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E-commerce Link : Keeping Up With the Joneses

A three-step game plan to conduct an e-mail audit

July 2009 By Regina Brady
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• Events and holidays. There are many Web resources that allow marketers to plan promotional calendars to take advantage of selling opportunities. Holidays certainly provide the chance to develop a themed approach building up to the date. How soon before the holiday do your competitors begin their promotions? How many e-mails do they send around the holiday theme?

• Mix of products and offers. Can you discern a cadence to their communications? How often do they promote general sales and discounts that apply to all products available on their sites? How often do they feature specific products? When they do promote products, how many do they feature?

• Design. Do they employ a mix of communication formats such as postcards, longer-form newsletters and text-only? Do they take advantage of the preview pane, and what elements do they include? Do they include navigational department links to take readers directly to their sites? How many products are featured?

• Personalization. Do your competitors use simple personalization in e-mails, and if so, how often? Do they per-
sonalize the subject line, the snippet in the preview pane or the salutation?

• Segmentation. Can you determine whether they use segmentation techniques based on location, gender or interests?

• Subject lines. Is there anything you can learn from looking at the subject lines they employ?

Once you’ve completed this step, you’re likely to have uncovered some insights into their overall approaches. Find elements you believe they do exceptionally well, and plan to incorporate them into your program.

3. Gain Intelligence From Online Services
Start with some of the free services that can provide you with a picture of competitors’ Web traffic and visitor profiles. You have a better sense of your own true metrics, but this is a chance to view Web sources that use the same methodology to look at your site and others. Here are just a few favorites:

• General site traffic analysis—To see various traffic analysis, average number of pages viewed, time spent on the site and, in some cases, a demographic profile of site visitors, go to the following: http://siteanalytics.compete.com; http://www.quantcast.com; http://www.alexa.com

• Search engine pay-per-click analysis—Get search engine marketing pay-per-click competitive intelligence at http://www.spyfu.com.

Conclusion
Do a competitive analysis annually. Remember, the goal is to solidify what you do right compared to your competition. We can all learn from our competition—and if you take a structured approach to competitive analysis in the e-mail arena, you just might find pockets of opportunity for your company.

Regina Brady is president of Reggie Brady Marketing Solutions, a direct and e-mail marketing consultancy. She can be reached at (203) 838-8138 or reggie@reggiebrady.com.

 

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