Internet Word Magic Blog

How to Improve the Customer Online Experience

2009-07-10T10:14:50-07:00

(photo from Abbyworld)

It wasn't too long ago that even big retail stores looked at website marketing as a stand alone program, completely different from their offline marketing. Internet marketing was looked at as a new opportunity, but one that was confusing at best.

Selling products from a physical store is an accepted and understood business practice. For hundreds of years, merchants have gone directly to customers to facilitate a sale.

Integrated Marketing Strategy

All the college business programs are set up to educate students about how to do business offline, but what's been missing is the Internet marketing approach. We are just now seeing business open up to the idea that companies need both an offline and online integrated marketing strategy to do business effectively.

According to Chantal Tode, of DMNews.com, "Companies such as JCPenny, Lowe's and Best Buy are just a few that have integrated their offline and online businesses into one marketing organization over the past nine to 12 months."

The Internet is giving companies more opportunities to be creative and reach out to customers in ways they never could before. Customers may not be physically coming into their stores, but retailers have a huge opportunity online to continue the sales process.

Create a Positive User Experience

Rather than concentrating on making the sale or driving traffic to the website, companies should focus on improving the customer experience on their website. It does no good to gather tremendous traffic if your website does not offer a positive user experience.

Here are three ways to improve the customer experience:

(1) Don't Make Me Think

Website navigation needs to be intuitive and require very little decision making. Moving from one page to another should be simple and hassle-free. The buttons or tabs to move you from one page to another should be clearly marked and visible. Put the most important information as bullets or lists that are easy to scan. Use internal links to logically move the visitor to pages where they can get more information if needed.

(2) Don't Overload the Homepage

The homepage is not a dumping ground for information. It should only contain the bare minimum amount of information that is needed for the customer to make a decision as to whether or not to do business with you. The ideal homepage will liberally use bullets, headings, and internal links to connect to pages that contain more detailed information.

The idea is to get the visitor to move throughout your website to get the information that is interesting to them. Let them make the decision of where they want to go when they arrive at your homepage. Give them logical routes to find the information they seek.

(3) Be the Customer

If you have a shopping cart on your website, take the time to go through the buying process yourself. How easy have you made it for someone to make a purchase?

The industry average for shopping cart abandonment is 70%! In other words, only 30% of the people who start to buy something online will complete the process.

Anything you can do to improve the shopping experience will increase your odds in completing the sale. Simply reassuring them that their purchase is safe and secure by posting security icons, is a good start. Also, let people know what the shipping charges are before they place an order.

Conclusion

More than ever, in this economy, companies need to implement an integrated online marketing and offline marketing campaign to reach their customers. "A lot of multichannel merchants are trying to figure out how to grow their Web sites and take advantage of the one channel that is growing," said Sucharita Mulpuru, senior analyst at Forrester Research.

People may not be visiting stores as often as they used to, but they are still using the Internet to shop. All it takes is some clever marketing to generate demand.

A New Look at the 80/20 Rule

2009-04-07T16:32:42-07:00

The economic recession has made all of us rethink our marketing plans. What
used to work without fail is now either working poorly or not at all.
Companies need to go back to the drawing board and start again with the
basic truths of marketing.

One of the most consistent and true basics of marketing is the 80/20 rule,
also known as the Pareto principle. According to Wikipedia, "The principle
was suggested by management thinker Joseph M. Juran. It was named after
the Italian economist Vilfredo Pareto, who observed that 80% of income in
Italy was received by 20% of the Italian population. The assumption is
that most of the results in any situation are determined by a small number
of causes."

When applied to business, the Pareto principle will show that 80% of
income is generated from 20% of the customer base. Or it could be stated
that 20% of your efforts result in 80% of your financial rewards. Of
course, this is not true in every instance, but it happens enough that
business owners should take a look at their marketing efforts for examples
of the 80/20 rule.

Consumers Are Slow to Spend

Most businesses have the mindset of looking for new customers to bring in
business: advertise in a journal, buy a list and send out a direct mail
campaign, or send out an email blast. But, the problem is that in this
economy, even though your message may be received by the right audience,
sales are dismal. Consumers are slower to spend because they are already
in debt and worried about job security. They are only making essential
purchases.

