#19 - Email Marketing vs Email Follow Up

#19 - Email Marketing vs Email Follow Up

Jul 9, 2024 | By Online People Talking Podcast


Welcome to Online People Talking with Jen Barkan! In this episode, Jen and Jessie Suggs are joined by one of our very own marketing coaches here at DYC, Beth Russell! There has been a noticeable uptick in highly templated and branded emails from OSCs that fit more within a brand marketing category, so the three dig into the difference between customer-oriented OSC follow-up emails, and brand marketing emails. Beth gives her expert insight on the purpose of the two methods and shares her concerns about blurring the lines, highlighting why the fusion of the two is truly the best method. The three also discuss the difference between live chat and chatbots!

Word On The Street: OSC emails that look like they came from marketing (08:03)

  • Email marketing is not the same as email follow-up.
  • Follow-ups should not have a template.
  • You risk people unsubscribing when you make your follow-up newsletter format. 

Topic Of Today: The fundamentals - the difference between email marketing and follow-up from online sales (17:30)

  • Marketing emails are there for awareness and engagement.
  • Email follow-up needs to be short and sweet.
  • Follow-ups are human-centered communication.

Skills Check! (36:40)

  • Go do an audit of your email follow-up. Is it too templated?
  • Talk to your marketing team and familiarize yourself with what is being sent. 

Online People Talking · #19 - Email Marketing vs Email Follow Up


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Transcript:

Jen
Okay. Oh my gosh. What?

Beth
Jen, I matched stripes, but you guys matched the gold hoop, so I'm, I need some gold hoops.

Jen
don't you just love a hoop? I love a hoop.

Beth
Yeah, I'm.

Jessie
Just a little hoop, girly.

Beth
I got a little extra.

Jen
Yeah. You are. You are being a little extra with your hoops today, Jessie, I got to say.

Beth
I like it. I'm here for it.

Jen
what are you guys doing for 4th of July? Any big plans?

Beth
Now.

Jessie
Hopefully somebody of water. It puts 109 degrees here on Sunday, so I don't know, the pool felt like a bath. So maybe somewhere in the air conditioning.

Beth
I don't know. Yeah I.

Jen
Think the.

Beth
Plan we were going to try to go somewhere, whether it was to the beach, because my brother is at a nearby beach for three weeks for my nephews baseball, something or other. So we're going to try to go there, but it's just outside of the radius that my husband's allowed to travel.

Jen
well, I saw you were in Savannah with our good friend and colleague Carla last weekend. I was jealous.

Jessie
I had FOMO.

Beth
It was amazing. we had so much fun. We the kids loved it. we just explored Savannah didn't do anything like crazy. Didn't visit Tybee Island, which is on my list for another visit.

Jen
Jesse goes there, and that's the place you go.

Beth
But yeah, I haven't been. You have to give me all the like, the notes, because I think next time we'll try to do that. It was just too hot with the kids and everything. So we did mostly indoor and activities and just walking around. and then we saw some other friends that just moved to the area. So super excited about that.

Jen
Fun. What about you? Stay safe. you know, I want to try to go to the beach, but my husband was like, we have to go at like 8 a.m. because Virginia Beach tourist town. I love you, Virginia Beach, but the crazies be coming out in the middle of the day. So he's like, we got to get there early and leave, you know, early.

Jen
So we'll see. Although lots of, like, shark attacks down here lately. yeah. No.

Jessie
Hey, random question. Do you call it barbecuing or grilling when you cook on the grill out? You know how when everybody, like, does a cookout.

Beth
Cookout, what do you call it?

Jen
Cookout. Let's have a.

Beth
Cookout. Yeah, it's like a it's a cookout or grilling, but really we we call it you can call it a barbecue, like we're having a cookout or we're having a barbecue, but I wouldn't refer like I wouldn't put the in, like, we're barbecuing. I don't know, you know.

Jen
Good question. Jesse.

Beth
I know I've never thought about that before.

Jessie
I think it's a north versus south thing.

