Cell Phone Marketing

I'm Honored

Monday, November 2, 2009 by Joel Book

Vote for the Most Influential People in Sales Lead Management in 2009

I am really honored to have been nominated as one of the Most Influential People in Sales Lead Management in 2009 and would sincerely appreciate your vote.

When I was notified about my nomination last week by Jim Obermayer, Executive Director of the Sales Lead Management Association (SLMA), I was humbled because the list of nominees includes so many of the top professionals in our industry – including ExactTarget’s CEO, Scott Dorsey.

Voting is open until November 13th. Both SLMA members and non-members can vote for up to five nominees. You can view a full list of finalists here.

Taco John’s and Scotts Highlight MarketingProfs Digital Marketing Mixer

The recent MarketingProfs Digital Marketing Mixer conference in Chicago attracted more than 300 interactive marketing professionals and was a huge success. Congratulations to Anne Handley and her team for producing a first-rate event.

Among the conference speakers were Renee Middleton of Taco John’s and Kip Edwardson of Scotts. Both joined me in presenting a special session to a standing-room-only audience titled, “Email, Social and Mobile. The New Triangle Offense of 1to1 Marketing.” Renee and Kip are on the cutting edge of one-to-one marketing, and discussed how they are using email in combination with social networks and SMS text messaging to attract consumers to their websites, convert them to email subscribers, and use email to drive consumers to retail stores. What they are doing – and the results they are achieving – serves as a great example of what’s possible when you match the right strategy to the right technology.

If you were not able to attend the conference, and would like to get a copy of our presentation, leave a note in the comments and we'll get you a copy!

Real vs. Perceived Threats to Email: Part 1 - Addressing Misperceptions

Wednesday, October 21, 2009 by Morgan Stewart

The now infamous Wall Street Journal article announcing the death of email sparked a fire in the bellies of email marketers and social media gurus alike. The overwhelming response is that social media is not posing a significant threat to email. To date, all the signs seem to indicate that these two channels will continue to evolve together.

True, there are dissenting voices. However, I have found none that are backed by credible statistical data. Since there is no statistical validity in personal anecdotes, I don’t care (except for the value they provide in forming hypotheses to be tested in future research). I care about what well-founded research tells us about the world at large.

Here is a list of the data sources I have located that reveal the truth about the current state of email use and email marketing:

Pew Internet & American Life: Online Activities Trends

79% of Americans use the Internet
90% of online Americans use email, making it the most popular online activity
57% of Americans check email daily

MarketingSherpa

78% of users email friends a link to information they wish to share with friends over the internet.
22% share through social media
MarketingSherpa’s research directly contradicts research released earlier this year from AddToAny, which suggested people share information twice as often through Facebook as they do through email. However, there were serious issues with the AddToAny research.

USC Annenberg Digital Future Report

How Many Americans Are Using E-mail? -- Almost everyone who goes online uses e-mail (97 percent of all Internet users).
Regular Contact by E-mail -- E-mail users maintain weekly personal e-mail contact with an average of seven people in the current study, down from the peak of nine in 2006. Forty-nine percent of e-mail users said they maintain personal contact by e-mail on a weekly basis with five or more people.

Participatory Marketing Network

Email (26 percent) and text messaging (26 percent) are the activities least likely to be "given up for a week," followed by TV (15 percent), talking on phone (11 percent), visiting social networks (nine percent), reading magazines (seven percent) and visiting non social network sites (six percent).

Pontifelx / Harris Interactive Survey

96% of online adults who have actually taken the step of providing brands personal information have shared their email addresses with marketers
12% of online adults have been willing to share information like their Facebook user name or their Twitter handle with a brand in exchange for information or promotional offers

SmartBreif on Social Media

While not nationally representative, this poll is interesting in that is suggests even social media professionals are not significantly curtailing their use of email.

59% of SmartBreif on Social Media readers (likely to have a heavy disposition toward social media use) report their use of email has stayed about the same despite the growth of social networks.
28% are using slightly less often
11% are using more often
2% of these readers rarely use email

ExactTarget – Is Email Marketing Endangered?

We asked a question similar to the SmartBreif poll, however, the question excludes marketers—so it is a better representation of the population at large.

Net 25% of online consumers report using social networks more often over the past 6 months (42% using more often, 17% using less often)
Net 23% of online consumers report using email more often over the past 6 months (29% using more often, 6% using less often)
Net 21% of online consumers report using text messaging more often over the past 6 months (38% using more often, 17% using less often)
71% of smartphone owners report sending more PERSONAL email on their smartphones than BUSINESS related email—it’s not all business.

