I hope all of you found some fun new toys under the Christmas tree or Chanukah bush this year (or however else your faith and family may bring you presents). While everyone was sipping on egg nog this past weekend, we were preparing a new toy for our users. We have added the option to insert a greeting into your emails. Holiday season or not, we could all stand to be a little friendlier. A personalized greeting in your email campaigns shows your subscribers that they’re more than just an address.

To include a personalized greeting in your email, first select the block in the editor that you want to add the greeting to. Within the block, click where you would like the greeting to appear. Select Greeting from the Insert Additional Elements section on the lefthand side of your screen.

A box will pop up allowing you to customize the greeting. Dear is the default for the Primary Greeting but it can be changed. You can choose First Name, Last Name or both First Name & Last Name. The Primary Greeting will display whatever contact information you set to appear. If there is no information for a particular contact, the greeting will go to the Alternative Greeting. This can be something simple like Greetings! (which is the default). For example, if you choose First Name in the Primary Greeting, the Alternative Greeting will display for any contact who has the first name blank in your contact information.

Personalization is a great way to engage your subscribers. People will be less likely to tune out your communications if they feel like an email is tailored exclusively for them. Targeted email marketing takes more than just adding a personalized greeting to an email, but it’s the best place to start!

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by Andy Shore

Andy Shore found his way to Benchmark when he replied to a job listing promising a job of half blogging, half social media. His parents still don’t believe that people get paid to do that. Since then, he’s spun his addiction to pop culture and passion for music into business and marketing posts that are the spoonful of sugar that helps the lessons go down. As the result of his boss not knowing whether or not to take him seriously, he also created the web series Ask Andy, which stars a cartoon version of himself. Despite being a cartoon, he somehow manages to be taken seriously by many of his readers ... and few of his coworkers.