It was a packed house Thursday night for Ultra Light Startups as the company unveiled its new meeting location in Midtown Manhattan at Sun Microsystems. The night kicked off with a slew of entrepreneurs pitching their sites and services to a captive audience.
Tonight’s panel topic was “Email Marketing Strategies for Startup Companies.” The all-star panel included:
• Greg Cangialosi the CEO of Blue Sky Factory
• Neil Capel, Founder and CEO of SailThru
• Adam Rich, Co-founder and Editor-in-chief of Thrillist
• Maisha Walker with Message Medium
The panel covered a wide variety of issues including finding the right email marketing strategies and helpful tips on selecting the email service distributors that are best for your business. The panel agreed that the days of renting e-mails lists and sending out e-mail blasts to unwilling participants are coming to an end.
The moderator, Maisha Walker explained that the emailing landscape has undergone a great deal of change in the past couple of years.
“It’s not just about sending emails out, it’s a discovery process,” says Walker. “You want to find out what your customers are interested in and what will keep them coming back for more.”
Neil Capel with SailThru says fresh content and interesting emails are a critical component during any e-mail campaign.
“Always send quality and engaging emails,” said Capel. “If they’re not good, people are going to opt out.
“Email is all about relevance, said Greg Cangialosi with Blue Sky Factory. “If you are not continuously delivering fresh, relevant content to your subscribers, you won’t have an engaged list, and you risk losing brand credibility.”
Cangialosi also says if you do decide to rent an e-mail list, here are some questions to ask before you hire any e-mail service distributor:
• Don’t get sucked into anything shady.
• What are their list practices?
• Where did they get the names?
“There is no magic bullet for building a successful email list,” says Adam Rich, Co-founder and Editor-in-chief of Thrillist. “The best shot you have is to create a great product and put strong content behind it.”
The panel also agreed that integrating social media into your email campaigns is likely to give you a significant boost in viewership. Have the tools available and if your email is interesting, many people will be happy to use the social media share function.
