Email Is Not Dead, and Word-of-Mouth Never Retired

by Deborah Garry  

BBG&G Advertising & Public Relations, Inc.

There are two thoughts newly appearing on the marketing landscape that, I have to admit, make me chuckle.

One says that email is dead. The other heralds the birth (or return) of Word-of-Mouth Advertising.

I was highly surprised to hear that email is dead as a communications or marketing tool because nobody told me. Nor did they tell all my business contacts, vendors, clients, associates, and would-be vendors who routinely communicate with me or market to me on a daily basis.

IN DAY-TO-DAY BUSINESS LIFE AND ON THE DIRECT MARKETING LANDSCAPE, email is as strong as ever. If you want more proof than what’s in your in-box, take a look at DoubleClick, ExactTarget , and Habeas, all of whom have released studies over the past month or so testifying to the overall strength of email. All show customers are quite comfortable buying through email and feel comfortable receiving email — as long as they have granted their permission and the companies are ones they know and trust. In fact, across the board, consumers prefer email when dealing with businesses for most communications. Not even college students see that changing any time in the near future.

     Why are these false alarms proclaiming the death of email appearing? Because new communication channels are emerging rapidly. Although email is currently the established technology for outbound digital messaging, more are appearing on the scene at great speed, adding even more complexity to direct marketing. Since 2000, there has been an explosion of new communication tools to add to the one-to-one marketers toolbox.

     The challenge to marketers is to evaluate and discern the role each tool should play within a balanced, integrated plan. To further complicate things, customers use different sets of tools for communication, and they use those tools differently depending upon varying factors. And those preferences don’t always line up in neat categories alongside traditional data points like age, income, or zip code.

What’s a Marketer to do? Start Listening!

    So what would your marketing program look like if you really listened to your customers? How do they share about deals they know are a good value and want to pass along? Or promotions? What about new products and services? Industry news? Or customer service alerts? Do they only use email? Or text? Or podcasts? Or the phone? Most likely they will want to receive communications differently, depending upon topic, content, and other factors. To listen to our consumers means that we need to commit to understanding and meeting how they wish to be contacted and communicated with. Here are integral issues to ask your customers about:

1.Permission. Do your consumers want to hear from you at all? Are you a "friend"? We need to understand this at a very base level, but then go deeper as well. How “close” of a friend are you? How can you deepen the relationship? Hint: be a friend by offering something of value with no strings attached.

2. Type of communication by channel. How do they want to receive promotions? What about account statements or product alerts? They may want certain types of communications to arrive by text, others by email, and some even by direct “snail mail”. Ask them.

3.Frequency. How often is too often? Again, this will vary by customer and by channel. They may want email once a week, direct mail quarterly, podcasts downloadable at their convenience, and text messaging — only in emergencies!

4. Content. "Opting-in" should give your customers a chance to tell you what they want and don’t want, and when, not just be an on/off switch. Don’t assume that one channel will work for them.

     I am happy to report email is certainly not dead, but it is far from being the only communications channel either. Pay attention to your customer’s preferences, or someone else will.

     This is critically important because Word-of-Mouth is popular again. Personally, I doubt that anyone in the Hudson Valley business community ever seriously thought it went away. But we have moved light years from the time when mass marketing and broadcast media were our only options, and word-of-mouth spread only to people our customers actually spoke to.Prospective and existing customers we communicate with want to have more control, they want to provide input into our programs, and they use all these communication channels to tell their friends, acquaintances, colleagues, and complete strangers what they think of us — in seconds. So, build the tools to listen now and reap the rewards for years to come.

 

Deborah Garry is president of BBG&G, a full service advertising, marketing, and public relations agency servicing a wide range of local and regional clients from healthcare and financial services to B2B, tourism destination, and franchise promotion industries. She can be reached at smartstrategies@bbggadv.com