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* This article is very image-heavy. For optimized Web viewing and readability, the images do not appear here. To see the print version, plus images, click on “Refine Your Multichannel Message” PDF under Related Content in the upper-right corner of this page. You must have Adobe Reader 6.0 or above to view this document. As the online channel has settled into the mainstream in recent years, multichannel integration has become more crucial for catalogers. Still, there are plenty of marketers out there who neglect, or simply fail, to maintain one voice and a cohesive visual treatment across the three key channels: catalog, Web

Multichannel Brand Management: Refine Your Message

Research shows that most people say they trust the content in e-mails they’ve signed up to receive. The challenge, though, is to build an opt-in list of loyal customers so you can convert those eyeballs into sales and keep them buying. GOT Corp., a Montreal-based e-mail service provider, offers several suggestions in its new white paper, “Growing Opt-In Lists: Turning Web Browsers into Buyers.” • Place multiple opt-in locations on your site. Too many marketers make the mistake of limiting opt-in requests to the home page, the whitepaper states. Include e-mail registration and opt-in requests on every page and at every potential customer interaction

Can a cataloger ever go overboard in trying to build its brand and drive sales? Actually, yes, particularly when using e-mails as a marketing strategy. Send too many e-mails to your target market and you could hurt the brand and ultimately lose customers by hitting an “exposure ceiling.” In his recent whitepaper, “The Email Exposure Ceiling,” Sundeep Kapur, director of customer service and e-commerce solutions for customized software solutions provider NRC eCommerce, says that because e-mail is a more personal means of communication than a print or radio advertising, people want to control what is sent to their inbox. If they feel a

Does the thought of e-mail prospecting send shivers up your spine? Have you deliberately stayed away from even thinking about a test? It’s time for you to rethink e-mail for lead and sales generation. I want you to consider why you should add this technique to your marketing arsenal. Why E-mail Prospecting? Direct mail prospecting is a central part of your marketing plan. Catalogers carefully test and expand on lists that hold promise. And e-mail lists are showing more promise all the time. Their appeal lies in their ability to expand your online marketing efforts. Your Web site now is an integrated part of your

No doubt you collect e-mail addresses and other consumer information on your Web site. Perhaps you have a box on your homepage offering a free newsletter, or a special page that offers discounts if shoppers supply personal data. Regardless of the method you use to collect this information, you should send an immediate welcome message to these new names, note officials at Internet marketing firm Topica in a recent whitepaper. Following are Topica’s tips for maximizing the effectiveness of these Web prospects: 1. Gather the correct information up front. In an effort to acquire as many prospects as possible, many online merchants ask only

Transactional e-mails, those key customer touchpoints that marketers typically use for purchase confirmations and shipping notifications, among others, offer the opportunity to reach customers with additional cross-sell and upsell opportunities. But not many online merchants use them for such promotional purposes. A recent study by e-mail marketing solutions provider Silverpop found that just 21 percent of online merchants use any kind of promotional content in transactional e-mails. Given that properly targeted offers in transactional e-mails can generate as much as $500,000 in additional annual revenue, according to JupiterResearch, this channel seems rife with potential. And in its recent report, Silverpop revealed the following

E-mail address churn and list fatigue plague your e-mail marketing campaigns, whether you’re aware of it or not. And the fewer addresses you have to e-mail, the fewer sales you close as a result. On a recent conference call hosted by NCR E-commerce Solutions, marketers, including men’s apparel cataloger Paul Fredrick MenStyle and a multichannel apparel and home goods merchant, offered several pointers on how to track, reduce and otherwise combat list fatigue. 1. Limit the number of e-mails you send. One merchant’s hard and fast rule is that customers never receive more than one e-mail per week, even during the holidays. While this merchant

While it’s widely known that hard-sell e-mails with product offers can be effective, at least one cataloger successfully focuses 80 percent of its e-mails on providing benefit-driven content, such as style guides and recipes, which isn’t directly sales-related. The e-mail campaigns that Monroe, Wis.-based multititle cataloger The Swiss Colony develops for 10 of its catalogs take more of a soft-sell approach that works. Aside from its namesake food gifts catalog, Swiss Colony's catalogs include Seventh Avenue (home furnishings, clothing, jewelry), Midnight Velvet (budget jewelry and gifts), The Tender Filet (gourmet foods) and Ashro (Afro-centric women’s apparel), among others. Designed to develop good relationships between Swiss

As B-to-B sales often aren’t as discount price driven as consumer sales, e-mails to a business audience can’t necessarily tout the latest promotional offer. Myriad other sales channels complicate the situation, making the decision of what and how often to e-mail even more perplexing. Following are successful e-mail communication strategies from three B-to-B catalogers and how they decide what kind of e-mails to send. VWR International The two-year-old e-mail marketing program at this scientific equipment catalog generally is coordinated around specific events, such as catalog mailings or buying cycles, says Lynn Homann, VWR’s director of marketing communications. “If we’re selling into the food and beverage market