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Justin
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Justin
Email doesn't work?
I recently visited one of my favorites sites for e-marketers and ran across and article entitled; “Why email marketing doesn’t work!” My first reaction was to jump on the defensive, because as an email marketing professional, I take great offense to such an absurd statement. After realizing that the article was merely a plug for an email marketing alternative, I quickly decide that it would be better to simply point out just a few pros to using email marketing. This is what I had to say…
Some really good reasons on why email marketing DOES work
- Customer Relationship Management – Email marketing is a great tool for customer retention and customer communications. Why? Because it can be extremely cost effective compared to call centers, or even traditional direct mail campaigns.
- Targeted Reach – For retail companies, email marketing is a great way to remind, or inform, customers of the great products, promotions, or services that your company may provide. If done correctly, the effectiveness and reach could make for a very profitable campaign.
- Cost efficiency – Email is great way to communicate to regions where the local infrastructure does not support traditional mail or communication, efficiently. For instance one of my clients that is a VERY large transportation company based out of Atlanta, only communicates with customers in the Asia-Pacific region through email. Why? Because it’s targeted, and much more cost effective than sending letters or developing out a multi-million dollar call center, or even outsourcing those call center needs to local providers.
- Sales Growth – Email marketing is a great way to up-sell and cross-sell existing or potential customers. The fact is targeted and personalized messages, based off of customer behavior has proven to be an effective way to generate additional sales and sales opportunities.
- Viral and Flexible – Also, email marketing offer the flexibility of personalization, but can be an extremely effective way to go viral. If an email has the right promotion, a recipient may just forward that information on to a friend that may be in the market for your product or service, even if the original recipient is not. It’s the next best thing to word of mouth, which is one of the most effective ways of marketing. I mean when was the last time someone re-mailed a direct mail piece. Never! It just doesn’t happen.
- Highly Effective – Lastly email marketing can be effective without large lists. Of course many email marketers would love to have a large list to blast messages to, because it increases their reach, but I can’t think of a single marketer who wouldn’t love a list of 10,000 people where, 50 to 60% actually took an action on the mailing as opposed to a list of 100K and only 3 to 5% actually even opened the mailing. Why? Because it’s about relevance not volume. Buying a list may increase your volume, but it will do little for your effectiveness, and will surely hurt a consumer’s confidence in your brand.
I could probably think of at least 10 more reasons why email marketing “works” but I’m starting to think that this article is merely here to plug an alternative. That is ok, I just think that taking an obviously biased opinion for a site devoted to e-marketers is just a quick way to get criticized or ignored, but hey maybe that’s what you are going for. Nonetheless interesting perspective. I’ve heard someone say the same thing about SEO, buying ads, creating affiliate programs etc, but the true marketer will use a variety of mediums to find the best marketing mix. That’s Marketing 101.
What do you think? Was the article out of line, was it simply biased, or do you think that there are some solid points in what the author had to say? Let me know, and I will shed more light on what APML is… after the break.
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Justin
At A Glance:
One of the founders of Gooruze, a social network for eMarketers, recently wrote a compelling and educational article on some of the things to consider when preparing for a product launch.
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Justin
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Justin
At 30,000 Feet: Set your own benchmarks
As you begin your new year, you have probably spent a very large amount of time on planning your online marketing mix. You have started to look at new technologies and maybe even new ways to showcase and inform people about your product or business. Well I just want to share a bit of advise about benchmarks from 30,000 feet (A High Level Perspective).
While planning your goals and setting your measures of success late last year, you may have taken a look at some of the many industry reports that are available. You may have even started to look at the performance of your marketing tools and began to compare your stats to the those found in industry analysis reports. Before you get too deep in to the year may I recommend that you take a minute to review your current plan and look to set benchmarks based off your own data, instead of published benchmarks. I believe it to be a very good practice to set your own benchmarks and measure your success off of the milestones you set for your emarketing programs. Industry standards, or benchmarks, may be a good place to start for measuring the success of your marketing or business plan, however there is one important variable many reports leave out. Your business.
Like I briefly mentioned before, industry benchmarks are essentially averages or the summation of data acquired and manipulated by someone outside of your organization. Sometimes the formulas they use, don’t take into account the variables your business model experiences or plans for. Industry benchmarks are important because it can give you a snapshot of the various marketing tools and how they perform across the marketing industry, but your business should really be measured on your own performance metrics and at your organization’s own pace. Let’s take email marketing for example. The open and click-through rates, detailed in a email marketing benchmark report, are aggregates and averages across various business models and sometimes business verticals. This can lead to a very skewed perspective and may even lead to beign misinformed about your customers’ preferences or behaviors. Instead of comparing your open rates on generalized standards, try monitoring and observing your own opens and clicks based off of metrics you define. By doing this, you can included variables that are likely left out of the industry benchmarks. Things like; seasonality, subject lines, dynamic content, communication preferences, personalization etc. If you measure from, quarter to quarter, month to month, or even campaign to campaign, you will undoubtedly find out more about your marketing performance and customers, than any benchmark will supply. This may seem like a regular practice to some, and foreign to others, but try it out if you haven’t before. Taking baby steps to improve your email marketing click-through rates or changing the links structure on your website for SEO, may take a little more time than you would like, but doing so will give you greater visibility into understanding your audience, even at 30,000 feet.
