If you want people to respond to a call to action, an e-mail campaign is the answer, because click through rates from e-mail campaigns are generally much higher than for banners.
Conversely, e-mails are not normally as effective for brand awareness, which requires the regular, repeat exposure offered by banner advertising.
- Open and click through rates vary from one e-mail to the next. But by way of example, the first 2 emails sent to all members in 2008 generated open rates of 30% and 36% respectively, and click through rates of 8% and 13% respectively. These are strong figures by any standard.
- At the 1st March 2008, our database numbered over 10,000 opted-in members, broken down into veterinary nurses, students, practice managers, teachers and veterinary surgeons.
Whilst e-mail campaigns offer a wonderfully measurable way to elicit a response, we do impose strict controls over what we are prepared to send to members, how often, and how.
- All e-mails are sent within a VetNurse template.
- We will only send e-mails which we believe will be of genuine relevance, interest and value to our members. That's subjective, but it's our decision. As a guideline, though, announcements of new veterinary products and treatments are likely to be accepted, as are special offers for veterinary nurses and practice support staff.
- We send an absolute maximum of 1 e-mail per week.
- All e-mails are sent by VetNurse. We never release our member database to a third party, in line with our privacy policy.
These guidelines are as much for your benefit as ours. If we were to get a reputation for sending our members irrelevant or dull e-mails offering cheap loans, they'd soon opt-out, and we'd end up with no mailing list.
- Give your e-mail a compelling headline.
- As with banner advertising, keep your message simple, and your call to action straightforward.
- Make sure that your call to action is visible without scrolling (i.e. positioned high on the page).
- We have in-house designers available to produce your e-mail campaign if needed.
After your campaign has been sent, we'll provide you with a report which tells you how many people viewed your e-mail, when, and what action they took next (i.e. visiting your website). That's precious data that you just won't get from a traditional direct mail campaign.
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