Email marketing offers the unique opportunity of direct contact without the hassles
of paper-based mailings. Delivery is instant and response can be as quick circumventing
the usual pace of snail mail. Email marketing is used in three distinct ways:
To inform customers about offers, discounts and the like
To send updated information on a company¡¦s products and services
To send free informative articles and write-ups to maintain contact and build
customer loyalty.
Email marketing strategies of the future are set to undergo a dramatic change
and much of this can be attributed to software advances in email marketing tools.
Before we understand how, we need to first put in perspective the key issues in
any email marketing program.
Who do you target: Identifying Your prospects
How often: The frequency with which you email them
What will you say to them: email content
Tracking results
Indications are that software advances will positively impact all these aspects
of email marketing .
The impact of software advances on email marketing trends
Rising to the demands of business users, service providers offer improved features
and advanced email-marketing capabilities. The advanced capabilities have been studied
for each of the 4 key issues in email marketing outlined above:
Who do you target: Identifying your prospects
?Targeting messages by segments using advanced database and search options: You
can vary messages by geographic area, by purchase history, and if available in your
opt-in list- by demographics and lifestyle. Software features allow you to easily
identify specific type of customers for customized promotions. You can mail customers
who purchased Product "XYZ" a complementary offer for a new Product. ?List Management
& Filtering Tools to organize your Opt-in lists, you can also merge more than one
opt-in lists and duplicated addresses get automatically removed.
How often: The frequency with which you email them
You will be able to fix the precise the month, week, day, and even the hour that
email messages go out to prospects. You can schedule the exact dates for an autoresponder
series
What will you say to them: email content?
Email content is developing into ¡§made of internet¡¨ material as writers become
savvier with this medium
?More visual oriented and high impact glitziness is envisaged using animation
features to make the email messages more appealing.
?The ability to sell effectively through email will be based on marketing dictates
and strategies much like mainstream ad campaigns. Is your information relevant to
the customer need? Is it different from competition?
?In the emerging email marketing era several providers will have readymade email
templates that simplify the process of designing email promotions
?There is a lot of learning built-up in the last few years on winning emails
and on email content that worked. Books and ebook resources written by those with
experience (on what type of email content, titles or questions increase response
rates) will greatly help new comers in this field. A great deal of study is going
into email ¡¥subject lines¡¦ that work.
?Another key development is in software tools that allow a degree of personalization
without having to individually carry it out email by email. Merging each subscriber's
personal information into every email or newsletter, and merging subscribers' names
into the subject line of every email is a strategy that minimizes the risk of being
mistaken for SPAM.
?Your customers can choose to receive your message as HTML or text if you use
technology called multi-part MIME technology
Tracking results Analysis of how your email marketing campaign is faring is an
important part of the whole process. There are advanced features that help you in
evaluating your campaign results and take any corrective action if necessary. You
can view your subscriber's history and instantly identify which email promotions;
autoresponders or newsletters have been sent and view the response rates. And all
this will be available in real time. Tracking your email campaigns in real time
means you know instantly how many people bought your product, how many chose to
subscribe to your newsletter, or even how many autoresponders were sent out in the
last two weeks.
In conclusion
For successful email marketing you also have to be backed up with a marketing
strategy that taps into the traditional concepts of marketing. Your product must
serve a need within your target in a better manner than any competing product, you
have to hit the price point at which people will buy; arrange easy and quick delivery
of product and secure payment systems. Once you have these in place, the persuasiveness
of your email messages and the interesting tools outlined above will act on your
customers to deliver results.