ExactTarget – 2009 Channel Preferences Study

57% of online consumers use email most often to send written messages to their friends, over text messaging (24%) and social networks (10%)
75% of online consumers prefer to receive permission-based promotional messages through email—up 3.6% from 2008—followed by 17% who prefer direct mail promotions and 4% who prefer text promotions.
More than half of online consumers have made a purchase as the direct result of and email message they received, more than any other online communication channel.

Forrester Consulting – Customer Knowledge is Marketer Power

34% of marketers believe email will become more effective over the next two years, 19% believe it will be less effective
Asked why marketers believe email will be more effective:
- 74% believe their email communications are getting more relevant
- 58% see email as an integral part of their multichannel activities
- 44% believe customers prefer email as a marketing channel

That is not to say there are not threats to the future success of email. Stay tuned for part two where I share insights from a panel I moderated at Connections last week where Julie Katz from Forrester, Rebecca Lieb from eConsultancy, and Stefan Tornquist from MarketingSherpa were asked to share their takes on the real versus perceived threats to email marketing.

Mobile Developers Solution Showcase

Wednesday, October 14, 2009 by Amanda Cross

Ratul Shah is the presenter for the first part of the solution showcase. Unlike every other presenter that's talked in this room so far today, Ratul is maneuvering through the crowd with the hand-held mic. What a showman. :)

Industry Standard Terms

SMS = short message service, aka text messaging. It has a 160 character limit.
MO = mobile originated = a message sent FROM a phone
MT = mobile terminated = a message sent TO a phone
short code = a 5- or 6-digit number that you buy from a carrier to send messages to your customers. http://www.usshortcodes.com
vanity short code = a short code that spells something out, such as our, ETSMS
random short code = a short code that doesn't intentionally spell anything. These cost slightly less.
private short code = only your traffic goes through this code
shared short code = a code that you share with other SMS users. Keywords differentiate your traffic from the traffic of other people on the shared short codes.
MMA = Mobile Marketing Association http://mmaglobal.com/policies. A group that creates guidelines for United States mobile marketing.
Aggregator = a third party company that maintains connections between the carriers and the content providers. When we provisioning a short code for you, we work with an aggregator to get you approved for all carriers.

ExactTarget SMS Architecture
You create JOIN, VOTE, HELP, UNSUBSCRIBE and other kinds of actions that subscribers use to send you MO messages to get in on your mobile messages.

Unfortunately, you can't create keywords or actions in the API at this point. You can initiate SMS sends through the API, however.

System Terms

Subscriber key = unique identifier for subscribers. Allows you to identify subscribers by phone number instead of email address.
Publication list = contains subscribers who opt-in using their mobile device
Data extension = contains subscribers whom you import through the GUI or the API

Implementing Text

Keyword response - text in and receive a response
Mobile capture - captures email address for list growth
Vote and check vote count - submit your vote. poll the response
Outbound (with opt-in) - a message from ExactTarget to the mobile device
Custom campaigns

Wow, Ratul goes through a lot of content fast, and a lot of these slides are very graphics heavy and difficult to translate to blog. Thankfully, everyone at the conference is supposed to be able to get the slides.

FanMail Solution

Dave DeVore - CEO FanMail marketing
Josiah Kaiser - Senior Operations and Solutions Consultant
Tim Kauble - ExactTarget product specialist and world-class AMPscript guru

FanMail Marketing is using SMS to capture email addresses. Initially they were asking subscriber to text their email addresses in this format:

krohn email@example.com to 88769

but they found that customers found this confusing and made errors that prevented the system from capturing their information. So for the next phase, they made it into a 2-stage process to make it more like a conversation. In the new setup, subscribers text in in this format:

stubbs to 88769

then the system sends back an text saying something to the effect of, "Thanks for your interest. Reply to this message with your email address to join our mailing list." When the subscriber responds with the email address, it is added to the email list. The customer gets an email immediately welcoming them to the list, and then any future mailings to that list.

The SMS message that was sent back after the first message included AMPscript to trigger the welcome email.

The first use case resulted in more errors than the second, and people weren't willing to try to sign up more than once. A limitation of both use cases is that it only captures people's email addresses, omitting other important subscriber information that would be useful for relevant messaging .

In the third phase of FanMail's SMS evolution, they integrated their SMS with landing pages to allow the capture of more subscriber information. People text in:

butter to 88769

The system responds with a message saying to respond with an email address. When the subscriber replies with the email address, the system sends them an email with a link to a landing page built with the Smart Capture feature. People complete the Smart Capture form and now the system has information to send really personalized information. For example, this band (Hot Buttered Rum) uses the subscriber's ZIP code to let the subscriber know about upcoming concerts in their area.

