. Financially.

Because of white privilege, I am more likely to be accepted to a good school, hired, promoted, and financially successful than my Black peers. I can use this power to support Black businesses, charities, and individuals.

4. Physically.

I can show up to demonstrate, protest, and physically walk alongside and protect Black protesters.

5. Time.

I can put time toward educating myself and others. Read books, watch movies, sign and share petitions, and talk to the people around me. On Juneteenth, I also started having conversations with my friends in the UK. I went to school in Austria and have found myself being particularly interested in hearing about how and what my friends were taught in school. The German author and activist Tupoka Ogette says in her book “Exit Racism” that by Whitewashing history, by collectively repressing our racist history, we are allowing racism to prevail today. By “not knowing”, we also “don’t know” that we’re doing anything wrong. It’s the easy way out. For white people that is. When I heard that dotdigital was closing all offices to commemorate Juneteenth, I was surprised. Surprised, grateful, and relieved. I hope with this year we have set a precedent for the years to come. I hope we can continue to use this day, alongside every other day, to educate ourselves and each other, actively elevate Black voices, listen, and work together to make crucial changes to a world riddled with racism and inequality.

What does Pride mean to you?

Team Dotdigital — Thu, 18 Jun 2020 17:42:30 +0000

From New York to London and Sydney, many of our team members would usually be marching at Pride in the coming weeks; but because of the COVID pandemic we need to commemorate this momentous event and month in other ways. Because this year, what Pride stands for is more important than ever before. I reached out to friends across dotdigital for their thoughts on the Pride movement and what it means to them right now.

Pride is a state of mind

Ashley Joyce, Head of Key Accounts

Pride is a beautiful celebration of love, life, and acceptance – covered in glitter! We still need Pride today to give hope for those who are not in as privileged a place as us. There are still countries today I can’t visit through fear of persecution, and there’s still outward and vocal discrimination in this country against the way I live my life. It’s as important as ever that we continue to fight for people’s right to be themselves. For people who don’t feel safe enough to come out, Pride is such an incredible statement, shared across the world, that shows that IT IS OK to love who you love. The Pride movement has reached high profile status and symbolizes hope and acceptance. Whilst I’m gutted there will be no parade (due to social distancing), Pride is a state of mind. A time to celebrate with friends, reflect, support one another, and continue to strive for equality. It’s so important that we celebrate how we can! For people struggling with their identity, gender, or sexuality, there are lots of platforms out there; such as The Rainbow Project, as well as other mental health support networks. Look out for allies and people who showcase the Pride flag in their windows (not to be confused with the NHS flag – which should be separate in my opinion) for people to talk to. There is a great sense of solidarity in the LGBTQ+ community and always an ear available to listen and talk.

Pride, the last thing remaining in Pandora’s box

Chris Cano, Content Team Lead

Pandora’s box was sealed shut before the last of its contents could escape: hope. Hope is an enduring survivor of humanity in the face of oppression. When the world looks bleak, turns its back on years of progress, and treats people unfairly, there’s always the hope of a better future. For me, Pride epitomizes people’s faith. And while I, a privileged gay white man, have little to fear in my society, I wish the same could be said for gay men everywhere, for people of color, for trans men and women, for religious minorities – for everyone. Our lived experiences are always circumstantial, contextual, and subjective; but just because it’s okay for me doesn’t make it okay. The Black Lives Matter movement has taught me a lot. While I’ve always believed in the decency of human beings – a rather romantic notion – the world, at times, can be full of ignorance, intolerance, and hostility. Because even in an ocean of love, one drop of hate can pollute it. Just think about how racism has become institutionalized, thanks to our colonial past, under our very noses. But people, including myself, are sobering up. Often, I’ve sat on my UK high horse and watched events unfolding across the Atlantic with horror – but with the relief and almost smug satisfaction that such events don’t happen where I live. I’ve come to realize that because I am anti-racist — and don’t know anyone who’s not like me in that respect — I never thought it was a problem in my immediate world. Sure, racism exists – of course it does. But not on my doorstep. I completely internalized my feelings on the issue like it were a non-issue; perhaps being orbited by a circle of liberal, bourgeois friends and family has made me complacent. That is quite sad. Adopting this kind of attitude — a dangerously warped version of reality — is wrong. Because how we see something shifts our truth; and that can be self-limiting. Visibility over disadvantaged groups of society, and understanding their struggles, is key. We all have a duty to engage in the narrative and align our perspective to the bigger picture. Being gay, and having suffered homophobic abuse, should have taught me that. But then again, I’ve never suffered racist abuse before – and it’s because I’m white. Just like my straight male friends have never suffered abuse on the grounds of their sexuality. I’ve never been subjected to sexist comments like my girlfriends have – and it’s because I’m a man. And my male friends have never been put at a disadvantage because of their sex before, professionally or otherwise, either. Privilege has corrupted our society, ingrained itself in more ways than one; and while changing culture is hard work, it’s not impossible. Pride isn’t the only answer to the deep-rooted, underlying problems we face in our society. But it acts as a vehicle of hope — a movement where everyone’s welcome to voice solidarity — to get us from A to B to C and beyond. We can’t rest on our laurels whenever we take one step forward, because we can just as easily go back again. But I hope for a day when all prejudices and injustices are confined to the history books. Until then I’ll no longer stand around waiting, but call people out more, learn the facts from those who suffer, and spread awareness whatever the issue – and whether it affects me or not.

