Email marketing was always seen as one of the top dogs in marketing but is this a marketing channel that is dying out?  Many firms have abused email marketing over the years by sending overwhelming amounts of emails and just annoying the recipients who then see it is as Spam and put it straight in the deleted bin. Some people believe that email marketing is a dying trend. However, I would like to disagree and prove exactly why it is an effective form of digital marketing and especially for the travel industry.

There are other highly successful and popular forms of digital marketing tools to share campaigns such as social media marketing. There has been plenty of debates about whether social media triumphs email and vice versa. However, social media and email marketing shouldn’t be seen as you must pick one or the other. Ryan, (2014) explains that social media can be used to amplify exposure and traffic therefore email marketing and social media can work in harmony together and support each other with campaigns. For example, looking at Thomson holidays, they could send an email to all subscribers and previous customers about their 2018 summer sale. Then support this campaign with this social media post:

Social media posts can therefore assist the email campaign in conversion creating a stronger and more effective campaign. They work well together to connect with their audiences in a powerful way. More can be read on social media and email campaigns here:
https://litmus.com/blog/how-to-successfully-integrate-email-and-social-media

However, after speculation from others that email marketing is potential a dying trend, there is many reasons as to why this is not true and why email campaigns are still a very effective method alone. Additionally, for the travel industry, I still believe email campaigns are the most efficient method.

Firstly, you can really personalise your emails towards the customer, with the rise of big data and the information from previous bookings you could even personalise the email to match similar budgets, similar locations or even a package holiday that’s from their local airport (Lucas, 2015). With this precious information, it allows better identification of the users wants and needs (Montgomery & Smith, 2009). These personalised emails can reach a mass audience, with content that seems personal and relevant to the recipient (Daykin, 2015). It is highly likely that you are more inclined to open an email if it is personalised and more relevant to you. Campaign Monitor, (2016) discovered that “emails with personalised subject lines are 26% more likely to be opened.  So, with relevant and personalised content, this is email marketing’s secret weapon to success and what can make it such a powerful tool in digital marketing and delivering successful campaigns.

Email marketing allows you to be able to grab audiences attention with subject lines like this:

Straight away, my attention was caught and I was keen to find out what exclusive offers I could receive by being an email subscriber. By stating that ‘I qualified’ and this is ‘by invite only’ this is building a customer relation as I feel I was being rewarded for being an email subscriber. Mohammadi et al. 2013) agrees that by using a subject line that can be personalised can build customer relations. When customer relations are built, you become more familiar and fond of that company and therefore if I was to see an email in future from this company I’d be more inclined to open it. Which could therefore lead to higher conversion rates and more sales.

Email marketing is an efficient way of reaching mass audiences in one go and for successful travel companies, they would have very large audiences. For any purchases made on travel websites you need to enter an email address to make your booking, meaning, these companies will have this large store of previous customer’s emails. But also, the potential to gain more email subscribers who could be potential future customers. Studies show that nearly 54% of the entire planet is using email (Tschabitscher, 2017).

Finally, email allows effective ways to review the success and return on investment and other key performance indicators. This allows marketers to accurately measure customer’s actions (Weible and Wallace, 2001) With this wealth of knowledge marketers are also about to review how successful that campaign was, but also to improve future campaigns.

It is definitely not a dying trend and is still a very effective way of marketing campaigns and it is a tool that travel companies should not forget about or pay attention too. The main benefits would be the building of customer relations, the better the relationships the easier it is to retain customers, keep them away from competitors and generate revenue. Personalised emails can also keep customers engaged and satisfied. Finally, it can reach such large audiences extremely quickly and effectively, it offers great exposure.

Word count: 795

References

Campaign Monitor (2016). The New Rules of Email Marketing – Campaign Monitor. [online] Campaignmonitor.com. Available at: https://www.campaignmonitor.com/resources/guides/email-marketing-new-rules/ [Accessed 26 Apr. 2017].

