Tag Archives: promotion

Email Marketing, Online Marketing

Sam’s Club Canada Experiences The Success of Good Email Marketing

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Sam’s Club Canada experienced the full power of email marketing last week when they ran a special “open house” email promotion.

On November 12, 2008 they sent out this email flyer with the subject “Welcome to our Open House”:

Sams Club eFlyer November 2008

As you can see, the email is very well formatted with a big call to action at the top and two specific product focuses. One of the biggest mistakes people make when creating email marketing campaigns is that they cram in as many products as possible, which ultimately just dilutes the amount of attention each item can get.

This email proved to be incredibly effective because the day the sale started (Friday) people were lined up at 3:00am at some stores (Note: The stores only open at 7:00am). The television sold out of their Vaughan location in a matter of minutes. This obviously left a bunch of angry consumers, but that’s an issue to discuss a different day.

This just goes to show you that sending out an email with a lucrative offer can have consumers jumping off the couch and racing to your store…even at an ungodly hour of the morning!

Email Marketing, Online Marketing

Should You Promote a Product in Your Email Marketing “Happy Holiday” Campaigns?

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All week long customers have been calling in discussing their plans for sending out holiday email marketing campaigns next week and the week after. Tis’ definitely the season to harness the power of email marketing to spread your message!

One customer posed an interesting question to one of our support representatives. He asked whether it was appropriate to advertise one of his products alongside his holiday wishes. When you really think about it, this is an interesting question.

Does it diminish the thoughtfulness of your holiday eCard if it comes across as a promotional piece?
Do people see your holiday eCard as a promotional piece anyway and expect to see advertising?

Personally, I would keep my product promotion out of my holiday email marketing campaigns. I think there is an implicit brand promotion in your holiday eCard without explicitly highlighting a product. Your holiday email marketing campaigns are a time for you to tell your customers that you are thinking about them and to wish them a happy new year. Doing this scores serious brownie points for your brand and I think you lose out on that if you say “Happy Holidays, Happy New Year, Click Here To Buy This Product”.

That being said, there is nothing wrong with putting a link back to your website (… I’d definitely encourage that!) You can even put a message saying you have many new products coming out in the upcoming year to get your customer’s excited.

If you try to do too much in one email, then you run the risk of accomplishing nothing. So, ask yourself, what is the real goal of your holiday email marketing campaigns and you should come up with the exact right answer for what tactic you should adopt.