How small businesses can make a big impact with a well-timed welcome email

Attracting clients to ecommerce sites and intriguing them with clever website design and relevant content are important for small businesses.

But a new marketing study says that a welcome email for new subscribers may be "the single greatest opportunity to engage subscribers" and retain their interest in the longer-term.

According to marketing strategy firm Smith-Harmon's Retail Welcome Email Benchmark Study, business are missing a "golden opportunity" that a welcome email offers - an easy, inexpensive way to gather more information about customers and inform them of benefits of being a subscriber.

The study shows that while a number of businesses took more than 24 hours to send a welcome email to customers, only 76 percent of those surveyed explained why being a subscriber was important and what discounts or perks they might receive.

Some welcome emails failed to invite shoppers back to the ecommerce site. According to Smith-Harmon, 13 percent of respondents did not include a link to their homepage in the initial marketing email.

Smith-Harmon says in its study findings that sending a series of welcome emails is an emerging trend that has thus far been "very effective at driving long-term engagement."

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