Is your e-mail marketing keeping up with the times?When marketers first discovered the power of e-mail, we thought we had found the road to utopia. With open and clickthrough rates through the roof, the ROI (Return On Investment) The monetary benefits derived from having spent money on developing or revising a system. In the IT world, there are more ways to compute ROI than Carter has liver pills (and for those of you who never heard of that expression, it means a lot). looked great. Then we hit a few bumps bumps a term used to describe a variety of papulonodular dermatoses in horses, including 'heat bumps', 'feed bumps', 'protein bumps', 'wheat bumps' and others. No specific disease or etiology has been assigned to the term and veterinary dermatologists wish it would disappear from use. in the road, and e-mail marketing Email marketing is a form of direct marketing which uses electronic mail as a means of communicating commercial or fundraising messages to an audience. In its broadest sense, every email sent to a potential or current customer could be considered email marketing. started getting bad press. Spam ... clutter ... phishing Pronounced "fishing," it is a scam to steal valuable information such as credit card and social security numbers, user IDs and passwords. Also known as "brand spoofing," an official-looking e-mail is sent to potential victims pretending to be from their ISP, bank or retail establishment. ... privacy ... inbox fatigue ... legislative hurdles ... filters ... black lists and white lists ... internet security ''This article or section is being rewritten at Internet security is the process of protecting data and privacy of devices connected to internet from information robbery, hacking, malware infection and unwanted software. . What made us think we could execute e-mail marketing campaigns flawlessly flaw·less adj. Being entirely without flaw or imperfection. See Synonyms at perfect. flaw  less·ly adv. and not encounter any challenges along the way?
You can't keep a good message down Despite the challenges, many companies are still getting good results from their e-mail programs Software in the user's computer that can access the mail servers in a local or remote network. Also known as an "e-mail client," "mail client," "mail program," and "mail reader," it provides the ability to send and receive e-mail messages and file attachments. . Take spam, for example--the scourge of responsible marketing and good customer relations. As legitimate marketers, we certainly don't endorse To sign a paper or document, thereby making it possible for the rights represented therein to pass to another individual. Also spelled indorse. endorse (indorse) v. spam as good marketing practice, and with legislation in place to try to bring it to its knees, we hope that spam will soon be history. But for now, there are some important insights to be gained from the spam research that we can apply to legitimate e-mail marketing efforts. For one thing, it appears that an e-mail campaign with a relevant message or offer targeted to the right customer is opened and read by at least some people--even if they haven't given permission. So when meaningful, relevant content is sent to consumers who have given permission, the chances for success increase significantly. Following the 3 Rs For e-mail programs to succeed, we have learned that much deeper, thoughtful strategies will be needed to keep customers' interest over the long term, and achieve a robust ROI. E-mail programs that will continue to be successful are those that have not only received clear permission, but also apply the 3 Rs: Relationships, Relevance, and Regularity. With all the new developments in e-mail technology, relationship-building is experiencing steady growth and generating good results in key metrics metrics Managed care A popular term for standards by which the quality of a product, service, or outcome of a particular form of Pt management is evaluated. See TQM. . As a result, many marketers have suggested that e-mail will continue to be strong as retention tool, but its days may be numbered for acquisition. The ROI simply doesn't justify the means. But even for pure acquisition campaigns, we know that e-mail marketing can deliver results if we follow the lead of customer-relationship marketers who are more focused on building loyalty and retention. For purposes of comparison with your own marketing efforts, here are statistics from two of our clients who produce e-newsletters: * One's unique open rates consistently range between 50 and 75 percent, with unique clickthroughs of 20 to 30 percent. * Another client typically experiences unique open rates of 80 to 95 percent with unique clickthroughs between 10 and 30 percent. Their secret? Building relationships by publishing regularly and providing relevant content.. Excerpted from Responsys Re: View Newsletter, 1000-119 Spadina Ave., Toronto, ON M5V 2L1, 416-971-9294, www.ariad.com By Shelly Paolini, Director of E-Mail Marketing, Ariad Custom Communications |
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