Jen
Okay, on that note, let's do this. Okay. I'm so excited. We are here for online people talking. Episode 19 already. And I'm here with my partner in crime, Jesse Suggs. Hello. And we have a special guest today, Jesse, don't we.

Jessie
Only one of our favorite people on the planet.

Jen
Oh, our Faye, one of our favorite people, Beth Russell, in case you've been living under a rock, Beth Russell is one of our marketing coaches here at The Convert. she's. Let's see. What was your nickname, chief? oh. And our entertainment. That was mine, chief. What was yours? Well, whatever she is, she is, she is energetic.

Jen
She is. She is fun. She is smart. She has a great personality. Wink, wink. Inside joke.

Beth
Energy.

Jen
Energy. See?

Beth
Chief energy officer.

Jen
Chief energy officer here at DC. but today we wanted to have her on because of her brain, her marketing brain. And because what we're going to be talking about has to do with marketing. Beth, just tell everybody a little bit about yourself, though, like, what's your background? Just so everybody can kind of get an idea of who you are?

Jen
Oh.

Beth
where do I begin? well, I've been doing sales and or marketing for a total of about 14 years now. I started in pharmaceutical market research, which is a very odd.

Jen
I didn't know that.

Beth
Yeah, very specific place to start. but honestly, I think that was the catalyst to me loving marketing, and I just didn't really realize it then because I was in the wrong space, in the wrong industry. I just didn't really find my place there. ended up starting with a master plan community, and they did both resale and new construction with various builders that built in this master plan.

Beth
Community fell in love with new construction. New. This was like, okay, I have to somehow be connected to this industry more closely long term. took some time off for my daughter. and then when I went back in, I was like, you know what? Let's see, with those sales people are doing on the other side, let's, let's, let's just play around a little, if you will.

Beth
and I sold for a year on site, and I just couldn't help but insert myself into the marketing conversation, which should surprise absolutely nobody who has met me before. and ever since then, you know, I spent about seven years at a large production builder in, in Texas, and we built the internal marketing department and, streamline the internal online sales department.

Beth
And we grew from 600 to at the peak before I left was about 1200 homes. You know, I.

Jen
Well, one of the reasons I love, you, I love talking with you so much is that you actually manage the online sales team. Yes, at your former builder. So you have this insight. You know, you have this marketing mind, but you also have the online sales, you know, side of things, right? You have experience with that.

Jen
And so I love getting your perspective on some of these things.

Beth
Yeah. I think being able to witness firsthand the importance and the impact that a successful online sales program can make was probably one of the highlights of my career. And, I was just really blessed to be surrounded by superstars that you guys know very well as, as well as myself. And, they made my job easy. I made my life easy, but they were just the impact that they ended up making long term.

Beth
And the amount of collaboration that they had amongst one another just inspired me. And I bring that every day. And to what I do now as a marketing coach of that importance of collaboration, the importance of communication. Because when you have that, you guys know you're unstoppable. I mean, look at Jessie. She did marketing and online sales as well.

Beth
She she took that to heart. She brings that collaboration every day into what she does as well as an online coach. And we see that on our side. And so I just want to bring that every day on my side as well.

Jen
Chills, chills. I know I want.

Jessie
To put all the heart emojis just around her.

Jen
Head, I got goosebumps. okay, folks. Jessie, what are online people talking about right now?

Jessie
Well, obviously it has something to do with marketing.

Beth
You know, really what we're.

Jessie
Talking about is the difference between online marketing and online sales outreach, whether 1 to 1, 1 to 1 looking or sit in mass and like, really, what's the difference? And how do we use.

Jen
Oh, okay. This is this is a this is a big topic. So take out your your notebook. buckle up. Pay attention. Listen to what we're saying. Because yes, we we come across this a lot. We see this all the time. and there's a few things going on here. And we are here to set the record straight and, you know, give you the very best advice and best practices around this.

