CU-BSC.TTM-SEM-IV-Digital Marketing-Second Draft

 https://www.codefuel.com/blog/classified-advertising-vs-paid-advertising-for- marketing/ 251 CU IDOL SELF LEARNING MATERIAL (SLM)

UNIT –14: E-MAIL MARKETING STRUCTURE 14.0 Learning Objective 14.1 Introduction 14.2 Legal framework 14.3 The heart of E-mail marketing: Subscribers 14.4 Newsletters 14.5 Applications and Resources 14.6 Advantages of Email marketing 14.7 Dis-Advantages of Email marketing 14.8 Summary 14.9 Keywords 14.10 Learning activity 14.11 Unit end questions 14.12 References 14.0LEARNING OBJECTIVES After studying this unit, the student will be able to  Learn about the importance of Email marketing and its applications  Analyze the advantages and dis-advantages of E-mail marketing  Understand the E-mail Marketing Subscribers  Learn what is a Newsletter 14.1 INTRODUCTION E-mail marketing is a web marketing technique that uses e-mail to send advertisements or commercial information. This is often a communication tool wont to attract new customers or make people who one already has loyal to the brand. E-mail and Internet have gone hand in hand since the online was created. The start of Internet dates back to 1969 (Arpanet at that time), while the primary e-mail was sent two years later (1971). This first e-mail showed some basic features that have remained till the present: the utilization of “@” on the username, also because the fields “To”, “Subject” and “Message”. In such a volatile environment, e-mail has been one among the online tools that have best adapted to vary, both in content and in scope and penetration. Therefore, e-mail marketing becomes one among the most tools in a digital strategy. 252 CU IDOL SELF LEARNING MATERIAL (SLM)

At present, e-mail is that the first Internet service before social media. In 2015, the amount of e-mail accounts within the world was about 4.353 million users from which 205 billion e- mails were sent. This volume of traffic includes legitimate e-mails and spam. The term “spam” refers to those messages we don't request and that we don't want or with an unknown sender, usually sent though mass mailing. Although spam are often used on other platforms and devices, for instance SMS on mobile phones, e-mail is that the most vital channel for this practice. The line between commercial information sent by e-mail and spam is, in many cases, a fine one that experts in e-mail marketing must properly identify so as to avoid making mistakes in their work. The most common sort of e-mail marketing is that the newsletter: a publication that's distributed with a selected periodicity on a stimulating topic for all recipients, called subscribers. The complexity level of a newsletter shall depend upon its goals and content; they will be simple with mainly plain text because the predominant feature or be enriched with images, graphs, adverts and/or hyperlinks. The objectives of e-mail marketing can be multiple and varied; however, all of They could be grouped around four main goals: • Diverting traffic to our website be it the home page or any special section inside it. • Promoting a special action: either promotion of new services, special discounts, sales, download of applications, etc. When the goal is to increase traffic or some Web-based special promotion, specific websites are usually created. Such pages are called landing pages. • Cost savings: e-mail marketing supports order management and information to the customer regarding the status of such orders, as well as the provision of customer support services at a lower cost than other communication channels. • Brand popularity and image: same as for other types of campaigns online, e-mail marketing is suited to generate popularity and brand image among consumers. 253 CU IDOL SELF LEARNING MATERIAL (SLM)

To make the most of your campaigns, follow these email marketing tips:  Make it easy for users to subscribe to your list – add the newsletter sign up box in places that are visible while users are browsing the website  Give them incentives (like a free book, free resources) – Freebies can make a big difference in how many people will sign up for your newsletter  Keep your promises – if you promise weekly updates, make sure that you send an email with new tips on a weekly basis.  Don’t abuse their trust – Users trust you with their email address and while you can use automation to send personalized mass emails don’t abuse their trust. Everyone’s inbox is already full of promotional emails so think about when it’s best to send them another one. 14.2 LEGAL FRAMEWORK The legal framework regulating e-mail marketing is vital because it can inhibit a number of its features. On the one hand, legislation protects personal data so as to stop the illicit transfer of databases. The relevant legislation forces the corporate to possess a register— in some cases physical—of user data and makes the corporate liable for the protection of such data. On the opposite, each country develops laws to manage mass mailing, a typical that influences commercial communications or advertising and people of transnational or relational character. Despite the very fact that the legal framework can vary from one country to the opposite, there are some common elements:  Mailing must have explicit authorization by the recipient. This authorization must be prior to the inclusion of the person in the mailing list. 254 CU IDOL SELF LEARNING MATERIAL (SLM)

