Email marketing's evolution challenges some popular notions about new marketing channels

So email marketing is a dying channel? Social media has taken over and now rules the roost?  Not so fast.
In the trenches, where actual marketing and lead gen occurs, outside of the scope of industry articles and blogs that state otherwise, email is growing in use at an exponential rate among b2b marketers.

While the days of generalist mass email blasts are going the way of the dinosaur, the use of email as a nurture marketing and content delivery vehicle are rapidly expanding.  We may not see a similar volume of email, but the usage by savvy marketers is certainly growing fast.  This post explores the new ways smart b2b marketers are using email to increase their lead conversion and improve their overall marketing  presence.

Get personal - the b2b marketer should rethink email marketing firstly from the perspective of what it is attempting to communicate to the potential buyer.  Personalization in email is not a new concept.  Marketers have been applying personalization to email for some time.  So what do I mean when I say "get personal"?  I mean get personal in the the content you deliver and how you deliver it with email.  Go beyond dropping the person's name/company in the email and start to deliver the right content to the right people at the right time.  That is the essence of getting personal in email marketing.   In order to execute a more personalized chain of communications, you need data.  What data you needs depends on how automated you want to go or how deep your content catalog is.  A simple example is you have solutions that support 3 vertical market segments.  A lead comes to your website and downloads a white paper relevant to Vertical segment 1.  You will then execute a series of follow up emails (usually automatically based on triggers) that provide supporting and relevant content.
A typical email trigger series may look like this:

Action - Download vertical white paper 1

• Trigger 1 - "Thank you for accessing white paper - cross promote white paper 2"
• Trigger 2 - "Thanks for accessing white paper - here is a link for product data sheet for vertical 1
• Trigger 3 - "Promote webinar/event relevant to vertical 1

In this example, you will need the basic name/email and the information about the asset that was downloaded.  this information will then trigger the subsequent communications.

Save Time and Money with Triggers
Trigger-based emails are becoming extremely popular amongst savvy marketers.  The reason is simple, Triggers never sleep.  While you're on vacation, in a meeting, at a trade show, home sick....whatever, you're triggers are sitting there, faithfully doing what was once a rote task that you had to be there for.  Well, I'm here to tell you that while they may sound simple, trigger-based emails are not as easy as an auto-responder.  Like any good campaign, they should have expected outcomes, planning and follow up actions.  Trigger-based emails, like the ones found in SalesFUSION, are often tied to the website.  You're website is presenting content out to the masses.  Someone comes in and accesses an asset.  The trigger-based email fulfills the asset automatically, then waits a day, thanks them, waits a few more days, thanks them again.

The importance of triggers cannot be understated.  They allow the marketer to always be on.  They also enable you to make actionable the content on your website.  You can also ensure that all leads that hit your website are treated equally, at least initially.  This has a real and measurable impact in your lead conversion rates. 

Drip Campaigns 
Unlike trigger campaigns, drip-based marketing campaigns are used more as a series of communications that are related to each other.  The primary difference between drip-based email and trigger-based email is who receives it and when.  In drip campaigns, you are communicating initially with a group, segment or list on a specific calendar date and time.  Most typically, the drip campaigns have specific follow up emails that are sent to groups who have behaved or interacted with the previous email in a certain way.  This string of communications can be relatively short (say 30-days) or long (90-days).  The benefit of drip campaigns is that they allow for continuous branding and messaging of relevant content to a group of people over time.

Email marketing has not succumbed to social media, or any other channel for that matter.  It is rapidly growing in usage amongst b2b marketers.   Email is being used more efficiently and effectively and has grown up in its overall efficacy as a marketing channel in and of itself.

Marketing automation and your budget

Marketing automation solutions have enjoyed tremendous growth in use by B2B marketers over the last 2 years and the trend is clearly in favor of eMarketing vendors. eMarketing solutions encompass a wide array of technologies including: Email Marketing, Web Analytics, Lead Management, SEM/PPC Management and Landing Pages. Much has been written about the fundamental shift away from "traditional" marketing mix items such as direct mail, trade shows and magazine advertising to more interactive, real-time emarketing venues. That blog topic has since past. eMarketing IS the marketing mix in B2B.

One of the key issues facing b2b marketers now is "how much can we spend on an eMarketing solution?" Pricing for eMarketing applications range vary widely. There are 2 classes of applications; Platform (meaning most components like email, landing pages...etc) are part of a single application or Point Solutions (email) wherein only one area is focused on in the application.

Platform application costs typically range from $1500 per month upwards of $5000 per month. Costing of SaaS marketing platforms is often times based on email volume per month/year and database size.

Marketers need to be very cautious when applications price based on database size. Depending on what is applied against the database size (customer records, emails, landing pages) the size of the DB can balloon very quickly and you're suddenly on the hook for a much larger monthly fee than you were planning on.

Additionally, be aware that email volume is not based solely on first outbound emails. Trigger, drip and nurture emails need to be factored into your total email volume per month.

If you're planning on using an email marketing solution for drip and trigger emails and you plan on marketing to a database of 10,000 names, you should estimate your volume at 10,000 x 2.5 per month. That will ensure you've budgeted for enough email to cover trigger emails.

Other things to factor in with email is metering. With some applications, you can meter bursts at a pre-determined rate. Other applications allow you to borrow from other month's allotments. There is no one perfect way to do this. You should work closely with your eMarketing vendor to ensure costs are well defined an your vendor should know what you're trying to accomplish in advance so they can recommend the best plan based on your budget.

Regarding budget, what percentage of your total budget should be allotted to eMarketing software? 10-20% is a number agreed upon by most but is by no means a hard and fast rule.
If your annual marketing budget is $100,000 then 20% works out to to about $1600 per month.

Obviously, the percentage varies based on your needs/activity but if you're total spend on technology is exceeding 25% of your total marketing budget, you are very likely paying too much for a platform based application.