Daykin, J. (2015) Personalised marketing at scale is the next big thing in digital. The Guardian. 19^th March 2015 [Online]< http://www.theguardian.com/media-network/2015/mar/19/personalised-marketing-digital-future>[accessed 27^th April 2017]

I-Scoop (2015). Email marketing versus social media – once more. [online] i-SCOOP. Available at: https://www.i-scoop.eu/email-marketing-versus-social-media/ [Accessed 26 Apr. 2017].

Lucas, J. (2015). 5 Useful Email Marketing Tips for the Travel Industry. [online] Emailcenter. Available at: https://www.emailcenteruk.com/blog/2015/10/5-useful-email-marketing-tips-for-the-travel-industry/ [Accessed 25 Apr. 2017].

Mohammadi, M., Malekian, K., Nosrati, M., & Karimi, R. (2013). Email Marketing as a Popular Type of Small Business Advertisement: A Short Review. Australian Journal of Basic and Applied Sciences, 7(4), 786-790.this

Montgomery, A.L & Smith, M, D. (2009) Prospects for Personalization on the Internet. Journal of Interactive Marketing. Vol 23, No. 2, p130-137

Ryan, D. (2014). Understanding digital marketing. 3rd ed. Philadelphia, PA: Kogan Page Ltd, pp.151 – 153.

Tschabitscher, H. (2017). Can You Guess How Many People Use Email Worldwide? (It’s Astonishing!). [online] Lifewire. Available at: https://www.lifewire.com/how-many-email-users-are-there-1171213 [Accessed 26 Apr. 2017].

Weible, R. & J. Wallace. (2001) The impact of the internet on data collection. Internet Marketing Readings Online Resources. McGraw-Hill, Irwin: Boston, pp.274-281.

Social media is a huge part of the world we live in currently, with users from all ages, backgrounds, and locations. It is recognised as one of the most powerful tools in terms of marketing (Kirtiş and Karahan, 2011). With the addition of E-WOM (E-word of mouth) this allows users to share experiences and exchange information instantly (Trusov, Bucklin & Pauwels, 2009). But how powerful is E-WOM through social media channels for influencing consumers?

Social media is a prominent channel for E-WOM as social media allows users to interact with each other instantly. When customers undergo a positive or negative experience they will usually share their opinions with friends, family, colleagues etc. Rather than waiting until when they next see them, they can post it on social media for all to see and react to. They can therefore freely express their experience and spread their opinions on a recent product or service they have used (Raacke and Bonds-Raacke 2008).

Looking at this graph; ‘reviews, comments and feedback’ has the highest votes from respondents, proving that word of mouth is seen as the most influencial source on social media activities when it comes to buyer behaviour. But why is listening to other people’s reviews and opinions the most influencial on social media?

A main factor in human communication is informing, meaning we like to discuss events or experiences that have happened to us in which the other person will register what has been said. When looking to purchase for example, a holiday, it’s rare that you would just look at a few pictures and think this is the one I’m going for! You would usually, look at a few reviews left by people who have been their previously and analyse whether the overall feedback is positive enough to make this your purchasing decision. Buyers will always naturally have suspicion and need further convincing whether they are making the right purchasing decision. Nielsen, (2013) discovered that 84% of consumers say they either completely or somewhat trust recommendations left by others regarding products and services. Proving how powerful word of mouth can be.

There can be risks to companies with E-WOM, for example, when some customers may share negative comments on a company’s products or services. For example, this Facebook status below:

The impact of this post will be that all their facebook friends who view their posts will now remember this certain venue to be bad and this may sway their future decision making when choosing a place to eat around this area. However, these negative postings can have potential to be resolved, by companies responding quickly to the negativity and responding calmly and politely. The consumers who have previously read the posting and been left with negative impressions could now be swayed and left a more posistive impression.