Pride: what really matters

Tamara Bond, Deliverability Operations Manager

This Pride month, in this of all years, I would be remiss if I didn’t say that what matters is intersectionality. People of color in the LGBTQIA+ community, especially trans women of color, are statistically far more likely to be the victims of the worst kind of bigotry and violence that any member of our community receives. Even within our own community, we find saddening examples of racism and cultural appropriation. Butch white lesbians have been appropriating the use of “stud”, a historically black lesbian identity. Gay black men are frequently discriminated against or fetishized by white gay men on gay dating websites. Each person has many identities, and for those of us who include ‘white’ in that identity – especially when combined with ‘able bodied’ and ‘neurotypical’ – the privileges that these identities afford outweigh so many of the the privileges we don’t have. It is really difficult to think only of the ways in which you have privilege without being distracted by the ways in which you don’t have privilege. This is an exercise recommended by Ijeoma Oluo in her book “So you want to talk about race”. I tried it, and I caught myself thinking: I’m white, that’s a huge privilege. BUT I’m a woman. I’m in a heteronormative relationship; I’m a woman and my civil partner is a man. BUT I’m still queer. I was privately educated and had parents who were very supportive when it came to school and homework. BUT my parents’ relationship was volatile and it broke up during my A-level years. For every privilege I have, my brain immediately provided a disadvantage. Those “buts” are so intrusive. Trying to think only about your privileges is a tough mental exercise, but a worthwhile one. Once you identify your privileges, you can see how they affect your world view and your opinions of others. You can start to explore how you can leverage your privileges to raise up those who do not get to walk through the world with the same ease. So, let’s talk about how us white members of the LGBTQIA+ community can be more understanding and supportive, and make our activism more intersectional.

What I’m hearing from people of color

I’m open to further advice, but here’s what I’m hearing from people of color so far:

It’s not the job of people of color to educate us on the history of racial inequality. They’ve already produced so many resources – books, articles, blogs, films, podcasts. We need to seek these out ourselves, and read and watch and listen.
We need to stand up when we see racial injustice, especially when perpetrated by other white people when no people of color are present. Just as men calling out misogyny in other men is important in the fight for equal treatment of women, white people have to call out other white people on our shit.
If we’re part of an event such as a meetup or conference, analyze representation of speakers and panelists and, if needed, be that person who asks the organizers: why aren’t there more people of color involved?
Support businesses owned by people of color, and look to buy from these businesses instead of large corporations who make their money from poorly paid labor. People who earn minimum wage are more likely to be people of color.
Donate to charities that support LGBTQIA+ people of color, like the Homeless Black Trans Women Fund, the Okra Project, the Black Trans Travel Fund, and the TransWomen of Colour Collective.

I was recently invited to speak on a Women in Deliverability panel at EEC (Email Evolution Conference). After some basic introductions to the other panelists, I asked a really uncomfortable question: does anyone here not identify as white? The answer was no, we are all the whitest. Okay, I said, we should make space for women of color – our feminism needs to be more intersectional. But none of us could think of any who work in the deliverability sphere. Part of our panel discussion is now going to be raising this issue. Are there no women of color in deliverability? Are there women of color in deliverability but they are not coming to the conferences and events where we all meet each other? Or are they coming to these conferences and not meeting the influencers in our niche section of the industry who can help to raise their profile so they can share their expertise? Our focus on this panel is, of course, going to be deliverability. None of us are experts in race, all of us experience the industry through the lens of our whiteness, and I don’t expect us to have any of the answers. But we will have that conversation, no matter how awkward and uncomfortable it makes us, because it’s important that as Women in Deliverability we embrace and encourage diversity. And we should be doing the same in the LGBTQIA+ community.

A time to stop and reflect

Amie Lane, Head of Partner Marketing

“When all Americans are treated as equal, no matter who they are or whom they love, we are all more free.” – President Barack Obama Every year in June, people around the world celebrate equality, freedom, love, and the LGBTQIA+ community – Pride! Pride can mean different things to different people, to me Pride is a celebration of self-affirmation, dignity, and equal rights for all. It’s a time for people from all walks of life to stop and reflect on what it means to be truly accepting and accepted, and the peaceful, positive effect this can have on the world. Pride represents breaking through the barriers and confinements of stereotypical beliefs in our society. It is a celebration of diversity and about allowing everyone to truly follow their hearts and have the freedom to love whomever they choose. Afterall love is the one language that connects us all. The first time I marched at Pride was just a couple of years ago in 2017 – the atmosphere in London was electric, the love was profound and the acceptance in the air was spellbinding, it was a truly wonderful feeling – when so many people come together and all have so much love and acceptance in their hearts – the world shifts, the air sparks and you can literally feel the energy of life. If only every day could be like that! “Openness may not completely disarm prejudice, but it’s a good place to start.”–Jason Collins, first openly gay athlete in U.S. pro sports It’s time to champion love!

