| Reggie Brady Marketing Solutions 203-838-8138 | ||||||||||||
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Reggie's Articles appearing in DIRECT Magazine | ||||||||||||
| Surefire way of boosting e-mail response June, 2001 BY REGGIE BRADY By now you're up and running with e-mail and enjoying the benefits of this cost-effective marketing channel. You do all the right things: You measure results, look at your return on investment and apply segmentation strategies to your efforts. What can you do next to increase results? Here are three ideas worth testing. Rich media can deliver a more emotive and engaging experience to your customers and prospects. From within an e-mail, you can stream audio and video content. Forrester Research predicts text-based e-mail will be perceived as quaintly archaic by 2005, particularly as faster delivery with DSL and cable modems take hold in the consumer market. Many marketers have been experimenting with rich media over the past year with good results. Click-through rates are averaging three times higher than text e-mail, and 10% to 20% higher than HTML e-mail. Plus there's an added bonus — recipients are much more likely to pass the e-mail along to a friend or colleague. Some caveats. Rich media works best when marketing to your own customer base. Keep the video or audio file size under 10K. And never autoload the streaming content — your customers should only activate rich content on demand. Transaction capability from within an e-mail is relatively new on the scene. Even though a link can take your customers directly to a specific area of your Web site, you can still lose them as they either visit other pages or abandon their shopping cart. If you have a clear offer, your customers can now consummate their order directly within the e-mail. Many publishers are using this technique on renewal efforts. Marketers offering three or four specific items for purchase have seen good results. One specialty book marketer saw four times more sales when it tested e-mail transactions against driving customers to its Web site. Viral marketing is the e-marketer's equivalent of member-get-a-member. Nothing is more credible and targeted than a recommendation from someone you know. This vehicle really pays off in spades if you create a special promotion that rewards your customers for introducing their friends and colleagues to your offerings. Most companies using this technique have created some kind of reward system that encourages customers to pass the e-mail along and encourage some specific action. This often takes the form of a sweepstakes or a contest; but the prizes need not be extravagant — some offer $5-off coupons, T-shirts or a software premium download. Two considerations when you use this approach. First, have your customers do the referring — it's much more powerful to receive an e-mail from a friend suggesting the recipient may be interested in an offer than receiving an e-mail directly from the company. And second, flag on your file those who do refer you. These folks are your evangelists and loyal customers. Treat them special. Each of these innovative techniques can deliver strong results. There are companies that specialize in providing these services and can provide invaluable experience in helping you structure tests. Remember that each is a tactic and while you should consider including them in your e-mail efforts, they need to be used strategically. If every campaign includes them, they can lose effectiveness. So harness the power of these enhancements to your e-mail efforts and you'll enjoy higher response rates and more new customers. Regina Brady is president of Reggie Brady Marketing Solutions, a direct and e-mail marketing consultancy. A respected industry leader, Brady is active on several industry boards and advisory committees and is a frequent speaker at trade conferences. She can be reached at (203) 838-8138 or reginabrady@att.net. Return to Articles | ||||||||||||
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