A recent State of Retailing Online 2007 report from Shop.org provides some very useful information about the effectiveness of email in retail. Here are some highlights:

1) Emailing a house list is delivering orders for less than $7 each. This is a real bargain when compared to banner ads ($71.89), paid search ($26.75), and affiliate programs ($17.47).

2) 88% of the merchants surveyed indicated that email became a higher priority during 2007.

3) The average click through rate on house email is 11% with a 6% conversion rate.

4) The average retailer mails its list 64 times each year.

5) Merchants rated different types of marketing emails based on use and effectiveness.

- Online-only promotions (71% use and 66% say it is effective)

- Segmented emails based on stated preferences or purchase history (63% use, 60% effective)

- New product announcement (73% use, 51% effective)

- Shopping cart abandonment (17% use, 13% effective)

- Promoting partners (29% use, 9% effective)

Emailing your house list is one of the easiest ways to increase revenue, but few merchants seem to have a good strategy for taking advantage of it.

It is not enough to just email in adhoc fashion when you remember to do it; you need to spend some time planning your campaigns. As this study shows, that planning could pay bigger dividends than the time you spend planning most other marketing efforts.

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About the Author: Having launched two multi-million dollar online companies, Greg Howlett has been working in the trenches of internet marketing for over eight years. He currently is the President/CEO of Vitabase. Vitabase is a leading health supplement company, selling hundreds of products under the Vitabase label. Vitabase markets exclusively online, and has built its customer base by providing a unique and cutting-edge online customer experience.

Greg lives with his wife, Marla, and four children in Monroe, GA.

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