This past weekend I planted my summer garden. As I waited for the bumper crop of fresh tomatoes, zucchini, and beans to pop out of the soil (it will be about a three month wait), I gazed around my garden and noticed that something was missing. My yard needed a picnic table. I went inside, hopped online, and found the perfect table. I placed my order online with a company call CedarStore.com, received a confirmation email, and called it a night.

This morning when I checked my email inbox I had a Facebook friend request from something I did not recognize. It was from Cedar Store. This was the online retailer that I purchased the table from the day earlier.

I did not immediately put the two together, but once I did I thought how nice it was that this retailer took the time to look up my email on facebook and ask me to be its friend. I have not seen retailers do this before. I am not sure if this site has some sort of magical script that queries order email addresses and sends them facebook friend requests, or if some furniture aficionado took the time to look me up and send the request. Either way this is a great touch.

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Email marketing is an ever evolving art.  It morphs and changes from one hot topic — or “must have” — to the next. Below are twelve current hot topics in email marketing listed in no particular order. Any serious or casual email marketer should know what these are and should use as many as them as he or she can in their email marketing endeavors.

7) ReMarketing (Abandoned Cart Campaigns)
One especially important and potentially lucrative triggered campaign is the abandoned cart (a.k.a. ReMarketing) campaign. This is an email sent to someone reminding them to purchase items/processes which have been abandoned — or left — in their online shopping cart. ReMarketing is a great way to nudge potential purchasers into converting.

8. Social Media Integration
Everyone seems to be tweeting, Facebooking and doing other awkward sounding social media actions. Be sure you include these important social media outlets in your emails. Allow subscribers to rave about how great you are on various social media sites or browse your corporate social media pages. Email marketing must adapt as the marketplace and subscriber preferences change.

9) Personalization and Dynamic Content
Use personalized or specialized imagery, product placement, or text when you can and when appropriate. Instead of saying “Dear Customer” in your message, it is much nicer to use your recipient’s first name — ‘Dear Balthazar” as an example. Also, utilize the data that you have on your subscribers. Some common dynamic content strategies are using different messaging based on the customer type, location, nearest store, browse or purchase behavior, recency, or email interaction.

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Email marketing is an ever evolving art.  It morphs and changes from one hot topic — or “must have” — to the next. Below are twelve current hot topics in email marketing listed in no particular order. Any serious or casual email marketer should know what these are and should use as many as them as he or she can in their email marketing endeavors.

1) Welcome or Welcome Series
Everyone likes to feel welcome when they join a group. This is especially true when someone opts in to your email marketing program. Be sure you make these new subscribers feel welcome. Send an appropriate and timely welcome (and maybe an offer) to newbie’s to your list.  Better yet, design a Welcome Series.  A Welcome Series is a string of welcome emails that not only says hello to the new subscriber but also can provide them more information about your brand and what you offer.

2) Segmentation Strategy
Careful, well though out, and flawlessly executed email segmentation is crucial to the modern day email marketer.  The days of loading and blasting your list are over. Take a look at this post by clicking here to learn more about email segmentation strategy.

3) Testing Plan
Testing is one of the most important actions an email marketer can take. Be sure to test frequently and use the results of your tests. Re-testing is another good habit to get into. Some examples of common email tests are subject lines, personalization vs. no personalization, dynamic content, creative versions, time of day, day of week, various offers, gender, offer code in the subject line, and location just to name a few. The options are endless.

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It is inevitable that sometime in an email marketer’s life, there will be a mistake in a live email deployment. This could come in the form of the wrong subject line, missing or broken images, mismatched offer codes, incorrect content, a down website just to name a few.

How should mistakes be handled? Yes, sticking your head in the sand or pretending that the mistake did not happen sounds like a good idea, but facing the error head-on might be the better option.

Before you send a knee-jerk apology email (which could compound the original mistake) or yell at your fellow email marketers, take a deep breath and review these questions:

1. What was the result of this error? Is the error worthy of an apology email? If there is not any harm in the mistake it might be best to do nothing.
2. What is the upside of sending an apology email?
3. What is the downside of sending an apology email?
4. What should the apology email look like? What about the subject line? Should I use humor? Should I be serious? Should I include an offer?  How much information should be included about the error?
5. Who should receive the apology email? Openers, clickers, purchasers, best customers, or everyone?

Here is recent example of an apology email a friend of mine sent me. Not only did this email deploy with a test in the subject line but it was also sent twice – at the exact same time!

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For many years, the public impression of how email deliverability works has been shrouded in mystery. Most seem to assume that email service providers hire deliverability experts because they know some sort of ISP black magic — or even better, that they have a direct ‘Bat-Phone’ to call ISP postmasters whenever a problem arises. While ISP relations are still critical to ensuring high delivery rates, the days of relying solely on ISP phone calls or emails to fix delivery problems are a thing of the past.

It’s important to note these key issues about ISP postmasters:

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I recently unsubscribed from Omaha Steaks email because I was subscribed with more than one email address and no longer wanted to receive duplicate messages. After unsubscribing via email, I was sent a real-time “We removed your email address” confirmation message. I had never received an email like this before (I am told other businesses also practice this), but it soon got me thinking — is it CAN-SPAM compliant? How will affect the user experience?  What about complaint rates?

I checked with the Experian CheetahMail compliance team to see if this type of email sent after an unsubscribe was CAN-SPAM compliant. I learned that unsubscribe confirmation messages like these are, in fact, compliant because “the CAN-SPAM Act explicitly exempts this type of email in their definition of ‘transactional or relationship messaging.’ The law provides an exemption for ‘notifications of a change in the recipient’s standing or status with respect to a subscription.’”

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I recently made an online purchase from The Home Depot. In the shipping notification email I received, they included an email sign up call to action. This is a great way to ask an already engaged customer to join your email list. Placing this above the fold helps to ensure great visibility and hopefully a whole bunch of new subscribers.

Orbitz uses a nearly identical opt-in link in their confirmation email, except in their case they choose to use a text-based rather than graphic call-out box:

Going back to tried-and-true direct marketing principles, it’s no secret that your most recent customers are your most important customers. When sending order confirmations, marketers should look to strike while the iron is hot by including an opt-in link, preferably at the top of the email.