Did you know that if you have a form on your page, users will more likely take the final step and send (submit) the form data if it says something other than the word “submit”? It’s true, and there are studies that prove it. And it’s pretty obvious why if you really stop to think about it. I mean, “submit” also means:

Submit: v. tr. To yield or surrender (oneself) to the will or authority of another.

Now that’s not a very soft and fuzzy feel-good message, is it?

You will get better results if your default submit button says something like, “Yes, Send Me More Information!”. Even better, reinforce what the reader has already seen (and thus has already cognitively processed) as the headline or link text to the page. For example, if the link they clicked said, “Register for an Account”, use the button text “Register”. If it said “Request a Quote”, label the button “Send Me The Quote!”. You get the idea.

Web developers sometimes forget that real human beings are submitting these forms and not robots. You want something from these people, something very valuable…so you darn well better talk to them like they are people, not robots!

I don’t know if this email marketing tip will work for everyone, but it nearly doubles my open rates most of the time.

After I send out an email newsletter, I’ll wait a few days, download the report, then segment the ‘opens’ and click-throughs from the ‘un-opens’. I then create a new group called ‘campaign-reminder_xx-xx-2011′ (so they still can opt-out if they wish, keeping everything above-board) and send just the ‘un-opens’ a simple and friendly, text-only note with a brief re-cap, letting the ‘un-opens’ know that the newsletter is now online to view at their convenience, in case they missed it the first time in their inbox.

Please note: I didn’t say, “Send the same newsletter blast twice”. I said, “Send a simple and friendly, text-only note with a brief re-cap”, reminding them that the newsletter is now online. Due to unreliable and inaccurate open rate tracking, some of the people you send the reminder to did, in fact, open it the first time. You don’t want to annoy these folks with a duplicate re-send.

This almost always doubles my open-rates, and very few people have ever opted-out due to the reminder blast. Those who do opt-out, have never clicked-through or opened in the past anyway, so it weeds out the unqualified customers and scrubs the list.

More importantly, my open rate on subsequent blasts generally goes up, presumably because people in the ‘reminder’ blast now know that they can expect quality content from the newsletters and not just a sales pitch.

Due to the naming convention (alphabetical/date), it’s easy to view in Constant Contact (or whatever email delivery platform you are using) the difference in open rates from the initial campaign from the reminder.

This strategy also allows you to play and experiment with timing of the reminders. e.g.: Measure the reminder opens 4, 5, or even 7 days after the initial blast.

It takes a little extra spreadsheet work to shore up the numbers to determine the ‘true’ open rate of the campaign, but if your company enjoys a nice measurable ROI through newsletter marketing, it’s well worth the extra effort.

Your mileage may vary.