I’ve been posting recently about multichannel marketing,  “Multichannel Marketing Integration is Vital”, and while I’m convinced that communicating in multiple channels makes for very satisfied customers and responsive prospects, I’ve also noted that it’s possible to be successful even when using one or one+ channels.

Case in point:  a large, eBusiness company wanted to acquire new SMB customers.  As a fully digital company, reaching out to unknown but highly qualified prospects, utilizing email made the most sense.  By working with reputable vendors we acquired email addresses for the majority of our target prospects.  A note here,  when purchasing prospect email addresses it is critical to determine their provenance to insure that these individuals have given permission to be contacted.  In fact we insisted that the email addresses be further submitted to a separate email invitation to connect.  This is known as double opt-in and many good companies even submit their own customers to the process from time to time.

The Design -  with the bulk of the campaign in a single channel, email, we added the element of frequency to the campaign.  Each prospect was sent 6 different emails over the course of 6 weeks.  In other words, each prospect received 6 waves of communication – in all, one acquisition campaign.  Further, the target audience of prospects was separated into six segments – based on geography and company size.  This was done for two reasons:  1. to smooth the flow of leads coming back from each wave, and 2. to provide manageability of email execution.  (Fortunately, now an entire multi-wave campaign can be fully automated.)

Call to Action – the power of multiple waves is the ability to offer increasingly rich calls to action.  Or varying offers of equal value but expressed in different terms.  This enables the prospect to self-select the offer that best resonates with him or her.  Additionally, prospects were offered several ways to respond.  For example, one email invited the prospect to call an 800 number while a second email offered a link to a landing page.  Another directed the prospect to the onsite Cart.  We employed six variations and the results were impressive.

Adding a New Channel – some prospect names were unmatchable to an email address.  We chose to reach out to them by creating a mail piece providing the prospect with a PURL (personal URL) which they could easily access on line to provide their email address.  Some mail pieces were given an 800 number to call instead.  Note here that complete coverage of the prospect market is the key and you can mix and match according to what channels you can implement.

The Results – at 6 weeks (the end of the first campaign to the first segment) Net Incremental Sales = $643K ; New Sales Account = 569.  Extrapolate from there to 6 segments and you get the picture.  This exceeded the addition of new accounts from business as usual.

Through the use of a single channel, used strategically, and supported by a second tactic/channel this large eBusiness company was able to drive significant incremental business.

Ann McCartan, DBMCatalyst, Practical Marketing Implemented

Let me know what you think!