Jen
First of all, I would say that email marketing is not the same as email follow up. first and foremost, like email marketing has a purpose email follow up from an online sales specialist and onsite sales specialist. Either one has a completely different goal, right? And we're going to talk about those. So that's the first thing I would say.

Jen
And we see a lot of times that these get these overlap or they get one is using one for the other thing. You know, online sales is using email marketing as their follow up. Right. And that's not good. So let's let's break this down. and talk about this. So what are some things. So as an online sales specialist Jesse, what are some things that, you know, skis need to be thinking about when they send emails out.

Jen
What are the key components? How should that look, feel?

Beth
Yeah.

Jen
What are the roles.

Jessie
When you're kind of unpacking what we're talking about? Because like you said, this is a big undertaking because you're you think about like your short term follow up process, which is 1 to 1, but maybe you're using templates and then you also think about mass emails for prospecting purposes. But the intent either way is still the same. It's 1 to 1 looking no pretty pictures, short and sweet, clear call to action.

Jessie
Catchy subject line. I mean, and like you said, they both serve different purposes. But this should look like you pulled up your inbox and you drafted this email directly for them.

Jen
Yeah, five sentences or less. Right. And here's what I see. I see some links doing those things. But there's still using a templated format in the CRM. Right. They're using like a template that has a header and footer and has these, you know, and I'm sure, Beth, I'm saying all the wrong marketing things, but it has like the margins around the sides and it looks very templated.

Jen
No, it needs like Jesse saying it needs to look as if I sat down and composed an email to the customer. Now, the why behind that is the purpose of online sales. Email follow up is to get an engagement. We are trying to get engagement. We are trying to talk. We are trying to get a response back versus Beth, what's the goal of email marketing?

Jen
You know, most builders use email marketing. E blast newsletters, all those things. What's the difference?

Beth
Yeah, to keep it simple, I think it comes down to awareness and engagement. Right? We're sending high level corporate communicators in for additional brand awareness or product awareness. And to be roommate like to, remind them and to remain top of mind for them. and then engagement just to get them clicking back to the website, coming back to learn more, not having that internal conversation.

Beth
It's not to start a conversation. It's to start a process over again, if you will. It's to have them come back and continue their journey. and very clearly, that being the biggest differentiator between the two, there's an end result that you're looking for when you're sending, corporate marketing email versus an end result that you're looking for coming from a 1 to 1 communication or a person.

Jen
Yeah. I just want to pull out what you said there that I think is really important. You said awareness and engagement, whereas online sales, it's not engagement like it. It's responsiveness. Like, yes, we're looking for them to respond to us and interact with us as when you're talking from a marketer standpoint, you're saying you want them to engage back on our website like, hey, go look at this on the website, go see this, go have that awareness of what our current incentive is or what our current, you know, click move ins are, or our new community that's coming up.

Jen
and everything that that marketing is doing is to drive that traffic back to the website. Right. Is that a true statement?

Beth
Yeah. I mean, we want we want to end up having them pick up where they left off in their journey. so if they came into our system and they're kind of stuck somewhere, then we want to reengage them and to bring them back so they can pick up their journey. And then if they're comfortable, you know, they have that additional communication coming from online sales or, even onsite sales, depending on where they are in the funnel, to then engage and respond and have that conversation because also keep in mind like the inboxes that these emails are coming from.

Beth
So for example, if the emails coming from marketing at do you convert.com or info and you convert.com, those inboxes aren't monitored the same way that a personal inbox is going to be monitored. So what you lose if you're trying to have that responsiveness in the marketing side of things is that you lose that immediate responsiveness, that timeliness, that engagement, and it feels cold.

Beth
It doesn't feel personal. It just it doesn't have the same touchy feely ness that you want out of and what an online sales program can bring. You know, it's you're getting to know them. You're asking their questions, you can prescribe them the right community, prescribe them the right home and lead them down the funnel hand in hand. Marketing is just trying to point the way like we're just like over there.

Beth
Click on that button.

