A Guide to Effective Email Acquisition

A guide to effective
email acquisition
An Experian CheetahMail white paper
May 2008A guide to effective email acquisition
Experian CheetahMail's top 10 best practices for growing your permission-based email file
IntroductionOne of an organization's best marketing assets is a healthy permission-based email list. While proper management and use of your email file will drive revenue immensely, it is often a challenge to acquire the file itself. With inbox clutter on the rise and customers becoming more sensitive towards any unwanted communication, marketers should develop their subscriber lists with relevance and care.
Fortunately, there are a number of simple and effective ways of doing so. Traditional online and offline tactics, as well as emerging strategies, such as paid search and integrated POS technology, generate endless email acquisition opportunities regardless of your industry. The challenge at hand is using these tactics responsibly, complying with all legal requirements and respecting subscriber preferences, in order to maximize list growth through every customer touch point.
This white paper provides a number of well-tested, organic methods for email acquisition - giving marketers actionable insight to attract and retain a loyal, profitable subscriber base.
1. Email sign-up boxesEnable customers to sign-up for email by placing a clear and conspicuous form Email sign-up on each page of your website. This common acquisition practice is not only boxeseffective, it's also very easy to implement. There are a few important things to consider when employing this tactic. Pep BoysFirst, keep the look and feel of all website sign-up boxes consistent, and place them in the same location on every page. This makes them more reputable, easy to find and familiar to your audience. Also, try to place sign up-boxes either as part of the top banner or just below. Most test results have shown that those located near the top of the website perform better than those located in the footer area.
Couple your sign-up boxes with a clear description of "what's in it for them." Let customers know exactly what to expect when signing up, and sell the benefits for being on your email list. This can be as simple as promoting the general advantages of the channel - such as being able to receive information and offers faster and that it's eco-friendly. Or, you can take it a step further by providing a . Form appears when visitors mouse over discount or incentive for signing up. sign up option.. Animation and audio -"Welcome to Pep Boys! Sign up today to receive For example, Pep Boys uses two sign-up boxes on each page of their website. exclusive emails deals on parts, services They use creative copy which gives a brief description of what types of informa- and tires."tion the customer will receive with a prominent call to action, making the sign-up . Benefits of email program are clearly stated.process simple, engaging and apparent. Also, images of the company's mascots and founders, Manny, Moe, & Jack, animate upon website arrival, encouraging sign-up and telling visitors the specific benefits of the email program.
© 2008 Experian CheetahMail, Inc. All rights reserved.2. Account registrations and online e-commerce formsMake sure to incorporate email sign-up into all account registration and Account e-commerce forms on your website. Site registration is the most common and registrationseffective means of acquisition for marketers.
Brooks Brothers
1JupiterResearch found that 77% of
marketers deem site registration effective in
terms of both list quality and quantity.
Brooks Brothers' registration program is a good example of how to do this effectively. As shown to the right, they have used a prominent call to action and clearly indicated the benefits of registering for their email list. They also provided an added incentive for registering. . Incentive is clear and relevent to target Although similar to an "email sign-up," the registration process is a bit more audience.Benefits of email program are clearly lengthy requiring more data entry from the customer. The benefit of a "registra- . listed.tion" is the rich customer data you can acquire, such as demographic and . Geographic and demographic preference information for segmentation purposes. Brooks Brothers leverages informati... [download for more]