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True One-to-One Marketing Email: The Ultimate Direct Marketing Tool -- by Chip House Being from Minnesota is not something I often brag about, since the winters here send most sensible people fleeing southward. The summers in Minnesota, on the other hand, are worth bragging about. Sure there are lots of mosquitoes and a bit of humidity, but the wealth of lakes and easy access to nature make up for it. Due to our odd mix of weather here, the top two sports in Minnesota are Snowmobiling and Boating. Since this is true, many snowmobile manufacturers advertise here on TV and radio. Their logic makes some sense, but the generalization that "he lives here so he must be interested in snowmobiles" isn't always true. In fact, most Minnesotans don't own snowmobiles or have the desire to purchase them. Wouldn't it be more effective if they marketed snowmobiles only to those most likely to purchase them? This concept of sending the right message to the right customer is what direct marketing is all about. Direct marketers leverage complex databases of demographic and behavioral data to best determine future behavior. In my background as a catalog marketer we perfected the ability to determine not only what a group of individuals were likely to buy, but what each individual in a group is most likely to buy. Marketing to the individual, or one-to-one marketing, was always thought of as direct marketing's "holy grail." Having this ability would have reduced our waste of sending catalogs to those uninterested, and maximized our response rates because each individual receives only items they are interested in. Problem is, one-to-one marketing has been too costly to be practical for offline catalogs and direct mail. Email on the other hand, is THE IDEAL one-to-one direct marketing tool. True one-to-one marketing is now possible and can be implemented with basic computer skills. ExactTarget's Direct Marketing Tools (DM Tools), for example, enable users to target text and graphical content "dynamically" to each individual based on their preferences. For example, the diagram below shows three possible content areas that could be used in an email based on customer preferences. Those interested in winter sports receive the snowshoe offer, those interested in boating receive sport sandles, and those interested in running receive the running shoes. Though the example shows only three possible consumer preferences, it is easily possible to target to hundreds of preference categories with a well-structured database. Our Subscriber Profiles and List Targeting options are the building blocks of one-to-one marketing. Our Subscriber Profiles option enables our clients to add additional demographic or interest data for each subscriber and begin using one-to-one personalization, based on subscriber company, income, zip code, birth date, purchase history, interests, etc. via our Dynamic Content option. List Targeting allows marketers to create Random and Nth Number samples of their subscriber lists for testing purposes. By creating two or more targeted list segments, organizations can easily test and optimize message formats, subject lines and content. One-to-one marketing is no longer a concept; it is a reality. Imagine receiving only emails that appealed to your interests? You wouldn't need to spend hours searching for information or products, you could just subscribe to companies using this technology, provide them a bit of information on your interests, and viola - you'd receive timely, targeted emails about skiing, llama farming, beer brewing, or whatever floats your boat. Because of the value added to you, you'd be more likely to do business with and stay with those companies. Recent studies have shown, in fact, that personalization in email can increase click-through rates drastically. The more personalization used, the higher the click-through rate. It's not surprising this is true. Actually the crux of permission-based email marketing is that messages be not only anticipated, but PERSONAL and RELEVANT as well. The higher the level of personalization, the more valuable and relevant the content is to each individual subscriber. Customers receiving value from you are more likely to stay with you, buy more from you, and tell others about their positive experiences. Not for your business you say? Too difficult to produce the database? No so. Direct marketing begins with collecting simple information on your customers' interests, or demographics and applies to organizations of all size. Data can be easily captured by customer actions or by asking them to fill out a small survey. Just a few nuggets of information can go a long way. For example, just knowing the income level or sex of your subscribers will help you market more appropriately and achieve higher response rates. Beginning to build your database now is just like planting a sapling. It may be small now, but in the long run you'll be happy you planted it when you did! |
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