For the business-to-business segment of the healthcare industry, e-mail is a strategic, critical business tool and should be a foundation of every marketing campaign. Your audience is very computer oriented and may not focus on traditional mail pieces.
Here are a few more reasons why we like adding them to our marketing mix:
1. Faster turnaround
With emails, you can act quickly and aren’t dependent on the USPS to meet your deadlines.
2. Analytics
With web-based programs like Exact Target and Constant Contact, you’re able to monitor analytics; opened, bounce backs, forwards, opt-outs, clicks and unique clicks. The clicks and unique clicks can help shape future email content as you’ll gather data on topics in which your readers are most interested.
3. Increase Web site traffic
Emails are a great vehicle to generating website traffic. Readers can be pointed to a specific location on a site that re-enforces your email message—perhaps a product page or registration page. By getting the viewer to your site with little effort (a simple click instead of having to type an address in the web browser) they’re more likely to spend time browsing and learn about your company.
4. Custom Design
Email applications allow you to customize your email design enabling seamless integration with your campaign look and feel. While the initial design time invested is similar to a printed piece, you save on print costs—especially when a template design can be utilized multiple times by changing out some graphics or text. MPV’s “Kindle” and FormFast’s “inter-office envelope” campaign are two examples of custom emails that delivered solid measurable leads and overall ROI of the campaign.
5. Personalize your message.
Another nice feature with the above mentioned programs is the ability to personalize your message with the reader’s name or even customize the information further depending on varied target audiences.
So those are just a few benefits of a beautifully designed email communication. Print is not dead though – a fully integrated approach using several different media generally works best.