A global celebration of self-respect

David Aldrich, Global HR Director

Pride for me is a great opportunity for people everywhere, not just those who identify as LBGT+, to come together GLOBALLY to celebrate, support and educate. By the very definition of ‘Pride’, it’s the perfect way for individuals and groups to express confidence and self-respect and to promote and share a positive culture. The wider use of the image of a rainbow is a symbol of togetherness, positivity, hope, and change. This has never been more important than when it was adopted as a symbol of support for key-workers during COVID. Even the more traditional interpretation of the rainbow as a symbol of Peace carries huge positive influence in its adoption by Pride and the support of the NHS and other key workers.

Pride is marching for love

Annica Ljungberg, Office Manager

2020. Who would have thought that this would be the year where we would have some of the worst wildfires, a devastating locust swarm, numerous earthquakes, and, of course, a global pandemic. And did someone mention giant murderous hornets coming our way? It is truly heart-breaking thinking about the amount of suffering the world has seen during the space of just a few months. But we have also seen some extraordinary things happening lately. There has been a dramatic fall in global carbon emissions. The Black Lives Matter movement is taking shape and there is change, real positive change, starting to happen. It is vital that we all take a stand, take part and reflect, and join in conversations with our friends, peers, and with ourselves. Finally, it seems, people are waking up to the fact that we have the power to change things. That it is achievable if we all come together. The power of the people is enormous. This year, it is 50 years since the first Pride march took place in New York City. People coming together, marching for the right to love who you fall in love with. We all still need to take part in this fight for love. Homosexuality is still illegal in many countries, and in Europe, an increasing number of politicians are trying to make it illegal again by spreading hateful and false propaganda. In the US, the Trump administration has just dictated that discrimination against L.G.B.T. people in the health care system is not forbidden. So yes, the fight for equality is still very much going on and is now perhaps more important than ever. We need to make sure we are moving forward, not backwards. A friend of mine was beaten up badly last year and ended up in hospital for a long time: because he was holding hands with his loved one. I can’t even fathom what it must be like, having to hide who you are, having to fear becoming a victim of violence because of love. It is vital that we all take a moment, this pride month in lockdown, to educate ourselves and become better people. Love conquers all.

It’s about making society fairer and kinder

Frank Brooks, Global Demand Generation Manager

Pride month in 2020 is definitely very different to previous years, but to me it’s never been more crucial to recognize and celebrate diversity and individuality. It might seem obvious to say, but for me Pride really is a time to be proud. Proud of who I am, what I stand for, the way I speak, and the example I want to set. I know in the past it’s been easier not to disclose my sexuality or try (badly) to appear straight; to not distract focus from the matter at hand, often in a professional setting. Pride reminds me this is wrong and gives me the confidence not to hide or change who I am simply to appease others. I’m lucky not to be immediately judged on my appearance or skin color, which isn’t the same for those of BAME backgrounds. I stand alongside my BLM friends and colleagues, especially those who are LGBTQ+ during Pride. This year’s Pride month is even more significant with the BLM movement finally gaining the attention and respect it deserves – the power of protest! But there is always more we can do; we need to continue to fight for all human rights across the globe. Pride is a reminder that the journey to equality will never be without struggle but as we come together, raise awareness, accept each other, and challenge the status quo, we move ever closer to a fairer and kinder society. This is why Pride month today is as important as ever. Pride has helped me embrace my uniqueness yet realize I’m part of something much bigger – a community which has similar prejudices, judgement, and scrutiny, but share a sense of togetherness and unity. Pride creates a safe space for us to feel free to be whoever we are and to celebrate it – and anyone is welcome. Happy Pride!

Pride: spreads love and beauty

Cara Cooke, Account Management Team Lead

What does Pride mean to me? It means showing my LQBTQ+ friends, family, and all LQBTQ+ people everywhere that they are loved, supported, accepted. Members of the LGBTQ+ community should never again have to hide who they are or live in fear. In a world where, under the surface, hatred is still very much prevalent, we look to the Pride movement as a source of comfort, security, and fortitude. Why do we still need Pride today? Because it is a celebration of diversity, it brings people together for all the right reasons. It spreads love and beauty. But most importantly, it acts as a platform of support for anyone who is subjected to any kind of hate. Whether you’re suffering from homophobic or trans abuse, racism, sexism or misogyny, Pride is your home. Everyone should embrace who they are, stay true to themselves, and fight for their voice.

