Collecting Email Addresses for Holiday Email Campaigns
With reports that consumer spending may decrease this season, gift basket retailers still have time to jump on the email marketing train. In an article posted by The Associated Press, “Kurt Peters, editor-in-chief of trade publication Internet Retailer, noted that stores can easily react to a sharp sales slowdown in a matter of hours by sending out e-mail blasts, which is faster and more cost-effective than redoing a mailer to consumers. Julie M. Katz, another Forrester analyst, estimates that it costs about $2 for every thousand e-mails sent. The Direct Marketers Association estimates that marketers reap $45.06 in return on investment for every dollar they spend on e-mail campaigns. That compares with $7.28 for catalogs and $15.55 for direct mail pieces.”
The first thing you must do is collect email addresses from your current customer base. If you don’t already have these on file, have your employees start calling customers right away to collect those addresses. When they have some down time, each employee can call 5-10 customers per day. Your email program includes a way for you to create a “Group List” where you simply type in all of these addresses. Then, when you’re ready to advertise your gourmet baskets or run a special promotion, you type a single email and send that to the group list that you created.
You can even build “unique group lists” that target your special customers. For example, build a separate list for your corporate accounts, or customers who usually spend a certain amount on their holiday gift baskets, or customers who often order baskets that include particular brands of gourmet items that you carry. Then you can target those groups with very specific email promotions that appeal to their particular needs.
Use email marketing this season to boost your holiday sales. With a minimal amount of effort, you can create special email groups that include customers who will be gratified to receive your messages that are relevant to their buying habits.
2 comments November 9th, 2008
