Constant Contact Helps Merchant Deliver the Goods

By James Maguire

March 25, 2005

Of the many chores facing the marketing director of an e-commerce site, administering an e-mail campaign is one of the most important — and the most headache-prone. Issues like tracking results, newsletter layout, and evading spam filters each presents their own challenge.

For Carolyn Gillis, her e-mail tool of choice is Constant Contact. Gillis is the marketing director for Boston-based Ruma's Fruit & Gift Basket World, which began back in 1900 as a neighborhood grocer, and went online in 2001.

"I was looking for a way to increase the company's presence," Gillis says, of her decision to bulk up Ruma's e-mail marketing. In researching the many e-mail software products, she wanted something "easy to use, something we could administer ourselves, and something that was CAN-SPAM compliant."

She settled on Constant Contact. "They were straightforward on what they offered and charged, and they let you try it for free," Gillis says. By her account, Ruma's first e-mail campaign using Constant Contact garnered a return on investment that was far in excess of costs.

Third Party Help

Many sites run their e-mail campaign without outside help, but Gillis sees advantages to using a third party product. "You can create your own campaign, and they have tracking functions that are built in," she says. "So you're able to view what was sent, who opened it, any spam reports, who opted out, who clicked through, who bounced — it's instantaneous."

Constant Contact provides a library of e-mail templates, including one for newsletter, coupon, general e-mail, invitations, and others. All the templates have an opt-out button so Ruma's stays CAN-SPAM compliant.

"You don't need a programmer to do anything," Gillis notes — that's important because Ruma's doesn't have a full time IT person. The software's fee structure is based on how many e-mails are sent, ranging from $30 for 2,500 e-mails to $150 for 25,000 e-mails.

Learning From Experience

Since beginning to use Constant Contact in 2003, Gillis has sent out 20 to 30 e-mail campaigns using the software. Her mailings vary from highly targeted mailings sent to 1,000, to all-inclusive mailings in the 15-20,000 range.

She tests the effectiveness of her offers by dividing her mailing list into two or three segments, sending a variation on the pitch to each audience, "to see which gets the better click-through rate and better conversion."

She finds that people respond best to e-mail campaigns with crisply written copy — to the point. Also important: "the photos must be of excellent quality." The best time to send out a mass mailing: late Tuesday or Wednesday morning, after everyone has cleaned the spam out of his or her in-box.

Additionally, she has learned that a key determinant of an e-mailing's success is its subject line. "People are bombarded by e-mails everyday, so you have to pay very close attention to that tagline." As she points out, "there are so many [spam] filters these days, if you put the word 'sale' in your tagline, sometimes it's lost."