If your idea of creating and sending an email campaign starts with using Word and then coping and pasting your content into an email client you're doing it all wrong.  I understand you're not a web designer, coder, email marketing guru or techie, and you probably cringe when you see words like HTML, CSS and FTP.  You also probably have no clue about how to create an HTML Email Template so that it will look good in all the various email clients that exist today,not to mention all the different handheld devices. That's okay, this article will introduce you to an easy to use web application that will do all the hard work for you and leave you with a great looking HTML Email Template that you can use to copy/paste into your email client.

The folks over at  Campaign Monitor  have designed an HTML Email Template Builder for people who want to create  great looking email templates without having to know any HTML or CSS.  The Builder can be found at the following URL: http://www.campaignmonitor.com/templates/

1. Start by choosing an email template design layout.

You can choose from 4 different types of email templates.  Simple announcement (1 column),  Basic Newsletter (2 columns), Content Heavy Newsletter (3 Columns), and an Image or Product Gallery.

After you have selected your template you can immediately start modifying the properties of the template. On the left hand side there are menu options for changing the various elements of the template. Start with the Basics, and then you can change the Header, Content, Footer and for the more complex templates, the Sidebars.

You can upload your own background header image/logo, change font type, background color, text color, link color.  All with the click of a button.

What's also great is that your email template is designed to look great on mobile devices as well. So you don't need to worry about recipients who prefer to read their emails on their handhelds.

You can change your own footer content such as street address, permission reminder as well as the colors associated with those.

Once you are done, you have the choice of saving your template and creating a Campaign Monitor account or you can download your template with all the images as a zip file to your local machine.  You want to choose the option to download your template to your computer.

• After the file has downloaded, unzip the contents.
• If you chose to add any images to the template you will need to upload those images to the internet, such as your own website, Facebook account, or even http://www.imageshack.us which offers free online image hosting services.
• You then need to view the index.html file in the unzipped folder in your web browser, such as Firefox, Chrome, Internet Explorer, Safari, etc etc.
• Once the email template is loaded, view the source code of the document.  Usually you can just right click in the white space of the page in your browser and choose View Source or View HTML Source.
• You need to copy all of the source code and paste it into a blank Notepad file, DO NOT USE WORD.
• Once the HTML and CSS code is in Notepad, you need to find any references to the image(s) you inserted into the template and replace them with the full URL of the image(s) you uploaded to the internet. If you don't do this your image(s) will not display for  your recipients.  In notepad, you can choose Edit >> Find, and if you search for just .jpg or .gif if you used that file type, it should find the first reference to your image. You need to replace the <img src="yourimagename.jpg" .... with the full URL of the image you stored on the internet...so it should look something like this... <img src="http://www.yourdomain.com/images/yourimagename.jpg" ...
• Once you have replaced all of the images in your template, you can copy the contents of the notepad file into your GoldMine Document Template Library as a new email template.

If you have questions about any of the steps involved with uploading your images to the internet or with replacing the references to the images in the HTML code in Notepad, please contact First Direct Corp. directly for assistance.

Admit it—your email marketing strategy has fallen to the wayside.  Now is the time to shake the dust off your outdated email marketing strategy and reinvigorate your campaigns. There are thousands of e-mail marketing tools out there, but they all fail in one fundamental way - they're not linked to your internal sales process or your CRM database. They allow you to create an e-mail and send to your uploaded contact list and then you can view some fancy reports about who opened, unsubscribed and clicked on a link, but that's about it. If this sounds like how your organization is sending emails today, there is a better way.

IntelliClick is different from all other types  of e-mail marketing systems. IntelliClick is a GoldMine add-on tool that allows personalized email campaigns to be  created, sent and tracked directly from within your GoldMine.

Key Features:

