As email marketing experts, our clients often ask us how many emails they should send per week/month/quarter to get the best results. But there is no “one-size-fits-all” answer because optimizing email send frequency depends on how your list responds to your mailings, and how relevant, timely, and expected your mailings are, as well as a host of other factors. In fact, the MarketTraq™ motto of “relevant, timely, and anticipated” is more appropriate to optimizing send frequency than any other aspect of planning an email marketing campaign. Any attempt to optimize your email campaign... Read More

19 hours. That’s the average amount of time that passes between the moment when an online abandoner first visits your page to when they finally make a purchase. A whopping 20% abandoners wait 3 days or more. These numbers, from the National Mail Order Association, present a very interesting view of the problem of shopping cart abandonment. When we did our blog post on conversion optimization a short while back, we mentioned “not ready to buy” as one of the leading causes of abandonment, and today we’ll look at what it means to abandon a cart and what to do about it. Before we’re an... Read More

The way to a Boomer’s wallet is through their mailbox – just not the one at the end of their driveway. As a demographic that pre-dates the Internet, Baby Boomers have historically been targeted through direct mail, television and radio advertising. But are marketers ignoring this segment as a viable target for online marketing efforts? Many marketers view GenX and GenY as the two groups most responsive to online marketing Understandably so, since these two demographics have spent a majority of their lifetime online. But as a group that’s rising rapidly in prominence and importance... Read More

Previously, we spoke about the typical hurdles that foster shopping cart abandonment and how to decrease abandoned carts through targeted email follow-ups. Let’s walk through how we could solve an abandoned cart issue with an automated e-mail marketing solution. It has long been considered an e-commerce best practice to disclose all possible shipping costs as soon as possible to spare sticker shock at the end of the purchase process. Nevertheless, it continues to be a top reason for abandoned carts. Step 1: Determining the Issue: How would you know that shipping costs were the reason for... Read More

If you made $1 million in sales from your e-commerce website last year, you let another $4 million slip through your fingers. Really. As many as 88% of shopping carts are abandoned. This was highlighted last May in a Forrester report (here is a summary if you don’t want to spend $500 for the original report). The bottom line is that no matter how friendly, how intuitive, and how well designed your shopping experience, you can’t realistically escape abandoned carts altogether –but you can reduce them. Technology and quantitative web optimization allow you to reduce abandons and... Read More

Think back to the last really great shopping experience you had at a brick and mortar store. Odds are good it involved a great associate who noticed what you were looking at, made recommendations based on your input and browsing, and gently but intelligently guided you towards exactly what you wanted and liked. Or an even better example, how about going to your favorite restaurant and having the hostess take you to your favorite table, the waiter knowing what your favorite appetizer is, and the sommelier already pairing the perfect wine for your meal before you’re even finished ordering?... Read More