What FanMail discovered was that going through this process aggregated higher quality subscribers who were more likely to be engaged with the marketing campaigns and therefore higher ROI on their marketing efforts.

The future phases of this SMS evolution may allow subscriber to provide attribute information via SMS, such as ZIP code to empower the functionality above.

Another thing that FanMail has discovered is that subscribers are willing to send you SMS messages if they're interested in what you have to offer, but they don't like for you to begin the SMS conversation.

Custom Use Case
Tim Kauble took the stage for the final portion of this presentation. Poor Tim--his phone junked out on him this morning and his data connection didn't work, so we're seeing a modified version of his presentation. Typical of technology!

Tim talked about designing a system to allow him to manage his own tasks using text messages. He wanted to accomplish the following:

Accept tasks
Assign those tasks
Assign priority, including deadlines
Expose the tasks to landing pages so that he could see them all
Support multiple methods of input, such a forwarding emails to an endpoint that generates a task with the content of the email.

Tim demonstrated texting in to the system to find out how many tasks he had. He had 30, by the way, plus the system also sent him a message to stop messing around with text messages and get back to work. :)

Tim also brought up the landing page where we could see his lengthy task list--such is the life of the ExactTarget employee!

Live Blog: SMS Text Messaging for Marketers Helps Increase Subscriber Engagement

Wednesday, October 14, 2009 by Amanda Berkey

Today at Connections 2009, I spoke on an industry panel about how SMS Text Messaging fits into the one-to-one marketing campaigns. We had four customers on the panel share their mature SMS marketing strategies. Hearing from the US Navy, Indianapolis Symphony Orchestra, Pier 1 Imports, and Hyperdrive Interactive, the attendees heard one common element throughout each story. In every case, text messages were used to improve subscriber engagement, marked with explicit permission.

The reason why SMS mobile marketing is so successful is because people always have their mobile phones with them, but they may not have their computers handy. People don't leave home without their mobile phones. And as marketers are looking for ways to set themselves apart in the marketplace, SMS mobile marketing can help give them an edge.

Based on the 2009 Channel Preference Study whitepaper, consumers surveyed say they want to receive SMS mobile messages with expressed permission for companies to send transactional messages, time-sensitive alerts such as flight notifications, and operational alerts such as banking messages for suspicious account activities. The key learning for marketers to is understand which messaging channel their subscribers prefer for different types of messages.

A best practice to solve this challenge is to collect your subscriber's preference for marketing channels they prefer for various message types in the future. For marketers considering SMS text messaging, the first step is supporting inbound Text to capture new subscribers to your future drip marketing campaigns.

Capitalizing on real-time interest when you have prospects' attention at a live event or retail location, gives the marketer new possibilities. Seasoned marketers know that offering incentives to potential texters helps drive people to participate in these new campaigns.

When Pier 1 launched their first SMS campaign they captured new subscribers in a younger demographic for future email marketing campaigns. Subsequent drip marketing emails featured a message with a youthful tone and unique offers to help drive conversion. Read more from their story in Mobile Marketer. Texters were incented to engage in order to enter the sweepstakes to win a free Pier 1 Papasan Chair.

Text messaging is all over Connections this year, powered by ExactTarget Text. Check out SMS marketing program examples.

Sending SMS Messages? Make Sure You are in Compliance with New SMS Regulations.

Friday, October 2, 2009 by Phil Schott

If you're an ExactTarget client using SMS to enable targeted 1 to 1 communications you should have received an email on October 1, 2009, informing you of a change to industry regulations.

Here's what the email stated:

Beginning October 1, 2009, industry regulations state that the phrase "Standard Message charges apply" is no longer acceptable as standard messaging in SMS communications. For all digital advertising formats and message flows, one of the following phrases must be used in its place:

Message and Data Rates May Apply
Msg&Data Rates May Apply
Msg&data rates may apply
Msg&data rates may aply

View the ExactTarget SMS Regulation resource page for more information and helpful links to ensure that your Text Messaging campaign and communication programs are compliant.

If you have any questions about this change, please contact Deliverability Services at deliverability@exacttarget.com.

Huge Opportunity for Travel Industry to Leverage Social Media

Monday, September 28, 2009 by Blaine Cooper-Surma

With the third quarter coming to a close, and the holiday season approaching, it's about that time to begin making holiday vacation arrangements. Personally, every year I travel to Florida to spend the holidays with my family. So how am I getting down to the beautiful, sunny weather this year? When it comes to planning my trips, I always purchase my flights online - quickly and painlessly.

