• by Joe Mandese  @mp_joemandese, June 8, 2015

That’s the metaphor Email Marketing Insider Summit opening keynoter Ryan Deutsch, DVP, Digital Addressable Marketing, Sears Holdings Corporation, used to kick things off.

Using a diagram of the solar system, Deutsch said the sun is “executive leadership,” noting that email is the closest planet to the sun.

While he didn’t call it Mercury, that metaphor also would have been appropriate, because, well, you know, Mercury was a messenger. No, the reason email is closes to the executive leadership’s sun, is because it the digital marketing communications channel that “integrates” into all of the other "touchpoints."

The other reason email is uniquely differentiated from the rest of Sears’ digital marketing channels, Deutsch said, is because it is the only one that is truly “personalized.”

Whether it is being used as CRM or to promote a product or service, Deutsch said, it has the “ability to personalize at scale.”