Catch up with this master class

“Email marketing is continually changing — not because the technology is changing, but because of consumers, their expectations, and how they use email changes. As marketers, we need to adapt to that.”

That’s the message Kath Pay will be hammering home, alongside fellow MarTech contributor Ryan Phelan, in the upcoming two-day master class, “Excelling in email marketing.”

The master class is aimed at email marketers with one or two year’s experience under their belts. “If you’re going to do a master class,” said Phelan, “it’s really not for a beginner. We want someone who has got that base understanding of knowing what a welcome email is, what an automation is, what a segment is. What we want to do is up-level those people and really give them some advanced tactics and strategies to work from. There are people who are just doing it every day, repetition, and that gets old and stale. If Kath or I can come in and say, ‘Have you thought about this or that,’ we can build off of what they’ve already been doing for a period of time.”

Register here for the master class.

Back to the foundations

That doesn’t mean Pay and Phelan won’t be looking at foundational programs. In fact, that’s where the low-hanging fruit is, said Pay.

“Those programs are the ones that have been set up and ignored for years,” Phelan explained. “The biggest opportunity is for someone like Kath or me to come in and show how small changes to existing programs can boost your numbers 20 or 30%. We always start with these foundational programs because those are the core of what it takes to do email. The biggest opportunity, right out of the box.”

Said Pay, “I do audits for my clients, and a big part of that is identifying what they have and more importantly what they don’t have. I bundle them up as missed opportunities.”

Dig deeper: Kath Pay — Spotlight on the expert

Email marketing and AI

Pay and Phelan will also be looking at cutting edge opportunities like the multiple applications for AI — and not just generative AI. “For a start, learn that muscle memory of what generative AI is,” urged Phelan. “AI is going to stay around for a long time. We’ve been in the generative language model part for about five minutes. The next five minutes is going to be different models with proximity to data that really changes the game in terms of how you look at customers, segments and campaigns.”

Getting a base knowledge of the ChatGPT-style models that are out there, essentially free, will help springboard marketers into readiness for the next iterations that are down the road.

Dig deeper: Ryan Phelan — Spotlight on the expert

Take learnings back to the C-suite

It can be hard for email marketers to find the time to step away from their existing programs and consider how to innovate — the demands of the job can just be too great. “The whole idea of this master class, over two days, three hours each day, they are going to save themselves a lot of time in researching; their going to get the great nuggets in this condensed class,” Pay promised.

“Kath and I are bringing 25 years of experience apiece,” said Phelan, “and there’s a lot of stuff we’ve learned from mistakes and successes that will be available to the audience.”

“The C-suite sees that email is generating the highest return on investment out of all the channels,” Pay said. “They think, great, we don’t need to invest any more money in that — and that’s where the problem lies. They can’t fathom how it could generate more return on investment by investing more in the channel. Marketers who want to push their program further and give their consumers a better experience, they need to be creating business cases to prove to the C-suite that, although they’re doing great, they could do better.”

“We’re going to give you the information to make that case for greater investment,” said Phelan. “One of the things we’re both going to emphasize is, take a read of whatever you have in place today — then change it based on what we’ve talked about, test it again and show the improvement, then take it to your boss. The opportunities are not just about education, but greater investment in your program and making your life easier.”

The master class will cover: