BOSTON, MA--(Marketwire - July 10, 2008) - Email marketing is one of the most profitable
marketing channels because it is simple, affordable, and measurable.
Consequently, email is also one of the most widely used marketing channels.
With increased competition for the customers' time, wallet, and mindshare,
top performing organizations are maximizing the effectiveness of their
email campaigns by personalizing outbound marketing messages. Heavy
personalization techniques allow organizations to develop highly
personalized relevant marketing campaigns by incorporating customer profile
information, segmentation or demographic behavior, channel behavior,
purchase history, personalized product or service recommendations, online
activity, and other attributes from customer databases. A recent study,
"Email Marketing: Get Personal with Your Customers," conducted by the
Aberdeen Group, a Harte-Hanks Company (
NYSE:
HHS), reveals that 96% of
organizations surveyed believe that email personalization can improve email
marketing performance. Furthermore, organizations that leverage email
personalization techniques increased average order values by 57% as a
result of their efforts.
While the pressure to improve return on marketing investments (ROMI) and
increase online revenue were identified as the top two factors causing
organizations to focus resources on an email personalization initiative,
the research reveals the businesses are challenged by an inability to
create personalized marketing content and a lack of data for use in
personalized emails. Best-in-Class companies indicated that they currently
utilize landing pages (78%), forms and survey tools (57%), and segmentation
tools (49%) to supplement accessible data and improve the effectiveness of
email campaigns. These enabling technologies allow Best-in-Class companies
to improve customer retention rates and opt-in rates by an average of 5% as
a result of segmenting customers with email campaigns.
"Companies are still struggling with more advanced email marketing
techniques (beyond the simple mail-merge of a name in the salutation). The
research unequivocally demonstrates that email personalization plays a
critical role in delivering superior email marketing campaign performance,"
explains Ian Michiels, Senior Research Analyst in Aberdeen's Customer
Management Group. "All organizations surveyed recognize the value of
personalization. They also realize the essential role customer data plays
in attaining Best-in-Class performance. As a result, all respondents have
initiatives in place to both consolidate and cleanse customer data before
implementing more advanced personalization techniques. Best-in-Class are
still early adopters of highly personalized techniques and technologies;
however, their performance is a clear indication that we will continue to
see increased adoption of more advanced automated personalization features
like dynamic message assembly within top performing organizations,"
concluded Michiels.
The report demonstrates the value of collectively leveraging organizational
practices in process, performance measurement, knowledge management, and
technology to provide a foundation for marketing success. By combining
published rules and regulations governing who in the organization is
allowed to communicate with customers and prospects via email (67%) and
processes for segmenting email lists for improved message relevancy (53%),
Best-in-Class companies are able to maximize the effectiveness of their
outbound email campaigns by personalizing each message with key information
specific to the intended recipient.
The research educates readers about the value of email marketing and
personalization techniques. The report also identifies Best-in-Class
performance as a result of email personalization compared to the Industry
Average and Laggards and the difference in capabilities and technology use
among maturity classes. A complimentary copy of this report is made
available due in part by the following underwriters: Campaigner
(
www.campaigner.com) and Emma (
www.myemma.com). Furthermore, this research
is being disseminated to the market through the support of various media
outlets, such as the ECT News network and ITO America. To obtain a
complimentary copy of the report, visit:
http://www.aberdeen.com/link/sponsor.asp?cid=4904.
About Aberdeen Group, a Harte-Hanks Company
Aberdeen is a leading provider of fact-based research and market
intelligence that delivers demonstrable results. Having benchmarked more
than 30,000 companies in the past two years, Aberdeen is uniquely
positioned to educate users to action: driving market awareness, creating
demand, enabling sales, and delivering meaningful return-on-investment
analysis. As the trusted advisor to the global technology markets,
corporations turn to Aberdeen™ for insights that drive decisions.
As a Harte-Hanks Company, Aberdeen plays a key role of putting content in
context for the global direct and targeted marketing company. Aberdeen's
analytical and independent view of the "customer optimization" process of
Harte-Hanks (Information - Opportunity - Insight - Engagement -
Interaction) extends the client value and accentuates the strategic role
Harte-Hanks brings to the market. For additional information, visit
Aberdeen
http://www.aberdeen.com or call (617) 723-7890, or to learn more
about Harte-Hanks, call (800) 456-9748 or go to
http://www.harte-hanks.com.
© 2008 Aberdeen Group, Inc., a Harte-Hanks Company
451 D Street, Suite 710
Boston, Massachusetts 02210-1928
Telephone: (617) 854-5200
Fax: (617) 723-7897
www.aberdeen.com
Contact Information: Media Contact:
Ian Michiels
Aberdeen Harte-Hanks
(925) 264-1824
Ian.michiels@aberdeen.com