There certainly is a buzz right now around social media in the marketing world. eMarketer.com recently published the results of one of their surveys that analyzed the percentage of internet users that have been influenced by social media in making their travel/vacation decisions. eMarketer found that 23 percent of respondents, who happen to be U.S. internet users, have been somewhat or significantly influenced by social media when it comes to making travel/vacation decisions.

Although just less than a quarter of these people noted the effectiveness of social media in influencing their decisions, this still is an enormous audience that travel companies are reaching. As I've already pointed out, I fall into the 23 percent of people that have made or changed travel plans due to some sort of social media. A month or so ago I noticed an ad on Twitter that boasted cheap flights to Orlando, and within minutes had scheduled a trip across the country. I see this as a huge opportunity for the travel industry to offer travel deals that are specific to Facebook and Twitter, as both of these social networking platforms have such an enormous user base.

Large social media platforms also have the ability to use 1 to 1 marketing techniques by pulling travel locations from user info in order to provide users with more relevant content - for example, if I lived in Anchorage, Alaska, it is likely that I would be interested in going on vacation somewhere a little bit more like Key West. Once the user has purchased the trip, travel sites like Expedia.com send a confirmation email that contains the travel itinerary and purchase information. In addition, travel companies have the ability to take this one step further by instituting an SMS campaign that sends customers an SMS message letting them know if their flight is on time - I know this is something that many frequent travelers appreciate and certainly take advantage of.

As soon as you've identified your 23 percent and have built your subscriber list, you are now able to send automated email messages that every-so-often offer your subscribers different travel deals and opportunities. As I pointed out in my last post, email marketing is still the best internet marketing channel and is sure to be around for a good while longer.

To see another example of how social media has benefitted personal travel arrangements, check out Liz's post.

SMS and Voice Campaigns at College Career Fairs

Thursday, September 24, 2009 by Kristeen Hudson

Recently, ExactTarget has been making appearances at college career fairs. One way that ExactTarget distinguishes itself from the other companies is by featuring some of its own technologies such as SMS messages and voice campaigns.

When students visit the ExactTarget booth they are given a costar that has a short code and a keyword that will allow the student to sign up for a SMS campaign (see picture). Once they sign up for the drip campaign they will receive a text message, voicemail, and an email detailing the positions available to college students.

This same process can be used in other venues such as trade shows or special events. According to an interview of Patrick Moorhead, these types of extremely targeted campaigns create an unusually high unique click though rate. An SMS campaign cannot only separate your company from the crowd, it also provides your subscribers with valuable information.

For more information about starting a text campaign for your next big event check out the whitepaper Text Is Next.

It Pays to Be Like Mike

Friday, September 4, 2009 by Joel Book

Mike’s Express Carwash is a chain of 37 carwashes located across Indiana and Ohio. They recently announced that their email marketing program had enabled the company to boost online sales in June by more than 60 percent over June 2008 totals.

Email gives us a way to reward our loyal customers,” said Sally Grant, marketing director of Mike’s Express Carwash. “We’ve also been able to build a great list of highly-engaged customers and send them special offers and discounts to thank them for their loyalty and drive increased sales.”

What I really like about Mike’s is how they invite the customer to become an email subscriber.

Customers are invited to participate in the email campaign when they purchase a car wash. Every receipt includes a unique offer code and provides a link to the survey site (www.talktomikes.com). Customers log on to the Website, enter the unique receipt code and their email address and then complete a two-question survey. Once the survey is submitted, the data is immediately sent to ExactTarget’s Application Program Interface (API) which automatically triggers an email to the customer that includes a bar-coded coupon for a free car wash. To prevent multiple uses of the same coupon, the company uses ExactTarget’s Live Content feature to automatically generate a new bar-code for every coupon. Data from each coupon barcode is automatically uploaded to Mike’s Express’ point of sale system to ensure the code is only recognized once.

Does this email opt-in strategy work? You bet it does!

In August, Mike’s Car Wash ran a “Back To School” campaign that offered customers a free carwash in exchange for completing an online customer satisfaction survey and subscribing to its email marketing program. The 10-day campaign added more than 40,000 new customers to the company’s email subscriber list!

You Can Be Like Mike

Whether it’s implementing Triggered Email Promotions based on POS Customer Data Capture, or using SMS text messaging to capture new email subscribers, marketers like Mike’s Car Wash are proving that email marketing is smart. And successful email marketing begins with a well-planned subscriber acquisition strategy.

If you want to be like Mike, gives us a call. We'll be happy to help.