• It's integrated into your CRM system. Information about the responses to your e-mail campaigns is stored and visible against the customer record where everyone can see it. No need to log onto some web site somewhere or run some kind of report to see who clicked on what. It's in your CRM system.
• Track e-mail opens. IntelliClick can track when your e-mail is opened or read by the customer. Literally within 10 seconds, that information appears in your CRM system and an optional e-mail, or pop up alarm in your CRM system can be defined to alert you and your staff.
• Track 'Click Throughs'. Tracks when a customer clicks on a link or image and is taken to a page on your web site. Again, an optional e-mail, or pop up alarm in your CRM system can be defined to alert you and your staff.
• Track Web Site Visits. A very powerful part of IntelliClick. Allows you to track visitor behaviour to your web site beyond the original e-mail. Maybe many weeks or months after the original e-mail was sent, your customer suddenly decides to visit your web site. With IntelliClick you can track what pages they visit, the duration of the visit and the last page they saw. Again an alert can be setup automatically and instantly when a customer visits your site. Many people use Google Analytics, but this is better because you know exactly who is visiting your site, and can take action right away.
• Track Unsubscribes. Provide one simple link in your e-mail (or button) to allow a customer to be removed from your mailing list. This will automatically update their record in GoldMine and IntelliClick will prevent you from sending future e-mails to them. What's more, the flagging is done at an e-mail address level, not an organisation level. Let's say you are dealing with 10 people in a company and one of them unsubscribes. IntelliClick will still allow you to send e-mails to the other 9.
• Track Bouncebacks. You'll never have a 100% accurate e-mail list. Inevitably, some e-mails will be returned to you as a 'bounce', and there will be several reasons why the e-mail did not get through - bad syntax in the e-mail address, person no longer works there, company has gone bust, etc. IntelliClick allows you to setup different rules based on the different types of bounces. Records are automatically updated in your CRM system - e.g. flag the record to prevent further e-mails being sent (you must not send e-mails out to duff e-mail addresses) or automatically schedule a call for a salesperson to ring them and check their addresses.
• Provide a Call Me Now Button. A great CALL TO ACTION to prompt the customer for a call back to them. Again it will pop up an alarm in GoldMine within 20 seconds indicating the person requested a call back.
• Track 'Forward to a Friend'. IntelliClick can create for you a single link in your e-mail to 'recommend a friend'. When your customer clicks this link, they are asked for their associate's Name and E-mail address. These are automatically transferred to your CRM or GoldMine database, to create a new record for them and a follow up call created for a salesperson.
• A One Click Event Registration. Do you run events or seminars? Give the customer just one link for them to register. No need to take them to a complicated form asking for their details again! The customer automatically gets a confirmation e-mail and their registration is recorded in your database for follow up.
• A One Click Literature Download. Allow customers to download documents or more information. When a customer clicks on the link, they get the file requested and again recorded in your CRM database for follow up.
• Sample HTML E-mail templates. Have you ever struggled trying to create a professional looking e-mail? IntelliClick is supplied with a vast library of sample email templates for all different types of mailings, one column, two column, three column etc...
• E-mail sending service included (SMTP Relay). Sending high volumes of e-mails directly from your CRM system and your own e-mail server could get your company 'blacklisted' and identified as a spammer. With IntelliClick, e-mails are sent through someone else's server not yours. The e-mails STILL appear to the customer that they have come from you. When the customer replies to the e-mail it goes to you. But the main benefit is there is no danger of being blacklisted on sending high volumes of emails. You can also access your SMTP relay usage (the sending of e-mails) and bounce statistics with detailed charts and data downloads.
• Full Campaign Reporting. We include 6 reports to see what your most successful campaigns are, your top pages on your web site and which customers have been most active or have show the most interest. Remember everything is tracked in your CRM database so it can all be accessed via a report or SQL Query. We also provide some SQL Queries for listing unsubscribes, campaign activity, etc etc. In addition we also have an interactive  GoldMine Dashboard that returns campaign tracking results. (see image below)
• Pricing is tied to results tracked in your CRM database as opposed to the more common way of pricing, which is based on volume of e-mail sent.  IntelliClick is a more affordable solution but with more functionality and easier to budget your costs.
• IntelliClick is easy to use and e-mails can be sent by non marketing users once the e-mail template has been setup. IntelliClick is equally suitable for low volume e-mails, even sending and tracking a single e-mail.

 REQUEST A PERSONAL DEMONSTRATION TODAY

You may have heard the expression “it’s not what you know, but knowing where to find it.” This is certainly true when it comes to your GoldMine database, where your ability to find a piece of information or a record(s) containing that information will depend on knowing how to go searching for it.

Since GoldMine offers multiple ways to look-up/find information it’s key to know which method to use – which tool to go searching with. The table below will help you to appreciate your best option* based on the nature of your search criteria.

*Author has indicated above my most likely search method, which is not to say you can not find what you’re looking for with another method.

As a general rule, my preferred search tool is the Contact Search Center. It is fast and efficient for the look-ups that are done most commonly throughout the day, such as a last name or company name. Since with GoldMine you can have multiple tabs open at the same time, one can easily jump to which ever search tool is most suitable.

