How to Capitalize on the True Power of Email
A recent Behavioral Insider column had a truly tantalizing quote from iPost’s Steve Webster:
"There is the presumption that when someone receives
an email message they then click on the email go to the Web site and
either make a purchase or not and then they are done interacting with
your email. This turned out to be wrong. We discovered very quickly
that the power of an email impression lasts for weeks after the customer has actually received the message.
The particular interaction they will have with you later really depends
more on their personal preferences than on your putting a new email in
front of them."
Emails are not perceived by recipients as distinct, one-off
promotions. But many marketers continue to view them that way and make
both strategic and tactical errors because of that. Here are a five
things you need to start doing – right now – if you want to capitalize
on the true power of email:
1. Stop analyzing each email in a vacuum. The
whole is worth more than the sum of the parts. The deeper you can dive
into your data and analyze the whole program and how recipients
interact (or don’t) the better decisions you can make. Be sure to read
the entire Behavioral Insider column – some of the tests they describe
around segmentation reveal how email does or doesn’t influence
purchasing and how it can be used more effectively.
2. Sending ever more email isn’t the answer. To
the point above, more email seldom makes buyers buy more. Marketers
don’t quite believe this because every email blast they deploy results
in revenue. But the point this column makes is that you have to look
at what is happening at the individual level. It soon becomes clear
that sending targeted, segmented email – less email per person – is
more effective.
3. Look past the click. As a corollary to #1, many
marketers believe if a subscriber doesn’t click, they haven’t
interacted. This clearly isn’t the case. The smartest marketers
segment their non-clickers into buckets. For example, a retailer might
look at non-clickers who are openers, online purchasers, site browsers
or in-store purchasers. If you have an email recipient who browses
your website every other week and then purchases in store once per
quarter, it is nutty to assume that the email isn’t influencing that
just because they don’t click through.
4. Reliance on CPA is going to bite you. Marketers believe that CPA is the best deal for them
because they only pay for performance. The problem is that CPA often
requires a very high degree of volume to achieve success for both
publisher and marketer. All those extra emails don’t just
self-destruct and wipe the memory of the recipient who doesn’t take
your "action." They’ve still made an impression – positive or
negative. Both CPA and CPM can be effective, but you need to work with
an expert who understands that email is about more than clicks.
5. Permission + value = ROI. Steve Webster’s quote
goes on to point out that "We thought the quality of the … creative
made all the difference. It turns out that it does – but not nearly as
much as the fact that [the email] made an impression on a customer who actually was interested in receiving an email from you."
Sending email without permission, as defined by the customer not by
you, is a non-starter. The first step is getting that person to
proactively sign up, and then making sure they recognize your emails as
desired. Then the value piece kicks in. Do you send what you
promised? Do your emails exceed their expectations? Do you delight
them? The more yeses you rack up there, the more revenue your email
will generate.
