Convert Your Prospect Subscriber into a Full-fledged Customer

Although some like to think we marketing managers are psychics...the real reality is most of us can use all the help we can get to figure out which prospects are close to making a purchase and which are still just kicking the tires. The most successful marketing managers are those who can identify a good number of promising customers and give them the right boost to get them to make a purchase.

There are so many priorities all needing to happen at the same time, so having a creative strategy that will drive the results without spending much effort is goal. For most of us it's a balancing act of one-to-one marketing and scheduled e-mail blasts.

Here are just a few tips to engage different groups of customers on your e-mail list to nudge them into making that final purchase:

1. Use Web analytics to keep track of behavior. E-mail subscribers often give inaccurate survey responses, and prospect reported data gets old fast. Try instead to track prospects by watching what they do with their e-mails and on your web site. Using tools like RFM (recency, frequency and monetary value) analysis will help you fin that 5%-10% on your list that's highly engaged.

2. Take a look at model behavior, models that detail your prospects behavior can not only help gain first time customers but it can also yeild a prompt secondary purchase as well. The key to this is usually in the balance of implementing the behavioral model and its true incremental benefit.

Yes this can be a time and cost heavy approach but the insight to better understanding human behavioral purchase patterns can give you an edge in pre-determining our customers actions.

3. Change things up, replace e-mail blasts with life-cycle messaging. Try not to send the same e-mail blast to everyone; the churn rate of finding new subscribers will cost you more than identifying the most interested people on your current list.

Start this by crafting targeted messages to subscribers by knowing what stage of the sales cyle thy're in. To gain that data, you need tools that count the click and open rates. If you don't know the best way to handle this type of life-cycle messaging there are various companies that can assist in creating a messaging program to fit your needs.

Keep in mind disinterested prospects of today could be your customers of tomorrow, so continue to talk to them the right way to move them on in the cycle.

4. Make it personal, personalized e-mails equate to higher engagement. Prospects appreciate you listening to their needs and because of that their interest increases. Develop the content of the e-mail to reflect their interest level, for example offering information on specific products or services or even a vertical industry.

When you get someone who asks for more info that's the key time to convert them to a sale by handing them over to a member of the sales team to speak to.