In the last year we have put a lot of time and effort into creating a solid email marketing campaign. What has been so unbelievable about the campaign is the growing support that we have been receiving from various departments around campus. I’ll save it for another post to really look at the various departments and how they are using our mailshot system to communicate with constituents, but wanted to share an excellent example of how it can drive traffic to your website. For Wofford’s e-mail marketing we use Bronto and to reduce confusion on campus refer to it as mailshot instead of list distribution or blast email or any of the other names out there.
For higher education Christmas break is usually one of the deadest visit times. I’m sure there are a few prospective students out there who visit the site as they whittle down their list of colleges, but for the most part people stay away and spend time with their family and loved ones. As a lot of people have suggested putting together a top ten list is an excellent way to get people connected one final time over the holidays and a mailshot is the perfect avenue to promote these lists. For our end of year we put together two such lists, one list for the top ten news stories and the other for top ten videos/soundslides. Soundslides are videos that are made up of pictures with an audio track on the backend. What is so good about soundslides is that assuming you have the pictures and an audio track they are VERY easy and quick to put together. Watch some of our videos and see for yourself.
So anyways we sent four emails out promoting this list each tailored towards a different target group. The messages were sent to alumni, prospective students, news, and website updates. Without getting into to much detail let’s just say we sent close to 40,000 messages and had over 20% open rate. Assuming each click through back to the site was unique we gained an extra 1,734 visitors back to the site during this slow time! Not bad and quite impressive if you ask me.
Below is the traffic data pulled from our Google Analytics account from December 15th to the end of the year. The blue is forand the green is for 2006. For the last week it’s pretty similar, but notice that big spike? We sent out our mailshots Dec. 18th-20th.
During this two week period here are some other interesting statistics:
- Visits up 26%
- Absolute Unique Visitors up 89%
- Average Pageviews up 52%
- Time on Site up 23%
- Bounce Rate down 18%
- New Visitors up 24%
Absolute Unique Visitors is the most exciting statistic there! I’m sure it’s not the only factor, but mailshots definitely have to account for a large part of the growth in this small sample! Want to learn more then sign-up for our mailshots and see for yourself.
Nice work! I’ve sent out ~700,000 emails over the last 6 months. Sometimes I feel like a dirty spammer.
Great stuff here Kyle, looking forward to reading more of your higher ed expertise
Just found your blog while researching email marketing for my college - nice work and helpful post.Looks like I’m going to be busy
A very informative article, thank you. Most of all I like the idea that for the end of year you put together two lists, one list for the top ten news stories and the other for top ten videos/soundslides. It is convenient for using.
You are right that putting together a top ten list is an excellent way to get people connected one final time over the holidays and a mailshot is the perfect avenue to promote these lists. It’s a good marketing strategy, I should say.
Interesting points made, I’ve done various other forms of marketing but honestly thought that email marketing was a bit dead in the water these days.
Absolute Unique Visitors have really impressed me. You applied a wonderful strategy and now you have amazing results. My congratulations.
hi! sounds to be much promising, impressive. i hope it will work!thanx for so much usseful information!now i know for sure what i’m gonna do this week-end:)
yeahh… i feel a lit bit like to be a great mr.SPAM… but this play is worth the candlу!!! and i like it! thanx
Interesting points. It’s a good marketing strategy.
I think you hit the nail on the head when you mention “tailored towards a different target group” without this email marketing would be nowhere near as effective. Thank you for sharing your findings, it makes for interesteing reading.
E-mail marketing will still be a great arsenal on bloggers and internet marketers now and in future time, you just have to make sure that you are using it right.
It seems that email marketing will work for some and be a disaster for others. The days of buying a list of 1 million people and blasting the hell out of them are long gone, but if you do it correctly, and build a natural list of people it is a brilliant way to keep people coming.
I did a campaign for Timeshare Market Pro
and it was a disaster. They always wanted to send out some spammy type of emails that did no good. Wasn’t my fault though
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Thanks for the info! I really can’t belive it’s almost Christmas.
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