The and SQL Query Search tools require more knowledge to use effectively. First Direct Corp. offers webinars on each of these topics. Below are links to such classes:

An Introduction to Microsoft SQL Queries & Reporting Services

GoldMine Universal Search

Filters and Groups offer search options as well.  To learn more about all these options and their respective pros & cons we offer the following training event as well -  Filters, Groups, and SQL Queries. 

Or, if you'd like to work with a First Direct expert one-on-one give us a call at (800) 935-4386!

Eight smart reasons to use repetition!

We hear the word repetition used over and over again in marketing. Especially from anyone trying to sell us advertising! Maybe they’re just trying to sell us something, or maybe they know something. Here’s what I know about the power of repetition and what it can do for you:

1. Right Place at Right Time – If the timing isn’t right … it may not matter how good your overall message is. Today’s consumer suffers from “information overload.” People are just too overloaded to pay attention to things that are of low or no priority to them. They may buy your product or service in a month from now, but if you are a month early or a month late, you lose. Repetition improves the odds of being in the right place at the right time.
2. Right Message – Life has been calle d a “moving parade” and at any point in time there’s something new passing by. What interests one, may not interest another. Repetition gives you more opportunities to appear before your prospect with something of interest to them. Each new communication you do affords the marketer or sales person with the opportunity to try a new, albeit congruent, message. What works for one prospect, may not be effective with another. Altering your message gives you a chance to appeal to more people.
3. Easier for the Consumer – Making it easier for the consumer can lift response. Repetition puts your offer in front of the consumer thereby making it easier to find what they’re looking for. (Assuming that they were in the market for your product or service.) Plus, repeating certain information inside an offer, such as phone number or website, makes it easier for them to respond.
4. Residual Effect – Each marketing message has an impact that leaves a residual impression in the mind of our prospective consumer. Even if they don’t act on it, as long as we capture their attention and interest, our marketing can have some lasting, residual effect. This can have a positive influence on the strength of subsequent marketing and sales communications. In other words, past communications can increase our ability to motivate our consumer in future communications.
5. “Top-Of-Mind” Awareness – Building brand recognition is a long accepted mission for marketing.  The fact is that purely “institutional” or brand-awareness advertising is out of financial reach for many businesses. Most organizations have shifted over to direct response advertising where the emphasis is on motivating our consumer to take some form of action. With repetitive direct response communications, you can also build “top-of-mind” awareness.
6. Relationship Development – To build and maintain any relationship , you need to stay in touch.
7. Thin-out Your Competition – Studies show that the majority of people who inquire on a product or service do eventually purchase it. In many industries, especially those with a longer sales cycle, the majority of sales are made after 5 or more contacts. Yet, less than 10% of salespeople make five or more contacts. This is one important explanation for why 80% of the sales go to less than 20% of the salespeople in any industry. Therefore, repetitive follow-up alone will thin out your competition.
8. Database Maintenance – As you follow-up you come to learn about changes in information. Key contacts change along with their contact information. You have more opportunity to collect missing information. You increase the value and usefulness of your database through repetition.

GoldMine Software has features that support efforts to be more repetitive including:

• Schedule recurring activities.
• Automatic tracking of "last contact date" so that "Queries" can identify customers/prospects which have been overlooked and warrant a follow-up.
• Automated Processes to create "drip" campaigns that space emails and/or scheduled call backs at intervals into the future.
• Filters/Groups for creating lists for targeted marketing campaigns.

Using these features and others a business is able to use repetition for the smart reasons in this article.  Learn more - work with a First Direct expert to help you build your business by leveraging the power of GoldMine.  Contact us at (800) 935-4386.

What if you could predict the future? If  you could anticipate what people will do, would you leverage that knowledge for success? You can and here’s how!

As sales and marketing professionals we don’t need a fortune teller to tell us the future. With a little experience and common sense, we can anticipate it.

The other day I was in my first working meeting with a new client. I was explaining to a group of their department heads how they could do this when my customer said with excitement, “It’s true … it’s amazing how responsive Bob is!

How so … well think about it. Can you predict how a prospect might react? I didn't say WILL react, I said MIGHT react. Can you predict what a prospect might ask you? Can you anticipate possible objections, fears, and concerns? Can you figure out the various reasons why prospects do and don’t purchase your products or services?

There’s no question we can anticipate most of the likely scenarios we’re faced with! The question is how well we use our instincts and our  experience to market and sell more effectively and efficiently! Here’s what it takes:

1. Planning: Make a list of the situations that you run into in a typical day or week. What do you do? What kinds of requests and questions do you get asked?  How do you handle new leads? Are there any redundancies? What patterns you can find or make?