Pride means love and acceptance

Gavin Laugenie, Head of Strategy and Insight

What does Pride mean to me? A few years ago the answer to this question would have been very different. *Warning, cliché alert* “I’ve got nothing against Pride, I have gay friends! I just don’t think it’s for me; it’s just all a bit gay, isn’t it?” Sound familiar? It’s probably something I would have said before I got over myself. I mean, why would I need to think about Pride? Being a straight black man, it’s not my fight or struggle; I’ve got plenty of other things I need to be worried about: in a nutshell, racism. Plus in my opinion, the black community still has some way to go in terms of acceptance of LGBTQ+ people; so supporting or attending Pride was a no-no. Telling friends and family that I was going to Pride would have brought up a load of questions: “Are you gay?; “Why do you need to go?”, etc. And on top of that, my insecurities wouldn’t allow me to attend; I mean what if someone saw me there, and God forbid, what if a guy looked at me?!! One of my favorite artists is Frank Ocean, a man who shocked his fans back in 2012 with an open letter addressing his sexuality. Of course, he’s black, and it was an incredibly brave thing to do coming out as it may have destroyed his career. But he did it regardless. Frank had the answer for me. In one of his songs, he sings “I believe that marriage isn’t Between a man and woman but between love and love.” It’s that simple, the answer is love, and I’d be a hypocrite asking the world to look at me as an equal being black if I didn’t think everyone else was equal regardless of who and how they love. Which lead me to try and understand what Pride is all about. It didn’t just come about because gay people needed a party. It was born out of a long history of struggle to commemorate the Stonewall riots. So a few years ago, I threw my inhibitions and hang-ups to one side and decided that, with my dotfamily, I’d attend my first Pride. I’m not sure I was ready for the visual feast laid out before my eyes, I mean I saw a lot, probably too much to go into right now. But one thing I can safely say is that I saw was a whole lot of love. People were coming together from all different races and religions to show solidarity and to have a f*cking great time. I screamed at the top of my lungs, I hugged countless strangers, pasted glitter everywhere (that stuff stays with you forever) and I laughed uncontrollably. And I didn’t spontaneously combust when another man winked at me! That first year at Pride was one of the best days of my life, and it taught me that we all have a lot more in common with each other than we think. Now I look forward to Pride every year, which is a massive shame because I won’t get my glitter fix this year. But that won’t stop me supporting the cause. We’re all here just trying to live our lives, and our sexuality shouldn’t matter one bit. So, what does Pride mean to me now? In a word, love.

A light that shines on equality and visibility

Isabel Muñoz, Event Marketing Manager

What does Pride mean to me?: As a proud ally of the LGBTQ+ community, Pride means so much to me. But at its core, it’s the celebration of love being accepted for being love. It’s also an opportunity for those in the community to spread their love and their light and to promote the equality and visibility that they deserve. Lin-Manuel Miranda summed it up best in his 2016 Tony Awards acceptance speech “love is love is love is love is LOVE.” Why do we still need Pride today?: To celebrate and commemorate the Stonewall riots and for all those who continue to fight for equality and visibility in the LGBTQ+ community. Though we’ve made huge strides, there is still so much work to be done! How does the movement inspire social action globally?: It definitely brings awareness and now is celebrated globally at the same time around the world. It’s all the same fight and struggle, some countries worse than others, so to be able to just drive awareness and show acts of solidarity is amazing. How can people celebrate Pride while social distancing?: Hanging the Pride flag outside your home or on your car, maybe watching an educational documentary on Netflix, sharing educational content on your social media platforms, or maybe just blasting some Lady Gaga or this Pride Playlist from Spotify and having a zoom party/socially safe-distanced part

Evolving RFM analysis for retailers this holiday season

Team Dotdigital — Tue, 22 Oct 2019 00:00:00 +0000

A natural extension of the Pareto principle which tells us that 80% of sales typically come from 20% of clients, RFM goes further to better understand the behavior of customers, and how best to convert them. Dedicated innovators, at Dotdigital, we’ve gone that one step further again. For businesses interested in behavior-based targeting and reporting, Dotdigital makes these activities possible with its customer dashboard and contact segment builder.

When interviewing retailers about RFM, they challenged us to go deeper and help them understand customer behaviour over time. Taking this back to our teams working on data science, we could not have been happier. We were already thinking and prototyping ideas in this area and were convinced of its value.

Some examples of what retailers were interested in include:

Examining how the number of at-risk customers changes over time;
Tracking the effects of a two-month marketing the campaign focused on increasing customer loyalty;
Targeting new customers who have become inactive in a specific time frame;
Seeing where loyal customers come from.

We knew, with Black Friday on the horizon and moving into Q4, that these items were going to be more important than ever. What’s more, during the holiday season, your customers don’t act in the same way they do the rest of the year round. We needed a report that would be as diverse as your customers’ behavior.

To visualize this in a concise and attractive way, we chose to use a Sankey diagram.

The Sankey diagram’s origins date back to steam engines, where the first one was used to show the movement of thermal energy through a system. Today their use is incredibly widespread. From tracking energy production to tracking voting habits – Sankeys are popping up everywhere. Their use is not always appropriate, or enlightening of the data being presented, but Sankeys are a great fit for our analysis of A-to-B movement.

Our persona movement report is designed to be interactive. Hovering over a starting persona shows pipes representing destinations; hovering over a destination persona shows pipes representing sources. Finally, you can hover over a discrete pipe to see the contacts moving between a source and a destination. The pipe is clickable, allowing you to dial in a contact segment and target customers who made that specific movement in the specified time frame.

In addition to the Sankey, our movement report also tracks the population size changes for each RFM persona between two time periods.

Another great thing to note here as we head into Halloween, Thanksgiving and beyond is just how robust our RFM model is. It’s not just your customers that change in the holiday season, it’s your definition of these RFM personas themselves. Because they are defined by segmented pots with assigned values of 1-5, the goal posts are always shifting. A valuable purchase in August of £50 might be a drop in the ocean compared to the larger spending in November on Black Friday, so the model must, and does, react and respond accordingly.

Being armed by persona movement reports on top of this means you have a better idea of your customers (and therefore better plans of action) across 12 months, instead of writing off valuable data because of seasonal abnormalities.

