Major online retailers on average began sending holiday e-mails on Oct. 28 last year, 58 days before Christmas, and increased their e-mail volume by 45% compared to before the holiday season. Two out of three sent out at least one e-mail on the day after Thanksgiving, often called Cyber Monday.
Those are some of the facts highlighted in “The Retail Email Guide to the Holiday Season” report to be released next week by the Email Experience Council, the e-mail marketing arm of the Direct Marketing Association.
“As marketers, it is important that we learn from past behavior,” says Kara Trivunovic, director of strategic services at Premiere Global Services, Inc., the guide’s sponsor. “Looking at your successes and failures over the course of previous holiday seasons will help you to avoid the pitfalls and repeat the windfalls. Be sure to review all aspects of the campaign including: day and time of send, subject line, offer, audience, length of offer and conversion rates. Analyzing these facets of your campaigns should help you in building the right direction for this holiday season.”
There are 16 phases of Christmas when it comes to e-mail marketing, starting with gently introducing holiday items at the bottom of e-mails in August and concluding with the promotion of post-Christmas sales, says the report’s author, Chad White, director of retail insights at the Email Experience Council.
Once the holiday marketing season gets under way in earnest in late October, retailers rapidly increase their e-mail campaigns, sending 2.8 e-mails per week compared to 1.9 during the pre-holiday period, says White, who monitors the e-mail marketing campaigns of more than 100 of the largest online retailers. Overall, 88% of those top e-retailers increased their e-mail frequency during the 2007 holiday season, according to White.
That means cluttered inboxes for consumers, notes Trivunovic of Premiere. “Your messaging needs to be relevant to your recipient and include content and offers that are specific to them,” she says. “Oversaturation of your audience could result in list attrition and negative impacts on your brand. If you see a steep decline in open and click-through rates, an increase in unsubscribes or spam complaints, then pull back to minimize the effects of over-mailing.”
Other suggestions in the report include:
- Target high-volume shopping days: The most popular day for sending e-mail was the Monday after Thanksgiving, when 68% of retailers e-mailed their customers. The next most popular day was Dec. 10, two Mondays later, followed by the day after Christmas.
- Craft subject lines carefully: Review the most commonly searched terms on your web site and the subject lines of competitors to find the terms that most resonate with consumers. Tout free shipping.
- Use animation: 19% of the major retailers tracked incorporated animation into their e-mails last year.
- Promote electronic gift cards to last-minute shoppers: 32% of top online retailers promoted e-gift cards at least once during the five days before Christmas last year.
- Consider sending a holiday greeting: Fewer than 10% of major retailers sent a holiday e-mail greeting on Christmas Day last year, including the Lands’ End unit of Sears Holding Corp., No. 8 in the Internet Retailer Top 500 Guide, and Harry and David Holdings Inc., No. 80. “Email is a relationship channel and your recipients need to recognize that every time you send a communication you aren’t asking them to buy something,” Trivunovic says.
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