By Meg Ingram

In this article, you will learn:

1) The click-through rate for a typical e-commerce e-mail;

2) Seven e-mail fundamentals that all e-mail marketers follow;

3) Important e-mail statistics as presented by Jupiter Research.

 

Recent research indicates that between 14% and 47% of customer prospects will open an e-commerce e-mail, but that only 8% to 10% will click through on that offer.

Despite the low click-through rate, savvy marketers have continued to find new and innovative ways to make e-mail marketing very profitable. We’ve analyzed the fundamentals of e-mail marketing and broken them down into 7 key strategies. By understanding and following these strategies, you’ll be able to increase your open rate, your click through rate and your online sales rate.

1. Build Qualified Lists

Developing a qualified list of expressed opt-ins is the first step towards creating a successful marketing campaign. Purchasing large, indiscriminate lists is usually not the answer. Instead, successful marketing campaigns should use a list of recipients that is not only growing in number but is also growing in quality. The more qualified the list, the more likely the e-mail is targeting the product or service’s potential customer base.

2. Take Advantage of Simultaneous Offline Direct Marketing

Recent studies indicate that 64% of e-mail advertisers use offline advertising and direct marketing to promote their e-mail campaigns. Cohesion between simultaneous offline and online DR campaigns and promotions legitimizes an e-mail message, thus generating a positive consumer perception of the product or service being advertised. By combining online and offline data, a better target base of customers will result.

3. CAN-SPAM Compliance

Strategies for qualified list growth include the use of opt-in and opt-out selections. By including these customer preference options within homepage placement and at the bottom of e- mails, the marketer develops an audience that actually wants to hear from him or her, promoting a positive B-to-C relationship. Plus, if you want to be CAN-SPAM compliant, you need to have an opt-out option on your website and within each and every e-mail.

4. Segmenting Your Recipients Increases Conversion by 1 to 4 Points

Once you are confident in the quality of your list, segment it according to the attributes and behaviors of your audience. Then, create campaigns which target the separate groups based on your findings. Conversion rates are one to four points higher when advanced targeting like this is utilized. Detailed information about recipients accumulates over time according to their response to e-mails and/or e-mail surveys. Data should be organized and analyzed to ensure that new e-mail campaigns are enhanced and target individual segments.

5. Customize and Personalize Creative

Just as marketers must segment their lists according to customers’ attributes and behaviors, they must also customize their creative based upon the audience and even personalize it at the individual level. One e-mail drop might include several different creative versions and/or a variety of subject lines according to who is receiving the e-mail. For instance, if a marketer segments the list according to gender, a male and female creative could be created and sent out according to the gender of the recipient. To determine sales lift of the particular creative, hold out a control group and make sure to set up test cells that allow for “clean” reading.

6. Optimize for Successful Delivery

How do you optimize the e-mail to make sure it reaches the targeted consumer’s in-box? Avoid being targeted as spam or being blacklisted by ISPs. Analyze your subject lines, e-mail content and preference policies (opt-in and opt-out), and stay away from heavy use of common promotional words or phrases that will be picked up as spam. This is another instance when the employment of a full service or ASP e-mail software service is vital for not only saving administrative time but also greatly improving deliverability rates.

7. Balance Frequency & Relevancy

The frequency of your e-mail campaigns and program should complement the relevancy of the message and the consumer’s behavior on your website. In other words, marketers should be aware of who their consumer is and his or her particular behavior on your website. Using this information in e-mail campaigns is a smart tactic and will result in a better relationship with the customer. You should target your customer based on the items that they have clicked on or purchased in the past or develop campaigns to engage lapsed users. If you send the same e-mail to all of your customers for every e-mail campaign, you are not taking advantage of the information that you can easily customize and personalize within an e-mail, and the e-mails could be considered spam. Ultimately, no personalization and customization likely could result in increased opt-out rates.

Relevant Statistics:

What follows are e-mail statistics presented by Jupiter Research vice president David Daniels, at a recent e-mail Insider Summit in Park City, Utah:

How Do Online Consumers Spend Their Time?

• 87%: Read e-mail
• 70%: Search for information
• 64%: Do search
• 60%: Shop
• 37%: Use instant messaging

Email Usage

• 274: Average number of personal e-mails weekly
• 304: Average number of business e-mails weekly
• 26%: Opt-in e-mail campaigns as percentage of total inbox e-mail
• 74%: E-mail users with 2 email accounts
• 18%: E-mail users who use mobile devices to sort e-mail

Unsubscribing Behavior

• 53% Say e-mail is irrelevant
• 40% Say e-mail comes too often
• 26% Unsubscribe using spam button

© 2008 The 60 Second Marketer

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