Rather than constantly looking for new customers, identify the 20% of your
customers who are providing the 80% of your income. Instead of putting a
plan together to reach out to loyal customers, put a plan together for the
brand to be more loyal to the customers.

Build the Brand and Drive the Purchase

A company's marketing dollar needs to be spent on not only building the
brand, but it's got to drive the purchase. Seth Solomons, Global CMO of
Digitas, had this to say in an interview with Direct Marketing News, "We,
as marketers, grew up on the direct marketing side always thinking about
getting the best customers and asking, 'How do we get them to be more
loyal to us?' We believe that in today's environment we need to be a loyal
brand vs. looking for loyal customers. Loyal brands are those that deliver
utility and value and listen harder and try to serve consumers at every
interaction. It goes back to every dollar having to multitask."

Relationship Marketing

One of the best ways to be a loyal brand is to practice relationship
marketing. Regularly demonstrate appreciation of your customers at every
interaction. Cara Wood, Editor in Chief of DMNews, suggests, "entertaining
content in marketing e-mails, timely direct mail reminders, product
recommendations in a search, landing page or e-commerce site and call
centers equipped with purchase history and product availability
information."

Reinforce the purchasing patterns of the 20% of your customers who are
bringing you the 80% of your business. Consider offering that targeted
group special offers along with regular information about the brand and
its products.

New Product Introduction

Brand loyal customers can be your best group to introduce a new product or
get their advice on a new product you are considering. As an added
benefit, they may identify a product that you might have not even
considered. One of my favorite stories about this is a company that
manufactured a popular fishing tackle box in the 90's. One of the
company's reps discovered that the tackle box was also being used by girls
for earrings and hair accessories.

The company took this information and started manufacturing the fishing
tackle box in bright pinks, yellows, greens, and blues. They renamed it
and started marketing it to tweens and it became an instant best seller,
even more popular than the tackle box product line.

This story illustrates the point that it pays to survey loyal customers to
get their opinion on what's working and what's not. This group wants your
company to succeed, so their ideas would tend to be positive, rather than
negative. Maybe they are using your product in innovative ways that you
never even considered.

Conclusion

In this economy, companies need to look at innovative ways to market,
along with clever ways to save money. Retaining your customer base is key
to surviving a recession, but even more important is identifying those 20%
brand loyal customers. Partner with these customers to make sure that they
are your priority and not lost in the shuffle to generate sales with far
reaching campaigns. Consider setting up ongoing marketing campaigns to
brand loyal customers in addition to broad based marketing campaigns to
bring in new customers.

Solving Email Delivery Problems

2009-03-03T14:13:41-08:00

Have you ever sent out an e-mail and wondered if the message was
received? Sometimes there is no rhyme or reason as to what
happens in cyberspace. Black holes do seem to swallow-up e-mail
messages.

Occasionally, you will know when an e-mail message does not
reach its destination because a failure notice is sent to you.
But, just as often, you get no notification.

Filters Dump Email

Because of all the new anti-SPAM software, your message could be
dumped before your recipient ever sees it. Each of the anti-SPAM
software programs look for specific keywords in the subject
line. If you happen to put one of those keywords in the subject
line of your e-mail, you have now sent SPAM. And logic doesn’t
always work when you try to figure out which words to avoid.
Some software can be customized for the user’s own specific
keywords.

I had this situation occur with my web master. I was following
up with her to find out if she received the updates I sent her.
The subject line was: Did You Get Updates? Her anti-SPAM program
identified “get” in the subject line as SPAM and immediately
trashed the message. Who would have known? I knew not to use
words like “Free” in the subject line, but “get” never occurred
to me.

For the last three years I have been using a mass-mailing
program to send out e-mails to about 350 members of a nonprofit
group I belong to. We have never had any problems with the
members receiving their e-mail. However, in the last six months,
some of the providers like AOL and Earthlink are interpreting
these messages as SPAM because they recognize the software I am
using. The only way I’ve gotten around this problem is to make
sure all 350 members have my e-mail address in their address
books. Otherwise, the message gets bounced.

