“Email is a persuasive channel—it helps brands put custom content in prospects’ hands to remind them about deals and discounts,” said Brafton, a marketing news industry. Many corporations are off the email marketing bandwagon, however email marketing is still a powerful strategy—if the email content is accurate and timely. In order to accomplish this, brands need an apparent insight into what drives web traffic, and what encourages web users to engage and to convert. American Airlines is an example of having a successful email marketing campaign, as they have a powerful and active ecommerce hub.
According to MediaPost, American Airlines increased website conversions by 400% with its new email strategy. This strategy is called the “Abandoned Cart Program”. The idea of this strategy is to target prospects that browsed American Airlines flights, added a desired flight to their shopping cart, but ultimately did not purchase the flight. If the flight is ignored for more than 24 hours, American Airlines sends out a personalized email offering the lowest and most flexible price to the flight the prospect added into their shopping cart. Compared with standard fare sale campaigns, the email strategy resulted in 300% higher open rates and 200% higher click-through rates—along with the 400% increase of conversion rates.
“Not only did the Abandoned Cart Program deliver phenomenal results, but the learning it provided on big data analysis is helping us to improve the relevance of all our email programs,” said Kay Kerman.
This was an instance of a retargeting campaign, where companies use ads to offer the customer a better deal so that they’ll come back and convert when they were so close to doing so on their original visit.
The American Airlines email campaign proves that customer involvement, call-to-action marketing, and a successful email marketing strategy will drive online conversion. Marketers and industries that wish to develop their online strategies should develop influential email campaigns that support customer relationships in order to successfully increase conversion rates.
Take a look at your business and see what channels you’re getting conversions from. What channels could you be seeing more from? Whether your company is massive like American Airlines, or runs a nearly microscopic operation, you need to open opportunities.
No matter your budget, you should be looking to diversify your advertising budget into as many channels as possible. This is how you find growth and reach more people. Don’t be afraid to take risks, you may yield results you never expected possible.