2. Invest Time: Prepare and assemble the materials you need to handle the various situations you expect. Be practical … start with the more likely ones (e.g. requests for literature, literature follow-up, frequently asked questions, etc.) Fulfillment may be in the form of an email, or letter, or fax. Or, possibly, schedule follow-up.

3. Invest in Automation: You’re going to need technology to do this right - a CRM (Customer Relationship Management)
System with certain capabilities.  A product such as GoldMine software has the features you need. Here’s what to look for in the system you choose:

• It must let you maintain a library of letters, faxes, emails, and have the ability to personalize them on demand. It needs to be able to print one label and envelope at a time. It must be able to capture contact information and other details from web forms.
• It must be able to automatically perform functions such scheduling activities based on information about the contact or responses on web forms. It must be able to delegate administrative and sales support tasks to others in your organization, in some cases automatically.
• It must offer the ability to build “tracks” which contain a sequence of actions that are performed when they are triggered by a variety of conditions including information in fields, the passage of time, completion of activities, and other circumstances in the database. And, have the capability to manually and automatically assign and remove these “tracks.”
• It must be able to dial the phone for you.
• It must let you build “macros” which can perform one or many functions at the click of a button.

4. Build Speed: Athletes develop muscle memory so that they can perform complex physical moves at high speeds in a reflex reaction to a situation.  Salespeople need to do the same in response to the situations that come at us. Whatever new system we build will take getting used to. Speed comes with practice and repetition. Functions that start out being difficult to perform become effortless and in a sense mindless once we do them enough times.

You Have An Edge!
By investing time upfront to save time later, you've developed an edge over other salespeople. Now you have leverage … you can do more in one day than most sales reps do in a week!  You’re more efficient and more productive. You can respond faster and follow up better. You’re not working harder … you’re working smarter!

To learn more about the Automated Processes feature in GoldMine click here or call First Direct at (800) 935-4386.

"OMG, it's nearly the holidays and I'm going to have to print my holiday labels using GoldMine."  If this sounds like you, not to worry!   For some people it has been a year since they had to do holiday labels and they've simply forgotten how.  For others it's the first time.  Either way, it doesn't have to be reason for a panic attack and you certainly don't want to let it spoil the season.

So, let's run through a quick 7 Step Briefing:

1. You need the list!  That's going to be either a filter or group in GoldMine. If the "group" is from last year there's no doubt it needs to be refreshed or probably recreated.
2. Start NOW because when the holiday's really do arrive it is probably t0o late to clean up the list.  There's an old marketing adage that goes, "When you need the list it's too late."  Very true!
3. Spot check the list for missing address lines (e.g. no street, missing zip, etc.) and then clean up the list.  If your list is large and spot checking is going to take too much time I recommend you develop filters that identify records with missing information.
4. If you are using "additional contacts" the process is a bit more complicated than this post is going to cover, but it can certainly be done and if you need help your GoldMine Partner can offer advice.
5. Identify a "label report" from among the standard GoldMine public reports under the category "labels and envelopes."  Test the report by printing out the first 2 or 3 pages of labels and making sure it aligns with the label sheets.  If you are going to change the label fonts, alignment, etc, I strongly encourage you to "clone" the report and work on that version so you don't run the risk of messing up (technical term) the original.
6. Set the "sort order" in the report properties so the labels are printed in an order you desire.  (e.g. alphabetical by last name or company name, or Zip order for postal sort.)
7. Now you should be ready to run the full report once the time is right.

It's a good idea to notify the users in your office of your deadline for running the labels and how you're selecting the records so that the users can make sure their records are included and clean up any contact information that they wish to.

By the way, if you want to do a cool email blast instead or in addition, we have some festive email templates to choose from and we can easily help you personalize them or make up an entirely custom greeting.

Of course, if you're having any trouble First Direct can help you with any aspects of this project! But, like your holiday shopping, please don't wait till the day before Christmas or Hanukkah!

Wouldn’t it be nice if every time someone filled out a web form on your web site, the contact information was directly imported into GoldMine? Never re-key information again.

TRY IT FOR YOURSELF

Solidify your web marketing strategy and take advantage of the benefits associated with Internet marketing using GoldMine Web Import.