Follow Up on Delivery

So, is there an easy way to find out if your message was
received if you don’t get an error message? Sure, pick up the
phone to confirm a message was received. But, you have to be
careful when you do this. People can misinterpret your action as
being pushy—like you need an answer right now and are not
willing to wait.

A good approach is to start off by saying, “This is just a
courtesy call. I sent you an important e-mail and I want to make
sure you got it. I know you needed the information right away
and I want to make sure you have it.” This way, it appears you
are looking out for them and are only trying to be efficient.
You won’t come across as demanding and cause the person to
become defensive.

Acknowledge Receipt of Email

As the receiver of an e-mail, you can greatly help this
situation by always acknowledging the receipt of an e-mail. Even
if you can’t get the answers right away, simply select the reply
button and let the sender know the message arrived. Make it a
habit to do this. Respond with a quick reply like, “Thanks. Got
your e-mail, but won’t have an answer for you till tomorrow.”
Or, even something shorter would work, “Got your e-mail. Will
get back to you ASAP.”

If you haven’t been in the habit of acknowledging the receipt of
an e-mail, start today. Letting someone know their e-mail
arrived is easy to do and greatly appreciated.

Conclusion

Even with all the problems we have with email delivery, it is
still the most popular method of communicating in business. Just
remember, it is not the only way to communicate. Don't count on
email 100 percent. Always follow up by phone if you think an
email never arrived.

A New Approach to Local Marketing

2009-02-05T17:05:45-08:00

The Internet is the first choice for most people when they are trying to locate information about a local business. What time does the store open? Where is the closest dry cleaners that does alterations? Where can I get the best price on office chairs? Where can I find a local plumber?

If you have a business that relies on "foot traffic" instead of "Internet traffic," you still need a website, but the website needs to be positioned a bit differently. Your website is not selling a product; it is a promotion tool for your business. As such, you want to reach consumers at the various stages of the purchase process with an online marketing strategy that blends online advertising with offline advertising.

Who Is Your Audience?

The best way to reach your audience is to know who they are and how they buy. Are your customers a younger crowd who are familiar with social media like Facebook or Twitter? If so, you might consider promoting your brand in the social media and social networking sites.

According to David Berkowitz, director of emerging media and client strategy, 360i, "Digital word of mouth – where a brand actively reaches out to website editors and bloggers to promote the distribution of the brand's assets – can also drive traffic and high quality inbound links."

How Do They Search?

How your customer searches is a key component in knowing how to optimize your website for the searches. Once you know how your customers behave in each stage of the sales process, you have a better understanding of how to put together an online and offline campaign to attract the right audience.

Noah Elin, VP of corporate strategy, Steak Media, has this to say on the subject, "Once you have a good sense of who your customers are and how they behave, develop and optimize content to meet their differing needs. This includes everything from keyword identification and expansion, optimization of digital media (images, video, news, etc.), content network selection (site targeting and ad network optimization), social marketing and coordination of activities between online strategies and offline placements."

Use Offline Techniques Online

Banner ads or Pay-Per-Click ads are not the only way to drive traffic to a website. Consider placing inexpensive ads in publications that are read by your audience. These ads can be used not to sell, but to drive traffic to your website.

Another simple technique is to use digital coupons. Coupon aggregation sites such as RetailMeNot.com, CouponChief.com, CouponCuisine.com and Savings.com offer coupons from many different brands and make it simple for consumers to find the coupons they want to use. Facebook also lets you use an application from Coupons.com on your profile. With the application, users can download new coupons each week and share with their friends.

"Coupon site visits were up 33% in October 2008, according to ComScore, with 16% of shoppers saying that they don't buy in general unless they can find a coupon. Three out of four adults are more likely to return to a store that offers coupons."

Conclusion

As a "brick and mortar" business with a local reach, you can still take advantage of the Internet as a powerful marketing tool. Take the time to really know what your audience wants, when they want it and how they want it. Then use clever online marketing techniques combined with offline techniques to reach your audience.

