Study Finds Many Retailers Lacking in E-Mail Knowl
Atlanta, GA, September 19, 2005 -- While retailers clearly embrace the power of email marketing, a Silverpop study finds many of them have yet to take full advantage of the technological power and creative potential offered by the medium.
Attendees at the Shop.org Annual Summit will be among the first to receive key findings from Phase II of the company's "2005 Retail E-mail Marketing Study," which reviews message content and creative design of the email campaigns of 175 major retailers. Phase I, released earlier this summer, identified registration practices of retailers. Silverpop will distribute an overview of Phase II of the study Sept. 13 and 14 at the company’s display on the Shop.org exhibit floor.
“Many marketers already use e-mail to drive incremental revenue,” said Bill Nussey, CEO of Silverpop. “But in order to achieve maximum impact and firmly establish a solid, revenue-producing relationship, companies must deliver such high customer value in their emails that customers actually anticipate receiving the next message. Successful programs combine compelling calls-to-action, rich, eye-catching imagery and appropriate timing to reach consumers when they are most ready to buy.”
The lack of any substantial data on the e-mail marketing practices of retailers prompted Silverpop to undertake its sweeping study. The goal of the study is to help marketers to better understand the state of the art of e-mail marketing and be able to evaluate how their companies’ programs fit into the overall industry landscape. The project reviewed the registration procedures, marketing messages and opt-out practices of companies including nationally recognized names such as Crate & Barrel, Neiman Marcus, JC Penney, CompUSA and many others.
“The range of practices is quite striking. When we reviewed the creative elements of hundreds of email campaigns, we found stellar examples that truly maximize the medium right alongside well-meaning but misguided attempts to force traditional print formats into the e-mail channel,” Nussey said. “Too many retailers fail to capitalize on the unique persuasiveness of the medium obtainable through rich content and highly personalized dynamic content, and as a result, suffer deliverability issues, poor brand image and sub-optimal returns.”
He said that to capture a greater share of online sales, many marketers need to take their e-mail programs to a higher, more aggressive and results-oriented level. Silverpop’s study found the following areas for improvement.
Stop selling to strangers: Most retailers studied failed at the most basic and easiest way to reach out and connect with customers: personalization. Silverpop found that 95% of the e-mails had no form of personalization even as simple as the recipient's name. However, while failing to address customers by name, retailers worked hard to showcase their own. Three out of four companies positioned their logo prominently above the fold, a best practice to increase recognition and improve readership.
Offer a reason to buy: When it came to offering reasons why customers should make a purchase, one in four retailers included discount offers in their e-mails, but slightly more (27%) offered no special reasons to buy at all. Nearly one in five companies sent messages urging customers to purchase items for a special event or holiday like Mother's or Father's Day.
Enhance the art of the e-mail: The single most-used format for commercial e-mail messages reviewed by Silverpop was the postcard layout -- long a staple of traditional direct mail marketing programs because of its lower cost. A one-block image, though, can be dangerous to use in an e-mail environment that increasingly suffers from the effects of image blocking in newer e-mail clients like Gmail and Outlook 2003.
Give customers a choice: The line between delivering messages with just the right frequency and spamming customers is razor thin and misunderstood by some retailers.
