Ryan Phelan

With over two decades of online and email marketing experience, Ryan has focused on driving successful strategies for high-growth SaaS software and online companies and advancing winning digital strategies.

In working for companies like Adestra, Acxiom, Responsys, Sears & Kmart, BlueHornet, and infoUSA, Ryan’s experience and history in the industry is unequaled. He works closely with RPE Origin’s client partners to identify their needs and develop a customized approach to achieve their goals with email marketing and related services.

Ryan was awarded our industry’s top honor of the 2023 Thought Leader of the Year award from the ANA-EEC in recognition of his lifetime achievement and leadership in the email marketing space and is recognized as one of the top global thought leaders in email marketing.

Video from the podcast:

Table of Contents

1. Introduction
2. Ryan Phelan’s Journey into Email Marketing
3. The Role of RPE Origin
4. Common Mistakes in Email Marketing
5. The Importance of Strategy in Email Campaigns
6. The Future of Email Marketing
7. Email vs Other Marketing Channels
8. Email Platform Migrations
9. Incremental Innovation in Email
10. Community and Collaboration in the Email Industry

Introduction (00:00 – 01:24)
Ryan Phelan’s Background in Email (01:24 – 03:18)
RPE Region’s Services and Approach (03:40 – 06:44)
Common Mistakes in Email Marketing (06:50 – 10:31)
The Importance of Email-Focused Agencies (10:43 – 12:58)
Best Practices for Email Platform Migrations (12:58 – 17:19)
The Future of Email as a Channel (17:35 – 20:28)
Comparing Email to Other Channels (20:28 – 23:50)
The Importance of Email Accessibility (23:50 – 25:30)
Incremental Innovation in Email (25:33 – 28:01)
Ryan’s Love for the Email Industry (28:01 – 33:32)

• Ryan Phelan’s journey into the email industry
• Common mistakes made by email marketers
• The role of email agencies and their approach
• Email service provider (ESP) migration process
• Challenges and shifts in the email industry
• The future of email and its comparison with other channels
• Incremental innovation in email marketing
• The email community and its collaborative nature

Email Marketing, Deliverability, Email Agencies, Esp Migration, RFP (Request For Proposal, Privacy Legislation, SMS Marketing, WhatsApp, Marketing, Incremental Innovation, Email Community

What are the common mistakes in email marketing?
Marketers often focus too much on tactics without a clear strategy, leading to ineffective campaigns.

How should companies approach email platform migrations?
Companies should take a methodical approach, documenting all processes and involving experts to ensure a smooth transition.

Is email marketing declining in power?
Despite challenges, email remains a top ROI channel, and its adaptability ensures its continued relevance.

• Common mistakes by email marketers include not having a clear strategy and understanding the “why” behind their campaigns, not promoting their program’s success internally, and not giving themselves enough credit.
• Role of email agencies: Agencies like RPEorigin work as vendor-agnostic partners, providing end-to-end solutions for enterprise companies, including strategy, creative services, data science, and more.
• ESP migration process: A thorough and well-documented migration process is crucial. It should involve all departments that interact with email, create a migration manual, and take the time to do it right.
• Challenges in the email industry include privacy legislation, managing increasing email volume, and adapting to changes like Gmail tabs and Apple Mail Privacy Protection (MPP).
• Incremental innovation: Instead of trying to launch a complete program at once, marketers should consider an incremental approach, rolling out components one by one as time permits.
• The email community: The email industry is a close-knit and collaborative community focused on sharing knowledge, helping each other, and lifting the industry as a whole.

“They said something about this is this will eliminate email for your entire company. And I’m like, no, it won’t, right and, and you know, all these companies keep coming out and saying this is the end of email guess what it’s not. We’ve been around for a while, not to get overconfident, but the channel is what is going to be the downfall of email people, ‘s overuse or misuse of it, not another technology.”

“The biggest mistake I think that marketers make is not taking that prerequisite step of the strategy and answering the question, why should the consumer give a damn about what we’re doing? And that strategic step helps inform and keep everybody on the center path of what the goal is.”

“I think if we as marketers started sharing those things, those successes, those metrics, those, those processes that show that email just isn’t as easy as Microsoft Outlook, that we would have a better success rate on funding and personnel in our, in our programs.”

“I think that it is what gets us through those times is, is three things number one the organizations that have been around forever. The two I, I mentioned before, the UKDMA is, is incredibly strong in leadership that, that permeates the US consciousness. I think the thought leadership class, the people out there that are thought leaders in the space help people navigate we saw that with MPP and the number of people that came out to do webinars and articles and, and all those things to kind of guide people through and give contact.”

RPEOrigin website

Ryan Phelan on LinkedIn