Jen
Yeah. So I love that so much. I always think about I always use the example. Jesse knows. It's like I get the Banana Republic, you know, email that's like, hey, you know, come check out our new swim set, you know, swim wear line. Right? I'm not replying to that email to Banana Republic, like, oh, sweet. Like I'm going to come in and try these on like it's driving me back to the website to go look, did you just get a visual?

Jen
Yeah. bad visual, bad visual. but I want to I want to talk about something that you just said, because we see this a lot, too. you mentioned sending marketing emails from a marketing specific email address. Jesse, what what have you seen out there happening? And let's talk about the do's and don'ts around this.

Jessie
Well, I think just like Beth said, it's important to have both because they have two totally different intent and two totally different purposes. And so one, is it more important than the other. One is lead generation and the other lead conversion. And so when you think about the goal, the marketing looking emails coming from a marketing specific email address, we're basically telling our customer, we know that you know that this is not personal.

Jessie
Like it's not it's not we're.

Jen
Not trying to trick you by lot or we're not trying to say like, you know, Jen, the OSCE made this amazing, email template and is trying to get a response from it. Yeah, yeah.

Jessie
But when you send something from an overseas email that looks 1 to 1, whether sent individually or in mass, your customer then feels like they have a point person, like they have a go to at your organization that they're safe with that they can ask questions to. And so it's important to send them from the right person. And when they start to, like you said, bleed into one another, where maybe marketing send something from the online sales specialist email because they're like, hey, you have the relationship with them, but I want to get this message across.

Jessie
It almost never goes across the way it's intended. So instead it should be more like, hey, I'm sending this out now. You circle back and piggyback off of my email with your personal relationship and get some type of engagement from them. So yeah.

Beth
Yeah.

Jen
Beth, any thoughts on that?

Beth
I think the balance that you're talking about is key because, you know, there's a mutual benefit to both, and like you said, Jesse of kind of the collaboration amongst two marketing sends an email, then the 1 to 1 follows up with that, hey, did you see this? Like blah, blah, blah kind of go into that. and I also see the benefit of there is opportunity where the two can cross paths at times when it's done the right way.

Beth
And I think that's the key is so often times we are seeing marketers spoon feed something to online sales. And like you said, I want you to convey this message, but the outcome and it's not coming across the right way. But if you tailor a certain message like, hey, this is what we want to feature this month, and then you give the OSC the autonomy to then frame that in a way that is applicable to their customers and segmented to the correct customers as a piece of long term follow up or a piece of, yeah, whatever.

Beth
Then I feel like there's a little bit more, benefit that can can arise of that. But what we're seeing now is there's too much crossover and there's not a clear, understanding of the basics. And I say that as a marketer, going back to what you said, Jan, who created a template, who created a header and footer template and was like to my team, use this.


Beth
And from my and I think that's like important to talk about because, yeah, I'm not perfect.

Jen
I was in the top because it was sized market. It was market sized.

Beth
It, I branded it, I slapped the brand on it and I was like, this needs to look pretty and professional. And, you know, in my mindset as a marketer, and this is where the marketers, I want them to listen because we have a control problem. First, to admit we have a control problem and we control the brand. We are the protectors of the brand and the OS are the protectors of their process and of their customers.

Beth
And they're part of the funnel. Right. And so as a marketer, I'm like, I'm protecting the brand. We need to look professional. We need to look clean. We need to look how all these other big builders are looking when they communicate. I'm not putting my buyer goggles on. Like I like to say, and not looking at how that's being perceived from the customer side.

Jen
Yeah, the.

Beth
Customer doesn't care about the header on the email. The customer cares about the content and the front line.

Jessie
I think that's a good point to both, though, because sometimes I've seen, you know, marketing doesn't put the branding slap on there. They're like, okay, we won't do that. But the market ties the content in the email where it then becomes like an information dump. So it looks 1 to 1, but then when you start to read it, it's like, oh, all of this was already on your website.

Jessie
I already knew it. That's why I inquired. I want specific and so there's a different bleeding that happens between sometimes too, that we in online sales world don't even think about because it doesn't look like that pretty clickable newsletter. It looks like a 1 to 1 email.

