Some of the largest publishers in the world have a problem when it comes to optimizing their newsletter email performance: Their tech stack.
The issue for these types of publishers — often early adopters of email newsletters — is that many times they rely on a combination of CMS and email solution that is cumbersome to use and limits performance. That’s because these solutions weren’t designed for publishers.
Sound like you? Let me explain.
Why do publishers have these complex tech stacks?
Historically, there’s never been high-quality, enterprise-level email solution available for a publisher specific workflow. The result? A stitched-together combo of multiple services to do the job.
And that’s where the problems start.
How can complex tech stacks hurt email performance?
A CMS was never intended to curate editorial emails, and ESPs weren’t built to be used by editorial staff. What results is a setup that hurts performance because it can’t effectively match the main selling point of a state-of-the-art solution: personalization.
Real personalization — that is, tailoring as much of each individual newsletter as possible to each individual recipient — is one of the most important methods a publisher can use to boost email engagement, increase retention and convert casual readers into paying subscribers.
But ESPs don’t “understand” content. And CMSs don’t track email performance. These two elements are the foundation of personalization. Because of this, any publisher who relies on a combination of these tools won’t benefit from any valid form of personalization.
What other problems do they cause?
Newsletters have the potential to drive very high ROI as part of a subscription offering. A complex tech stack, however, cuts down ROI through lower performance and higher maintenance and operating costs.
To the extent that personalization is possible with a CMS/ESP integration, it comes at a high price. Keeping templates in sync, for instance, between these two systems requires ongoing technical work. Making changes to templates or email sections also needs expensive technical resources to make happen as ESPs have to be reconfigured. And creating even the leanest, temporary, new pop-up campaigns also requires technical effort to make happen.
Not only this, with more moving parts and different companies developing their products independently things can (and often do) go wrong.
What’s the best email solution for publishers?
An ESP built specifically for publishers is a far better solution than a stitched-together set of tools. And this holds true for both performance but also reliability and ease-of-use.
Echobox Email was designed specifically for publishers giving it two distinct advantages over other ESPs:
- Workflow: Echobox Email uses automation technology to produce the most efficient workflow for publishers while still leaving ample room for manual control. Simply connect your content feeds and Echobox Email does the rest, generating newsletter editions at the click of a button.
- Personalization: And with each send, the content and send time of those editions become more and more refined, matching the habits and interests of each subscriber. Echobox Email uses AI and machine learning to analyze audience behavior for each send. This means looking at when they open the email and how they engage with it. Through this, Echobox can personalize send time, content selection and content ordering to maximize performance with no extra effort.
And because we have a wealth of experience with publishers we offer a bespoke implementation service. This makes it as easy as possible to set up quickly and thrive.
| Curious to see how Echobox Email works? Here’s a short video with our Product Manager, Sam Welbank.
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How can Echobox Email impact ROI?
Reduced technical costs with improved performance are fundamental aspects of generating ROI from Echobox Email. But you can also make direct cost savings. Echobox Email is priced based on sends rather than subscribers making it cheaper — often much cheaper — than legacy ESPs.
Takeaways
For publishers relying on a stitched-together CMS and ESP for newsletters, finding another solution is generally a case of when not if. In terms of performance, reliability and cost, there’s no comparison. An enterprise-level ESP designed for publishers outperforms the CMS/ESP combo in every measure.
And there’s no enterprise-level ESP for publishers quite like Echobox Email. We’ve helped publishers around the world with diverse setups and workflows increase their click and open rates, grow their subscriber base and scale their newsletter offering, all while drastically reducing the time they spend creating them.
If you’re ready to ditch your outdated email setup for a state-of-the-art solution, get in touch with us today and take the first step to game-changing your newsletters.
