Ematters Email Marketing Interview 2011

AMSTERDAM, NETHERLANDS, April 30, 2011

The specialists that have been interviewed are:
- Joost Nienhuis from Tripolis Solutions,
- Michael Linthorst from Copernica;
- Marc Borgers from Borgers & Straathof;
- Jordie van Rijn from eMailMonday;
- Robert Rebergen from E-Village;
- Ernst Muller from Veritate;
- Wouter van der Hucht from Ematters.

Some summarizing conclusions

A number of interesting matters emerged in the interview. On the basis of those, some summarizing conclusions:
- Email is definitely not dead. All interviewed specialists agree and that's shown in the answers to question 2;
- The expectation is that fewer emails will be send in the future, but that they will be more relevant. This means that quality is more important than quantity;
- Testing, testing, testing. This sounds like a cliche, but guessing and thinking that the current emails cannot be improved will not help the email marketing along. Of course, you can come a cropper, but through testing there is a good chance of achieving higher ROIs.

Question 1
The layout of the inbox is changing: relevance of the message is increasingly important. Facebook announced their own "email" platform and Gmail introduced the Priority Inbox in 2010. Platforms will increasingly opt for a different layout than just on the basis of arrival. What should B2C marketers pay attention to in the future, to prepare for this?

Joost: Relevance is and remains leading in the wish to "stand out from the crowd" in increasingly fuller inboxes. Next to the "moment of arrival", the moment of actually reading the email will become important. And of course location and proximity.

Michael: Relevance is the keyword. Marketers should especially pay attention not to start from the batch-and-blast idea and continuously send bulk mail. That's not just noticeable for the developed inboxes. You can see that the consumer also manages to see through the commercial message more easily. So listen to your consumer and make this clear in your timing, frequency and of course especially the content of your messages. Enter the dialogue actively. Collect all data you can and use everything for personalisation and segmentation. It's okay for the recipient to see that your message is automated, when you've done this right they will only appreciate it. With this, you improve your reputation with the recipient and you ensure yourself of a place in those different inboxes.

Marc: On the short term, operationally speaking, email marketers should test better on increasing the opening percentage, for instance on subject line, preview pane, the time it's been sent, sender. If the opening percentage rises in that way, the emails will be classified as more relevant. However, this is only a makeshift measure. The messages should really be relevant or people will not fall for enticing subject lines or other tricks anymore. This can be achieved particularly by using more event-driven email (so communicating on the basis of relevant events in the context of the recipient). Not only sale-directed, but also service-directed. Next to that, you can make the message more relevant by segmenting better based on enriched customer profiles. The power of the brand you work for naturally also has an effect on the perception of relevance.

Jordie: The platforms adjust to the wishes of the user. They want their inbox to remain manageable, digestible and interesting. The best advice for the marketers is to do this with their individual messages as well. This has always been the most effective. The (more) intelligent inbox helps the users to separate the wheat from the chaff. Conclusion: is your email marketing of top quality, then you will be at the top of the inbox.

Robert: They have to try and test, come a cropper and try again. They have to work with Facebook Inbox and Google Priority Inbox, see what works, make mistakes and try again. They have to be concerned with their recipients, but should not take it too far and also have to be realistic enough to realise that not everyone opens all of their messages. Just like in a shopping street, people will occa

Ematters is a bureau for direct marketing.