E-mail-driven sales jump 77% at Drs. Foster & Smith
Sales driven by e-mail marketing rose 77% year-over-year in the first quarter at pet supplies retailer Drs. Foster & Smith Inc., thanks to a multi-pronged strategy including Can-Spam compliance and coupon promotions, Gordon Magee, Internet marketing and analysis manager, tells InternetRetailer.com.
“E-mail sales are up dramatically from a year ago, following a dramatic rise last year over the prior year,” says Magee, who will speak at the Internet Retailer 2006 Conference in Chicago in June on the topic, “Search Engine Marketing: The No. 1 Online Marketing Tool.” He adds that this year’s first-quarter total sales are also up by a double-digit increase.
One e-mailed coupon promotion that has worked particularly well was the recent “$8 for 8 Questions” survey, which asked customers eight brief multiple-choice questions regarding what they liked about certain products. The coupon incentive helped to produce a 25% response rate for the survey, which provided data the retailer used to tweak its products and improve marketing and merchandising programs.
“It let the customer tells us what they want, rather than us just offering what we want to sell them,” Magee says. Drs. Foster & Smith is No. 80 in the Internet Retailer Top 400 Guide to Retail Web Sites.
As an extra benefit, he adds, the coupon offer also boosted sales. The coupons offered about 10% off or more on a minimum purchase of about $80. “The coupons only went to a sample of customers, so it wasn’t a huge increase in sales, but it offset the cost of the survey,” Magee says.
Complying with the e-mail provisions of the Can-Spam Act, including noticeable opt-out links subject headings that accurately reflect the content of the e-mail message, Magee says, “make for a good long-term relationship and create a positive climate of trust between the customer and the company.”
Drs. Foster & Smith has also been careful not to send too many e-mails, Magee adds.
“If a company over-mails, what may develop is a segment of people who are irritated or bored or both, and therefore less likely to respond,” he says. “E-mailing less can effectively be a ‘list-cleansing’ activity in reverse, in that a weak segment of irritated or bored e-mail customers is not being created.”
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