The Latest One to One Marketing Solutions With iLab - Omniture Test and Target

Thursday, August 27, 2009 by Jeff Cunning

iLab at ExactTarget is always rolling out new products, solutions, features, and functionalities for your benefit. Recent innovations include Impression Tracking for Dynamic Content or AMPscript, Outbound Text Messaging with a Shared Short Code, and International Text Messaging. Some spaces still remain so don't wait any longer to become our newest partner in innovation.

This week, we are excited to release Omniture Test & Target. And in iLab, it's not just another affordable email marketing solution--it's free! This new feature is a conversion product that allows marketers to test subscriber interaction with website design, content, navigation, and campaigns. Test results can be accessed in real time and used to target marketing offers, products, and content to different segments or individuals in order to create the most effective campaigns.

Whether it's B2B or B2C, access iLab today to sign up for Omniture Test & Target and take the next step in delivering the most relevant information to your subscribers!

Truly a One-to-One Marketing Company, Not Just an Email Service Provider

Wednesday, August 26, 2009 by Kyle Schroeder

As I am looking back over the 14 weeks that I have been here this summer, one of the biggest things that has hit me is that ExactTarget is not just an email marketing company. They are not just an email service provider. They are truly a one to one marketing company that has a full line of products to help increase the marketing ROI for a company.

Yes, we do email. We actually send some of the most intelligent and customer-driven email through our dynamic content capabilities.

But what else is in our product line?

SMS: We have the ability to develop and execute powerful SMS text message campaigns to engage customers on the spot.

Voice: We have a product that can send targeted and specific messages to consumers by telephone. Adding this personal touch moves a company way beyond simple TV advertisements.

Landing Pages: These microsites enable users of ExactTarget’s already powerful email software platform the chance to call customers to action through a targeted website, designed specifically for the particular action.

When a company uses all four of these tools together, they have the ability to become a very sophisticated marketer that engages consumers in a relevant way.

Kyle Schroeder
Slingshot Summer Intern

E-Coupons are HOT! (Even if the economy is not.)

Monday, August 24, 2009 by Joel Book

As reported in last week’s online issue of MEDIAWEEK, “8.6 million (or 8 percent) of U.S. households currently acquire coupons via text messages and/or email.” This finding is from a recent report from Scarborough Research.

The article noted that “a number of factors have contributed to the increasing use of text or e-mail coupons, such as the increased usage of cell phones and other personal communications devices, which allow consumers to access offers at the point of purchase. And because consumers must opt in to receive the coupons, they tend to be more targeted.”

Gordmans’ Birthday E-Coupon is a Winner

Email is the direct marketing workhorse for Gordmans, an Omaha-based retailer of ELP (Everyday Low Price) merchandise. The company, with 65 stores throughout the Midwest, uses e-coupons to “congratulate” its customers on their birthday by sending a bar-coded coupon worth $5 off their next purchase.

Results:
70.5% Open Rate
4.3% Conversion Rate (of delivered)
6.0% Conversion Rate (of opened)

Most importantly, the average sales receipt for customers redeeming the “Happy Birthday” coupon is 33% higher than average!

Looking for Retail Marketing Horsepower?

In today’s highly competitive retail environment, it’s more important than ever to employ a multichannel marketing program that includes digital one-to-one communications—and gives customers exactly what they want, when they want it.

Whether it’s implementing Personalized E-coupon Solutions, POS Customer Data Capture for Triggered Email Promotions, or using SMS to capture new email subscribers, ExactTarget can help.

Email and Text Coupon Use on the Rise

Thursday, August 20, 2009 by Morgan Stewart

We are in the midst of a recession and a massive shift in how the world consumes information at the same time. Consumers are cutting their spending due to their need to lower costs while there are more resources available to them to find ways to lower their costs through an ever growing array of online and digital tools.

And coupons are at the crossroads.

Yesterday, Mediaweek ran Scarborough: Text, E-Mail Coupons Growing in Popularity sharing new data from Scarborough Research about how U.S. households acquire coupons. Their highlights include:

8.6 million (or 8 percent) of U.S. households currently acquire coupons via text messages and/or email.
Sunday newspapers are still the most popular way households obtain coupons at 51 percent
The top market for text and/or e-mail coupon users is Providence, R. I., where 12 percent of households obtain coupons via text or e-mail, followed by Washington, D.C.; Atlanta, Ga.; San Diego, Calif.; Austin, Texas; and Chicago, Ill., all at 11 percent.
7 percent obtain coupons through internet sites, compared to 8 percent who acquire them through email and/or text

The full list was made available in a press release titled, More than 8.6 Million Households Obtain Coupons via Text Messages and/or Email.

