Great article below from our friends at eMarketer.com. The opening paragraph is especially salient to me since I just relocated from Texas back to Toledo, Ohio. And I am thrilled to join Thrive Internet Marketing as a Digital Marketing Specialist.
"Email’s not dead. In fact, Q2 2014 research by Gigaom found that 86% of US digital marketers used email marketing regularly—the highest response rate out of all programs listed."
It is relevant to me this week because the 25+ e-newsletters I subscribe to have to be updated so they find me at Jeff@ThriveIM.com.
In the article it says that email marketing is the most effective tool for customer retention. Better than social media. Better than digital display ads and Pay Per Click.
I think a lot of this is true because you are in control of email. If you don't want to read the emails coming from a company, simply tell them to stop. Try that with ads on a web site.
People keep asking me how to get more customers and the answer has been the same for +25 years. Give customers something they want, not what you want to sell them.
In the digital age we need to be reminded that we "can not be all things to all people". You are better off with 500 passionate individuals in your email list than 10,000 individuals that could care less about your product.
Segregate your database of people so you can control the process of giving them what they want. It is hard work, but a database of 10,000 individuals is probably 10 groups of 1,000 people with similar interests. Manage accordingly.
Go Mud Hens!
Email: The Old Kid on the Block's Still Got It
Around three-quarters of internet users check email via mobile
Email’s not dead. In fact, Q2 2014 research by Gigaom found that 86% of US digital marketers used email marketing regularly—the highest response rate out of all programs listed.
On top of that, the June 2014 report detailing the survey results, underwritten by Extole, called email “the digital marketing workhorse,” meaning it was effective—and often considered the single most effective—for reaching all goals, including awareness (41% of respondents), acquisition (37%), conversion (42%) and retention (56%).
When it came to that last objective—customer retention—email dominated other programs, leading second-place social network marketing by nearly 20 percentage points.
Due to these positive results, one-quarter of respondents planned to increase spending on email marketing. This was the third-highest response, trailing social network marketing (38%) and content marketing (28%). Meanwhile, few marketers said they would up investments in newer digital formats such as mobile advertising (16%) and digital video ads (14%).
Based on April 2014 polling My.com, a chunk of those dollars would be well spent on mobile-optimized email. Nearly three-quarters of US internet users studied said they checked email on a mobile device. Android-powered devices were the most popular mobile platforms for checking email via mobile, cited by 48% of respondents, followed by iOS, with 38%.
However, a June 2014 study by Ascend2 found that mobile-optimized email still had much room for growth. Around one-third of marketing professionals worldwide said they used or were planning to use mobile-optimized email in the next year, compared with 54% who said the same for mobile-optimized websites. Email ranked fourth overall, with response rates close to those for mobile apps (35%) and mobile social media (33%).
