Ready, Set, Send Reflections

[Nick_S]

We recently wrapped on our Ready, Set, Send Challenge and boy, does it feel good! This was our first time running a challenge of this nature, so we learned a lot and it seems like our Community members did, too! Now that the challenge is in the rearview, we want to take a moment to reflect on the wins and accomplishments over the last six weeks.

First off, a big, BIG thank you to our Community Coaches for pulling out all the stops, hanging out in the threads and sharing your expertise and personal feedback with so many of the participants. 

But Who’s Counting? (We Are)

211 Badges awarded!	500+ posts!	1000+ Kudos!

The challenge started off strong right out of the gate with 148 people who uploaded their goal setting worksheet. If there is one big takeaway from this challenge, it’s that y’all love a good worksheet.

There was a lot of support, encouragement, and replies between participants and even if users weren’t commenting, the Kudos were flyin’. Let’s not forget about our rockstar participants who committed to completing all six weeks… Amazing!

We also saw participation from a lot of different industries, including nonprofits, educational institutions, faith-based organizations, retailers, and more.

By and large, participants were looking to: 

• increase engagement through emails
• grow their social media following
• build awareness of their brand, drive traffic to their websites
• become more visible in their communities
• leverage sign-up tools to grow their lists and increase event attendance.

One participant saw a 7% increase in open rates between the email they sent during Week 1 and the email sent during Week 5. They were also excited to see that their personal open rate exceeded that of their industry average. Another participant got a 50% higher open rate. Huzzah!

Along the way, we heard some inspiring words from participants:

• "I got my goal! Over 40% open rate for our newsletter!"
• "UPDATE - I’m up to 56% open rate as of today! Wahoo!" 
• “Obsessed with the BrandKit and Campaign Builder! Thank you for this!”
• “Appreciate this challenge as it has expedited my use of Constant Contact and shown me there are a number of marketing options available to me that I was unaware of.  Thank you!”

Some Takeaways (That you are welcome to use)

After reviewing many of the entries and comments from participants, we saw some common tactics and strategies that seemed to resonate and work well for many. Check them out and revisit one of the previous weeks. Most weeks include a worksheet that you can use to help organize your plan!

• Don’t market blindly. Come up with a plan so you have a benchmark to perform against. Review Week 1
• Make it actionable. When crafting an email, think about what you want your audience to act on after they receive it. A compelling, visible call-to-action can boost conversion rates. Review Week 2
• Be where your audience is. Put your sign-up form in places where prospective contacts might find you, such as your social media pages or link to a QR code at the counter of your physical business. Review Week 3
• Being where your audience is might mean multiple channels. Your audience is not always looking at their emails, so utilize multiple channels and talk to them where they are, like on social media. Don’t hesitate to use tools like Campaign Builder to help come up with content for the channels most important to you. Review Week 4
• Timing is everything. Try to understand when most of your target audience is likely to open an email and schedule future emails for that time period. It’s not as simple as 8AM or 6PM, but dependent on your own metrics and the industry you’re in. Plus, don’t hesitate to send to non-openers when it makes sense, because sometimes the email can be overlooked even by interested parties. Review Week 5
• Get personal. Personalized content performed better. By collecting unique and interesting data from your contacts (e.g. their birthday, anniversary of their first sale with you, or where they are located, etc.) you can then use that to inform the type of content you put in your emails. Review Week 6

We loved having this opportunity to gain insight into the inner workings of our amazing customers and better understand their goals, mindset, and challenges – and to celebrate your wins! 

Even if you didn’t participate in the challenge, we encourage you to review what others submitted to gather ideas and find inspiration. Feel free to download the worksheets for your own personal use!

We plan to do more challenges like this in the future and hope to improve and make it even better next time. If you have any ideas on challenges you’d like to see, let us know in the comments. Stay tuned!