Newslettersoft: software para el env�o de newsletters y campa�as de email marketing - Articles - Definitions

What is Viral Marketing?

no@spam.com (Isabel Sabad�) — Mon, 03 Sep 2007 16:42:06 CEST

Viral marketing and viral advertising refer to marketing techniques that use pre-existing social networks to produce increases in brand awareness, through self-replicating viral processes, analogous to the spread of pathological and computer viruses. It can be word-of-mouth delivered or enhanced by the network effects of the Internet. Viral marketing is a marketing phenomenon that facilitates and encourages people to pass along a marketing message voluntarily. Viral promotions may take the form of funny video clips, interactive Flash games, advergames, images, or even text messages.

It is claimed that a satisfied customer tells an average of three people about a product or service he/she likes, and eleven people about a product or service which he/she did not like. Viral marketing is based on this natural human behaviour.

The goal of marketers interested in creating successful viral marketing programs is to identify individuals with high Social Networking Potential (SNP) and create Viral Messages that appeal to this segment of the population and have a high probability of being passed along.

The term "viral marketing" is also sometimes used pejoratively to refer to stealth marketing campaigns--the use of varied kinds of astroturfing both online and offline to create the impression of spontaneous word of mouth enthusiasm.

Permission marketing

no@spam.com (Isabel Sabad�) — Wed, 29 Aug 2007 14:34:07 CEST

Permission marketing is a term used in e-marketing. Marketers will ask permission before they send advertisements to prospective customers. It is used by some Internet marketers, email marketers, and telephone marketers. It requires that people first "opt-in", rather than allowing people to "opt-out" only after the advertisements have been sent. The term was coined by Seth Godin in his book of the same name.

Marketers feel that this is a more efficient use of their resources because advertisements are not sent to people that are not interested in the product. This is one technique used by marketers that have a personal marketing orientation. They feel that marketing should be done on a one-to-one basis rather than using broad aggregated concepts like market segment or target market.

Types of email marketing messages

no@spam.com (Antxon Pous) — Wed, 29 Aug 2007 09:12:35 CEST

The three types of email marketing messages:

1. Direct email
Direct email involves sending a promotional message in the form of an email. It might be an announcement of a special offer, for example. Just as you might have a list of customer or prospect postal addresses to send your promotions too, so you can collect a list of customer or prospect email addresses.

You can also rent lists of email addresses from service companies. They'll let you send your message to their own address lists. These services can usually let you target your message according to, for example, the interests or geographical location of the owners of the email address.

2. Retention email
Instead of promotional email designed only to encourage the recipient to take action (buy something, sign-up for something, etc.), you might send out retention emails.
These usually take the form of regular emails known as newsletters. A newsletter may carry promotional messages or advertisements, but will aim at developing a long-term impact on the readers. It should provide the readers with value, which means more than just sales messages. It should contain information which informs, entertains or otherwise benefits the readers.

3. Advertising in other people's emails
Instead of producing your own newsletter, you can find newsletters published by others and pay them to put your advertisement in the emails they send their subscribers. Indeed, there are many email newsletters that are created for just this purpose - to sell advertising space to others.

These days, people are tired of receiving solicited email messages, and it is for this very reason that this type of advertising poses the biggest problem for the future. A more ethical approach to email marketing that is evolving is based on the idea of permission marketing. This is a complex subject and is an intensive, ongoing debate in the marketing community. Basically, you need to obtain proper permission concerning the intent of your commercial email before sending it. If you don´t obtain proper permission, the email receiver will see your message as spam. There has been a lot of discussion concerning the Spam industry and undesireable emails. That is why it is quickly becoming more important, now than ever to send specific emails exclusively based on permission, where the users have expressed their explicit consent to receive promotional emails.

Why is email marketing so popular?

no@spam.com (Ernest Argel�s) — Wed, 29 Aug 2007 09:09:11 CEST

Email marketing (on the Internet) is popular with companies because:

The advantage of a mailing list is clearly the ability to distribute information to a wide range of specific, potential customers at a relatively low cost.

Compared to other media investments such as direct mail or printed newsletters, it is less expensive.

An exact Return on investment can be tracked ("track to basket") and has proven to be high when done properly. Email marketing is often reported as second only to search marketing as the most effective online marketing tactic.

It is instant, as opposed to a mailed advertisement, an email arrives in a few seconds or minutes.

It lets the advertiser "push" the message to its audience, as opposed to a website that waits for customers to come in.

It is easy to track. An advertiser can track users via web bugs, bounce messages, un-subscribes, read-receipts, click-throughs, etc. These can be used to measure open rates, positive or negative responses, correlate sales with marketing.

Advertisers can generate repeat business affordably and automatically

Advertisers can reach substantial numbers of email subscribers who have opted in (consented) to receive email communications on subjects of interest to them

Over half of Internet users check or send email on a typical day.

Specific types of interaction with messages can trigger other messages to be automatically delivered.

Specific types of interaction with messages can trigger other events such as updating the profile of the recipient to indicate a specific interest category.

Green - email marketing is paper-free

What is email marketing?

no@spam.com (Antxon Pous) — Sun, 05 Aug 2007 09:15:16 CEST

Email marketing is a form of direct marketing which uses electronic mail as a means of communicating commercial or fundraising messages to an audience. In its broadest sense, every email sent to a potential or current customer could be considered email marketing. However, the term is usually used to refer to:

Sending emails with the purpose of enhancing the relationship of a merchant with its current or old customers and to encourage customer loyalty and repeat business.

Sending emails with the purpose of acquiring new customers or convincing old customers to buy something immediately.

Adding advertisements in emails sent by other companies to their customers.

Emails that are being sent on the Internet (Email did and does exist outside the Internet, Network Email, FIDO etc.)