L&S Unscripted

Almost daily, we talk about, preach, practice and prove that social media is truly important and significant. The evolution of it is remarkable, and it only continues to provide more and more each day.

As of late, the focus has been on the money making – or saving – one can do with these services. Several new offerings have hit the social scene, presenting opportunities to further market and sell products and services. Moreover, consumers can reap the rewards of the special deals. 

Twitter recently released @Earlybird, a new service that gives followers exclusive deals from Twitter’s advertising partners. This is the social media platforms take on the recent upsurge in online deal offerings.

An equally beneficial sales driver, yet slightly different concept by Facebook developers, called Payvment, is a social network ecommerce platform that allows users to set up a free storefront. This application is a one-stop shop, allowing all the marketing, sales and administrative functions to be done within Facebook.

And we would be completely amiss to leave out Groupon, with its daily deals via email and Twitter, customized to your geographic locale. Additionally, it was just announced that Groupon will now be customizing its offerings to the specific users, treading into customer relationship management waters. The daily offerings will start to be geared more towards each individual’s specific interests rather than the entire audience.

These services parallel each other in terms of an overall goal – the utilization of existing social networks to market and sell products. What better way to drive sales and market products than directly with the relationships that are already established.

Making – and saving – money via social media channels is simple and essentially free. See what kind of ROI your business can get with these great tools.

If you want your retail e-mail offer to be most effective, deliver it to the Moms in your database on Friday morning.  A recent white paper by AOL Advertising states that 84% of Moms shop online while at work, and 60% of women respond to e-mail offers while at work.  E-mail is the most influential driver toward purchase, with 3 out of 4 women surveyed saying they subscribe to at least one e-mail alert.

Most of the online shopping occurs Friday between 11 a.m. and 2 p.m., but all week long, moms are shopping during their lunch break.

• 54% shop during lunch
• 41% while multitasking
• 46% during breaks and downtime
• 25% right after seeing a “deal”

After reading this study, I began to examine my e-mail alerts; curious about when they hit my inbox and if I am more likely to respond on certain days or at certain times.  There are a handful that I subscribe to for sales alerts and coupons; Target, Kohl’s, JC Penney’s, Budget Travel Deals and Papa Murphy’s Pizza offers to name a few.  Here is what I discovered about mom-self:

Target: These are consistently delivered on Sunday and Wednesday, with all arriving between 3 and 4 a.m. each time.  In looking back, the only offer I clicked on had a subject line with a 15% discount offer.  I am a bargain shopper, what can I say!

Kohl’s : They send e-mails nearly every day of the week, including Saturday and Sunday, and always in the early morning hours (between 1 a.m. and 5 a.m.).  I have only opened about 10% of them, most often on Sunday.

JC Penny’s: The sales e-mails are most likely to arrive on Sunday morning and rewards e-mails on Thursday, both in the early morning between midnight and 1 a.m.  I open about 2 of every 10 e-mails sent, and most of those are the Thursday Rewards notifications (they typically contain coupons). 

Budget Travel Deals: Wednesday morning is the deployment for most Deal Alerts from Budget Travel.  I love to travel, and like to dream big about my next vacation.  Wednesday, during the mid-week hum-drums, is just as good of a time as any.  In the past 4 months, I have read about 30% of their Alerts.  Although I have not made any purchases based on the offers, it has given me a lot of ideas for future vacations and the itch to pack my bags and catch a flight to anywhere.

Papa Murphy’s: They know me well.  I receive most of their e-mails on Friday between 11 a.m. and 2 p.m., and I open more than half.  Sitting at my desk wondering what to make for dinner; then “ding”, a coupon for take home pizza arrives.  It works for me.

You can read more about the AOL study at http://advertising.aol.com/sites/default/files/WomenRetailStudy.pdf.

Before my morning stop at Starbucks or even brushing my teeth, I immediately roll over in bed and turn to my BlackBerry. I of course check any missed calls or texts, but then go straight to my email, followed by a quick Facebook overview and glimpse at Twitter.

