Televised Friday in the U.S. was the Olympic opening ceremony, care of NBC. Have a peek at some email marketing tips (really? I know right!) we learned from Matt & Meredith’s commentary that night: Tip #1 Be personal – nobody wants to talk to an autoresponder. Include your own personality and emotional touches to truly engage people, don’t just barf up a sales proposal. Matt Lauer spilled his heart trying to relate during a tribute to the National Health Service, “I am sitting here watching this, I’m thinking what an incredible experience for these doctors and nurses. They’re looking around them in this Olympic stadium thinking, ‘My goodness, I’m part of something incredibly special.” Tip #2 Use line breaks and white-space liberally. People scan emails quickly – they don’t read every word. Breaks make it easy to find headings and key value statements in your emails The British Olympic team entered to David Bowie’s Heroes, white confetti and the overwhelming roar of the crows. Bob Costas – who commentated during the Parade of Nations – introduced the team and stated “Let’s sit back and listen” to which him and Matt did for 20 seconds before providing more needed analysis. Tip #3 Make sure every line in your email is relevant to your customers. Nobody is interested in you, they’re only interested in themselves Knowing that a lot of children would be watching with their parents – and that children really only know about their own self-interests – Bob Costas put one African country into a context they would get, “Madagascar – for our younger viewers a country associated with a few animated movies.” Tip #4 Use your emails to get customers talking about you in social media – MailChimp allows you to auto-post your emails to Twitter and Facebook for every campaign. Towards the end of the broadcast a “Shut up Matt Lauer” campaign began spreading on Twitter. April Thompson tweeted, “The Olympics does bring people together! America is united in the opinion that Matt Lauer and Meredith Veiyra should shut up.” Getting people talking about you is the key to social media. Remember, NBC has been doing this for a lot longer than you, which is why they’ve got it down pat. Don’t worry, you’ll be at their level in no time!