Oldie But Goodie, E-mail Marketing
Do you remember when e-mail was just a fun way to say hi to friends and family and getting a reply was in and of itself a pleasant surprise?
We’ve come a long way since then, some might say, to the other end of the spectrum of woeful abundance, each of us owning multiple e-mail addresses for personal, business, spam purposes, barely having time to check all of them. But research shows e-mail is very much alive and kicking, and it is one of the most effective tools of online marketing.
A recent survey conducted by my.com, the developers of a mobile e-mail managing app, shows just how engrossed we are in our relationship with e-mail. The results say 90 percent of Internet users check e-mail compulsively throughout the day. Eight percent even admit to checking e-mail immediately after coitus! Forty-six percent spend more than an hour a day reading e-mails. Among the many uses of e-mail, getting information is one of its main raison d’être, and 43 percent of responders use it to receive information about products they are interested in, and 42 percent get discount information via e-mail.
In San Francisco there is currently a raging battle for hegemony among ride-share companies like Uber and Lyft. Most users have at least two or more ride-sharing apps on their phones, opening and lining them up on a busy Friday night in case one falls through, making the companies really work for their money. Last Friday a group of us were going out. We would have normally taken the bus, but one of our friends remembered she had received a promotional e-mail from Uber saying they were temporarily lowering their price during summer. It wasn’t hard to decide to ditch the bus and take an Uber in luxury.
And it was that simple. All the ride-share companies had her e-mail, but only Uber let her know of the promotion. There had been promotional banners on social media and other popular sites about similar discounts, but it’s Uber’s direct e-mail message that stuck.
Well played, online marketing wizard batting for Uber's team.