Surprising to me is the finding that more households acquire coupons through text or email than they do through coupon sites, expecially given the meteoric increase in coupon site traffic last year. It just goes to highlight the increasing importance of usind email and text messaging to distribute coupons which was articulated well by Scarborough's Gary Meo, "Coupons received via text messaging are typically sent only to consumers who have opted in to receive them. This increases the relevancy of the offer and the potential for the consumer to act on that offer."

Connections ’09 Brings Big Surprises

Wednesday, August 19, 2009 by Lindsay Niemiec

Connections ’09–deemed the largest one-to-one marketing conference in the country–is only 60 short days away! Now, I don’t know about you folks out there, but I can guarantee that everyone at ExactTarget is pretty excited for that second week in October. Aside from the anticipation of a full year’s planning, we get to spend a full week with our customers, while delivering the best knowledge in the industry. How, you ask? With over 30 breakout sessions divided into five unique tracks perfect for everyone in your office. Don’t forget about our keynote speakers including Malcolm Gladwell, Kelly Mooney, Marlee Matlin. And of course the double dose of networking and fun during our two unique evening events!

So, what do you pack for this experience? Well, don’t forget your cell phone (or charger for that matter). We love our text messaging platform so much, and we cannot wait to show you all its capabilities. Do you enjoy a morning run but not familiar with the area? No problem, watch your phone for an invite via text for a morning jog with the ET marketing team and fellow marketers. Running not your thing? There will be plenty of opportunities to text in and win prizes (VIP treatment anyone?). And of course, you’ll have the ability to request your favorite session’s presentations through a simple text message.

If this isn’t enough to whet your appetite, call me personally…no seriously. I could go on for days about my excitement for Connections and if you haven’t signed up yet, I urge you to do so soon. Last year we sold out and I know that this year’s event will do the same.

Permission-Based Email Marketing: SMS eNewsletter Sign-ups

Tuesday, August 18, 2009 by Kyle Schroeder

I was eating dinner this week in a local fast food restaurant in Anderson, IN and they had a giant box sitting on the counter that encouraged customers to sign-up for their email list.

Since I work for an email marketing company: they got me.

I signed up.

What was good about this?

1. Subscribers are opting-in to the communication.

2. The database is going to be subscribers who want regular communication.

How could this be improved?

1. Convert from paper to SMS. Instead of having me fill out a slip of paper with my contact information, have me opt in by text message.

2. Follow-up and engage immediately. I still have yet to receive any communication and it has been 3 days later. By the time I receive their first “welcome email”, will I still want communication?

This type of SMS campaign can be developed through the email marketing software powered by ExactTarget. SMS campaigns can instantly capture and engage subscribers by simply texting a keyword to a short code. The system replies with a confirmation text and then can ask for an email address in step 2.

You have now grabbed my cell phone number and my email address, two valuable pieces of information that can build a bigger and stronger email marketing program.

Have you considered ExactTarget?

Kyle Schroeder

Slingshot Summer Intern

The Entertainment Industry is Using Text Messaging to Engage their Audience

Tuesday, August 18, 2009 by Kristeen Hudson

Normally cell phone usage is fronded upon within the entertainment industry. When you attend a concert, play, or movie the audience is normally told more than once to turn off their cell phones. The fact of the matter is people are bringing cell phones to these events, and they are probably even using them for texting purposes during the show. Why not use this to your advantage and engage your audience using SMS text marketing?

The Indianapolis Symphony is a great example of using text marketing within the entertainment industry. In an attempt to engage a younger crowd the symphony had its audience text in their request for the encore song. This is a great way to make the audience feel more involved.

They Indianapolis Symphony also has numerous shows outdoors. Printed on all the tickets is a short code where patrons can send a text to get show cancelation information. This is not only convenient for the patron but once set up it requires no effort on the symphony’s end. This same SMS text message marketing technology can also be used for professional sporting events or any other outdoor entertainment activity.

These are two great examples of how SMS mobile text marketing can be used within the entertainment industry. If you would like to learn more about SMS text marketing and how it can be combined with targeted email marketing check out the whitepaper: Text is Next.

How To Sell Virtual Goods Using Email and SMS Marketing

Friday, August 14, 2009 by Kevin Nuest

So you think you want to sell virtual goods for a living? First you have to understand what a virtual good is. According to Wikipedia, “Virtual goods are non-physical objects that are purchased and exchanged on the internet.” Pretty vague definition. As an example, most people thing of items in online games such as World of Warcraft and Second Life as the only virtual goods being exchanged.

What about those virtual flowers you bought on Facebook and sent to your significant other? Or maybe it was a martini or beer glass you sent to your friends on Facebook to commemorate an unforgettable night out. According to eMarketer, the market for virtual goods is on the rise and will reach nearly $2.5 billion by 2013!