It is a habit – one that may seem slightly ridiculous. However, it’s becoming a habit for more and more consumers. A recent report by ExactTarget sheds a little light onto the behavior of online consumers and what this means for marketers, as well as our tendencies as consumers.

Online consumers can be grouped into three different categories: subscribers, fans or followers. Subscribers opt in to emails from businesses, fans “Like” businesses on Facebook and followers do exactly that, follow businesses on Twitter.

When a consumer goes to email first, they are said to be more apt to interact with brands online, looking for offers, promotions and information on new products or services. A vast majority of online consumers are subscribers, coming in at roughly 93%.

Those who initially go to Facebook, about 38% of online consumers, are said to be more interested in entertainment or showing support of a brand, rather than obtaining promotions and deals.

Only about 5% of online consumers are followers on Twitter. These individuals are most likely to engage with brands via Twitter.

So, what does this mean for marketers? Consumers using email, Facebook and Twitter are interested in brands and companies they like. They want to see offerings, promotions and be engaged by the content provided on these services. Finding a good balance of deals, consumer interaction and brand advocacy is crucial across all social media channels.

It is wise to cross-promote your business through the different social media services, beings consumers utilize the different services for different reasons. Getting a Facebook user who has “Liked” your company to opt in to your emails could drive more sales when you offer great deals via email.

Before planning and deploying your e-mail campaign, think about the message goals:

1. Open the e-mail: Message open rates depend heavily on the inherent trust that lies with the sender of the e-mail and the subject line. Think carefully about the “from” field in the e-mail. If the relationship lies with an individual employee, list that person’s name rather than a generic customer service e-mail address, or the like. Subject lines should summarize the content of the e-mail and sell the value of the content found within. Ask the question the recipient will be asking – WIIFM – “what’s in it for me”? Also, pay attention to the time of day you’re sending to your audience – consider when the message will be best received.
2. Read the e-mail: What is the goal of the content? To educate the consumer on industry best practices? To present a client success story? To sell the features of a product? To discuss a new service? Whatever the goal, make it clear and always make sure you’re providing value to the reader.
3. Click from the e-mail: What’s the desired next step? Don’t provide all of the available information within the e-mail… give the reader a reason to click for more information or to complete the associated task. Make the call-to-action very clear and provide adequate instructions so the reader knows what to expect when they arrive on the web site landing page.
4. Click through web site: You’ve gained the web visitor – you’re done, right? Wrong… gaining the click is only half the work. Now, you need to provide a clear navigation path for the visitor to click through and convert on your web site. Conversions may be a sale, a request for information, an e-mail newsletter sign-up, a content/promotion, etc.
5. Convert on site: You’ve led the visitor to the final step – now make task completion easy and thank the visitor on the confirmation page.

Effectively e-mailing,

Robin

In e-mail marketing, think beyond a one-message-fits-all approach. Relevancy is key – placing the most applicable message in front of each consumer will produce the best results.

The old school way: one database, divided into multiple segments (based on geography, interests, date of signup, etc.) >>> different sets of creative for each database segment >>> multiple e-mail deployments >>> multiple sets of results = lots of time and difficulties pulling it all together.

The smart way: one database full of various record attributes >>> one e-mail template with dynamic content >>> one e-mail deployment >>> one set of results.

Compare ‘smart e-mail marketing’ to form letters. In a form letter, you designate spaces where a placeholder, such as [first_name], looks in the database and finds the appropriate first name for that member of the audience. Same can be true for content… be creative. Example:

In a database of potential tourists, if:

• Visitor 1 is interested in mountain biking
• Visitor 2 is interested in shopping
• Visitor 3 is interested in casino gaming

Within the e-mail template, visitors 1, 2 and 3 above would received personalized e-mail content relevant to their interests. Within the same location in the e-mail template the visitors would see the following:

More to follow on e-mail marketing… stay tuned.

Efficiently e-mailing,
Robin