A recent survey examines what email marketing tactics get the attention of and action from moms.
Those of you in my age bracket or beyond may remember the days of the retailer catalog. I'm not talking about the 20-page LL Bean or Sharper Image "brochure" homes receive today. I'm referring to the phonebook-size Sears and Penny's catalogs that were chock full of every type of merchandise imaginable.
At Christmas time, my parents doled out these behemoths to my sister and me, letting us scour the pages in order to create our gift wish lists. As fun as this was for us, I realize today that it also made life for my mom -- the primary gift buyer -- easier.
With catalogs being a thing of the past, mothers today turn to the internet. comScore Media Metrix calculates that more than 15.5 million women aged 25 to 44 with children use the internet at home. And a November 2004 study by Lucid Marketing and BSM Media found that email in particular influenced the buying decisions of 71 percent of survey subjects, with 88 percent reporting that they "sometimes" or "often" made purchases based on email they receive.
Armed with this information, Lucid Marketing partnered with EmailLabs to better identify the email marketing tactics that get the attention of moms and get them to respond.
Lucid sent moms email invitations requesting participation in the survey, offering the opportunity to win one of three $100 Amazon.com gift certificates as an incentive to participate. The company hosted the 23-question survey online and collected the data through a web page. Six hundred and ninety five moms with young children and with varying work status completed the survey. Response data was collected between May 18th and May 31st, 2005.
The results
Lucid and EmailLabs confirmed that moms are very active email users and that email marketing is a significant influencer of their purchase decisions. As many as 44 percent of moms who responded have two email accounts, and 74 percent have their own accounts which are not shared with other family members. More than half of the respondents check their email more than twice a day.
Despite this reliance on email, moms are discerning when it comes to opting in to receive email. The survey found that 63 percent of moms subscribe to only one to five newsletters/promotions. What's more, 30 percent always uncheck the opt-in box when making an online purchase. However, 59 percent indicated that their decision to opt-in is based on the perceived value that they will receive.
What do they find valuable?
Moms place significant value in discounts and coupons. They are the reason why 87 percent of moms sign up for retail email newsletters/promotions. Coupons lead the pack as the most popular characteristic moms are looking for from retailers’ newsletters. Discounted prices (72 percent) and free shipping (60 percent) also topped the list.
"The survey is consistent with the results our clients are used to seeing when they add coupons to their regular customer communications," says Jeff Weitzman, president & COO, Coupons, Inc. "Our data show email newsletters with coupons see two to three times higher open rates and three to five times higher clickthrough rates on average than similar communications without coupons.
"Coupons are very effective in making email highly anticipated consumer communications," continues Weitzman. "When consumers are actually looking for your message in their inbox each week, you've really established a valuable marketing relationship. This study confirms that what nearly every consumer that signs up for a newsletter wants to see in their email is that coupon."
Whom an email comes from also matters to moms. Forty percent of moms base their decision to open an email solely on the "from name" and 56 percent base it on a combination of the "from name" and subject line. Only 2.6 percent look at the subject line alone.
If she chooses to read the email, enticing product photos and clearly displayed price information in the body of the email rank as the two most effective ways to get a mom to click through to a retailer’s website. Savings should be shown in dollars, not percentages. Mom needs to know you respect her busy life enough to do the work for her.
In drilling down deeper into segmentation, the survey found that moms with multiple children are 37 percent more likely than moms with just one child to subscribe to online retailers' offers, and are 50 percent more likely to find their newsletters valuable.
Full-time moms are 106 percent more likely to check their emails the same way throughout the whole week than working moms are, and full-time moms are 43 percent more likely to subscribe to newsletters.
What does this mean for marketers?
Convenient, concise and clear messages are vital to the success of email marketing to moms: Tell her proudly who you are, make a compelling and relevant offer, and above all, show respect for her precious time.
"Through this survey, moms have made it clear that they will respond to retailers who help make their busy lives a little bit easier," says Loren McDonald, VP of marketing at EmailLabs. "By doing things such as offering discounts, showing product pictures and displaying savings in dollars rather than percentages, retailers will be rewarded and break through to the coveted 'inner circle' of moms."
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