The Next Generation of Email Prospecting

Measure it Right
While open and clickthrough rates are good indicators, the measurements that really count are new customers and sales. Email produces sales in all channels, so it's important to measure impact holistically — online, phone and retail. In many cases, 80 percent to 90 percent of these sales occur in stores and offline. Sophisticated email marketing analytic solutions use online and offline sales data and analyze it properly against the emailed group and a matched control group to show incremental impact.

A major communications company offering a broadband service tested this approach in a controlled environment. When measured using traditional online-only sales, the program was considered a dismal failure. However, when matchback analysis factored in phone orders and local store sales in addition to online sales, there was a 45 percent reduction in new customer acquisition costs. The offline sales to online sales ratio was 23-to-1. As a result, the program was deemed a success.

With smart strategies and proper measurements, highly targeted email communications get the best results, and ultimately deliver positive ROI.

Doug McCrea is president of Acquire Marketing Services, an email marketing solutions provider. Reach Doug at doug@acquireweb.com.