Improving Communication to Increase Website Conversion

2008-12-30T06:00:00-08:00

The average website has only a three percent conversion. In other words, out of 100 people who come to your website, only 3 will make a purchase. So the challenge is how to get those other 97 people to make a purchase and increase your conversion rate.

Just getting website traffic is not enough; they need to buy.

Relate to Your Customer

Your homepage should immediately start building rapport with your visitors. Make sure it is very clear who you are, what you do and why they should do business with you.

Think about what you need to do to start a conversation with your customer. What are the buying habits of your customers? What language is being used in the searches to find your website?

Align yourself with your customer so that you are looking out for their best interests. Think of ways you can improve their buying experience on your website by using words that are familiar to your customer. Give them enough information so that it is easy to make a decision to do business with you.

Build Customer Relationships

Let your potential customers know that you understand their problems and that you have a solution to their problems. One effective way to do this is to put testimonials on your website. Make them feel that you can be trusted by posting testimonials from other satisfied customers. You can tell them how great your product or service is and how it is the right choice, but why believe you? It's better to have the positive statements coming from someone who has successfully done business with you.

Don’t you tell people how you solve their problems; let someone else tell the story. Testimonials are powerful and necessary to a successful web site. Testimonials not only say you can do the job, but they say how well you can do the job. And they are so much more believable than you trying to promote yourself. Let others speak for you.

Include testimonials throughout your Web site. Don’t make the mistake of having one page just for testimonials. Rarely will someone click to a testimonials page and read the whole thing. So, you are in essence wasting your time and resources with a testimonials page.

Instead, sprinkle testimonials wherever you think they might help convince your audience that what you are saying is true. Back up your statements with testimonials and you start building relationships with your readers.

Make It Easy to Find Information

The navigation on a website can make or break a website. You can have the best content in the world, but if readers can’t find what they are looking for, they will leave.

Use simple, descriptive headings and subheadings to direct visitors throughout your web site. Put keywords in the headings and subheadings so that the search engines have an easier time indexing your pages.

Think about the problems you solve for your readers and make sure you offer solutions to those problems. Remember, people are searching for information and solutions to their problems.

The easier you make it for them to find information, the more likely you will be able to entice the visitor to stay awhile. And, the longer they stay, the more likely you will gain a customer.

Conclusion

More than ever, in these bad economic times, companies need to improve communication with customers to increase website conversion. Making sales on a website is more than generating traffic. To increase the conversion rate, consider relating to your customer with easy-to understand language, build your customer relationships through testimonials and make the website navigation easy to find information.

Three Tips for Writing Better Email Subject Lines

2008-11-24T19:00:00-08:00

Your number one goal in composing an email should be to make sure your reader understands your message right from the beginning. Don’t wait till the middle of an email to let the reader know what you are talking about. Get immediate clarity with a well-written subject line.

Tip #1 – Specific Email Subject Line

An email subject line needs to be specific to your purpose for writing. For instance, if you were writing a memo regarding July’s Retail Sales Report, you might have a subject line of: Sales Report, July’s Sales Report, Retail Sales Report, or July 2008 Retail Sales Report. Which email subject line would be most helpful to you?

The last example, July 2008 Retail Sales Report, is the best email subject line because it is the most specific. All the other subject lines leave out important information and could be confusing to the reader.

Another problem with vague email subject lines is that it makes it difficult to file and locate messages. Imagine looking for the January 2008 Sales Report when all of the e-mails have a subject line of “Sales Report.” It would take you twice as long to find what you need.

Tip #2 – Concise Email Subject Line

A good email subject line will use key words that accurately describe the email message without creating a complete sentence. Try to use six or less words in a subject line. You want it to be brief, yet clear.

If you are writing an e-mail to request something, don’t put the whole request in the subject line. Just use a descriptive phrase for the email subject line and then put your request in the body of the message. For instance, if you wanted to attend a Business Writing Workshop, your subject line would be: Business Writing Workshop.

