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I’m Looking Over a Four Leaf E-mail Capture Program

by Ruth Stevens on April 7th, 2011

Everyone’s looking to do more with less these days. When you compare the cost of postal mail, about a dollar a piece, to the cost of e-mail, about a penny a piece, any B-to-B marketer is going to prefer using e-mail as the medium for staying in touch with current customers and inquirers. No-brainer, right?

But here’s the rub: Most B-to-B companies have e-mail addresses for only a fraction of their customers. And even worse, if their privacy policies call for opt-in, only a fraction of that fraction is e-mailable.

Consider the case of Cicso Systems, the networking hardware giant. While 45–50% of Cicso’s global house file contains e-mail addresses, only 29% of those are opted in. Doing the math, that’s a mere 14% of the file that can be contacted via e-mail.

Here are four options for business marketers to increase their customer coverage via e-mail:

Data append. The cheapest and fastest route to jump-start your e-mail address collection is via data append. For pennies per record, you can expect to append valid e-mail addresses to around 10–30% of your file. Select a reputable vendor, such as FreshAddress. Only try appending names with which you already have a business relationship, like customers or inquirers. Appending e-mail addresses to prospect names, while tempting, should be avoided.
Revise your permission policy. Just as the B-to-B world has ducked the Do Not Call Registry, business marketers may want to rethink their early decision to apply opt-in policies to their e-mail communications. If I attend a trade show and exchange cards with a vendor, I fully expect to receive e-mail—as well as postal mail—from that company. As a business buyer, that’s how I stay informed. So, as long as opt-out is offered and respected it’s my view that a business relationship implies willingness to receive e-mail, and that the well-established standards of opt-out (“notice and choice”) should be the rule of thumb for business marketers.
Proactively collect addresses. When you look at the cost savings, the business case for aggressive e-mail address collection is very clear. So educate your customer-facing personnel on the importance of gathering e-mail addresses, and weave a collection program into your current business processes.
Some tips on e-mail collection best practices:
- Explain to your customer the benefit of providing the e-mail address. Give a good business reason, like, “We want to keep you up to date on new technical developments.
- Service touch points may actually be the most effective collection points, versus outbound marketing communications.
- Create a Web-based preferences page, where customers can manage their subscriptions and indicate what kinds of e-mail, mail and phone calls they’d like to receive.
- Avoid blanket permissions that apply across brands or business units.
- Place an e-mail collection device on your home page and elsewhere in your site as well.
Improve the relevance of your communications. Stop blasting! Once you have an e-mail address, your mission shifts to maintaining its status—preventing customers from opting out. Relevant, timely, targeted communications are the key. We all know this, but not all of us are executing. So, do the right thing, using personalization and a message strategy that is segmented by audience interest.