Another email marketing trend we’d like to talk about: text that appears above your header, or banner. MediaPost’s Email Insider blog last week offered a detailed rundown of the different ways retailers are using preheader text. It’s interesting and informative to click through to the examples given by bloggers Alex Madison and Lisa Harmon for two reasons: 1) you see the variety of approaches businesses are taking with preheaders, and 2) you can “experience” the preheader yourself as a customer or prospect.

Take a look at the many examples and start thinking about how your company might start using preheaders in your email marketing campaigns. But remember what we as the email consultants constantly preach: test, test, test. Don’t add preheader text because REI and Macy’s do it, and assume it will up your email marketing ROI. Play with different approaches, test, and find the preheader text that makes a difference for you as an email marketing tool.

But also act like a consumer and compare your reactions to the different approaches. You might be surprised at how much you don’t like one preheader or another…and then find out in testing that a preheader like that works best of all!

Titled “The Transactional Messaging Imperative,” the report encourages email marketers to take advantage of their transactional messages to build brand, increase revenue and, surprisingly, decrease calls to support centers. As an email marketing vendor, we’re always on the lookout for ways to improve email marketing ROI, and this definitely fits with our mission!

The report claims that switching from text-based, information only transactional emails to html emails that include ads and offers could generate $2.9 million annually in additional revenue. And we’re predicted to send out even more transactional emails as time goes by. The JupiterResearch E-mail Marketing Forecast indicates as consumers we’ll receive 146 transactional messages in 2012, almost double that of 2007.

If you’re going to transition to marketing via transactional emails, you’ll need to take a look at how you’re doing it right now. Often transactional emails aren’t owned by marketing, so your first step is to figure out who owns them and if you can usurp them. That can even help with email delivery, according to the report: “…respondents [who] indicated that IT owns their transactional e-mail efforts cited the highest instance of deliverability issues (31 percent).”

And as Jamie Schissler pointed out in MediaPost’s emailInsider, you’ll want to take a look at your platform before switching your transactional emails from plain text to html:

“In all likelihood, you will have to migrate to a more robust email delivery platform, or augment your transactional infrastructure to accommodate the reporting, delivery, and creative (HTML) requirements of rich transactional email. Most transactional email is deployed and managed off a basic MTA (Mail Transfer Agent), which does little other than send a text email.”

When you’re ready to add transactional emails to your email marketing tools but you’re not sure if your platform is up to the task, ask ClickMail. We can take a look at what you’re using and suggest an alternative if you need it. Simply email us at blog@clickmailmarketing.com for advice.