Doing It Wrong Is Worse Than Not Doing It at All
When it comes to making ads relevant for multicultural audiences, doing it wrong is worse than not doing it all.
A new study from OMD Worldwide found that ethnic groups are turned off by ads that rely on stereotypes and caricatures rather than meaningful cultural cues. "The respondents were saying, 'We want to see ourselves represented in ads, but not in a stereotypical matter,'" said Pamela Marsh, group director-primary research and insights at the Omnicom media agency.
Multicultural Consumer behavior
The OMD study, a telephone survey of 1,453 respondents 18 and older, sought to understand how ethnicity affects consumer behavior and advertising receptivity. Four different groups were represented: blacks, Asian-Americans, Hispanics and the general market (which was about 76% Caucasian in the study).
The ethnic groups agreed that messages should be culturally relevant, but they responded more positively to ads with multicultural cues, such as ethnic characters, phrases, expressions and values, than ads that were simply translations of general-market ads. "Ad relevancy is more about communicating in kind than speaking in a language," Ms. Marsh said. Cultural relevance is also important for media placement, the study said, noting that ad models created on the basis of general population statistics, such as channel planning, are likely to fall short if they do not take relevant ethnic differences into account.
How to Reach Multicultural Segments
Though all segments in the survey gravitated toward the same top four media -- TV, radio, internet and mobile -- different ethnic groups spent different amounts of time with each of them. Blacks, for instance, spent the most time with TV; Hispanics spent more time with radio; and Asians used the internet at significantly higher rates.
The study also found that black consumers place a higher premium on word-of-mouth information before making buying decisions -- particularly when seeking feedback about a product. Asian-Americans also rely heavily on word-of-mouth because they are less receptive to ads than other segments of the population, according to the study.
Marketers have a significant opportunity to influence the purchases of blacks and Hispanics, the study said, because they are more open to advertising than other groups but feel as though most marketing messages are not relevant to them.
Saturday, January 12, 2008
Win Back Inactive Subscribers
A reactivation campaign can help you revitalize your list
How many email messages did you send out in your last campaign? Really? That many? Wow! Now, how many of your recipients actually opened or clicked on your email?Yeah, that's a different story. Remember that with email, size doesn't really matter. Performance is what counts, not just for your email program and its bottom line but also for your sender reputation.
A reactivation campaign is the answer here, and it's just as important as any acquisition campaign. It will help you clean out the dead wood, re-energize your list and reclaim some of the money you spent acquiring and engaging those addresses in the first place.
Why reactivation works: Your email service provider might be thrilled that you ship out millions of messages in each campaign, but you could actually hurt yourself and your sender reputation and spend money you don't have to when you send to people who never bother to open or act on your messages.
Sure, maybe they did sign up with you once upon a time. Since then, though, they abandoned those mailboxes, and you never noticed. The ISPs are noticing, and they'll treat your email accordingly.
Many use these long-dead email addresses as spam traps to monitor your list hygiene and measure your sender reputation. The dirtier your list, the more likely they'll route your email messages to the junk folder or block you.
Just by looking at your database, you can't tell which subscribers actually abandoned their mailboxes, who deletes your messages without opening them or who still is sort of interested in you but hasn't seen any reason to open.
A reactivation campaign will identify which addresses you can safely drop from your list without killing off live ones and re-establish connections with past customers. Think of it as going on a second honeymoon. Just like a tired marriage needs a spark to keep it going, your subscribers who take you for granted need a fresh, new reason to keep opening your messages.
You know you get the most action from your newest subscribers. Apply the tactics you use on them to rejuvenate the inactives on your list instead of spending more money to replace them.
Ready with the virtual flowers and candy?
First, identify your inactives. This takes a little database work. Create a separate mailing list, and add anyone who hasn't opened or clicked on a message in, say, six months or longer, to it. Send a message with a pleading subject line, such as "We miss you! Please come back!" Go ahead, grovel a little. Include a special offer or invitation to fill out a new profile or encourage them to unsubscribe once and for all.
Move any responding addresses back to your active list. Send the message again, this time saying you'll take them off your list if they don't respond in, say, a week. Then, scratch them from your list if they don't respond. It might kill you to do that, but a smaller, more vital list will do you more good than one where nobody's home anymore.
Keep everybody interested...
These tactics will keep your whole list engaged and energized:
1. Ask them what they want to get. It could be you have lots to offer, but your subscribers aren't getting what they really want. For example, if you're a book seller it may be that someone subscribed to your general list is really only interested in mysteries. Ask recipients to take control of what they want to get, and you may see renewed interest.
2. Make them an offer they can't refuse. Discounts, new products, samples and free shipping can work wonders for retailers. B2B marketers can renew interest with a special white paper or discount on a conference or webinar.
