There are a lot of great reasons to add GIFs to your emails:

• Tell stories in a visually engaging way
• Command attention for calls to action: animated “buy now,” “read more” and “donate” buttons motivate clicks
• Showcase product functionality without lengthy text paragraphs
• Explain difficult concepts with simple visuals
• Convey cause and effect, or product benefits
• Offer easy to understand, step-by-step how-to tutorials
• Present multiple products or services in a small space, like slideshows
• Encourage video clicks with animated video previews
• Add humor to emails, set the mood and express emotion to lend a personalized, human element

Animated GIFs make for livelier, more engaging emails that earn more clicks and ultimately boost sales, traffic, and fundraiser donations.

Here’s how to add them in VerticalResponse:

1. Click on an image to edit
2. Click “Replace” in the left sidebar
3. Select “Upload Your Own Image”
4. Upload your GIF

That’s all there is to it! You can even add an animated GIF as a background image, like so:

1. Select the row where you’d like the background GIF to appear
2. Click the “Background” tab
3. Click “Replace” in the left sidebar
4. Select “Upload Your Own Image”
5. Upload your GIF

Have questions? Need help? No problem! Head on over to the VerticalResponse Help Center to get answers to your questions.

Make your emails stand out from competitors and resonate with your audience. Use VerticalResponse’s new animated GIF feature to create powerful marketing emails that generate results.

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1. Pay as you go

Some of our users take advantage of monthly subscriptions to send unlimited emails. Others purchase credits because they send emails less frequently. If you’re in the latter camp, this update is for you. Now, you can choose the exact number of credits you need instead of paying for a predefined block.

For example, you no longer need to pay for a block of 2,500 credits if you only need 2,347 credits. Simply enter the exact number you need and checkout. Our new pay as you go feature makes it easy to control email marketing costs and maximize your return on investment.

2. Add custom fields to campaign download reports

Now you can customize campaign download reports with custom fields. Choose exactly what you want to include in your report, including any custom fields you create for your contact list. Examples include birthdays, customer IDs, question responses and any other data you want to collect.

To access this feature, click on the message name and then “download report.” Then, choose the custom fields to include from the dropdown located near the bottom of the Download Report page.

3. Google Analytics link tracking

Do you use Google Analytics? If so, now you can use it to track email campaign performance. See which email links your subscribers click, and track their journey through your website. It’s a great way to bring your analytics all under the same roof.

To add Google Analytics tracking to your emails, check the box at the bottom of the page where you designate which contacts will receive your email.

4. Customize sign-up form confirmation emails

Add a personalized touch to your sign-up form opt-in confirmation emails. Now you can create a custom confirmation message for each sign-up form. You can also customize the from name, address, subject line and confirmation button text — plus direct subscribers to a custom landing page URL after they click the confirm button.

Custom confirmation emails can be tailored to your audience to help increase opt-in conversions, and custom landing pages can encourage new subscribers to act. Use them to introduce subscribers to your products, services, a special offer or anything else you’d like.

These new customization options are available in Step 3 of the sign-up form creator.

5. Search contacts by date added

Want to make a list of contacts added before or after a given date, or during a defined date range? Now you can with our new “date added” search filter. This is a useful tool if you want to create a new campaign that targets subscribers based on when they were added to your list. You can even use this feature to filter other contact search results, allowing you to fine-tune your mailing lists for advanced targeting.

6. Clearly named email report tabs

We’ve renamed our email report tabs for clearer, easier-to-understand metrics. The new tabs reflect common industry nomenclature such as “Sent,” “Opens” and “Clicks” for simpler reporting on the metrics that matter.

7. New VerticalResponse mobile functionality

Now you can check your email campaign stats on the go with our new mobile functionality. It offers real-time campaign statistics on your smartphone, lets you verify that scheduled emails were sent and allows you to view past and upcoming emails.

Mobile functionality makes it easy to stay on top of your email campaign performance from anywhere. It’s a value-added service that works on any mobile device with a web browser.

(Currently, mobile functionality is not available to VerticalResponse Classic or Deluxe Marketing Suite users.)

8. Intuitive drag-and-drop email content blocks

Our email builder updates make it easier than ever to craft compelling email layouts. Previously, clicking on content blocks would move them to the bottom, then you would need to move them up to the position you wanted. Now, you can drag content blocks directly into the builder and place them wherever you want.