Jen
So okay, that's that's possible. That's a big that's a big one. Okay. So let's let's bring this let's bring this all together here. online sales okay. Follow up email follow up needs to be short and sweet, not templated. Have a call to action. Ask a question. no pretty pictures, no headers, no footers. Be sent from the online sales specialist.

Jen
Email address. Right? Okay. Am I forgetting anything? No info dumping, human centered communication, customer focused, not builder focused. Customer focused. How can I help you? And no info dumping. Okay, email marketing. We didn't talk about the frequency. I'm going to come back to that. Email marketing is created by the marketer, not the OSC. Okay, OSC, don't be creating newsletters and things like that.

Jen
You have enough to do a marketing email marketing created by the marketer coming from a marketing specific type of email address, not from the Aussies email address. We don't want people unsubscribing from the online sales specialist when they get those email blast, because as a customer I might be like, oh, I don't really want to see email marketing.

Jen
It doesn't mean I'm not interested. It just means I'm going to maybe unsubscribe from the email marketing and then guess what? If it's coming from your LLC, they have unsubscribed from your you just shot yourself in the tush. Okay. The email marketing that can totally be about like Beth saying awareness, like pretty pictures, links, all that goodness.

Jen
Great, right? Driving people back to the website. How often is should email marketing go out? Is there anything is too much email marketing? because I hear this too, email marketing is going out like five times a month, you know, on top of my follow up. And I go each. So how much is too much? What's is there a good amount?

Beth
It's changed a little bit over time. I think obviously Covid is a big, catalyst for that because everything kind of had to come from marketing a little bit. Then, you know, that was we really had to really engage in there were certain processes in place that kind of upped the ante in terms of frequency, but I think that's probably where people have gotten distracted.


Beth
They went that became their new baseline, that became their new normal.

Jen
Okay, is.

Beth
We have to stay in front of them by sending a marketing email once a week. No, no you don't. It's the similar thing like on social media, social media, you can stay active and post every day to your stories to get people clicking and engage with your content and your people and your product and your messaging, whatever. But you're on your feed, whether it's on your Facebook page or your Instagram page, you are only as good as your last post.


Jen
Whoa.

Beth
And so the email that you're sending out, you shouldn't be sending out something that lacks substance just to check a box. You should have at least biweekly, if not monthly, frequency and distance between each email.

Jen
Okay.

Beth
In order to gather the information that you need to send something of substance, whether it be a change of incentive, a new community popping up featuring certain, quick moving homes that need more attention. It should serve a purpose. I think that's where people get lost. They've got lost in the over communication, and they have since lacked purpose and intent in their messaging from a marketing standpoint.

Jen
Less is more.

Beth
Need to learn more of.

Jen
From says more. Make sure the less is intentional.


Jen
Yeah okay. Yeah okay. Good okay. Now if you're an online sales specialist out there and you're like oh man this is not how we do things. what advice like Beth, how should they talk to marketing and or leadership about this.

Beth
It's a great question. And I think it's something that even marketers struggle with. And it's because they need to feel confident in explaining the why and to over explain the why if they have to. Because a lot of times I'll use myself as an example. My team did come to me and say, hey, this isn't Jen told us this isn't best practice.

Beth
And I was like, well, just it's fine. Do it anyway. Like, I didn't think about it, right? Like in me, my marketing brain had already made a decision and was like, this is what we need to do to elevate our brand. This is what we need to do to appear a certain way. This is why this is good, right?

Beth
And I didn't pay attention to the why. I'll be the first to admit it. And I think as marketers, we need to step back, and listen, we need to, which is what we're going to talk about on our webinar. Webinar? ironically enough, Jen. Yes, but we need to stop and we need to listen and listen to the why, listen to the data, pull up the data.

Beth
If you need to look at that open rate, that response rate, that click rate, like whatever, you need to feel comfortable with it. But the why matters. And you need to find a way to explain the why as best you can in their language so that they stop. And if they listen.

