Here are some quick things to watch out for that Stefan Pollard suggests are the hallmarks of classic spam:

• Vague or aggressive subject lines
• E-mail address or stranger’s name in the sender line instead of a company or brand name
• Aggressive language in body copy, along with overuse of exclamation points and misspellings
• High ratio of images to text, especially one large image
• Oversized, boldfaced red type
• Too-frequent messages, often with unwanted or irrelevant content
• Newsletters that look more like solo offers than reliable information sources

Though the above are all warning signs, preventing looking like spam really boils down to the application of common sense. Try to read your email messages with the perspective of the recipient. Or instate a test-run, and send other company members your email, asking for feedback on whether they got spam vibes from the message.

When someone reaches out to a new prospect, each action is strategic and carefully executed. The prospect explains the circumstances, their needs are evaluated, recommendations are given and a professional relationship is developed. Most times, not everything is solved immediately and the sales cycle takes full effect. Marketing and Sales should adopt the inner campaign cycle that should let eat department understand the necessary development process of each new marketing or sales campaign. By having a more professional relationship as opposed to a dueling sibling rivalry, marketing and sales will naturally be able to let synergy evolve between them.

The belief that sending more emails to more people leads to better business is flawed. After a certain point, this approach will lead to a greater amount of unsubscribes and spam complaints, resulting in higher acquisition costs to replace the lost customers.

The solution? Segmenting prospects and nurturing them through appropriate drip marketing programs. A more personalized and targeted approach is key in driving sales and conversions while reducing list churn.

Aaron Ross at Build a Sales Machine provides a rundown (and even some fun illustrations) of the sometimes confusing definition of inbound leads versus outbound leads. According to Ross:

Inbound leads are, as it implies, leads that come to your company and into your website or 800#: usually through word-of-mouth and referrals, public relations, search engines or perhaps through marketing campaigns… these leads generally are already interested in what you have to offer, and are about to start a buying cycle.

Outbound leads are lead that you had to go dig up, whether through market development campaigns or a Cold Calling 2.0 or other “proactive” methods to let prospects who aren’t already interested know who you are, what you do and why it should matter to them.

Ross goes on to explain how a marketer should approach or nurture these different types of leads and what to expect from each group.

Subject lines:

• Subject lines should be relevant to the recipient and match the content of the email.
• Research shows that while shorter subjects optimize open rates, longer subject lines tend to optimize click and click-to open rates.
• The same research shows that the more words in a subject line, the more likely the email is to appeal to the “right” people.  Increased information allows people to better decide if an email is relevant to them.

Content:

• The first line should tell the recipient why they are receiving this email (i.e. “You are receiving this message because you have subscribed to list XYZ.”)
• Check that the content matches the subject line and is relevant to the recipient.
• Make sure the unsubscribe link is easy to find (this may mean shortening your message.)

Formatting:

• Don’t rely on people being able to see your images - image blocking is common on many email services.
• Add inline styles - again, many email services will not allow anything else to show up correctly.
• Use structural tables to create columns.
• Make sure that the plain text version of your email is reader-friendly.

Timing:

• Don’t send email too frequently.  This can cause recipients to tune out and ignore your email, or worse, annoy them to the point where they mark your emails as SPAM.
• Don’t send emails too infrequently, this can make your recipients forget you.
• Find the delicate balance between having your users forget you and having them annoyed by you.
• Send out your emails during regular intervals so the recipient comes to anticipate them, and is less likely to mark them as SPAM.

In Marketing Sherpa’s recap of their B2B Lead Generation Summit, they designate one point as the summit’s key takeaway. The “most scribbled-down-tip” was when Jackie Kiley of Sybase explained the importance of passing only qualified leads into your company’s CRM. Marketing Sherpa’s article highlights this point reinforcing that your firm should “*never* put suspects, inquiries, or unqualified leads into [your CRM]”.

By not filtering your leads, you send the good and the bad onto your sales team, and create an immense amount of “noise” which the sales people must sort through to be successful. Rejection and lost time results in a less-than-motivated sales team, that will begin to distrust leads sent to them from the marketing department.

A lead qualifying tool can improve the relationship between your sales and marketing departments by allowing for a more seamless interaction between the two. Marketing automation software allows only qualified leads to make it to the sales pipeline, allowing both departments to more effectively accomplish their goals.

Also key in aligning sales and marketing is providing scheduled feedback on leads by having sales report on the status of leads (good, bad, accepted, rejected, etc.) Doing so is the final step in closing the loop between the two functions by further refining the filter for the next sales cycle.

Friction is defined as psychological resistance to a given element in the sales process. This resistance is created by requiring visitors to fill out a form or take a similar step to obtain an item of value. That item of value is the incentive, or an appealing element introduced to stimulate a desired action.

Since completely eliminating friction would result in no information for your sales efforts, it is important to find the right form length, call to action and incentives to provide maximum conversion and prevent drop-off. MarketingExperiments examines how the item offered, the landing page layout and the difficulty of a form can impact conversion rates.

The report is definitely worth the read for marketers who rely on landing pages to convert visitors to prospects.

I frequently speak with marketers who aren’t aware that open rates are based on images being loaded or that they can’t be tracked at all for text-only emails.  These facts make open rates a highly unreliable marker of success - and it’s likely that if you’re presenting these numbers to your boss, you’re actually selling yourself way short!

The study claims that 85% of marketers don’t personalize emails from the initial interaction. It also finds that it can take an average of 9 days for a new subscriber to receive their first email.

With modern email marketing technology, there is no reason for these oversights to occur. With automation software, it only takes a few simple clicks to ensure prompt, personalized messages are delivered to your subscribers. Here’s what you can do to make sure your prospects are feeling the love:

Choose an email tool that allows you to set up automated rules.
Web-automation suites often include email functionality in their features package. Using one system to integrate your subscription forms with your emails means you can segment lists based on a prospect’s subscription selection and deploy the appropriate email within minutes, automatically.

Use autoresponder emails.
If you know there will be a delay between the time a prospect submits a request and the time they receive the material, set up an autoresponder email that will act as a thank you message and acknowledge their submission. This works especially well if a customer is requesting support or follow-up by phone, which may take longer than email responses.

Personalize emails with dynamic tags.
Similar to a mail merge, most email engines allow you to dynamically insert prospect information like first name in to a template. Though the email may not be completely unique and targeted, adding tags to insert a few key pieces of personalized information like name or company can go a long way to making an email appear less generic. Additionally, tags can be used to make a message appear to be sent from a prospect’s assigned sales representative, helping to build key relationships.