The update turns a two-step process into an intuitive one-step process, making our email builder more user-friendly than ever.

VerticalResponse is dedicated to consistently improving the user experience so you can craft compelling email campaigns that get opened, get clicked and help you earn more sales. Stay tuned for future updates!

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Real-time email campaign statistics on your smartphone

Log in to VerticalResponse on your mobile browser to get a bird’s eye view of your email performance, including email opens, clicks and unsubscribes for every email you’ve sent. Understand what’s working and what isn’t, so you can improve your marketing over time and act on current trends for email marketing success.

Past and upcoming emails

View a list of all past emails, plus the dates and times they were sent, and see what’s coming next in your Drafts and Scheduled lists. Verify that scheduled emails were sent and keep your finger on the pulse of your email marketing campaigns.

Quick, easy smartphone access (no downloads)

VerticalResponse can now be accessed directly from your mobile device. It’s not an app, so there are no downloads to hassle with. Simply visit the VerticalResponse login page on your smartphone to access your email stats from home, the park, your child’s school or any other remote location.

Value-added service and excellent support

Mobile access is available to most VerticalResponse subscribers at no extra charge. You only need a smartphone and an active subscription to view your email campaign stats on the go!

Busy entrepreneurs need tools that make it easy to run their businesses. Take advantage of VerticalResponse’s mobile functionality to check email campaign stats from your smartphone, so you can gain valuable marketing insights on the go!

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Cleaner interface

We’ve streamlined the app’s interface, so you can quickly locate the tools you need to manage your contacts:

New action bar

Ready to create an email campaign, social post, Landing Page or Email Automation? Getting started will be simple with the blue action bar. Everything you need to kick off your next project will now be found at the top of the page:

(One slight functional change in the new interface is that in the top menu above the blue action bar, “Leads” have been replaced by Forms. Click on Forms to create Pop Ups.)

Updated look

VerticalResponse retains the same functionality you’re familiar with, but with a sleek, modern look:

Log in to your VerticalResponse account and check out the changes!

The post Check out our new look appeared first on VerticalResponse.

What are VerticalResponse Pop Ups?

Everyone has some experience with pop-ups — the smaller windows that appear while you’re browsing a website. As a business owner who needs to grab readers’ attention, you can count on Pop Ups to put your message front and center and help you achieve your marketing goals. In addition to delivering timely information to website visitors, Pop Ups are a powerful list-building tool. Having a fresh, robust email contact list helps you reach prospective customers. While there are so many ways you can go about list-building, adding a Pop Up to your website is one of the quickest and easiest options.

Creating a custom Pop Up in VerticalResponse is simple. Using the same editor you use to create emails in VerticalResponse, you can customize forms that not only collect visitors’ email addresses but also gather other data about your audience, such as phone numbers, geographic locations and birthdates. Embedding the form on your website is easy and doesn’t require any technical or coding experience.

Why use Pop Ups?

Grow email lists and customer intelligence. Use pop-up forms to gather data on prospects or customers such as name, email, birthday, phone number and location. Use that data to get a better picture of who your audience is, so you can provide them with the most relevant marketing content possible.

Generate leads and sales. After collecting email addresses through the Pop Up’s sign-up field, leverage the Welcome Series feature in VerticalResponse to create a lead nurture campaign and immediately engage new subscribers.

Save time. Build and customize your opt-in form in minutes. Once you’ve added the Pop Up to your website, all the data gathered is automatically added to your specified email contact list, so you can start nurturing those new leads right away.

Match your brand. Customize the Pop Up with fonts, colors and styles that match your existing website design. For further personalization, upload your own background image. When you’re happy with your design, preview the form right inside the Pop Ups editor.

Flexible placement. You decide where on your website or landing page the Pop Up will look best. Placement options include centered, left sidebar or bottom banner.

Track Pop Up performance. Know how your Pop Up performs with reports that show how many visitors viewed it and how many signed up for your list.

Here’s how to create Pop Ups for your website or VerticalResponse Landing Page:

Creating a new Pop Up can be done in four simple steps.

Step 1: Setup

Click the Forms tab in the VerticalResponse app, and then click “Create Pop Up.”

