This blog will critically review the factors that make The Body Shop’s email marketing, effective and appealing to recipients.

‘This is not a trick, it’s a treat’, with that The Body Shop managed to trigger my curiosity and entice me to open the email to face my fate. With the ever growing and evolution of the Internet, email marketing has acquired a critical role in building and maintaining companies relationship with customers, making it an essential medium of marking communications  (Ellis-Chadwick and Doherty, 2012).

Scrolling through my emails, I tend to ignore most of The Body Shop, primarily because I have enough makeup/ skincare products and secondarily because I receive very frequent emails. San Jose-Cabezudo and Camarero-Izquierdo (2012) states that repeated exposure of emails can overwhelm recipients when faced with large amounts of emails leading to rejection. However, this particular one caught my eye, entitled ‘This is not a trick, it’s a treat’ and because I love celebrating Halloween, I opened it.

This is a simple yet catchy subject line that holds so much relevance, as the Halloween celebration was approaching, making it an instant attention-grabber. The line ‘it’s a treat’ is very appropriate as it portrays an incentive, although not directly announcing it, were recipients are likely to link it to seasonal promotions and free gifts, given that the nature of the celebration is to get treats. Had it not been a catchy and relevant subject line I would most likely of ignored it, however subject lines are often hard to get right and relevance to the customer and linkage between the subject line and email are deemed important to encourage the opening of the email (Ellis-Chadwick and Doherty, 2012).

Once I’d opened the email, the overall layout design was well laid out and easy to follow, with a prominent logo. The use of eye-catching images and videos allows more engagement from the reader (Ellis-Chadwick and Doherty, 2012). The text length was moderate but informative given that the sole aim of the email was to make customers aware of the treats (discounts and products) and encourage spending. Most importantly, the good use of interactive features next to text, allowing immediate links to the relevant webpages for further information, thus increasing user involvement (Ellis-Chadwick and Doherty, 2012) and inviting immediate action to buy.

Geisler et al. (2006) state that complexity influences consumer attention, and too much information, too many graphics, and hyperlinks have a negative effect. Complicated emails can lead to the reader feeling lost and overwhelmed, causing them to lose focus and interest in the email (Ellis Chadwick and Doherty, 2012).  The Body Shop however has successfully integrated the amount of simple images and content to appeal customers.

Despite checking most of the boxes, good length, good subject line and good content, it is lacking personalization. This is a negative factor as personalising an email makes customers relate to the content of the message (Mohammadi et al, 2013) and therefore should be incorporated. This will make me, a subscriber to their e-newsletter, feel valued and improve the click through rates for The Body shop, as it will sustain attention or engagement (Ellis Chadwick and Doherty, 2012).

Mohammadi et al. (2013) emphasizes the importance of an Opt out option requests and their accessibility as it can hurt email marketing efforts and sender reputation. The Body Shop has followed the law and incorporated a opt out option but it is not easily visible as its located at the bottom of the email in small letters. Although it is a single step option were, as a single click in the unsubscribe will opt them out of the list. This factor should therefore be improved.

The Body Shop‘s landing page is their main homepage where you can search for all the offers and products available and purchase them. The layout is simple and easy to navigate making it user friendly, especially in comparison to other retailers, which tend to be more crowded like Superdrug. Therefore having good content. The page is consistent with the aim of the email for the customer to spend once made aware of the offers products. It facilitates this by having direct links saying ‘Shop Now’ on gifts and type of products like skincare. To some extent it does offer personalisation but only if you login, where your name will appear at the top. However it is not effective as it does not relate products to latest purchases or searches, making it less relevant. It also displays social media to keep involved with the companies news and offers. This is effective to maintain repeat business and good relationship with customers, as more tend to look at social media than emails. Therefore having immediate access to HMTL provided in social posts leading to taking immediate action.

Ultimately, it was an effective campaign, it was targeted and well delivered and did what it was meant to do. Overall, what made this campaign so effective and made me buy was the relevance to me, a female student who greatly enjoys Halloween mainly because of the treats.

References

Ellis-Chadwick, F and Doherty, N. (2012) Web advertising: The role of e-mail marketing. Journal of Business Research. Volume 65, Issue 6, Pages 843–848 [Available at: http://oro.open.ac.uk/27747/2/47C57B0F.pdf]

Geisler, G et al. (2006). The influence of home page complexity on consumer attention, attitudes and purchase intent. Journal of Advertising,  Vol. 35, pp. 69–80 [Available at: https://www.researchgate.net/profile/Richard_Watson5/publication/261586814_The_Influence_of_Home_Page_Complexity_on_Consumer_Attention_Attitudes_and_Purchase_Intent/links/57ae5e7108aeb2cf17bddb30.pdf]

San José-Cabezudo, R. and Camarero-Izquierdo, C. (2012), “DETERMINANTS OF OPENING-FORWARDING E-MAIL MESSAGES”. Journal of Advertising, vol. 41, no. 2, pp. 97-112. [Available at: http://search.proquest.com.ezproxy.brighton.ac.uk/docview/1060101387/fulltextPDF/83F8BFC5DA7F459DPQ/1?accountid=9727]

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, Vol. 7, 786-790. [Available at: http://ajbasweb.com/old/ajbas/2013/March/786-790.pdf]