A great way for creators of virtual content to claim their piece of the pie is to market their masterpieces using Email and SMS text messages. For example, someone that regularly creates and sells backgrounds for Twitter can begin to amass a following. Why not allow customers to opt-in for a weekly, personalized email notifying them of newly released backgrounds that may be of interest to them based on previous purchases. This type of One to One Email Marketing campaign has a huge ROI compared to that of other traditional methods of advertising.

Maybe you create games or programs for the iPhone. You can send customers an SMS text message when you release new add-ons, updated versions, or products that are similar to something the customer already downloaded from you. Of course all of this can be automated, leaving you with more time to make amazing creations.

Where To Find New One-to-One Marketing Software

Friday, August 14, 2009 by Jeff Cunning

Want to improve your marketing strategy? Need affordable email marketing software? The Innovations Lab, commonly referred to as iLab, is the perfect place to enhance your one-to-one marketing efforts. We release our newest features to iLab first where clients can access them in exchange for providing us with valuable feedback. iLab is located in ExactTarget's 3sixty user community--clients can login and view current, former, and future innovations and sign up to have the available features automatically enabled. During the test process, clients will also be able to complete a short survey and phone interview to help influence future product enhancements.

A couple examples of recent innovations are Live Images and Simplified Landing Pages. Live Images allows you to change image content in emails after they're already sent. Simplified Landing Pages offers the ability to create a landing page in just minutes by boiling the process down to a few simple steps. New innovations will continue to arrive and become available to any user--although spaces are limited--on a first come, first serve basis.

Innovations that are set to become available soon include SMS solutions 1) Global Text and 2) Outbound Text Messaging with a Shared Short Code as well as new tracking capabilities with 1) Impression Tracking for Dynamic Content and 2) Impression Tracking for AMPscript. Login to iLab today or join the iLab group in 3sixty to stay up-to-date with the latest and greatest features!

Text Message Marketing is for Everyone - Including Retail

Tuesday, August 11, 2009 by Kevin Nuest

It seems like no matter where you go these days, people are texting on their phones. While they walk down the street, while they’re in meetings, while they eat lunch, hopefully not while they drive – the extendable thumb is going to work feverishly to stay in touch with family and friends.

So as a retail marketer trying to hit your audience with the appropriate four P’s “Price, Product, Place, and Promotion”, text message marketing seems to be an increasingly popular channel. Enacting permission-based SMS campaigns can create a competitive advantage for marketers looking to provide customers with urgent, portable, and appropriately timed messages.

Text messages serve as instant messages - which can include deals, promotions, coupons, and more - to your customers that are easy to track and serve as a green alternative to redeeming coupons or other promotions. And what’s even better is that under ExactTarget’s integregrated 1-to-1 Platform, marketers can manage not only this element of SMS marketing, but also Email, Voice, and Landing Pages from a single platform and vendor, saving you more time to do some text messaging of your own.

Learn More about integrating SMS marketing into your campaigns. Read, Text is Next: Marketing with SMS.

SMS Mobile Marketing Ideas

Friday, August 7, 2009 by Megan Sabine

SMS Mobile Marketing. It’s all a buzz in the market right now, but are you having trouble thinking of ways it can help your business? Well hopefully the ideas listed below will help get the wheels turning on how your organization can benefit from SMS mobile marketing.

SMS Mobile Marketing to Grow Email Marketing Lists
Here at ExactTarget, we call this Text Capture. It allows a subscriber to opt in to your email communications via SMS. If you are a brick & mortar shop looking for a way to grow your email marketing list, why not place a promotion at your register prompting your most engaged segment – your customers – to opt-in to your email marketing programs. And once they have, reward them with a coupon on their phone that they can use on that purchase or a later one.

SMS Mobile Marketing to Reward Loyal Customers
Allow your customers to opt-in to receive outbound SMS mobile marketing messages from you. Use those messages to entice your customers to engage with products at your store or website to redeem a SMS subscriber-only coupon. Your SMS savvy customers will enjoy this new way of receiving coupons or deals.

SMS Mobile Marketing to Deliver Timely Messages
Perhaps the most recognizable SMS mobile marketing use case is to deliver alerts. It’s unrealistic to think that your customers are always in a place where they can access their email when they need to read an alert from your company. On the other hand, it’s more realistic that they will have access to their cell phones during that time.

SMS Mobile Marketing to Deliver Presentation Materials
This is one that ExactTarget has experienced success with. Historically, audience members had to wait a day or two to receive presentation materials – and possibly getting caught back up in the day-to-day grind. By allowing audience members to text in to receive the presentation materials via email while they are still watching the presentation (and the most engaged with the topic) you are continuing the engagement before it has had time to die down.