Jen

Beth
Learn from my.

Jen
Mistakes.

Beth
People.

Jen
why I love. So it's really important what you're saying there because really with anything is like, here's the why might not just, hey, this is this is and best practice like don't do that. It's not best practice. Okay. But here's the why. Like we talked about today. You're going to get more unsubscribes people. The whole goal is to get responsiveness and they're they're responding to a marketing inbox like it doesn't it doesn't make sense.

Jen
and I think, you know, like Jesse and she's going to kill me, but I'm just going to bring this up. Jesse has had instances where, you know, like just butting heads with marketing about this and and just changing that perspective of it's all about the builder. It's all about the lifestyle and the builder versus the communication. And that's fine for marketing, but marketing is not a follow up.

Jen
Jesse, am I saying that correctly? Like you've had some friction there.

Beth
Oh yeah.

Jen
Oh, you had to navigate.

Beth
Well.

Jessie
And it's interesting because once, like you said, Beth, once you explain the why, that's step one. And then once they start to taste it and see it, then they go, okay, I could continue this like I'm, I'm, I'm understanding, I'm digging it. And then when you really see the fruit of like buying into something that maybe you weren't open to at first, it's like, okay, I wasted all that time like you said, Beth, you're like, I'll be the first to admit I screwed it up.

Jessie
and and yeah, in some way. And so it's been fun to watch that specific instance with explanation and with examples there. Conversion metrics have just shot through the roof. And so it's with the strategy you have to go in that in that direction. But it takes time to.

Jen
I think trust is important to you got to trust each other. You gotta, you know, like I see that a lot too. Like online sales is going and trying to explain this and they're not like, oh, what do you know? Like you don't know, you know. And so I think proof is in the pudding too, like you were saying, you both were talking about looking at the results.

Jen
Look at the track the metrics, track the open rates, track the click thrus, look at the results. You're going to get better engagement from personalized looking emails versus a marketing email. That's two different goals, two different goals. Okay. Yeah. Beth, can you stay on for the rest or do you need to boogie? We're going to talk about two things.

Beth
I can stay on for a little bit longer. And I want to say something that we didn't say that I think it's important for you guys. Hit it. And, that I want all of us to keep in mind when they're talking to their marketers. The risk involved of making having marketing content go through your online sales specialist is that you are then discounting, the expertise and the positioning, the trust, the relationship that that online sales specialist has put into each of their prospects and their leads.

Beth
Because you are taking away their voice, you're taking away the personalization and you're inserting the brand. And that's again, like I understand the temptation to do that, but we have to remember that, like, just like an online sales specialist is handing off their leads to the next step. We need to do the same and hand off the process to the next step and allow them to elevate themselves and do what they're supposed to do, because now they're the expert in that part of the funnel.

Jen
Holy cow. I'm glad you stayed on to say those things. Okay, that was brilliant.

Beth
Yes, I do that sometimes.

Jen
No trust. I mean, yeah, like, let's like, let go of that control and let them do their thing, which is building rapport and making human connection. so good, so good. okay. I don't have a video mailbag. You guys got to send in your video emails. So we have video mail, but we did get a question in the online sales community.

Jen
And, Beth, I'd love to hear your thoughts on this, too. did we have a, a chat recommendation? You know, and, Jesse, what what did you find out? Because you pulled you pulled some people to see what they thought.

Jessie
It was basically an overwhelming, response of live chat, which is, you know, the industry typically tends to surround around one that they know works for them. That has enough capabilities to, like you said, keep the personalization piece, but also add a layer of screening to make sure the online sale specialist doesn't get bombarded with paint colors and all of those things.

Jessie
So live chat was what we heard from them. But Beth, what do you what do you see work or what are marketers? What do they lean towards?

Beth
live chat again would be on our side. The overwhelming favorite. and oftentimes I think it's because of the feedback that they're also getting from their online sales specialists. Yeah. They're hearing like that's the favor that that's the easiest to use that, that, one that serves what they needed to do. I think you have to look at any chat, because I think it was several years ago at the builder show, and I, I'm very outspoken about my thoughts on chat.

