EP. 33- [MUST LISTEN] December 2023 Gmail Update… l Jay’s Scoop

Foreign. Welcome to do this, not that, the podcast for marketers. You'll walk away from each episode with actionable tips you can test immediately.

You'll hear from the best minds in marketing who will share tactics, quick wins and pitfalls to avoid. Also, dig into life, pop culture, and the chaos that is our everyday. I'm Jay Schwedelson. Let's do this, not that. Hooray.

We're back for do this, not that. This is a great time. Isn't this the best time of year? It is. I just love it. And that's what we're going to talk about today.

Some things that are specific to this time of year so we're talking about now is like, stuff you actually might want to pay attention to or you might just want to ignore. But I think you should pay attention. Why not? We're here, right? Why not? All right, so the first thing that most marketers may not be aware of.

So on December 1st, Google is doing something with Gmail that is a pretty big deal. So starting December 1st, it's not going to all happen December 1st, but a lion's share of it's going to happen right around December 1st.

Google, who owns Gmail, they're going to be purging out any Gmail account that has not been active in two years. What does that actually mean?

Any Gmail account that somebody uses that they haven't checked their photos in Google Photos, they haven't used Google Drive, they haven't checked their email in their Gmail account, they haven't done anything related to anything in the Google universe for two years, Gmail is going to be wiping out those addresses. So why does that matter?

So if you right now, after December 1st, email to anybody that's at a Gmail address that hasn't been active in their account for two years, you're going to see those emails start to bounce because they're just going to be gone. I mean, those photos are going to be gone. Everything's going to be gone tied to that, that Gmail account.

And it's something as marketers that we need to be aware of. Why do we need to be aware of it? Obvious, right?

On the B2B side, about 20% of all B2B databases, even though Gmail's more of a consumer, Obviously email address, 20% of all contacts on any B2B database are generally a Gmail account. That's how. How much people use Gmail for everything.

And on the consumer side, it's on average close to 50% of all the contacts in your database are at a Gmail address. Now, theoretically, hopefully, you do a good job with your database. You're not emailing to accounts of this type of adornment people.

But keep in mind what we're talking about here. These are not people that haven't been active with you in two years.

These are people who have not been active with this Gmail account at all in two years. So some marketers are like, oh no, this is terrible news. My database numbers are going to shrink.

And let me tell you what the weirdest thing in the world is. The weirdest thing in the world is to have an ego about the size of your database.

If your database is populated with people that have not checked that email address account in two years, you do not want these people on your list. They are boat anchors. They are hurting your deliverability, they're hurting your performance, they're hurting everything.

So why do I share that after December 1st, this is all going to happen because you are very likely going to see your bounce metrics really jump for a period of time unless you've done a really great job of monitoring activity. So you're going to see your bounce metrics jump.

And when you look at this internally, if you're not aware of this, you're going to be like, whoa, what has happened? So that is one really significant change that's going to happen effective December 1st.

So keep an eye out what happens with your Gmail contacts in your database, because your database numbers are probably going to shrink a little bit. So a couple other things that are happening in the month of December. Specifically, let's first talk about the business side.

Things that are working really well. Let's talk about email in the month of December, letter format emails.

When you send out an email that's in the letter format, if you're sending out a business to business email, B2B letter format emails that are being sent to people that are director level and above directors, vice president, C level from December 1st through December 15th. We actually see the reply rate on those sales type letter format emails to executives.

They're thinking about new opportunities and they're not flooded with as many calls and things as they normally are because it's a weird time of year. So a lot of times business marketers turn off their brain and they're not actively pushing stuff.

But from December 1st through December 15th, if you're sending out letter formatted emails, emails in a letter format to to director level and above contacts, you're going to see really high reply rate. You may not see a high open rate or anything like that, but you're going to actually see more interactions than normal.

So I would really be in the market testing those things.

Now, on the consumer side, there are absolutely some things that we need to be thinking about. You know, we're all aware of the, the big holidays. I don't need to tell you that Christmas is a big holiday. Hello, that's not incredibly useful.

But there are these other little events that actually have an impact on performance. I'll give you an example. One of those is Free Shipping Day. Free shipping day is December 14th.

It's a ridiculous fake day, but it's a day actually that is determined to be Free shipping day.

The funny part is if you actually mention Free Shipping day in your offers consumer or small business, we see an open rate increase of about 24% versus the same offer. Without mentioning that.

The funny part, and you're mentioning Free Shipping Day, if you mention that the funny part is the lion's share of consumer offers and SMB offers. Especially this time of year, you're getting free shipping. There's very few times you're purchasing unless you're expediting it.

They're actually paying for shipping. So the fact that Free Shipping Day has any impact on performance, it's odd, but it does because we need to be reminded, oh wow, free shipping. Great.

So leveraging these like this, this random day actually matters. Okay. The other thing that works super well on the consumer side is list related content. Okay.

So yes, you're going to be pounding your database right now sending out offers, Buy this, buy this, buy this.

We know that that's the time of year that we're in, but you know at some point you're going to say we've sold everything we could sell or we want to send out other types of things that are not just offer pushing and what works better than any other form of content for consumer marketers in the month of December and is lists related content. Meaning like the seven cocktails for New Year's Eve, the nine best New Year's resolutions for runners. Right?

