|
Best
Email Newsletter for Marketing Purposes: Honorable Mention
Consumer Fossil Rim Wildlife Center: Wildlife W@tch
Brand/Client
Side Team:
Jan Busey, Pat Condy
Vendors/Agencies
e-Marketing Strategies
MarketingSherpa
Summary -
Why They Won:
Fossil
Rim's content team are continually thinking up new reader
involvement devices. They don't just ask you to click to
read more, they ask you to help name the new baby giraffe,
to enter your own photos in a contest, and to submit articles.
Plus, content includes downloadable posters and desktop images.
We like the way this newsletter pushes the envelope to be
more to its readers.
From
Their Nomination Form:
Fossil
Rim Wildlife Center is a 1,800-acre natural wildlife conservation
facility in Glen Rose, Texas. Its financial support comes
largely from donations from visitors and members, so communication
is key to maintaining this support and keeping the focus
on the animals and land. The e-newsletter program is a very
cost-effective tool for gaining new visitors, building a
relationship with supporters and keeping them involved. It's
also a vital tool for cross-selling membership and products
from the Nature Store, as well as educating its readers on
other aspects of Fossil Rim, like its camps, home school
programs, lodging, events, tours and more. Fossil Rim Wildlife
Center is smaller in size for a non-profit organization,
compared to other behemoth non-profits. However, it has taken
the pace of the cheetah when it comes to adopting a strategic
e-marketing program. In just more than one year after the
launch of the Center's Wildlife W@tch e-newsletter, its subscriber
base grew from less than 1,000 to more than 4,000 targeted,
opt-ins and now this customer communication program boasts
an online audience of more than 6,500.
The
key to this success? Fossil Rim understands the
importance of handing over its trust and support to a third
party to develop a long-term, ongoing strategy for its
customer communication program. That partner is Dallas/Fort
Worth, Texas based E-marketing Strategies, Inc. led by
President Mona Belcher. E-Marketing Strategies showed Fossil
Rim the importance of trying new things, adapting to the
needs of its audience and remaining fluid to the changing
interests. E-Marketing Strategies created Wild W@tch, and
just like the wildlife stars of this e-newsletter, Wild
W@tch itself has evolved with its changing habitat ' the
readers. This first step to launching Wildlife W@tch was
to clean the existing list of 1,000 database members. E-Marketing
Strategies tackled this by sending a 'thank you for your
support' message and inviting Fossil Rim members to become
newsletter subscribers. Next, a template was created that
included all the right elements for effective e-mail marketing:
quick download time, easy-to-use navigation and fun graphics
(photos of the baby animals are especially popular).
And
then, of course, was the main ingredient--the content. The
goal of the customer communication plan is to build a sense
of community and to keep members and visitors up-to-date.
E-Marketing Strategies guides Fossil Rim on the type of
content that will engage its audience. Some recent article
topics include Field Notes from Dr. Robin Radcliffe and
Animal Care's Adam Eyres, also known as the 'Rhino Wrangler.'
Other key elements that E-marketing Strategies incorporated
include: A sense of appreciation by sending special offers
and 'first to know' material. Reader involvement, like
voting on names for a new baby Photo contest and recent
stories submitted by Fossil Rim visitors.
Downloadable
posters and desktop images. Photography plays
an especially important role in Wildlife W@tch. In fact,
the photos receive almost as many clicks as the articles
themselves. Fossil Rim and E-Marketing Strategies spend
time testing the content and the promotions to see what
its audience is hog 'wild' about. The outcome is a few
regular features ' like Cheetah Chatter, Distinguished
Resident and What's Gnu. Since its inception, Wild W@tch
has published 27 consecutive months, retaining readers
from all over the world, including Africa, New Zealand,
Europe and Canada. Its popularity is due to consistency,
strong branding, sense of anticipation, successful delivery
and less than average bounce rate. With the success of
this program, Fossil Rim continues to allocate more marketing
dollars into their customer communication program and is
redeveloping the website based on information it has harnessed
from its e-newsletter program. Fossil Rim's e-newsletter
subscriber base started with less than 1,000. Current audience
is 6,500 (in 27 months) and growing. All subscribers are
100 percent permission based. A key to this success is
an excellent list-building strategy, which grows consistently
by 300 subscribers each month. This program also maintains
higher than average open rates, which are always between
35 to 40 percent. Wild W@tch has never had an open rate
less than 30 percent. The click-through rate is 16 to 20
percent of those received.
The
e-newsletter also generates web visits, new member
sign-ups, donations. For example, when the newsletter featured
a $99 lodge special, it received a very high forward rate,
plus generated instant calls and emails inquiries. The
e-newsletter also gets read all the way to the bottom.
In March 2006, the links in the very last article of the
newsletter received the highest number of clicks. Another
key to this success is to keep the links 'live 'indefinitely.
Past issues of Wild W@tch are archived, and they're optimized
for search engines ' providing even greater exposure for
Fossil Rim. In the coming months, E-Marketing Strategies
plans to implement email surveys and add a new email confirmation
page that is well-branded and provides new subscribers
a special 'new subscriber' discount in an effort to motivate
subscribers to make the journey to Fossil Rim. There are
many things on the horizon for this email program. The
subscriber database is expected to grow to 10,000 by the
end of 2006, making this program one of the largest email
program for a non-profit this size. |