Beth
but it's because I don't like chat boxes for the same reason as I just went on a tirade about we can't discount our OS's, we can't discount their authority and their presence and the ownership that they have in the funnel. We don't want chat bots to discount what they offer in that relationship online.

Jen
So okay, so there's a difference between a bot and a chat. Yeah. So I was kind of confused by this whole thing too at the beginning. So let me just say chat bot is chatting on your behalf basically with a customer, with questions and weeding them out. not a fan. Okay. Just going to say, live chat is real time chat with an OAC.

Jen
Now, the thing with live chat and we're fine with that. If you are doing all the other things really well, like if your answer rate is good, if your response time is good, all of those things don't layer on top of that a live chat. If you can't keep up with your calls, your miss rates are through the roof.

Jen
Don't add another lead source, so a live chat is good if you're able to actually be live and chat. if you're finding yourself turning it off all the time because you can't keep up with your other stuff, maybe you don't need it. So yeah. And then if you're going to get a live chat, make sure that it does have the ability to put in some playbooks, meaning like kind of like, almost like a call flow or call tree for chatting, like, oh, is this a warranty chat that needs to go to somebody in warranty?

Jen
Not the OSI. so it has some built in things you can set up in there. So difference between a chat bot and a live chat do all agree?

Beth
I want marketers to hear disagree. Yes, because I think oftentimes they're confusing that I know it's like, oh, an easier name, but does it serve your customer? Does it interrupt their journey? Can this be done elsewhere? And I love what you said, Jen, about making sure that everything else is covered before you add in this layer, because I think often times organizations are quick to add more on to online sales.

Beth
and to put more pressure on them when like maybe you so work with your marketer, run the market proof algorithm. Do we have enough leads or do we need to add in something like live chat to help generate more and help website conversions? I don't know, maybe that's something we look at within the data, but the decision needs to be made with data collectively and, intelligently before just jumping in and adding an added layer or complication.

Jen
Do your research.

Jessie
Yeah. We found, one customer expectations really high on that. I mean, if you're seeing, chat now level people expect an immediate response. And if you can't respond quickly, then you're already losing their trust early on. And so it's an opportunity to really kind of mess up the process at the beginning when we're totally focused on customer experience.

Jessie
but to like you said, you can when I was in the seat and we had live chat, we would bury it on certain pages so it wouldn't just be on like the main landing page. It would be a customer had to go through certain, you know, they had to click here, go here, go here and get to a certain phase in their their search journey before they could access that.

Jen
So yes, the bench is important. Put it on like a queue. I, you know, page where they can ask those specific questions versus the main web page. Okay. All right. It's time for the skills check. Because what? Jesse, you better check yourself.

Jessie
Before you make your sale.

Jen
you guys know it's coming. You knew it was coming. What are we been talking about? Okay, so here's your homework. It's pretty simple. First, go do an audit of your email follow up. Make sure it follows those fundamentals that Jesse was saying. Is it templated. Does are too many pictures. You got headers and footers. Change it. Refresh.

Jen
You should refresh your email follow up every six months or so anyway. So go in, take a look at that. And then the second part is talk to your marketer. See what is going out. See make sure that it's coming from a marketing email. First and foremost. And if it's not, again, just have listened to this podcast and tell them the whys behind it.

Jen
Okay, get after it. Go get them. last question, Beth, are you done with Oppt?

Beth
Yeah. You know me.

Jen
Yes. Hey, if you love if you love listening to Beth. Hey, tune in to Laso webinar on Wednesday. I think this podcast will be this podcast will come out next week right before we do the webinar on Wednesday the 10th. So you can just get a bunch more of Beth awesome notes.

Beth
will match again. I don't know, we'll need to.

Jen
Do more.

Beth
That maybe pink podcast.

Jen
this has been fun. Thank you guys.

Jessie
Thanks, Beth.

Beth
Thanks, guys.

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