Even though there are risks which cannot be avoided, there are many benefits of E-WOM in social media. Social Media Today, (2015) discovered that 71% of consumers are likely to purchase items based on recommendations on social media. Additionally, a survey carried out by Invespcro, (2017) resulted in 78% are influences in purchasing decisions by social media posts. It’s clear how much impact e-WOM and social media can have when consumers and looking to purchase items or services. In addition, e-WOM via social media creates brand awareness due to discussions and sharing of experiences of the company’s product or service and therefore all other connected users can become aware of their brand. The best part is the company does not even have to spend a penny on marketing costs in order to do this, this is all done by consumers.

(Invespcro, 2017)

Additionally within this study they found that 81% have used recommendations from friends and family to impact their buying decisions. So combining the power of social media has on purchasing decisions and the power of WOM from friends and family makes this a very influencial factor of marketing.

Key points to takeaway:

• The power of E-WOM in social media should never be underestimated.
• It has a huge influence on decision makings and can create brand awareness.
• It is a form of marketing that your consumers do for you, however this can leave positive or negative outcomes.
• There is potential to tackle negative opinions and postings on social media

References

Invespcro, (2017). How Social Media Influences Purchase Decisions – Statistics And Trends [Infographic] | The Invesp Blog. [online] Invespcro.com. Available at: http://www.invespcro.com/blog/social-media-influences-purchase-decisions/ [Accessed 27 Mar. 2017].

Kirtiş, A.K. and Karahan, F. (2011) ‘To be or not to be in social media arena as the most cost-efficient marketing strategy after the global recession’, Procedia – Social and Behavioral Sciences, 24, pp. 260–268

Nielsen, (2013). Under the Influence: Consumer Trust In Advertising. [online] Nielsen.com. Available at: http://www.nielsen.com/us/en/insights/news/2013/under-the-influence-consumer-trust-in-advertising.html [Accessed 26 Mar. 2017].

Raacke, John and Jennifer Bonds-Raacke (2008), “MySpace and Facebook: Applying the Uses and Gratifications Theory to Exploring Friend-Networking Sites,” CyberPsychology & Behavior, 11 (2), 169-174.

Social Media Today, (2015). Is Social Media the Biggest Influencer of Buying Decisions?. [online] Social Media Today. Available at: http://www.socialmediatoday.com/marketing/masroor/2015-05-28/social-media-biggest-influencer-buying-decisions [Accessed 27 Mar. 2017].

Trusov, M., Bucklin, R.E. and Pauwels, K. (2009) ‘Effects of word-of-mouth versus traditional marketing: Findings from an Internet social networking site’, Journal of Marketing, 73(5), pp. 90–102. doi: 10.1509/jmkg.73.5.90.

Daily, I receive multiple emails regarding the travel industry, there is only a small percentage of the time that I open the email and assess the deals offered. But what was it about those specific emails that made me open them and lead me to explore further?

Firstly, customers will tend to only open the email if it’s from a brand they recognise (Ryan, 2014). So, the first step is to make it clear who your email is from and your brand is clearly displayed before needing to open the email, otherwise it will go straight into the deleted bin!

Studies show a 500% incline between 2011 and 2014 in the amount of emails opened from a smartphone, (Jordon, 2015). With the rise of emails being opened on mobile devices, it is vital for email campaigns to have an eye catching subject line and headline to draw the attention and therefore lead to opening. With mobile devices having a much smaller screen than computers and laptops, the opening line must be short and easy to read on a mobile device. Ellis-Chadwick & Doherty, (2012) explains the subject line in the email is the first point of contact and needs to encourage the recipient to open. Without the need, urgency or value shown at the first glance, the recipient will not be interested.

Looking at travel and leisure company emails and focusing on their subject line and headlines, there were some emails more attractive to me than others.

