I am very excited to announce that now you can easily create attractive and mobile-friendly email campaigns with our Loyalty Program's email marketing feature!
[Read the official press release here on PRWeb: "SignalMind Enhances Customer Loyalty Program with Email Marketing"]
This new feature provides just the tools needed for creating and delivering emails that encourage repeat business from loyal customers, and look great on any device. If you are familiar with our mobile site builder, you'll feel right at home when designing your email campaigns:
- simply place elements (widgets) in any order you like
- create attractive call-to-action buttons right there in our platform (no need to use any graphic design tools)
- apply styling to widgets (backgrounds, rounded corners)
- add mail-merge fields as needed
- customize your recipient list based on your criteria with granular list filtering
- see stats on email opens and clicks.
Mobile first!
Currently a majority of emails are read on mobile devices. Yet, in June of 2013 only 11.84% of newsletters optimized their layouts for mobile devices. Most emails looked more like old newspapers, with a complex set of embedded tables, pictures and links that would blow up on most smartphones. Now, in 2014, I am finally seeing more and more companies optimizing their email newsletters for mobile.
Because the majority of emails are now read on mobile devices, it makes sense to take a "mobile-first" approach by optimizing email campaigns for mobile devices first, and for desktops second. Fortunately, most desktop email users are also more receptive to a simpler, cleaner layout.
Loyalty Program members want to hear from you!
In our recent research (see this infographic) we've mentioned that loyalty program members want to hear from you. 94% of survey participants said they prefer to receive communication from the loyalty programs they are members of, and 57% said they always read that communication.
The goal behind our Loyalty Program module was to give businesses data and stats on member visits and purchases, as well as the ability to easily act on that information by sending attractive personalized email offers to certain member segments (coupons to infrequent visitors, special offers for the best customers, birthday offers, etc).
Email is a great mobile marketing channel
Today we have a multitude of ways to reach out to customers. As I've mentioned in my previous blog, good old email seems to be the the most commonly accepted recipient-friendly mobile channel. We are all familiar with the process for managing and sorting email, and we are used to receiving regular email notifications from companies we do business with. The cost of email marketing is low, and the rules are well defined. Because email is less intrusive and more actionable then other mobile channels, consumers are a lot more likely to respond to your offer and stay engaged.
Cultivate your list
The real benefit of a loyalty program for businesses does not come from getting customers to come in more to receive discounts. Discounts (or points) may be a reason why a new member would join, but it should not end there for the business. A well-implemented loyalty program should be about growing a list of engaged customers and marketing to that list effectively with basic segmentation and personalized offers. Unfortunately, with many popular loyalty programs out there today, the business owner does not own their loyalty program member data, nor do they control how they reach out to their followers. (And this, by the way, warrants a separate post which I'll try to write soon.)
Our email marketing feature is currently in beta phase and is included with the Loyalty Program module at no additional cost. Once the beta phase is over, there will be a pre-paid fee for email credits (our pricing will stay in line with popular email marketing services), and we'll give you an advance notice when this happens.
For now, happy emailing! And don't forget to give us feedback!