What you don’t want to do is put your request in the subject line: May I have permission to attend a Business Writing workshop? This is especially ineffective if you know you are going to have to talk your boss into letting you go for training. She’ll read the subject line and say no before you have even had a chance to explain why you should be allowed to attend the workshop.

Therefore, a poor subject line can cause your message not to be read. This problem consistently occurs with e-mail subject lines.

Tip #3 – Attention Grabbing Email Subject Lines

How many of you will not open an e-mail if it has a strange subject line or one that doesn’t make sense? We have to be cautious, because opening an e-mail could cause a virus to enter our computers. If you have a vague e-mail subject line like “Report”, how is your audience going to know it is safe to open? Unless the reader recognizes the e-mail address of the writer, there is a good chance this message will not be read.

People also look at email subject lines as a way to decide whether or not to open your email. These days our inbox is flooded with so many emails that we find ourselves in the position of deciding which ones to open and which ones to ignore simply because we don't have enough time in the day to get our work done.

By taking the time to create a subject line that that might actually encourage someone to read your email, you have a chance that your email will not be ignored.

Conclusion

Email is a convenient and popular way to communicate, but it can also be the worst way to communicate because email is easy to ignore or delete. Get your email opened as soon as it arrives by following the three tips of creating a subject line that is specific, concise and interesting.

Five Tips for Ethical Business Communication

2008-10-28T06:00:00-07:00

Do you know what ethical behavior is? Ethics authority Michael Josephson has an excellent explanation: “Ethical behavior involves four principles: honesty, integrity, fairness, and concern for others. These four principles are like the four legs of a stool. If even one leg is missing, the stool wobbles, and if two are missing, the stool falls. It’s not enough to pride oneself on your honesty and integrity if you’re not fair or caring.”

Ethical Behavior in Business

Ethical behavior in business has been a topic of great concern lately. Looking back at the last year, it seems that “business and ethics” are contradictory terms. Between Wall Street, Fannie Mae, Freddie Mac, AGI and all the mortgage companies being investigated for questionable business practices, it is indeed depressing. It looks like the “greed is good” era of the 1980s has not left us after all.

Our business leaders are turning out to be crooks and you would think this would encourage people to be more ethical in their behavior. But, it can just as easily be used as an excuse for continuing their bad behavior. Why not use the company computer for personal business; your department head uses the company phone to make personal long distance phone calls? Employees begin to feel no remorse for their little indiscretion when comparing it to what they see the company leaders doing.

Managers might be inadvertently encouraging unethical behavior by demanding more work from a smaller, downsized staff. It is not unreasonable for employees to try to increase productivity any way they can, ethical or not, when they are being pressured by management to meet company goals. The message becomes, “Go ahead, it's OK to lie, steal, cheat, whatever it takes to meet your goals.”

As the economy dips back and forth, we need to take a look at ourselves and make sure that we don’t slip into unethical behavior just because it appears easy to get away with it. One area you might want to improve is your business communication.

Here are five tips to help you become an ethical business communicator: (source: "Business Communication, Process & Product," Mary Ellen Guffy, 2000)

Tell the truth. Do not make statements that are deceptive or untrue. Half-truths and exaggerations are also unethical.
Label opinions. Don’t try to pass off an opinion as a fact. Do your research and make sure you aren’t just repeating someone else’s opinion.
Be objective. Do recognize that your biases may show up in your writing. Even if you feel strongly about a topic, it is your ethical responsibility to be objective in the way you present the information.
Communicate clearly. Do write in such a way that your message is understood easily and quickly. Use words that are easy for the reader to understand. Don’t intentionally bombard the reader with long confusing sentences or terms the reader wouldn’t understand.
Give credit. Don’t plagiarize. Most people know to use quotes when you are using the author’s exact words. But I’ve found many people don’t realize they also need to give credit for ideas. Reworking a sentence and adding a few words of your own to the original text is still plagiarism if you don’t give credit to the author.

Conclusion

Being an ethical communicator is not only necessary; it is the right thing to do. Lead by example. Your success in business, by being ethical in all your business dealings, will encourage others to follow your example.

