’Tis the Season for Holiday eGreetings

We have officially entered the Holiday marketing season! The Holiday season is traditionally a great time to connect with potential, current, or past clients to let them know you are thinking of them and thank them for supporting your business throughout the past year. There are, of course, many effective ways to communicate this message to your clients; but one favorite vehicle among marketers this time of year is the blended tactic of email blasts and ecards.

The Benefits of eCards

Information Experts has utilized this email marketing tactic throughout the years for a number of reasons.

Ecards:

• Promote products or services in a creative, compelling manner
• Create and/or retain brand awareness among client base
• Keep your brand top-of-mind among client base
• Represent a cost-effective, immediate method for reaching a target audience
• Enable distribution to customized lists of clients through the use of a CRM database
• Depict the personal, human side of your company
• Signify an environmentally friendly way to send a Holiday greeting to your clients
• Have the potential to be shared by clients
• Allow marketers to track metrics such as opens, views, clicks, shares, etc.

Tips to Improve Exposure

However, just like most email marketing campaigns, it’s easy for your greeting to get lost and/or deleted during the influx of emails received during this season. Here are some tips to help you increase your chances for exposure in the inbox:

• Don’t get lost in the mix. Send your email at least 2 weeks prior to the official holiday date to beat the rush, ensure your clients are at their desks and not on vacation, and effectively stand out among competitors.
• Use a third-party email marketing application like Vertical Response, Constant Contact, MailChimp, or AWeber to help organize your recipient database, develop HTML emails, and automate your launch date and time.
• Avoid the “Junk Mail” Folder. Comply with the CAN-SPAM Act of 2003. Visit the Federal Trade Commission’s Bureau of Consumer Protection website to get the list of requirements you must meet when sending out emails to a list of recipients. Most email marketing applications will help ensure you don’t send out an email that doesn’t comply.
• Don’t ignore the accompanying email message. It doesn’t matter how great your ecard is―if the email that accompanies it doesn’t persuade users to click, no one will view the greeting. Make it highly visual and explicit about what users will see if they click the link.
• Skip the sales-y eCard. You have plenty of opportunities to talk business with your clients; use this opportunity to be personal, light-hearted, creative, and fun!
• Don’t forget about other Holidays! Beat out the competition by sending ecards on non-traditional holidays like Thanksgiving and the 4th of July!
• Offer your clients something of substance. You are asking your clients to go out of their way to open an email and then click on a link to view your greeting. Reward them with more than just “Happy Holidays.” Give them something that entertains, tells a story, and begs to be shared and viewed again.

ECard Examples

Check out my most recent article on the Information Experts blog, “Insights from the Experts”, to view samples of egreetings from years past.