You have six different layout options as to where the form will be placed on your website: Centered, full screen, top banner, bottom banner, left sidebar or right sidebar.

For each layout, there are two template options that you can select from for the starting point of your design.

Step 2: Design

Add content blocks, edit content and select the page style in the Pop Ups editor. You have the option to include several different form fields. From visitors’ email addresses to their website addresses, you will be able to collect the information that you need.

To ensure that visitors completely fill out forms, you have the option to create required fields. If a site visitor does not fill in a required field, they will see a red error in the form field.

Step 3: Rules

Name the Pop Up (this is for your reference only, and will not be displayed to website visitors), and then choose whether you would like the Pop Up to appear on your own domain or on a Landing Page that you’ve already created in your VerticalResponse account.

Select when the Pop Up will be triggered:

• When a visitor lands on a page
• When a visitor tries to leave the page
• After a visitor scrolls down a percentage of the page (you can select between 10% and 100%)
• After a delay you determine (you can select between 5 and 60 seconds, in five-second increments)

Select how often the Pop Up appears:

• Once per visitor
• On every visit
• Every certain number of visits (you can select between 1 and 10 visits)
• Only on certain visits (can select between the first and tenth visits)
• Not on the first visit but on all following visits

Step 4: Publish

This step confirms that the Pop Up is published and provides the embed code that you will need to paste into your website just before the </body> tag. Even if you chose to use a VerticalResponse-created Landing Page in step 3, you will still need to go into the Landing Page and add the embed code. The code will not be added automatically.

After you add a Pop Up to your website or Landing Page, you can view all of your Pop Ups by clicking on “Forms” in the top navigation. This will let you select the status of each Pop Up (choosing whether to keep it active or not), as well as view the number of visitors and conversions, and the conversion rate.

VerticalResponse Pop Ups help you gather new newsletter subscribers, connect with prospects who want to learn more about your products or services, and collect visitor demographic information that enables you to create more targeted marketing messages. Start creating Pop Ups today.

The post Introducing VerticalResponse Pop Ups appeared first on VerticalResponse.

What is Email Automation?

Before we get started on putting Email Automation to use, let’s do a quick review. Email Automation can be one email or a series of emails that are automatically sent based on a pre-defined time interval and/or subscriber actions. Emails can be triggered according to criteria such as whether or not contacts have opened or clicked a link in an email. Such a series of email messages is also known by a variety of other names, including:

• Drip campaign
• Onboarding campaign
• Welcome series
• Lifecycle emails
• Autoresponders
• Marketing automation

Why use Email Automation?

There are tremendous benefits to leveraging Email Automation instead of sending individual emails. According to Marketingtechblog.com, open rates for drip campaigns are 80 percent higher than individual emails, with clickthrough rates three times that of a stand-alone email. Additionally, companies that utilize and maximize automated email series generate 80 percent more sales at a reduced cost from sending individual campaigns.

Types of Email Automation campaigns

You can automate a campaign to meet your unique business goals and marketing needs. Here are some of the most popular campaigns:

• Win back lapsed customers
• Build excitement for an upcoming event
• Reach out to people who didn’t open your last email
• Thank customers for taking a survey
• Onboard new clients
• Educate customers about your products or services
• Share news about product or business updates
• Send birthday or anniversary greetings (first segment your contact list by birthdays or anniversaries to automate these campaigns)

How it works

Set up a series

1. From the home page of the VerticalResponse app, click Create Email Automation to begin your campaign.

2. Create a name for your campaign and select which contact list to email.

3. Next, choose the criteria for when the email will be sent. You can automatically release a different email depending on whether a reader has joined a list, opened a previous message or clicked a link.

4. Specify the email campaign and set the time your emails will be sent. You may choose between days, weeks and hours.

5. Create your email as usual with the VerticalResponse email editor (or using HTML).

6. Finally, you have the option to add another email to the series. Continue to follow the set-up sequence until you’ve completed your autoresponder series. There is no limit to the number of emails that you can add.

Reporting

We’ve made it easy to view the results of your Email Automation campaigns. To check the progress of your autoresponders, simply follow these two steps:

1. From the VerticalResponse app homepage, navigate to the Messages tab, and then select an active Email Automation campaign to view reporting (see screenshot above in step 5).

