We needed to understand what kind of results they were getting from their existing strategy, what tools they were using, and how they interacted with their customers.

We discovered that their overall strategy could be much improved. First, they were using an expensive marketing automation solution integrated with their Salesforce CRM, but were using it as if it had more limited capabilities, such as Constant Contact or MailChimp. Basically, they were not using the full functionality of their marketing automation system, even though they were paying for it. We delved deeper into the issue to see how we could help them achieve better results.

And of the 20k leads list, they were working with, half of the customers had already opted out – alarming, to say the least. With 10k remaining who did receive emails, only a very small number were opening their emails, and most were not even clicking through them. Additionally, some of the people complained that their “regular” emails were going into the spam folder, an embarrassing situation if the contact is from a sales person. 

We investigated what kind of emails they send out and how often to better assess their strategy. Their emails were sent out in this cadence: 

  • Sales promotional emails – at least once a week to leads and prospects
  • Webinar invitations – twice a week to the entire database, including customers
  • Rewards emails – 2 times a week to customers
  • Newsletter – once a month (heavily sales oriented)
  • Event announcements – as needed based on location

In total, most of their contacts get at least 10-12 emails per month, and some may get as many as 20 emails per month. Are you starting to see what is wrong with this picture?

Orders from the top mandated that the number of sales emails sent by the company needed to be sales promotions. The instruction was, “We should always have an active promotion in the market.” But what if the customers don’t want to buy today or tomorrow? Bombarding customers with promotions doesn’t build relationships in business. Annoying customers is not a good approach when marketing products, so what is the solution?

Tackling the problem with a completely different strategy would be a wise action to take, but it would mean they would have to revamp their approach to sending emails, along with changing the way they format their “sales” messages. Having an email content strategy that resonates better with their target audience would be a smart move.

Poor email results are something that needs to be fixed at the core. Deliverability is frequently a symptom of a bigger problem, and treating the symptom is not going to cure the issue.

Devising a way to fix the company’s deliverability issue while engaging customers necessitates a cohesive strategy, as opposed to maintaining the current email practices or constant sales messaging, which clearly has not produced the results the company wants.

The saying “treat the cause, not the symptom” rings true here. The core of the problem here isn’t email deliverability; it’s the type of emails the company is sending.