So thinking about non off related content that you can send out this time of year is a win. One other thing. And then I'm gonna get into, since you didn't ask, this time of year.

Sometimes we look at this time of year and we get annoyed by all the marketing that we see. I'm getting so many emails, I'm seeing so many ads on social media and I can't take it. I'm getting inundated. But we are marketers. We are marketers.

And what we need to look at, what we need to think about is we have to change our perspective.

You say, wow, this is the time of year that literally every major brand is focused on and they're trying to take all their best thinking and their best talent and the most creative ideas and they're putting out into the universe the absolute best that they can come up with. So when you get these emails to your inbox and you see these social media ads, you see all this different marketing that's coming at you.

Direct mail doesn't matter.

You need to examine it, you need to break it down, you need to document every little idea that you see, every test that you think that they're running, because these are the brands, these giant brands have spent so much time and energy on this time of year. And you're getting a gift from these companies, a marketing gift of, here's the best that we can do. What do you think of it? And for me, I love it.

I make a folder, I put everything in it because there's so much gold in there to think about. So this time of year, put your marketing hat on and don't think of being inundated by all these different things that are coming at you.

Think of it as, wow, I got to break this down and see what can I get out of this for my business, for what I'm going to test going into next year, because it is an absolute marketing gift. That's how I view my inbox this time of year.

So before we get into, since you didn't ask, which I got to get something, I got to talk about something. But before we get into, since you didn't ask, I Want to talk about who this podcast is presented by? This podcast is presented by Marigold.

Marigold is a fantastic platform. I use Marigold. My company uses Marigold.

We send out billions of emails through my agency and we use Marigold and their email platform and it's incredible. It doesn't matter if you're a small marketer or a mid mid sized marketer or a large marketer. It is an incredible platform for sending out your email.

Great performance, great deliverability, great tools. But it's also great for loyalty marketing. A great platform if you have a loyalty marketing program or thinking about one. And relationship marketing.

It's a great suite of products and services. So if you are thinking about a new platform or are considering a change, really got to consider Marigold.

And to find out more information go to meet marigold.com that is meet marigold.com strongly recommend I use them. I'm a big fan. Okay, now let's get into. Since you didn't ask, this is the portion of this podcast where I talk about things that are useless.

Has nothing to do with work or whatever. It's just whatever is going on with me. And so what is going on with me.

So this is the time of year where there's lots of holiday get togethers at family houses, at friends houses, just these big gatherings and dinners and things. And there are a couple of things. I love the holidays, my favorite time of year. But there are certain things about the holidays that drive me bananas.

So I have to share with you what's on my mind. This is so random, but this happened already the other night and I couldn't take it. So I was going over somebody's house.

They were having this big holiday dinner and we were invited. So we go and they go, okay, park on the driveway. I go, okay, so I park on the driveway.

And there are a lot of people at this thing and I get boxed in. I get boxed in. So now people parked behind me and on the side of me and I am like. I mean, I'm like in and out burger, dude.

I want to get into these things and I want to be like one of the first people to leave. I'm not a hangout and let's stay all night and talk. I don't care. I want to leave.

And so my new rule is I am never parking on a driveway ever again at one of these things because I couldn't get out because I had to ask like six different people to move their car right in order for me to leave. And then I'm like breaking up the entire party. I was trapped. It was terrible. So you will never see me ever again for the rest of my life.

Parking on a driveway when there's a lot of people somewhere. Because it's not. It's like, it's horrendous. Okay, what else bothers me? Everything goes. Why is everything bothering me? I don't know.

Then at this party, they had a big thing of mixed nuts on the table. And I'm not like a germaphobe or anything like that, but, like, there's a lot of people.

Everyone's just going in there, grabbing some mixed nuts, and I want to throw up. I'm like, that's disgusting. It's just people are gross. People are just gross.

And this whole idea of mixed nuts in a big bowl and you just put your hand in, like, get a spoon, or I don't know. There's gotta be some other plan when you have mixed nuts during the holiday.

So if you're gonna have mixed nuts, please have some sort of plan in place for people like me that want to throw up, because I want to throw up. Did. And then lastly, this is definitely not important. So we were having people. We had people over, and I realized I get anxiety.

I get anxiety when I have people, like a lot of people over. When my wife says to me, okay, put on some music. Put something on the TV for everybody.

Because every time I pick the music or I put something on tv, I get, oh, can we change this? That's terrible. Whatever I pick. Doesn't matter what to pick. I never know what to pick.

It is the most stressful part of this time of year is what music am I supposed to put on, what is supposed to be on the tv. And then invariably, whatever I need to just pick the opposite of whatever it is I want to pick.

Because then I feel like I have a shot at it being correct. So do not give me the remote. I don't want to be in charge, Period. End of story. All right, very. These were all very important topics.

So anyway, hope you're having a wonderful holiday. Hope you think about what's gonna happen with your Gmail addresses and you think about what you're sending out and do something with your mixed nuts.

This is outrageous. And give this thing a 5 star review. As long as you don't give out lots of mixed nuts. That's it. All right, bye. You did it. You. You made it to the end.

Nice. But the party's not over.

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