Overview of GoldMine Web Import:

With GoldMine's web import feature you can put the power of the Internet to work for you by capturing information from the Internet (such as Sales Leads and Customer Contact Information) and automatically create a contact record in GoldMine.

Then, you can unleash the power of GoldMine with Automated Processes. Automatically send an e-mail, automatically trigger a drip marketing campaign, automatically schedule a follow up call! GoldMine Web Import frees you from time consuming "busy work" and allows you to focus on serving your customers and building your business.

CLICK HERE TO LEARN MORE...

Whether it's email stationery for everyday correspondence or a monthly newsletter to keep your customers informed, we can create customized HTML email and newsletter templates that are professional and standards compliant and perfect for your businesses needs.

Why Use Our HTML Email Design Services?

Save Your Time

First Direct Corp. can provide you attractive HTML e-mail templates that you can use over & over, so you can save time to focus on your message and copy. These communications can be added to your GoldMine Document Center so your GoldMine users can send out high impact communications quickly and easily.

Convert Your Existing Documents to HTML

Don't make the mistake of attaching files (PDF, Word, graphics) to your marketing emails. Converting your content to HTML, shrinks the size of your message, reduces SPAM blockage, and speeds up your communications.

Speedy Delivery & Impeccable Quality

We can deliver a rough draft of your campaign to you in a relatively short time, usually 1-2 days. Secondly, we are fully committed to customer satisfaction. We are keen in meeting all our customers'' requirements to the last detail.

Click to learn more...

Would you like to be notified via a sound wave /audio file when new email arrives in GoldMine, just like AOL does with the "You've Got Mail!" voice.  It's quite simple to setup and will allow you to be notified of and respond to your incoming emails right away.

The first thing you will need is an audio file to be played when ever you receive new email. There are lots of them available for free on the internet. I used the famous AOL  audio file. "You've Got Mail!" Once you have downloaded the file save it to your GoldMine  directory, or any where you choose.

Next Login to GoldMine and go to your Email Center.
Right Click on your inbox and select Options >> Set up E-mail Rules
In the Email Rules Center, in the left hand column, Right Click on Default and choose New >> New Rule

In the first field provide a unique name for this New Rule, I would suggest  "You've Got Mail".
Then check the Incoming Email radio button
now click Next >

Check the "All of the following conditions must be true" radio button
and then click the NEW button at the bottom

In the Mail Field drop down select To:
and in the "Logical condition" drop down select Contains
and the Value field will be your email address, for instance I entered @1stdirect.com

You might ask, why just the @1stdirect.com?

I receive email from several different email addresses into my GoldMine, so
I am accounting for them all by putting just @1stdirect.com, you can do the same on your
end or just put your full email address if you only have 1 email account.

Once you are done hit OK

Then hit the Next > button

Now we are going to specify the action to take when the
previous condition is met, ie, when we receive new email.

Click the New button
In the "Action on Mail" drop down list, choose "Notify with a Sound"
and then browse out to where you saved the You've Got Mail audio file and select it.

Now hit Finish.

Last but not least, you will need to click  SAVE at the top of the Email Rules Center.

You should also check to make sure that you have your email account
set to auto retrieve and auto delete your emails from the mail server. If you
need help with that please contact First Direct Corp, for further assistance.

Take your GoldMine e-mail marketing campaigns to new levels with IntelliClick.

Send personalized email campaigns that track instantly back to your GoldMine database.  IntelliClick alerts your sales team by e-mail, text message or scheduled phone calls in your GoldMine CRM system.  As email campaign recipients access "intelligent" hyperlinks inserted into your campaigns, designated individuals in your organization are alerted so that they can take action to kick start your sales process. Integration with your GoldMine system, logs all tracked responses (email opens, web hyperlink clicks, one button literature fulfillment, one button call request and unsubscribe), allowing timely follow-up to be triggered.

Go beyond the first click to gain even more insight into your target audience interests using IntelliClick to track web site pages viewed and the frequency visitors return to your web site for each campaign to enable timely sales follow-up.

With the purchase of IntelliClick you are provided an SMTP Relay account for reliable email delivery of messages sent directly from your contact database via the IntelliClick Unified Email SMTP relay option.  Using the Unified Email portal, you can retrieve reports on the effectiveness of your message delivery and bounce rates.

IntelliClick also includes a library of professionally prepared HTML templates (see examples) which you can readily use and modify with the on-line HTML WYSWYG (What You See is What You Get) editor. Benefit from messages that pack a punch and are designed to be optimally displayed by virtually all email applications.

Check out the demonstration videos

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