 The fact that the message is linked to advertising must be explicit, as well as the identification of the sender on the e-mail, the subject and the heading of the message.  In the cases of offers, competitions and promotional games, they must be identified as such and be clear and explicit about the conditions and participation on them.  In some countries, the advertising message has to be identified with the word “advertisement “or abbreviation, as well as with a valid postal address for the company.  Simple procedures for the user to withdraw consent are a must.  In the case of multinational companies, the relevant legislation is that of the country where the company is based and not that of the recipient. 14.3 THE HEART OF E-MAIL MARKETING: SUBSCRIBERS The success of a marketing campaign lies precisely in target management; therefore, an honest strategy to draw in and retain subscribers is required. The recipient database must be meticulously kept and segmented. The essential question here is quality over quantity; therefore, purchasing user databases is discouraged— unless this is often unavoidable, or unless their usefulness has been proven. Best practices in e-mail marketing stress the necessity to get and maintain the organization’s own database. The rationale is simple: it's easier to urge back a client than to urge a replacement one. Getting subscribers may be a slow but steady task, although it are often sped up through online and traditional channels. Registration boxes are often created on an internet site, either as pop-ups or in another Web section where registration is required to request information (e.g. a budget) or in exchange for exclusive content or downloads. Generally, easy forms must be used, where the compulsory fields include name and/or e-mail, although the amount of fields within the form could also be increased counting on the worth of the treat one is offering the user in exchange for his or her registration. Another common instance is e-commerce. When a user registers on a specific online shop and accepts the utilization and repair terms, they're automatically included within the e-mail marketing database. Regarding traditional channels, the compilation of e-mails and knowledge associated with the users are often done through competitions, on-street promotion, postcards, loyalty cards or formal information requests through e-mail, phone or postal mail. Traditional channels demand, however, the digitalization of the info to be included during a subscriber list. Keeping subscribers may be a task that needs special attention which must be implemented while new users are added. During this process, brands must be especially careful regarding content and therefore the form e-mail communications take. Content must be interesting for the user, giving priority to quality rather than periodicity. During a nutshell, it's about adding value to commercial communications with complementary information (comparisons, advice, features, etc.) useful for the buyer. 255 CU IDOL SELF LEARNING MATERIAL (SLM)

14.4 NEWSLETTERS—SOME KEY ASPECTS Four key aspects are to be considered for effective newsletter design: • Database. In order to have good content segmentation, the organization needs to know the subscriber base of their newsletter as much as possible. This information will allow for specific profiling depending on demographics, geographical data, interests, etc., thus increasing the efficiency of communications. • The content of the newsletter. The content must be useful and interesting, and the weight of commercial information must be properly balanced. Subscribers value content that adds value or is useful to them. In fact, newsletters are one of the key tools of content marketing. • The field “from”. In the context of communication saturation, the customer will look at the field “from” as a filter to recognize the origin and dismiss—or not—the mail. • The field “subject”. Same as with a slogan or tagline, the field “subject” must stand out above the mass of incoming e-mails. Likewise, this field must fulfil the criteria of usefulness and interest for the user and, above all, honesty about the content they will find in the mail. Otherwise, the company runs the risk of their mail becoming invisible and that the subscriber requests to unsubscribe from their database. The field “subject” must not be too long or complex, although it allows for the inclusion of special characters such as emoji’s. There is no exact formula to predict the success of a newsletter. Each campaign is different and is closely linked to the audience it addresses. In any case, campaigns may be optimized using A/B tests. These tests are random experiments with two differential variables. Two different versions of the newsletter are sent to two subgroups of the database just changing a single element (the field “subject”, layout or organization of content, the color of the download button, the size of the main image, etc.). This process allows for an empirical test that reveals which version of the message works better and leads to higher ratios of opening, clicks, conversions, etc., so that optimization of future versions of the newsletter becomes possible. Basic Metrics to Assess the Efficiency of E-mail There are three elements to assess e-mail marketing: the user database, sending the newsletter and conversion metrics. In metrics associated with databases, estimating the index of increase in subscribers is straightforward or, if that were the case, the speed of unsubscribes. Identifying the cause for any increase or decrease in subscribers is of essence. As they happen during a timeline, the cause are often traced back to a specific content item, in order that the organization knows what content works better. Regarding sending newsletters, there are four indicators to live the success of e-mail marketing: 256 CU IDOL SELF LEARNING MATERIAL (SLM)

