What performance is “acceptable” in email marketing?
With targeted email lead generation and nurturing becoming more popular among B2B marketers, many clients ask me what performance levels are considered acceptable? We’re talking about metrics such as unsubscribe, open, and click-through rates. A recent study, the 2009 Digital Marketer: Benchmark and Trend Reporter*, issued by Experian Marketing Services, offers some insight into these questions.
- Unsubscribe rates drifted downward in 2008, ending at about .08% of total email addresses in January. The decline was attributed to marketers allowing subscribers to self-select mailing frequency and specific types of information
- Bounce (undeliverable) rates drifted up during 2008 ending slightly below 2% of total email addresses
- Open rates remained steady throughout 2008 at about 18% of total email addresses, even as email volume increased
- Click-through rates (those clicking on a link in the email) averaged about 3.5% of those opening the email in 2008
For our clients’ campaigns, we normally see performance that exceeds these results, primarily by incorporating offers for highly relevant content in the email. So compare your campaign metrics to these numbers to assess their performance against industry averages.
To download the study, click here.
Rick Whitmyre
*Data collected by Experian CheetahMail® from January 1, 2008, to December 31, 2008, by monitoring all client programs.
Beyond Lead Generation to Lead Nurturing
For most B2B marketers, lead generation plays a major role in their marketing strategy. But once leads are acquired, they typically are turned over to the sales department, hopefully for follow-up and conversion. Marketers tend to view their roles as lead producers. It’s someone else’s job to qualify prospects and transform them into sales. But today’s Web-based technologies empower marketers to go beyond lead generation to lead nurturing – and become actively engaged in the sales conversion process.
Lead nurturing involves a structured program of continual contact with the prospect. It’s focused on offering your company’s technical and scientific content in a form that solves problems and enhances a customer’s business. This content might include white papers, management briefs, application notes, Webinars, case studies, podcasts, and videos.
Through the use of a CRM database, such as Salesforce.com or TW Solution’s low-cost LeadManager, and an email campaign management solution, a marketer can target this content to a lead’s personal areas of interest, enhancing relevancy and effectiveness. The analytics in these tools measure prospect response, enabling the calculation of a true ROI.
Lead nurturing’s benefits include better qualification, stronger prospect relationships, enhanced company positioning as a thought leader, and a much greater opportunity for sales conversion. Our firm is managing lead nurturing programs for clients who understand that continual engagement with the lead around beneficial content will dramatically increase their opportunity to close sales.
J.P. Morgan’s Internet Predictions for 2009
Several compelling issues were noted in J.P. Morgan’s Nothing But Net 2009 Internet Investment Guide that could impact the way B2B and life sciences companies approach their marketing campaigns. They include:
Performance-driven advertising should continue to rise
B2B publishers will begin accepting online advertising that is based on a pay-for-action model such as pay-per-lead, pay-per-registration, etc. (Tiziani Whitmyre’s TW Networks division is achieving success lining up these publishers for clients across a wide range of markets.) That means much more efficient advertising buys and very little waste.
Challenges in monetizing Web site traffic should persist
B2B publishers continue to struggle with monetizing their Web sites. This will open up opportunities for performance-based advertising (see above). We are finding that publishers are more open to creative forms of online advertising and are beginning to be flexible in considering non-traditional approaches.
Social networking needs a new revenue approach
While traffic at social network sites (Twitter, FaceBook, LinkedIn, YouTube) is exploding, traditional ad-based models have not generated sustainable revenue and profit growth. This is driven by advertisers’ inability to measure any value derived from social network marketing. J.P. Morgan suggests that social networks must move to performance-based advertising, ecommerce, and the sale of virtual goods to enhance the monetization of their huge visitor numbers.
Global paid search revenues will climb 12% in 2009
While down from a breathtaking 34% growth rate in 2008, J.P. Morgan predicts global paid search advertising will continue its expansion in 2009. In addition, the number of search queries is expected to increase by 24% over last year. However, look for somewhat lower keyword bid costs as advertisers decrease their budgets in the coming months.
Online video strategy does not appear to be working
The successful use of video in the B2B marketing world will continue to be problematic. The issue appears to be a Web site’s inability to guarantee viewership for any specific video the way television does in the upfront model. Often, it is very unpredictable as to which video will be popular. We are advising clients only to use video in online campaigns on a pay-per-view model.
The mobile market is long-term interesting, but near-term challenging
While 84% of Americans are using cell phones, only 15% are using mobile Internet services. And advertising on small screen mobile phones is challenging. But as business people continue to embrace smart phones and higher speed networks, the opportunity eventually will exist to reach B2B audiences using mobile marketing technologies.
Download the J.P. Morgan report.
Google Now Capturing Almost 75% of Search Volume
Google’s domination of Web search was evident in May as the company accounted for 73.3% of the total search volume. Yahoo was a distant second at 15.8% and MSN/Live.com had a paltry 5.6%. Google also was the most visited Web site, grabbing 7.6% of all Web visits. YahooMail was second at 4.9%. For B2B marketers, the takeaway is clear: Optimize your sites for Google and let the chips fall as they may for the other search engines.
In the social networking space, it was no surprise that MySpace (30.9%), Facebook (29%), and YouTube (9%) continue to run far ahead of the pack. Facebook clearly is the preferred social network for B2B marketing and several of our clients are getting traction with videos posted on YouTube.
The statistics were reported by Hitwise, an Internet measurement company. — Rick Whitmyre
New Product Introduction Kaizen Achieves Impressive Results
I recently participated in a Kaizen event to improve a global manufacturer’s capability to launch new products. As a veteran of Six Sigma and Lean manufacturing events during my corporate career, I was interested to see how Kaizen might improve a critical marketing and sales process.
This multi-division company did not have a documented product introduction process. Product launches were implemented at the discretion of each product marketing manager. With major new product platforms ready for market, the company believed this competency was essential for business success.
Our cross-functional Kaizen team consisted of sales and marketing managers from each division, a sales consultant, an operations manager, and a technology manager. As a provider of marketing services to the company, I was invited to participate in the Kaizen as a subject matter expert. Two Lean black belts served as facilitators. We met in a half-day prep session and a one-day workshop event. Our objective was to create a best-practice new product introduction process for application across the company.
Admittedly, I was skeptical that we could accomplish our goal in such a compressed time frame. But the facilitators flogged us hard and kept us focused on the mission. Using a swim-lane diagram tool, we identified all of the new product introduction tasks across six parallel paths – marketing, sales, technology, operations, customers, and legal. Interconnects and decision points between the tasks also were inserted. During a 10-minute brainstorming frenzy, we broke up into teams, furiously scribbled marketing tasks on Post-it notes, and stuck them to the wall.
I was astounded at how much work the team completed in a matter of hours. We created a comprehensive product introduction process that meshed well with the company’s present technology development methodology. Four key elements of the process were identified as significant improvement opportunities:
- Product definition – Creation of a powerful unique value proposition
- Marketing strategy – Development of the product’s positioning and pricing, competitive analysis, launch budget, brand building vs. lead generation, channel strategy, etc.
- Product sampling plan – Making samples available at launch
- Internal launch – Sales, product, and operations training
These elements will be internalized and given special emphasis as the new process is rolled out across the company. Congratulations to the team for embracing a Kaizen approach to create a simple, yet comprehensive, product introduction path that will dramatically improve their sales and marketing efforts. — Rick Whitmyre
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