2. Reports will show the total metrics for the entire series, as well as the individual breakout for each email message. Each report summary will include number of emails sent, opened and clicked. For a more detailed reporting view, click “View Report.”

Email Automation helps you reach your audience with the right message at the right time — and boosts the efficiency of your email marketing program. Start using this time-saving feature today.

The post Getting started with Email Automation appeared first on VerticalResponse.

Why use Surveys?

To achieve long-term success, a business must consistently meet its customers’ needs. But before you can meet those needs, you have to identify them. What better way to learn what your customers care about and what they’d like to see from your company than by asking them directly?

Customer surveys provide your business with invaluable insights into what people think about your products or services. The feedback you collect can then be used to improve customer service, hone your marketing strategy and shine a light on the types of projects or business initiatives you should be focusing time and money on.

VerticalResponse’s survey creator makes it easy to collect those insights. With this simple but powerful tool, you can build and distribute mobile-friendly surveys in just a few clicks — no coding or design experience necessary.

Send unlimited surveys

There’s no cap on the number of surveys you can create, so design and send as many as it takes to find out what your customers think, want or need from your business. Then, use the feedback to make updates that will boost customer satisfaction.

Increase your credibility

Consumers appreciate the opportunity to share their thoughts with companies. Let them know you care about what they want by asking for their opinions.

Create surveys that work for your business

When designing your survey, you can add your business logo and edit the colors and layout to match your brand. And because you’ll only need a few minutes to create a survey with our easy-to-use tool, you can conduct your market research in less time than with other tools.

Design surveys that look good everywhere

Distributing your survey is simple. Email the survey’s URL to your subscribers, add it to your website or a landing page, or share it on social media. Surveys are mobile-responsive and will display properly on any device, so you can reach your customers anywhere.

Get results in real time

The results of your survey will be delivered to you in real time, so you can start acting on the information you collect right away.

No need for outside help

There’s no need to hire an outside agency or consultant to poll your customers for you. You can easily produce and distribute surveys from start to finish, in your company’s voice and branding.

Question types

Surveys are extremely customizable. Choose from 11 different question formats:

• Text field: Respondents can enter a single line of text as an answer.
• Multiple choice: Respondents can select from a variety of answers that you create. When selecting the layout, you can choose from four different style options. Questions can appear as one long column, can be split up into two or three columns, or be displayed horizontally.
• Drop-down: All possible answers will appear in a drop-down list.
• Comment field: Questions are open-ended, and customers will be able to enter multiple lines of text when they respond.
• Star rating: Respondents can select a rating based on a scale of your choosing. There are four style options: star, thumb, heart and smiley.
• Matrix rating: Select answers from columns and rows.
• Multiple text fields: Allows for text entry on multiple lines.
• Contact info: If you’d like to collect customer data, you can use this question type to learn the name, email, phone number, address, city, ZIP code and state of recipients.
• Text content: Allows for descriptive text without a question, which works well for survey introduction copy.
• Image content: Add an image to your survey or use this content type to customize your design by adding your logo.
• Text/Image content: Add an image with descriptive text.

How Surveys work

After signing into your VerticalResponse account, go to the Surveys tab in the top navigation bar. Click the New Survey button to begin.

Once you’re in the survey creator, content elements and question types will appear in the left column. Click a question type to add it to your survey. Edit the questions and layout as you go by clicking the respective tabs.

Make questions required or optional

If you’re looking for specific information, you can designate certain questions as required, and respondents won’t be able to proceed without answering.

Add multiple pages

Multiple pages eliminate your readers’ need to scroll through questions, which can be especially useful for longer surveys.

Randomize questions and add skip logic

Minimize order bias by randomizing questions and add skip logic, which directs respondents to specific questions based on previous answers. (Surveys are free to all VerticalResponse users; however advanced features such as skip logic and question randomization are only available through paid Survey plans.)

Once you’ve finished building your survey, click the publish button in the top right corner of the app.

This will generate a link that you can share with your customers.

View results by navigating back to the Surveys tab.

The app’s reporting function gives a breakdown of all of the answers you have received.

Listening to your customers is a critical part of running a business. The feedback that you receive can help your organization grow. Start creating and sending surveys today, and get the insights you need to improve your business’s performance.

The post Get the customer insights you need: Introducing Surveys appeared first on VerticalResponse.