• Sent index: Percentage of deliveries to the recipient (i.e. where there was no mistake in sending). • Opening rate: Percentage of e-mails that are opened by the recipient. Some applications provide information about what recipients have received and opened the e-mail, also as reception and opening time. • Clicks on links: it's possible to work out what are the links that are clicked and establish a popularity ranking counting on the amount of clicks. •Unsubscribes per batch sent: Number of individuals who have cancelled their subscription to a newsletter after they need received a specific issue. Finally, a conversion rate are often established between the sending of the newsletter and therefore the accomplishment of a specific goal, for instance downloading a mobile application, employing a discount voucher, registration on another website and sending additional information by the user. 14.5 APPLICATIONS AND RESOURCES FOR AN E-MAIL MARKETING The supply of existing applications around e-mail marketing is wide, with many applications for various operating systems, like Windows (G-Lock EasyMail7, for example) or OSX (Direct Mail, for example), although market trends seem to specialize in the event of Web applications that help manage this type of online marketing. The benefits of Web services dwell their mobility and therefore the possibility of accessing them from different devices. Thus, we will have a good array of Web services to implement an e-mail marketing campaign successfully. The features vary a touch across platforms, although there are a series of functionalities that has got to be present for a correct professional development of such marketing: • Contact and list management, with the likelihood to import and export, and to make segmented contact lists. • Newsletter design, usually HTML based. Many of the tools incorporate visual editors to form the planning aspects of the newsletter as easy as possible, to incorporate multimedia elements and to distribute the weather within the newsletter. • Sending campaigns and therefore the possibility of scheduling and automating the method. • Statistical analysis of output. Some tools enable the mixing of the newsletter with other services and platforms regularly employed by organizations. Some examples are the incorporation of a widget on the company’s blog, the mixing of social media or tools like Google Analytics. 257 CU IDOL SELF LEARNING MATERIAL (SLM)

The most widely used newsletter editors are Teenvío, Dopple, Mail Chimp, Benchmark, Mail Relay, Campaign Monitor, MPZ Mail or SendinBlue. These sorts of services tend to supply freemium business models, offering a limited free version that permits to check the service with some restrictions; they're usually linked to the amount of subscribers and/or monthly dispatch of e-mails. Choosing one platform or the opposite depends on the requirements of the corporate and therefore the possibilities they provide on their free or payment versions. E-mail may be a powerful marketing tool that's also easy to mix with other strategies and platforms, like social media and e-commerce. 14.6 ADVANTAGES OF E-MAIL MARKETING The strong penetration of e-mail within the current context becomes a crucial reason to incorporate any digital strategy, but there also are other important reasons to try to so. This is often mass technology that instantly reaches everyone and whose use spans devices and screens (desktop, laptop, mobile telephones, tablets, etc.). The system is direct and ready to reach individuals during a scalable and targeted way. This is thanks to the very fact that an e-mail are often sent to one address or thousands, while content can target differing types of audiences. In fact, the system’s scalability doesn't hinder customization; despite its capacity for mass mailing, it are often highly customized at a price far less than that of other sorts of campaigns. This is often also a multimedia channel that gives the likelihood of sending an outsized amount of data as text, images (static or moving), sound or hyperlinks, in any combination. As this is often data communication, its impact are often quantified through different metrics that leave an evaluation of the output of every campaign. 14.7 DISADVANTAGES OF E-MAIL MARKETING Despite the various plus points of this marketing format, starting e-mail campaigns are often hindered thanks to some disadvantages inherent to the present channel: The most important enemy of execs within the sector are antispam filters of e-mail managers that identify e-mail marketing as spam, thus reducing the effectiveness of campaigns. Furthermore, explicit authorization by the end-user to receive ads through mail is required. Such actions are regulated by data protection acts and specific e-commerce laws. Depending on the country and specific laws, sending unauthorized messages may end in very high fines for the businesses sending them. This need for prior authorization to incorporate the person on an e-mail database of a specific organization has pushed e-marketing into the group “permission marketing” 258 CU IDOL SELF LEARNING MATERIAL (SLM)

