The Online Advertising Playbook: Proven Strategies and Tested Tactics from The Advertising Research Foundation

Email Influences Consumer Purchasing

Each relevant email sent by marketers can offer consumers links to brand information and websites that may lead to sales. In addition to product offers, emailed statements and bills or updates from travel rewards programs, for example, are largely untapped opportunities for most marketers to communicate with consumers and stimulate sales (Epsilon Interactive 2006).

Email is a powerful purchase influencer. During the 2005 shopping season, email service provider ReturnPath found that 95% of the shoppers they surveyed used email to navigate to a retail website, read sites for gift ideas, and took advantage of the offers they contained (Miller 2006). Email works double duty as a branding and direct response channel.

Emailed coupons are effective purchase incentives and drive sales. Three-quarters of online purchasers redeemed an online coupon, and almost 60% redeemed an online coupon at an offline retail outlet. Special offers can help email get read and acted upon.

After purchase, customers expect to see order confirmations and shipping notices in their in-boxes. And customers in a DoubleClick study expressed interest in follow-up offers for related products, membership rewards programs, and sweepstakes (Anfuso 2004).