Salesforce enhances your email marketing

It’s easy to see the benefits of combining Salesforce with your email marketing program.

Save time

Free, unlimited two-way syncing between Salesforce and VerticalResponse means that a contact update in one platform automatically flows to the other. No need to update contacts in both places. Set the sync process to happen as often as you want, when you want it.

Actionable insights

Salesforce’s powerful segmentation tools and customer intelligence let you see who’s engaging with your messages. Use those insights to better target your campaigns so they resonate with the customers most likely to act on them.

Painless setup

All it takes to connect Salesforce with VerticalResponse is three simple steps. Then you’re ready to start leveraging the power of Salesforce.

How Salesforce works with VerticalResponse

Integrating Salesforce with your VerticalResponse account is easy. Here’s what to do:

1. Download the VerticalResponse app from the Salesforce app exchange, then sign in with your VerticalResponse account. If you don’t have a VerticalResponse account, you can easily set one up at this stage.
2. Map your VerticalResponse contact fields and your Salesforce lead fields so the two apps communicate the way you want them to. To start you off, email address, first name and last name fields are automatically mapped for you. If you want, map as many additional fields as are useful to you.
3. Choose how often you want the two apps to sync. That’s it!

You’ll start getting detailed lead and customer insights right away.

Learn more about using Salesforce with VerticalResponse and see images of it in action here.

The post Turn more leads into customers: Integrate Salesforce with your VerticalResponse account appeared first on VerticalResponse.

Subject line A/B testing

Do your subscribers respond to subject lines phrased as questions? Do emojis improve open rates? Do shorter subject lines work better than longer ones? Our new A/B testing feature allows you to compare two different versions of a subject line to determine what prompts increased email open rates.

On the Campaign & Sender Details page, under the Subject Line form, is an option to “Add A/B testing with different subject lines.” Create two distinct subject lines in the form. The system will automatically send the email out to 25 percent of your audience — half of that group will see subject line A, and half will see subject line B. The system automatically determines the winner based on which subject line received the most opens, and it sends the winning subject line to the remaining 75 percent of your email list. Find the number of emails sent and open and click rates for the test on the Message details page.

After the test, use the results to fine-tune your subject lines in future campaigns. Or continue testing different types of subject lines to see what your readers respond to.

HTML live editor preview

Make emails look exactly the way you want with our split screen HTML editor, in half the time as before. The updated HTML editor allows you to make corrections on the left side of the screen and simultaneously view the results live on the right side. No more clicking a preview button and waiting for a new browser window to open to see how your code renders.

Folders

Struggling to keep tabs on campaigns from previous months or years? Now you can easily manage and organize messages (and any accompanying social media posts) with folders. Not only are folders a time-saver, but they also help track performance by letting you view the combined metrics for all of the messages and posts in the folder.

For instance, want to find out how your newsletters are performing? Simply click the “view folders” drop down on the Messages tab, create a new folder, and label it “newsletters.” Select all of the newsletters from your messages and move them into the folder. View the new folder for summary metrics of email opens, clicks, social shares, and more.

Grouping and tracking multiple emails at once helps direct your email marketing efforts. If a certain kind of campaign performs well, try sending that type of message more frequently. What’s more, this feature offers the flexibility to organize messages however you like — by topic, date, email type, recipient type, and so on.

Inbox Preview for HTML Editor

Every email client displays HTML a little bit differently. With Inbox Preview for HTML Editor, there’s no need to send multiple test emails or go to an outside application to see how your messages will display. Now VerticalResponse shows how campaigns will display on specific email clients and mobile devices such as Outlook, Gmail, an iPad, and many more.

Preview email messages from nearly 70 different email clients and devices, approximately 10 times per month depending on your VerticalResponse plan. To determine which email clients and devices are most popular with your readers, use our Email Analytics feature. Then make any necessary adjustments in your code to ensure your email looks great for your readers’ most-used email clients and devices:

Here’s a closer look at the right-hand navigation for Inbox Preview for HTML Editor:

The HTML Live Editor Preview and Folders are available to all VerticalResponse users. Upgrade to a Pro Plan to start using Subject Line A/B Testing and Inbox Preview for HTML Editor today.

Be sure to check out the Product Updates category to learn more about our newest features and updates.

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