I personally was drawn to the Expedia.co.uk with the subject line ‘It’s your lucky day! We’ve chosen you to enjoy this…’ and ‘Confirmed! You’ve scored awesome discounted flights…’This is because I felt it had some enthusiasm and even though it didn’t include my name I felt it was personalised and was directed at only me. It’s important to use email marketing to build customer relations, and to start this process by using a personalized subject line (Mohammadi et al.,2013). Teo, (2005) explained that if you provide a personalised service via email you can provide customers with a feeling of uniqueness. Travel companies have an advantage as they can use previous data of customer’s past holiday bookings to then entice them to purchase another. They can time their emails in relation to popular travel seasons, or popular holiday booking seasons to make sure they target customers at the right time. To see more ideas that travel companies can use to create successful email marketing can be found at http://www.adestra.com/7-email-marketing-tips-travel-companies-can-implement-today/ .

The next important factor to contribute to the success of an email campaign would be the content of the message, which must be aligned to the subject line and headline shown and offer immediate gratification when opening (Ratcliff, 2014). I received the email below, after previewing the intriguing subject line, I decided to open it. However, I was disappointed as I thought it would give be examples of what these ‘awesome low-fare flight deals’ are, maybe providing me with different countries that this deal applies to. However, as you can see below there isn’t much more details provided, I then must click on the pictures and links to find out any information about these deals I have been invited to look at.

However, I much preferred the content of an email from lastminute.com for Disneyland deals, it provided me with exactly what I thought it would from the subject line and gave me a few options with hyperlinks and images attached to view more. It also included a matter of urgency – ‘last chance to book’ which encourages me to keep looking and make sure I did there and then.

This email is also a suitable length, of around 3 pages with all relevant information throughout. Studies show the length of emails ranged between 1 – 5 pages and the average length was 2.4 pages, (Ellis-Chadwick & Doherty, 2012).

But how frequent are the travel industry sending out email campaigns? From the research by Ratcliff, (2014), It seems like there definitely can be ‘too many emails’ being sent in a certain period. The travel industry is selling luxury products that are not consumers every day purchase. Too many emails promoting holiday deals which usually require more thought when purchasing can become extremely annoying therefore the unsubscribe button could look increasingly tempting.

The most important factors for travel companies to focus on within their email campaigns would be a catchy subject line as this is the first point of contact (Ellis-Chadwick & Doherty, 2012). To also increase the success of this first step would be to include personalisation. Personalisation instantly makes your email engaging and more inviting (Barsby, 2016). But Finally, to have good and relevant content to what your subject line was promoting without this link and continuity this will just confuse and frustrate customers and they will not be encouraged to look any further.

References

Barsby, A. (2016) Xanthos Blog. Available at: https://www.e-xanthos.co.uk/blog/9-benefits-personalisation-digital-marketing/ (Accessed: 22 February 2017).

Ellis-Chadwick, F., & Doherty, N. F. (2012). Web advertising: The role of e-mail marketing. Journal of Business Research, 65(6), 843-848.

Jordan, J. (2015) 53% of Emails opened on mobile, outlook opens decrease. Available at: https://litmus.com/blog/53-of-emails-opened-on-mobile-outlook-opens-decrease-33 (Accessed: 21 February 2017).

Mohammadi, M., Malekian, K., Nosrati, M., & Karimi, R. (2013). Email Marketing as a Popular Type of Small Business Advertisement: A Short Review. Australian Journal of Basic and Applied Sciences, 7(4), 786-790.this

Ratcliff, C. (2014) How the travel industry uses email marketing. Available at: https://econsultancy.com/blog/65007-how-the-travel-industry-uses-email-marketing (Accessed: 22 February 2017).

Ryan, D (2014) Understanding Digital marketing: Marketing strategies for engaging the digital generation. 3^rd ed. London: Kogan Page Limited

Teo, T.S.H. (2005) ‘Usage and effectiveness of online marketing tools among business-to-consumer (B2C) firms in Singapore’, International Journal of Information Management, 25(3), pp. 203–213. doi: 10.1016/j.ijinfomgt.2004.12.007.