You already know that customers behave in different ways. The data is clear just by looking at your retail dashboard. But do you treat them differently even after knowing this? And how do you do that? Well, it’s true that persona movement reports won’t help you come up the amazing personalization that you, as a marketer, are so good at. But it will empower you to improve re-targeting, measure what’s working, and give you the kind of insight that inspires great campaigns; ones that are every bit as unique and diverse as your customers.

Start sending smarter messages now. Download out factsheet on Commerce Intelligence here.

Reporting: colors matter

Team Dotdigital — Wed, 26 Jun 2019 00:00:00 +0000

At best, that’s frustrating for your reporting efforts. At worst, you’re failing on decisions that could impact your business.

To help improve the usability of reporting in Dotdigital, we have decided to update our data ink colors. ‘Data ink’ here means the important detail you read from charts, dashboards, and reports.

Meet our new palette, Viridis. Coming to Dotdigital on July 3rd.

What was wrong with the old colors?

In data-ink terms, color should be about function not aesthetics.

What looks pleasing to the eye, or adheres to brand guidelines, is rarely what is needed to convey or enhance information.

Dotdigital’s previous reporting data ink used a combination of brand colors (pink and green) along with some generic colors. The charts looked on brand and the colors were distinct.

However, the palette had some problems:

It didn’t work for people with colorblindness
Greyscale printing became impossible to read because the palette didn’t have a uniform luminance gradient; which determines the perceived brightness of colors
Colors were not perceptually uniform. Simply put: a change of the same amount in a color value should produce a change of about the same visual importance
Colors used for data ink should be able to show that something is less than, more than, before, or after, another value
The previous palette could not show clear graduations of good and bad (diverging values) on the same chart
The palette didn’t transition to a dark background. We wanted our charts to be easy to embed in our users’ presentations, whether they used a light or dark background

Viridis is a better color palette for data

With those thoughts, we are adopting Viridis for our data ink. The color palette was created by Stéfan van der Walt and Nathaniel Smith and is popular with data scientists.

As well as solving the specific data visualization challenges within Dotdigital’s reporting, Viridis also met the challenges around accessibility and colorblindness.

As you can see, irrespective of the type of colorblindness, the sequence of the colors is still understandable. For an eight-color diverging spectrum, that’s a huge achievement.

This is a hugely positive change, with benefits both to the increasing power of our data visualization and who you can share those visualizations with. Look out for these changes coming to Dotdigital on July 3rd.

For a sneak peek on what we’re working on, check out our roadmap here.

Why use AI-powered product recommendations?

Team Dotdigital — Thu, 16 May 2019 00:00:00 +0000

A humble bestseller product recommendation is an easy win. For a little effort and low data dependencies, it gives you strong revenue uplift.

Bestsellers’ high performance makes sense.

Your most popular products are popular for good reason. They exist at key intersections of value, features, desirability, quality, and trend.

Amplifying any of those signals to your audience is always going to make you money. It’s easy to understand why it’s one of the most popular types of product recommendations.

Job done, right? Why do you need AI?

Avoiding saturation

After you’ve marketed your bestsellers for a time, you may hit a couple of challenges.

First, bestsellers favor your more established products. Unless new products are immediately successful, a recommendation can become self-reinforcing. It can be hard to get different products to breakthrough.

Second, you may notice that revenue uplift starts tracking new customer growth. At this point, the recommendation is saturating. Whilst it’s smart to hit your new customers with your best stuff, it’s now underperforming for existing customers.

Both problems warrant their own detailed discussion. For now, let’s look at a more nuanced strategy and how AI can help find new revenue in your existing customer base.

Unlocking inaccessible revenue

AI-powered product recommendations will identify new and unique customer/product relationships.

Finding these relationships at scale is where machine learning comes in. It analyses your products, orders, and web behavior data, so you don’t have to. It roots around the dark corners of your data to match products to customers.

Doing this analysis manually, even if you knew what to look for, would be an impossible task. Machine learning does it continually for you. Each time it trains on new data, it learns and gets more accurate.

My argument for this kind of big data approach to marketing is simple: don’t assume your established customer personas are the only truth. Until you use machine learning, you don’t know what you don’t know.

Winning with blended recommendation strategies

Bestsellers may always be your top performing recommendation. Talking to retailers, I’ve heard cases where a small set of products accounts for over 60% of sales. AI is unlikely to outperform against such massive numbers. (Unless you’re Amazon and have an enormous and diverse catalog!)

These retailers are aware of the risks of saturation. Not marketing effectively to their wider customer bases is a long-term challenge. Historically, there are easier battles to win that deliver nice returns.

Fortunately, technology is catching up to support retailers.

We’ve built Dotdigital product recommendations to support a blended strategy. You can combine so-called heuristics (like bestsellers) with hyper-personalized recommendations using AI.

The theme behind this strategy starts with covering known areas with broad sets of rules. Create non-AI product recommendations to match your known customer cohorts. You might focus on product categories, price points, seasonality, trends, or any other rules you like.

Once you have those, it’s time to infuse your campaigns with AI recommendations.