Using the "Palin Effect" to Boost Sales

2008-09-30T06:00:00-07:00

Thanks to the 2009 presidential race, online business owners can use a clever and highly effective marketing technique to boost sales. I call it the "Palin effect:" an instant, passionate, emotional connection not based on reason or logic.

You'd probably like to think that someone purchasing your product or service is making the decision based on logical reasons such as price, the selection, the warranty, or the testimonials from satisfied customers. Unfortunately, you'd probably be wrong.

Why people buy is largely an unknown factor because it's often a personal decision that's usually based more on emotion than facts. Good advertising campaigns are specifically set-up to play on people's emotions. It's not the facts that are important, it's how you make people feel that matters.

2009 Presidential Election Campaign

A good example of this is what we are seeing with the 2009 U.S. presidential election campaign. When Republican presidential candidate John McCain selected "hockey-mom" Sarah Palin as his running mate, he saw a huge boost in the polls. In fact, according to Newsweek magazine, "With Palin on the ticket, 71% of McCain voters now say they support the ticket strongly, up from 39% before the convention."

So how did Palin cause this big jump in the polls? Simple – she touched an emotional button with the American people. As Democratic presidential candidate Barack Obama says, "Palin is a great story."

According to historian Michael Beschloss, "A good part of Sarah Palin's appeal is her life history, the choices she made, things that let voters form a bond." She comes across as an average mom, a working woman who just happens to be governor of Alaska
and now the Republican Vice President nominee. People identify with her story and it makes them feel good.

In this election year, Americans seem to be making decisions based on emotion, rather than reason and knowledge. The election campaigns are the same as a well-planned sales campaign using emotion as the hook that persuades consumers to make a purchase. But what really is predominant in this election campaign is the use of "the story" to make the emotional connection with the buyer.

Use Your Story

As an online business owner, you can also use "your story" to boost your sales. Especially if you are an information marketer, your story is gold; this is how you can stand out from the crowd and make that emotional connection with your buyer.

Two good examples of highly successful online business owners who have a great story to tell are Alexandria Brown and David Neagle. Both these multimillionaires have a rag to riches story that is memorable and persuasive. When they tell their story, they come across as personable, truthful and most of all – convincing.

Conclusion

Everyone has a story to tell. What is yours? Take a look at how other successful marketers are using their story and put your own story together. Use it as part of your sales campaign and make that emotional connection to increase your sales.

Smart Marketing Tips for a Slow Economy

2008-08-26T15:13:04-07:00

The other day I went to buy groceries and standing outside the store entrance was a young lady representing a nonprofit that collects food for a local food bank. I glanced over and saw that she already had two shopping carts filled with food items. She handed me a bright blue plastic bag with a flyer about her organization and asked me if I would consider buying some food items for the nonprofit while I was shopping today.

I think I took her by surprise with my enthusiastic response. "What you are doing is absolutely brilliant," I remarked. "What a great idea!" Rather than asking me to donate money, she asked me for what she really needed (food) and then positioned herself in a location where it was easy for me to deliver what she needed (food).

I was happy to donate to her cause because she made it not only easy, but a "no-brainer" for me. All I had to do was put some food in my bright blue bag while shopping and hand it to her on the way out. I didn't have to drive to another location or call a phone number to have someone come to my house for a pick-up. I walked in, I walked out, and I was done.

This story proves that marketing doesn't have to be difficult or complicated. The techniques this nonprofit used to successfully collect food can be can be broken down into very simple steps that anyone can use to effectively market online:

Know Where to Find Your Audience

People coming to a grocery store have money and are prepared to buy food. Where does your audience go when they have money and are prepared to buy?

People are always in various stages of the buying cycle and it's easier to make a sale when they have already made the decision to buy, and are now ready to choose which widget to buy, rather than should they buy a widget.

One of the most overlooked opportunities to make a sale online is after you've just made a sale. Instead of completing the sale with a thank you page, offer them another opportunity to buy when their credit card is out of their wallet by creating an upsell page with a product or products that might be of interest to them. "Now that you've bought this, how about buying this?" It's the old, "Would you like fries with that?" technique and it works great.

