Products and services are market-oriented based on customer needs just like conventional marketing in general. Due to the increase of technology, however, the success factors have changed.

Of course, continuous success stands or falls with the uniqueness and persuasiveness of the offer. Moreover, relevance and response play an important role in real-time. Email, as a fundamental component of a multichannel approach, offers businesses excellent opportunities to address and market intelligently and in an automated way.

How it works, will be explained briefly in the following text:

The offer is always in the forefront

The unique selling proposition (USP) is the most important element of a communications strategy and just has to be communicated properly: What is the advantage of the product and what sets it apart from other offers?

The following success factors apply for the significant advantage of a good communications strategy:

• Crisp headline;

• Clear description of the benefits (e.g. in bullet points);

• Motivating call-to-action;

• Meaningful images;

• Slim design;

• Mobile optimization; etc.

Any marketing message should clearly state that the offer is, for instance, simple, affordable, diverse or risk free, with e.g. supportive incentives like "test it for one month for free".

Relevance: Conversion optimization with marketing intelligence

“The more relevant the offer, the better the conversion” is the principle that marketing intelligence is harnessing. The more you know about the customer, the more relevant and appropriate the design of the offer can be, which is the reason why different tracking methods are used to collect user data in emails, social networks, shops and on websites. Even before the registration, anonymous profile data can be collected by means of pre-targeting and combined with the email address later on. After that, the profile will be enriched with additional data from click and purchase behavior or other activities as well. Gradually, a complete profile of interests is created that can be used for automated responses through various channels.

Real-time: Individualized real-time response with marketing automation

Core of marketing automation is the “automated”, commercial approach of getting in touch with prospective customers. From the newsletter registration to re-activation, there is a variety of ways to pay for the cost of lead generation and increase the email ROI.

The contents of the mailings unfold from the available interest profile, but at the beginning of a newsletter subscription, the registration is usually the first trigger. Immediately after logging in, the user can be imported into a welcome campaign, however, at such an early stage, data to personalize the mailing contents can only be gained from the browsing behavior of the user on the website. The profile data is collected by means of pre-targeting and can be used after the registration to individualize the first welcome mailing.

Especially at the beginning of the customer relationship, the individual modulation of content is important, since the opening rates are two to three times higher at this stage. Although you can send any brochure to new subscribers, the high number of those who open an email in the beginning, makes it worthwhile to put some effort into the individualization of contents.

According to promio.net, the effect of personalization of mailings is an increase of about 100% in click-through rates. The shopping cart dropout mailing, on the other hand, is characterized by a similar effectiveness. Customers who placed the products in the cart, but didn’t purchase, will receive a reminder of their shopping cart order. A simple approach is to implement a measurement pixel in two places: One measures whether products have been added to a cart and the other finds out whether the purchase confirmation page has been visited. If that page hasn’t been looked at after several hours, the reader receives a reminder by email. Keep in mind that the reminder is particularly effective in combination with a voucher.

In the next stage, the mailing could promote the products of the abandoned shopping cart or similar offers. It is still possible to restore the cart via click, so that the purchase is simplified and can be completed easily.

However, a classic among the automated campaigns is the reactivation campaign. If a customer doesn’t open, click or buy over a period of time (e.g. 90 days), he is imported into the reactivation campaign. A sequence of 3 or 4 mailings is sent out at intervals of for example one week.

The mailings are designed in a way that they create a particularly high activity:

• Activating subject matter;

• Exciting and targeted offers - customize!;

• Direct call to click - data update, etc.;

• Clearly communicated advantages: discounts, coupons, special offers, etc.

At the end of the campaign, it is perfectly legitimate to ask the reader directly, if he still wants to receive the newsletter. If you get no reaction from the reader after the reactivation mailings, you should disable the address, as the sending to a high number of inactive addresses can affect your reputation as consignor and impact your statistics in a negative way.

By Daniela La Marca