Here’s how to use different classes of recommendation:

Set up multiple category-targeted best sellers for some big hitting recommendations;
Find tomorrow’s best sellers with the most viewed recommendation type;
Mix things up with the hybrid trending recommendation type (it blends best sellers and most viewed);
Match your niche customers to their perfect products with AI-powered lookalikes;
Use best next’s AI to let shoppers help other shoppers find products they didn’t even know they wanted.

With this approach, you’re casting the widest possible net to drive more sales. You’re building automated marketing around cohorts you know. Meantime, AI is finding new customer/product relationships you didn’t know you had.

Announcing new integration with Shopify Flow

Team Dotdigital — Fri, 07 Dec 2018 15:38:46 +0000

There’s not a single minute to spare for marketers – especially this time of year. When we talk to our customers about their main obstacles, there’s one challenge comes up time and time again – time!

What if you could get some of your precious hours back? What if you could take full control of the data held in your ecommerce platform and automate some of the tedious tasks you need to perform on a regular basis in order to be successful? What if you could automate these recipes in order to run your ecommerce and marketing platform better together and on autopilot?

Have I got your attention? Keep on reading.

What is Shopify Flow?

Shopify Flow is the ecommerce automation tool from Shopify available to all Shopify Plus merchants. Flow was designed to let you easily automate and offload manual tasks and business processes within your ecommerce store. As a merchant, you can quickly devise three-step workflows by selecting a‘trigger’(something happening in your store), applying‘conditions’ and eventually automating‘actions’.

For example, this can be: Tag a customer as VIP as soon as they spend at least $100.

Dotdigital’s connector for Shopify Flow

Not only does Shopify Flow allow you to react and run actions happening within your store, but you can also extend its native automation functionalities with actions and triggers that are built by Shopify apps you use every day to run your business. These extensions are called Shopify Flow Connectors. You don’t need to set up anything in addition to your existing plug-and-play apps. As soon as a tech you use creates a connector, it will appear automatically in Shopify Flow, ready for you to use.

We’re delighted to announce our first Shopify Flow action available to all Dotdigital for Shopify users: Add to marketing program.

More than just an action, it is a way to build bridges between your ecommerce automation and your marketing automation systems.

Every business process created in Shopify can be used as an entry point to a relevant Dotdigital program, ready to trigger a chain of marketing actions such as sending an email, triggered SMS, push notification, Facebook messenger, etc. In turn, this means you can better segment your customers, reward your most valuable segments or engage with them through an entirely different channel like Google Ads, Facebook or Instagram.

Additionally, our AI-powered product recommendation builder and our unique coupon code feature can also be used to drive more revenue back to your store, right from an automation program.

“Dotdigital’s new connector provides endless possibilities to automate engaging customer experiences. With their omnichannel approach to marketing programs, brands can now create targeted, relevant experiences based on behavior from any other app or solution that works with Flow.”

Anthony Kentris, Product Marketing Manager at Shopify Plus

Unlocking engaging marketing programs

So what exactly does the Dotdigital’s connector for Flow allow you to build? You can use it as the glue between your Shopify store, Dotdigital, and any other Plus apps that work with Flow. The possibilities are nearendless. Not to mention, having two of your most important tools talk to each other can only bode for bigger, better things – in line with both marketing and commercial objectives. Here are a handful of examples that are likely to help you save tons of time – what’s more, you can download these as flow templates and import them into your store:

When a customer places a second order, send a coupon code via their preferred channel (SMS, email or Facebook Messenger) ( download template)
When a large refund is requested, enroll the customer onto a win-back program ( download template)
After an order has been fulfilled, send a personalized triggered email with the tracking info

Now, let’s layer other Flow Connectors you may already be working with on top:

Customer birthday is in seven days on Loyalty lion, set a trigger to send a birthday coupon code via push notification in Dotdigital ( download template)
Enroll customers onto a Dotdigital “VIP program” after Persosa serves them a personalized on-site experience
A 1* review is submitted on Stamped.io, send contact to customer-care program( download template)
When a pre-order is created via Pre-order, enroll the

Big changes, big data, BigQuery

Team Dotdigital — Thu, 28 Jun 2018 00:00:00 +0000

Our customers store diverse data in Dotdigital, including product catalogs, orders, reviews, carts, web analytics, and more.

They do this thanks to our insight data features, which are a flexible way to store and use any type of data. Today, thousands of Dotdigital customers use it to power their segments, automations, campaign personalization, GDPR consent, and reporting.

It’s fair to say that the feature has been very popular.

We’ve seen individual customer insight data grow from thousands of rows, to hundreds of thousands, to millions, to tens of millions. To support that data growth, and deliver some exciting big data-powered features, we have partnered with Google to launch a new version of insight data built on their BigQuery data warehouse platform.

BigQuery is being made available in staged migrations: US accounts are already migrated, EMEA is in progress, and APAC will migrate once BigQuery is available in that region (this is expected in October).

What BigQuery gives you today

If you’re a bit geeky, you’ll be excited by BigQuery’s technical headlines: it’s an infinitely scalable, server-less, data warehouse.

However, if you’re more interested in the tangible features and benefits, here’s what BigQuery gives you today in Dotdigital:

GDPR-compliant consent insight storage
Product recommendations that generate powerful dynamic content for your campaigns
Segments that can now be infinitely complex and will consistently return results in < 15 seconds
Segments that can now use a powerful ‘contains’ operator

There really is no limit to how much data you can store in Dotdigital, how you can query it, or what you can do with it.