14.8 SUMMARY  E-mail marketing is a web marketing system that uses e-mail to send advertisements or marketable in sequence. This is frequently a message tool want to attract new customers or make people who one already has loyal to the brand.  The legal framework regulating e-mail marketing is vital because it can inhibit a number of its features. On the one hand, legislation protects personal data so as to stop the illicit transfer of databases.  On the opposite , each country develops laws to manage mass mailing, a typical that influences commercial communications or advertising and people of transnational or relational character  The success of a marketing campaign lies precisely in target management; therefore, an honest strategy to draw in and retain subscribers is required.  One should have a good array of Web services to implement an e-mail marketing campaign successfully. 14.9KEYWORDS  HTML:Hypertext Markup Language  Click-through rate: Percentage of total clicks on an email link, or CTA, as a proportion of the total number of email opens  Freemium: a business model, especially on the internet, whereby basic services are provided free of charge while more advanced features must be paid for.  Integration: the act or process of uniting different things 14.10LEARNING ACTIVITY 1. Discuss the various new letter and their key aspects ___________________________________________________________________________ ___________________________________________________________________ 2. Discuss the resources for an E- Mail marketing ___________________________________________________________________________ ___________________________________________________________________ 14.11 UNIT END QUESTIONS A.Descriptive Questions 259 Short Questions 1. What is a legal framework in E-mail marketing? CU IDOL SELF LEARNING MATERIAL (SLM)

2. What is a Newsletter? 3. What is Target management? 4. What are the applications of a E- mail Marketing? 5. Discuss the advantages of a E-mail marketing? Long questions 1. Discuss the key aspects for effective newsletter design 2. Explain the basic Metrics to Assess the Efficiency of E-mail 3. List out the Advantages& Disadvantages of Email Marketing 4. Mention the applications and resources for an Email Marketing 5. Discuss the importance of subscribers in E-mail Marketing B. Multiple choice questions 1. E-mail marketing is an __________ marketing technique that uses e-mail to send advertisements a. Online b. Digital c. Web d. Social-Media 2. The beginning of Internet dates back to________ a. 1967 b. 1969 c. 1965 d. 1963 3. The complexity level of a newsletter shall depend on its goals and __________ a. Needs b. Payments c. Target d. Content 4. E-mail marketing is suited to generate popularity and__________ among consumers. a. Brand image b. Brand loyalty c. Brand information d. Brand awareness 5. _____________can be highly customized at a cost far lower than 260 CU IDOL SELF LEARNING MATERIAL (SLM)

a. E-mail marketing b. Digital marketing c. Native marketing d. Content Marketing Answers 1-a, 2-b, 3-d, 4-a, 5-a 14.12 REFERENCES  Nielsen, Jacob (2100) Designing Web Usability, New Riders, Indianapolis, ISBN 1  56215 810.  Kelly, Kevin (1999) New Rules for the New Economy, Fourth Estate, London, ISBN 1  85702 8929  Womack, James P, Jones, Daniel T and Roos, Daniel (1990) The Machine that Changed  the World, Macmillan, New York, ISBN 0 89256 350 8  B2B Digital Marketing: Using the Web to Market Directly to Businesses (by-Michael  Miller), Pearson Education.  https://www.marketo.com/digital-marketing/  www.mailchimp.com  https://www.udacity.com/course/digital-marketing-nanodegree--nd018  http://blog.marginmedia.com.au/our-blog/the-5-cs-of-digital-marketing  https://www.business-standard.com/article/technology/active-internet-users-in-india- likely-to-reach-900-mn-by-2025-iamai-121060300710_1.html  http://dcac.du.ac.in/documents/E-Resource/2020/Metrial/424NehaJingala1.pdf  https://blog.hubspot.com/marketing/social-media-marketing  https://www.simplilearn.com/the-scope-of-digital-marketing-article  https://www.portent.com/blog/marketing-strategy/stack-infrastructure.htm 261 CU IDOL SELF LEARNING MATERIAL (SLM)