Hopefully the list above helps you get the wheels turning for how your organization can benefit from the power of SMS mobile marketing! For more ideas, be sure to check out ExactTarget's Field Guide to SMS - "Text is Next: Marketing with SMS."

7 Awesome Ways to Wow Your Customers Using Voice on Your eCommerce Site

Thursday, August 6, 2009 by Bob Ullery

Start with this:
Txt ecommerce to 38767

Let's face it. The internet is saturated with other eCommerce sites selling the exact same stuff that you do. Maybe yours is higher quality or less expensive than the ones the other guys are selling. But ultimately, it's the same stuff to the customer.

Even though your customers have a wide variety of competitors to purchase the same stuff from, why do they buy from you? Sure, price is a usual suspect, but as any eRetailer will tell you, repeat sales often boil down to customer loyalty and first time buying decisions are often generated from the customer's first impression of YOU, not your product.

So, how do you wow existing customers so that they become a champion of your company? How do you engage potential customers so their first impression is positive? One way is to communicate with them on a personal level, in the format they want. It's called 1 to 1 marketing. You could send email, even a txt message, shoot you could send a letter - but wouldn't it be way cool if you could just TALK to them? You can - with ExactTarget's Voice Marketing platform.

This article covers 7 awesome ways that eCommerce sites can leverage ExactTarget's Voice Technology into their marketing and customer communication strategies. Wow!

1. 'Voice-to-a-Friend'
Your customers have all seen the standard send-to-a-friend form on product pages that sends information about the product to their friend. These are all-good by themselves, but what if we could type in our friend's phone number and have someone TELL them about the product? We can!

'Hey Bob, your friend Rob wanted to let you know that we have this new cool widget for sale on our site ______.com.'

But who should deliver the message? Read on.

2. 'Celebrity Product Endorsements'
Who better to tell your customers about your own product than someone who has no idea what it is!? We all know the power of celebrity. How cool would it be as a customer to receive a voice message from someone that I admire talking about how great your product is?

'Hey Bob, This is Michael Jordan. Buy these shoes and I think you could beat me in HORSE.'

What if we don't have any endorsement deals with celebrities? You could deliver the message from someone the subscriber could relate to. With ExactTarget segmentation technology, you could have a different spokesperson deliver the message depending on who the subscriber is. If the subscriber is a woman, she could hear a message spoken by a woman. You could even further segment by dialect. Californians could hear 'Hey bro'; Indiana - 'Hey dude'; New York - 'Capeesh'..... Capeesh?

3. Promo Code Via Phone
ExactTarget offers the only live offer engine in the industry. We can generate bar codes on the fly, mark an offer code as redeemed via interactions with your online payment systems, and even issue a unique code for each of your subscribers that tie directly back to them. That's all good, but we're talking about voice here people. Why don't you take those SAME codes, use our Text-to-Speech technology and excite your customers about receiving an exclusive code by calling them and telling them about it!

'Hey Bob. Use code ________ next time you buy something. You'll get 10% off.'

4. Shipping Alerts
'Hey Bob, your widget has just been shipped, just wanted to let you know personally.' - Nuff said.

5. Product In-Stock Notifications
Talk about awesome. You could leverage your inventory data, segment against subscribers who want to be notified when a product is back in stock, and send an email, sms or a VOICE message reminding them that they already made the decision to buy it:

'Hey Bob, remember that widget that you wanted to buy but wasn't in stock? Well, it's back in stock, and if you use promo code ________ we'll give you an extra 10% off if you buy today.'

6. Subscription Renewal Reminders
Personally remind your subscribers why they chose to subscribe to your offering in the first place:

'Hey Bob, your subscription for my thing is expiring next month. Are you planning on renewing? We sent emails to all of our non awesome customers but wanted to call all of the awesome ones personally.'

7. SMS to Voice (using voice and ExactTarget's SMS Application)
Here's a cool technique for offline conversions: SMS-to-Voice.
Your customers can text a keyword to your ExactTarget short-code and get a voice message sent to them instantly. In the middle there, ExactTarget can store their information, and even request for them to provide more of it via additional Text messages.

Many eCommerce sites market themselves on offline channels, but how can you convert those interactions? Maybe you can't convert them instantly, but you can start the conversation that does.

ExactTarget also offers a robust SMS API for custom integrations.

Automation
Did I mention that all of this can be completely AUTOMATED? Set it and forget it. Integrationless integration. It's a beautiful thing.

GIVE IT A SHOT
Txt ecommerce to 38767

So those were 7 awesome ways to wow your customers using voice. Do you have any ideas? Post them in the comment area below

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