Tomorrow looks very exciting

BigQuery is an enabling technology for Dotdigital and our customers. By allowing you to store more data, and use it more easily, our engineering teams are free to build ambitious new features to power your omnichannel marketing campaigns.

Central to the new features that we’re working on are predictive marketing capabilities powered by machine learning and artificial intelligence. With what we’re building, we think Dotdigital will fundamentally change the way you think about, build, integrate, and report on your marketing campaigns.

For our ecommerce customers, we are also bringing you many new features for product recommendations. These include new recommendation types, a powerful filter builder, and ground-breaking machine learning functionality for predictive recommendations.

We can’t wait to show you the new BigQuery-powered features we’re developing.

Does this sound good to you?

If you want to know more about what we’ve got under the hood, contact your account manager or book a demo today.

7 Tips For More Effective Mobile Emails

Team Dotdigital — Fri, 08 Jun 2012 00:00:00 +0000

Email and mobile together are already functioning as a team, whether we as marketers want them to or not. The customers and consumers have voted with their usage. They’re not sitting around waiting for marketers to get their act together, but as I write this between 20-60% of your database will be reading your marketing emails on their mobile device.

If designed and planned well, email and mobile together, will, in the forthcoming years, form a formidable marketing force. So marketers, a question: Will you be leading the way and profiting from your competitors lack of preparedness? Or will your competitors be profiting from yours?

Challenges

Many marketers get stuck here and go no further. In no way am I trying to minimize the challenges that lay ahead for a marketer to optimise the mobile email journey – however they are certainly not as insurmountable as they first appear.

The obvious challenges are: designing for smaller screen, many distractions from being ‘mobile’ and not sitting at home or in the office, slow network – often 3G, short battery life of mobile devices and the user is often multi-tasking – i.e. reading your email whilst continually checking to see whether the train is arriving.

And of course not forgetting the rendering challenges for the multiple devices, an example of a Eurostar email being shown below, courtesy of Striata.

There are more subtle challenges, such as understanding that due to all the above challenges, the buying journey is different, however, depending on how you look at it, you can easily also read this as being a benefit, to be taken advantage of by the savvy marketer.

Opportunities

The opportunities are plentiful. On the flipside of the coin of the consumer being distracted by the goings on around him outside the office or home, there is also the benefit that on many occasions the consumer will be looking to ‘kill time’. Here they’re looking at their phone to be a distraction, and entertainment –to engage them somehow.

Norman Nielsen’s Usability Newsletter Report 2010 calls this the killing time Factor and attributes the fact that many reports have found mobile email users to be more engaged than either web or desktop users, primarily due to this fact. An example of this can be seen below using Litmus’ analytics tool.

Embrace the change

When combining mobile and emails, a marketer now has the ability to be with the consumer/customer/subscriber 24/7. Some questions a marketer should ask are: is it relevant? is it personal? is it contextual? Be aware that they could be reading your emails in bed, whilst watching TV, in the bathroom (yes!) and whilst waiting (in a queue, for a train/bus, in-between meetings) as well as in the local café or whilst having dinner with friends!

7 tips to improve your mobile emails

1. Get their attention – use the subject line wisely. Whilst the iPhone truncates the subject line you have the advantage of being able to also use the pre-header to gain their attention. Regardless of which email client or device is being used, it’s wise to front-load the subject line with the imperative information or words.

2. Simplify – simplify your design and content. Remember the email doesn’t have to do the conversion – your landing page can take care of that – just focus on getting them there by removing as many barriers as possible.

3. Design for touch – think fat thumbs. Ensure Call To Actions (whether text or buttons) are thumb-friendly.

4. Design for immediate action – Design for the 80/20 rule. Users spend 80% of their time looking at information above the fold therefore place the Call To Action ‘Above the Fold’ (i.e. in the first screen of the device), where it can be easily seen and acted upon.

5. Use Alt Tags – Only the iPhone and iPad automatically download images – Blackberry, Androids devices don’t, so ensure that you use descriptive and persuasive Alt Tags. And of course don’t hide a Call To Action behind a button!

6. Test the rendering of your email – in multiple devices. Don’t assume that all will be ok – ensure it is. If you don’t have multiple devices, then use a third party service such as Litmus or Return Path.

Finally – don’t forget to optimise the whole journey

In my next post I’ll be looking at optimising your landing pages for mobile, for as we all know, in 99% of cases, the purpose of the email it to ensure that you arrive at the landing page, where the conversion will take place. So don’t forget to design, test and optimise this imperative step.

How many email marketing days till Xmas?

Team Dotdigital — Thu, 20 Oct 2011 00:00:00 +0000

dotMailer’s step-by-step guide to planning and running successful Christmas email marketing campaigns.

Unlike your last minute Christmas shopping, successful Christmas email marketing campaigns cannot be put off.

Whether you work in B2B or B2C, planning for your Christmas email marketing campaigns is something you need to start now. Gulp!

If you haven’t already started, then where do you start?

At dotMailer we’re into our second decade of helping email marketers in companies big and small. That’s 11 Christmases and counting.

