Real results with permission-based email

Email marketing is one of the most impacting and cost-effective ways to drive quality traffic to your website. Problem is, email marketing is also one of the more abused and mis-used online marketing practices, particularly in the auto industry where email practices by car dealers are a disgrace.

Implementing the necessary steps to true permission-based list building is becoming increasingly more important. Companies that do so establish a major competitive advantage over those that do not.To give you an idea how much a difference true permission-based email marketing can make, look at the 4 sets of reporting data on recent email campaigns.

The first 3 sets are from monthly newsletter campaigns by 3 different dealerships sent to their mass email list of recipients which was compiled using conventional industry practices. The 4th data set is the combined result of 3 different email campaigns with 3 different messages over the course of a 2-month period to the same list of double opt-in recipients built over the past 6 months.

Newsletter Campaign to Sample Conventional List A
12659 sends
2045 unique opens (16.2%)
716 unique clicks (5.6%)

Newsletter Campaign to Sample Conventional List B
4457 sends
447 unique opens (10%)
111 unique clicks (2.5%)

Newsletter Campaign to Sample Conventional List C
13387 sends
1326 unique opens (9.9%)
322 unique clicks (2.4%)

Combined Result of 3 Campaigns to Double Opt-in List
968 sends
607 opens (62.7%)
189 clicks (19.5%)

This double opt-in list of 350-plus recipients belongs to the dealership with Sample List A and effectively demonstrates QUALITY vs. QUANTITY. The messages sent in each of the 3 campaigns were completely different too. One was for a free haircut at a local salon; one was for a free battery check; and one was to solicit an actual car in stock.

The quality over quantity factor is a reality and particularly challenging for car dealers. Customer expectations of dealer intentions are low to begin with, and permission-based list building requires time, commitment, and a genuine understanding of your audience. But with the right tools and the right approach, incorporating this should return good dividends for car dealers realtively quickly.