Sunday, 12 December 2010, 11:05 PM

New School Marketing, The Responsys Way

Last Monday I had yet again the privilege of visiting Responsys in Copenhagen. I was there to learn more about how they help their customers to make their way from creating ordinary and traditional newsletters, to integrating email, social media, the web, and mobile. But, in a dialogue that is adapted to the customer. This means that you communicate with the customers, then check statistics from all channels to see what your customers think, where they are in the buying process, and how you build a good relationship.

I’m thrilled when I hear representatives from an email supplier say that it’s better to send less emails, but make them sharper and more precise. Last Monday, it was Lisa Harmon who let me hear those lovely words produced (au contraire to what you would normally expect a supplier to say). We don’t need to send one email to let the customers know that they’ve collected however so many points, another one telling them that they’ve abandoned their shopping cart, and one more to remind them about a “limited time only” sale. No, no, no, send all of this information in one email. Show them how many points they have, which products they’ve jilted in their shopping cart, and some basic customer related reminders. Simpler, easier.

I’ve said before that I really like Responsys, but that’s because they make sure that their customers are brought up to a fairly sophisticated understanding and prowess with email, and other channels of interaction. And it’s clear that they know what they’re talking about, because they have such a huge variety of examples of customers that they talked about.

Something else that I noticed. Lisa was showing us a brilliant example of how you can increase the number of signups for a newsletter by using multiple different channels. (The example used showed an 800% increase! Crazy!) I know that there are so many companies out there that want more email addresses… And they want them so badly that they are ready to go over to the ”dark side”, yes… to buy addresses. But here is where Lisa pointed out that just a little thought and a whole lot of creativity can give you some high quality email addresses. One acute listener wanted to know what the results were in sales. Lisa said that it’s difficult in such a short period of time to know exactly how much sales have increased… But, it’s an investment for the future.  It’s inevitable that it will increase your sales, and most importantly… create good relationships with your customers.

Lisa flourished. She pointed out – in a much more pleasant way than I would have – that it’s all about creating good relations, not short-term sales. If you only see sales in front of you, it will increase… but only for a short time – and then decrease again. But how will you ever get these customers back? Mmhm.

Build long-term relations, and the subscribers will come streaming in.

Thanks so much Lisa and Martin! For letting me attend, and I hope to see you both very soon!

This is our dynamic email fighting duo below.

Lisa Harmon and MartinWammen from Responsys.

(Us Swedes have to learn how to turn off our cell phones and respectfully listen the whole morning, without running in and out of the room. The Danes prevail at this… but then again, it was a very captivating morning.)

Sarah@@@@@