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Effective E-Marketing Campaigns for Entrepreneurs

Written by: Nancy Arter

Article Overview: This article looks at an online wine seller and how they've utilized e-marketing campaigns to reach their customers. This is a low-cost way to reach customers and build relationships with potential customers. All businesses can utilize e-marketing effectively to build their customer bases.

Effective E-Marketing Campaigns for Entrepreneurs

E-mail marketing is definitely becoming the darling of all of the direct marketing channels. In the past, it was looked at with skepticism -- and e-marketers were oftentimes branded as spammers. We're happy to say that the world has finally caught up!

Many of us want to be contacted by e-mail. It's just easier than talking to someone or even opening up a piece of mail. Spam definitely is still an issue but most folks have either implemented excellent spam filters or are getting good at going through and getting rid of spam manually. All in all, when I get an e-marketing message that is relevant to me, I'm happy to read it -- and very likely to respond.

Case in point, last week K&L Wine Merchants sent me an e-marketing message regarding two great wine selections that they were featuring on sale. As an avid red wine drinker (ever wonder what RRW stands for--think UB40), both were big reds -- a Beaulieu Vineyards Tapestry Red and a Sterling Vineyards Cabernet. The price point was excellent -- so I ordered a half-case of each. The online shopping experience was excellent and I even got the chance to fill out a survey on my observations.

Apparently, K&L is very aware of the value of e-marketing. In fact, they've even taken steps to upgrade their e-marketing platform recently. According to DM News, "Online wine retailer K&L Wine Merchants has tapped e-mail marketing services firm StrongMail Systems Inc. in a move to increase its white listing and more easily manage its program." Apparently, their in-house system was harder to manage and resulted in a lot of blacklisting. This new solution will help with both of these problems. In addition, according to the article, it will help with campaign management and provides some robust reporting tools.

Brian Zucker, CTO and co-owner of K&L, wants to ensure that his customers receive offers that are relevant to their tastes (based upon previous orders) and that they always have the inventory on hand when the customer orders. Zucker states: “We always have to determine how many e-mails to send, because our products are not limitless,” Zucker added. “We have a new wine with only 500 cases made and so we have to determine who would probably respond to this wine and not oversend e-mails.”

Once again, this is music to our ears . . . sending relevant messages via the direct marketing channel that customers prefer, and ensuring that there's enough red, red wine to go around!

If you're looking for some good e-mail delivery systems that are low cost and professional looking, there are many providers out there that support entrepreneurial marketers. We use iContact (www.icontact.com)-- and are very pleased with their service. For a low monthly fee, you can send out professional, CAN-SPAM Act compliant e-marketing messages to your customers. It is a low-cost way to stay in contact with your customers about your product offerings and to keep them engaged with your company.

Cheers!

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Article Tags: beaulieu vineyards, blacklisting, campaign management, customer orders, direct marketing, dm news, e mail marketing, mail spam, marketing channels, marketing services, new solution, red wine, reporting tools, spam filters, sterling vineyards, ub40, wine drinker, wine merchants, wine retailer, wine selections
Referred by: http://www.internet-search-marketing.com



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