Show Proof of Success

People like to feel secure that they are making the right decision. Seeing that other people have made a successful decision on the same product as you is a wonderful encouragement for them to buy.

When I was approached by the nonprofit representative outside the grocery store, I saw that many other people had donated food and it made me feel confident that this was a good cause.

On a website, if you can set up a place for people to post reviews of your product, it will increase your sales. It also increases your credibility with your potential client. The fact that you are willing to post all reviews of your product, (both good and bad), shows that you have confidence in your company, as well as your product.

Another technique is to have a short demo video that shows someone successfully using your product. Seeing how a product works is quite convincing for most people.

Make it Easy to Do Business with You

People may want to do business with you online, but they won't if you make it too difficult. Take at look at the number of steps it takes for someone to make a purchase from your website. If it is more than three clicks, you are probably loosing sales.

On a website, potential customers are looking for streamline purchasing. The easier you can make it for them to buy, the more likely you will close the sale.

When that nonprofit rep handed me the blue plastic bag I knew exactly what I needed to do and how to do it. For both of us, it was a positive outcome.

Conclusion

Deliver marketing information in a way that doesn't come across as a sales pitch. Although your audience wants product information, what they truly want is confidence that they are buying from a reliable source and that they are making the right decision.

Are You Losing Customers From Too Much Email?

2008-07-29T14:51:12-07:00

Email is no longer a "stand alone" program for marketing. Years ago, when email was the new kid on the block, it was easy to use email as a marketing tool just by itself. Most businesses weren't using email to market and when they did, it stood out and was typically read.

Nowadays, our inboxes are flooded with emails from both people we want to hear from and those we don't. People have become disillusioned with email and it no longer has the sparkle it had even three years ago.

Now that everyone has caught on to the ease and cost effectiveness of using email marketing, it has become a monster; not only for the spammers, but those of us who want to legitimately use permission-based email for marketing.

Email has now gotten a bad name and if a business wants to continue using email to market, it needs to rethink its approach to using this tool.

Know Your Customer

The most effective email campaigns are ones that are set up to target a specific audience. Don't make the email message broad; make it specific to the audience you are trying to reach. It's better to create six different email campaigns for six different audiences rather than lumping everyone together into one campaign.

Another technique is to think about where you might find your audience and go to them. Datran Media's Sean O'Neal says, "Reach audiences where they are. If consumers use social networks to learn about products, but most often purchase after a reminder e-mail, structure campaigns to support this scenario."

Integrate Other Channels

Rather than using an email campaign by itself, consider combining it with another marketing technique such as direct mail. A 2007 Jupiter Research study found "email campaigns improved 74% for marketers who integrated off-line direct marketing. Overall, e-mails are four times more effective when targeted and integrated with other data.

According to Scott Olrich, CMO at email service provider Responsys, "The goal of an e-mail campaign should determine which channels are used in conjunction with it. Segmentation helps marketers deliver personalized information, while testing can inform decisions about channel mix as well as content."

Use Postcards with Email

A simple way to integrate direct mail with email is to create a postcard campaign to drive traffic to a website landing page.

"According to a 2007 Ipsos US survey, 67% of the online population is driven by offline messages to perform online searches for more information on a company, service or product. Thirty-nine percent of those respondents then make a purchase."

If you don't have a list for your direct mail campaign, consider renting a list from a reputable company such as infousa.com. Choose your target audience carefully and make sure the message on the postcard is not a sales pitch. The idea is not to try to sell them with the postcard; the idea is to peak their interest to go to the website.

Once at the website, make it easy for them to give you their email address by giving them some type of promotion, special report or gift in exchange for their information. This way, you are creating your own permission based opt-in list. Now you can continue to legitimately follow-up with them by a series of email auto responders.

Although it is possible to purchase email lists, I don't recommend it. If someone doesn't know you, the email is most likely to be deleted before it is even read. The odds are much better with direct mail. According to a USPS 2006 study, 80% of people read or scan their direct mail.

Conclusion

Rather than a sales tool, think of email marketing as an opportunity to increase customer satisfaction and build a trusting relationship with both your customers and your potential customers.