SMARTER
EMAILING THROUGH ANALYTICS
By Chris Baggott, ExactTarget
In the early
days of email marketing, generating high response rates was relatively
easy. The costs were low and the returns were high. A generic
email message sent to thousands of subscribers resulted in response
rates that no other medium had ever achieved, including direct
mail. High returns with minimal investment lulled many marketers
into a habit of batch-and-blast email marketing tactics. Yet marketers
soon found that the long-term drawbacks soon outweighed any short-term
benefits, as subscribers left in droves and response rates plummeted.
Email marketers
now are learning that the key to success is a customer-centric
email strategy that recognizes each customer is distinct and will
react in a unique way to email.
An effective
way that marketers can target email campaigns is through the use
of analytics. In fact, a recent JupiterResearch report found that
using web analytics to target email campaigns can produce nine
times the revenues and 18 times the profits of broadcast-or batch-and-blast-mailings.
The report also shows, however, that most marketers still rely
on broadcast and basic personalization tactics that do little
to make email messages relevant. Why?
Because it
takes work to figure out what is relevant to your customers and
to respond to those needs. Demographics are not enough. To be
relevant, you must deliver the right message to the right person
at the right time. That requires dividing your audience into "segments
of one."
Putting
Analytics Into Action
You may already know basic performance information about your
email campaigns, such as bounces, deliverability, clickthrough
rate and even who has opened your email messages. While these
reports are valuable, they really only show the quality of your
subscriber list.
Using email
analytics, you can gain additional insight into what your subscribers
did after they opened and clicked on your email-whether they purchased
an item, what they purchased, what items they looked at online,
how long they spent looking at items, etc. This wealth of information
will help you develop a personal, highly relevant and profitable
relationship with that subscriber.
Utilizing
email and web site analytics enables email marketers to accurately
measure the effectiveness of their email campaigns by tracking
subscriber actions from the inbox to the shopping cart. For example,
you send an email to a subscriber and he clicks on a link that
brings him to your website. There, he looks at ties but doesn't
buy any. This can trigger a follow up email offering a coupon
on ties to this subscriber. Once your subscriber buys a tie, you
can send email offers for cufflinks, shirts, etc. Over time, you
can begin to collect rich data about this customer's buying preferences,
which will help you create even more relevant emails targeted
just to him.
In addition,
email analytics will help you understand if your email performed
the way it was intended. Did your subscribers click to the area
of the website you wanted them to go? Did they navigate to other
areas you hoped they would? Did they purchase items you intended?
Insight gained from tracking email effectiveness will lead to
improved future email campaigns.
One company
that is benefiting from email analytics is Motorcycle-Superstore.com,
an online retailer of motorcycle gear and accessories. The retailer
has a customer base of about 110,000 and has cultivated about
11,000 affiliates. Customers receive weekly emails with content
tied to the calendar. For example, during the summer months emails
may feature a Father's Day or 4th of July promotion. Affiliate
partners are emailed monthly with promotions designed to entice
them to display Motorcycle-Superstore.com's links more prominently
on their websites.
Motorcycle-Superstore.com
uses email analytics to gauge what content and promotions their
customers and affiliates are interested in receiving and to make
crucial decisions, such as the right frequency to email subscribers.
The company
uses ExactTarget as its email service provider and analytics company
WebTrends. Together they provide one seamless solution that delivers
a comprehensive view into how email subscribers react to specific
creative and content elements within an email. Now Motorcycle-Susperstore.com
has the ability to analyze consumer behavior for any given email
design/layout in an extremely useful, graphically appealing format,
and has an efficient method for deciding how to move forward.
Motorcycle-Superstore.com
recently ran a campaign with nearly 85,000 emails, which produced
a delivery rate of 98.2 percent, an open rate of 25 percent and
a unique click-through rate of 8 percent. The company noticed
that open and click-through rates were starting to decline as
they increased the frequency of their emails. Using analytics,
they are able to evaluate the increased revenue generated from
more frequent mailings to the potential draw-backs, which include
increased opt-outs and decreased conversions per send. Without
analytics, this information would not be available.
 |
Chris
Baggott is co-founder of ExactTarget, a leading developer
of on-demand outbound email software solutions with more than
3,800 customers. ExactTarget offers solutions that meet the
needs of all industry verticals and all size organizations.
To learn more, go to
http://www.exacttarget.com or contact Christopher Barnes
at 310-686-2314 or via email at: cbarnes@exacttarget.com |