Follow our step by step guide and this year your Christmas email campaign planning will be as easy as falling off a Yule log.

Step 1 – Your analysis

Last year’s marketing

The first step is to review your previous years’ activity.

What did you do last year?
What worked best?
What subject lines generated the most opens, and what offers, product lines and approaches generated the most click throughs and conversions?
How did your contacts respond to your increased frequency?

Your sales teams and your competitors

As well as your own campaigns, take a look at what your competitors did. What were they doing that you should have been doing better? And speak to your sales teams and staff to collect their anecdotal feedback and analysis on how customers behaved and what they responded to last Christmas.

Your finance department

Get the hard facts. Speak to your finance people and get them to run you some key reports on which products/lines/offers performed best both last Christmas, and throughout the year.

Wrapping it all up

Based on your findings from all this analysis you will be in a position to draw up an outline plan of:

What you want to offer in your pre-Christmas marketing
How you want to offer it
And who you want to offer it to

Step 2 – Your Christmas lists

Emails containing targeted content based on customer data are proven to return higher ROI than untargeted, ‘blanket’ campaigns.

This is the busiest time of the year in recipients’ inboxes and you need to focus on the relevancy of your content. Avoid the blanket approach at Christmas and use targeted, data rich, opted-in lists.

Collect the data you need

If you don’t have all the data you need for targeting, it’s not too late to collect it. Start running customer surveys or competitions right now, and build in a data collection element. Promote these at all your customer touch points, always including your website.

You can also use contacts’ historical click behaviour to drive your targeting.

With dotMailer you can build a segmentation query that allows you to, for instance, select those who have been clicking on links for male presents – across several different campaigns. You can then target those with your top selling male gifts.

Step 3 – Transactional Emails

Your transactional emails, such as invoices, customer updates etc are all a potential source of cross-sell. Make sure your transactional emails are editable and consider offering appropriate cross-sell offers.

Step 4 – Send a Christmas e-card

A Christmas e-card helps build customer loyalty and brand recognition. Don’t make it a commercial message. Make it a feel good factor.

Step 5 – Viral and social

Make sure your key content, messages and offers, whether on your website or your email campaigns can be easily shared on social networks and forwarded to friends.

Key advent calendar dates

The second Monday in December – 12th December:

This is traditionally the biggest online shopping day of the year. If you sell to online to consumers then make sure you are actively marketing on this date.

December 22nd: Lifesaver email offering next day delivery

December 23rd: It may be too late for online ordering and delivery but it’s not too late to direct customers to your store.

Christmas Day: Are your contacts being driven mad by their families and the TV? It could be a good time to connect with them via email.

Boxing Day: Target your contacts with your best offers and best sellers to take advantage of this high-traffic shopping day.

A guide to B2B email marketing

Team Dotdigital — Fri, 30 Sep 2011 00:00:00 +0000

High-performing email marketing is a future-proof tool to win new contracts and drive your business forward. Basically, there are two types of online marketing: business-to-customer or b2c and business-to-business or b2b email marketing that work wonders for contemporary companies, big and small. While the purpose and effect of business-to-customer promotions are quite clear, the benefits and importance of business-to-business email campaigns may be understated. Below, there is a short guide to b2b marketing that may help you get the most out of your campaigns.

What is business-to-business email marketing?

Cost-efficient b2b email marketing is a form of direct online marketing designed to inform potential and existing partners about new products and services offered by your company. In comparison to business-to-customer campaigns created to get new customers on the hook, business-to-business marketing is focused on establishing and strengthening relations with current and potential suppliers, lenders and clients.

Create a strong call to action

Whether you want to attract new investors or extend your credit line, a strong call to action is the key to success. Business people are bombarded with numerous emails every day, so it is pivotal to make your message clear and up-to-the point. Make sure that your b2b email marketing campaign contains strong calls for action, so your peer entrepreneurs are likely to click on and read to get the idea of what you are offering.

Take care of your reputation

If managed incorrectly emails get into spam filters or blacklists which may undermine your reputation, so it is essential to refer to agencies specialised in email marketing to avoid it. Reliable companies allow you to stay away from spam filters and blacklists by employing several techniques. Special tools are set up so you don’t risk re-uploading any emails which have been unsubscribed. Still, it is advisable to delete unsubscribers from your own records if you are keeping separate information locally. If you don’t want your messages to be filtered out as spam, choose reliable b2b email marketing agencies recognised by large email providers as responsible senders. Such agencies prevent spam from being sent out to protect you from being tarred by association with non-compliant senders.

Hire professional experts

Poor quality newsletters and unprofessional design is something you can’t afford, so it is better to hire skilled specialists offering free trial packages to give you the opportunity to decide which one works best for your company. Whether you are looking for a single template or a full suite of templates for your b2b email marketing campaign, reliable agencies provide you with a full HTML service. It is important to point out that some reputable agencies offer you free trial versions that can be used for up to one month, so you can get the idea how email marketing works and how it may improve your operations.

Business-to-business email marketing is a form of direct online marketing popularly used to inform potential partners about new products and services offered by your company. In order to get the most out of your campaigns it is advisable to use strong calls to action, avoid spam filters and hire professionals to create attention-grabbing templates.