3. Incentivize! Ask users to update their profile, and give them a chance to win a big-screen TV. (iPods are, well, kind of over unless it's a really upscale one.) Be careful to keep the focus on the email, though. If the prize is too good, people will re-engage, only to click the spam button when your email actually arrives.
4. Threaten to break up. Tell subscribers if they don't click, you're going away. It's possible that your heavily texted message is in fact being read, but you can't know it because recipients don't enable the images. It's fair to say that if recipients don't let you know somehow that they're still there, still breathing, that you'll drop them from the list.
5. See what's on their minds. Simple surveys, sweetened with a little incentive (see No. 2), can help you find out what's going on. Maybe you're sending too often and they turn a deaf ear. Or, you're not coming around enough and they drift away.
6. Change your format. Are you sending long, chatty emails to people who read them on their phones and don't get down to your offer? Or, do you stuff all your content into a single large image that won't show up? Offer a text format to people who read email on alternative platforms and make it short and sweet.
The effort you spend now to wake up your list and re-engage with them will pay off in better deliverability and a higher ROI.
How many email messages did you send out in your last campaign? Really? That many? Wow! Now, how many of your recipients actually opened or clicked on your email?Yeah, that's a different story. Remember that with email, size doesn't really matter. Performance is what counts, not just for your email program and its bottom line but also for your sender reputation.
A reactivation campaign is the answer here, and it's just as important as any acquisition campaign. It will help you clean out the dead wood, re-energize your list and reclaim some of the money you spent acquiring and engaging those addresses in the first place.
Why reactivation works: Your email service provider might be thrilled that you ship out millions of messages in each campaign, but you could actually hurt yourself and your sender reputation and spend money you don't have to when you send to people who never bother to open or act on your messages.
Sure, maybe they did sign up with you once upon a time. Since then, though, they abandoned those mailboxes, and you never noticed. The ISPs are noticing, and they'll treat your email accordingly.
Many use these long-dead email addresses as spam traps to monitor your list hygiene and measure your sender reputation. The dirtier your list, the more likely they'll route your email messages to the junk folder or block you.
Just by looking at your database, you can't tell which subscribers actually abandoned their mailboxes, who deletes your messages without opening them or who still is sort of interested in you but hasn't seen any reason to open.
A reactivation campaign will identify which addresses you can safely drop from your list without killing off live ones and re-establish connections with past customers. Think of it as going on a second honeymoon. Just like a tired marriage needs a spark to keep it going, your subscribers who take you for granted need a fresh, new reason to keep opening your messages.
You know you get the most action from your newest subscribers. Apply the tactics you use on them to rejuvenate the inactives on your list instead of spending more money to replace them.
Ready with the virtual flowers and candy?
First, identify your inactives. This takes a little database work. Create a separate mailing list, and add anyone who hasn't opened or clicked on a message in, say, six months or longer, to it. Send a message with a pleading subject line, such as "We miss you! Please come back!" Go ahead, grovel a little. Include a special offer or invitation to fill out a new profile or encourage them to unsubscribe once and for all.
Move any responding addresses back to your active list. Send the message again, this time saying you'll take them off your list if they don't respond in, say, a week. Then, scratch them from your list if they don't respond. It might kill you to do that, but a smaller, more vital list will do you more good than one where nobody's home anymore.
Keep everybody interested...
These tactics will keep your whole list engaged and energized:
1. Ask them what they want to get. It could be you have lots to offer, but your subscribers aren't getting what they really want. For example, if you're a book seller it may be that someone subscribed to your general list is really only interested in mysteries. Ask recipients to take control of what they want to get, and you may see renewed interest.
2. Make them an offer they can't refuse. Discounts, new products, samples and free shipping can work wonders for retailers. B2B marketers can renew interest with a special white paper or discount on a conference or webinar.
3. Incentivize! Ask users to update their profile, and give them a chance to win a big-screen TV. (iPods are, well, kind of over unless it's a really upscale one.) Be careful to keep the focus on the email, though. If the prize is too good, people will re-engage, only to click the spam button when your email actually arrives.
4. Threaten to break up. Tell subscribers if they don't click, you're going away. It's possible that your heavily texted message is in fact being read, but you can't know it because recipients don't enable the images. It's fair to say that if recipients don't let you know somehow that they're still there, still breathing, that you'll drop them from the list.
5. See what's on their minds. Simple surveys, sweetened with a little incentive (see No. 2), can help you find out what's going on. Maybe you're sending too often and they turn a deaf ear. Or, you're not coming around enough and they drift away.
6. Change your format. Are you sending long, chatty emails to people who read them on their phones and don't get down to your offer? Or, do you stuff all your content into a single large image that won't show up? Offer a text format to people who read email on alternative platforms and make it short and sweet.
The effort you spend now to wake up your list and re-engage with them will pay off in better deliverability and a higher ROI.
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