At my job, we utilize Salesforce as our Customer Relationship Management (CRM) tool. Salesforce is one of those incredible systems that can do virtually anything, but usually requires some effort to get there.
One of the great efforts that I see Salesforce advancing is proactive email marketing usage reports that are sent on a monthly basis to each user. The reports provide some insight into areas of the application that they are fully utilizing as well as other areas that could help them.
The automated email report ends with 4 sections:
- Implement
- Reinforce
- Optimize
- Expand
While the email marketing strategy on this is fantastic, I find the details within each section lacking practicality or ease of implementation. You can click through each of the topics on the email to get additional details on what the feature offers. Optimize, for example, had 15 recommendations within my email. The majority of these recommendations are interesting but I have no control over implementing some of them.
This is a great email marketing strategy that I’d encourage everyone in the Software as a Service industry to implement; however, I’d make the following recommendations:
- Keep it simple. I’d recommend a single item for each section… one item to implement, one to reinforce, one to optimize, one to expand.
- Business opportunity. With each item, I would provide the business opportunity or a case study of another client utilizing the item.
- How to start. Now that they’ve peaked your interest, some contact information for who to follow up with for help would be logical.
By automating and implementing an email marketing strategy like this, you’re providing your clients with the tools for success. In return, a successful implementation of your software will lead to improved usage and business results – a great opportunity for upsell opportunities and increased customer retention. If you’ve implemented an automated strategy such as this, let me know. I’d love to hear the results!
My inspiration for this post was Chantelle at Compendium, who recently implemented a Tip a Day email for its clients to opt into. Alternatively, users (or even non-clients) can opt into a Daily Tips for Business Blogging on Twitter!
I still remember how Hotmail makes a big hit last 10 years ago. They use the signature link in all user’s email to spread the word around the world which quickly fly them high. I’m sure email marketing is a good marketing technique but handling spam box will be an additional talent.
We used salesforce at my last job, and while I’m sure if set up properly it could be useful, I found the user interface to be borderline unusable. That said, I wasn’t using it for marketing, I was using it for sales. At some point I’d like to see CRM’s integrate with social media. That would be a whole lot more useful for me personally. Data just isn’t really my personality. I prefer relationships.