• by Wendy Davis  @wendyndavis, May 3, 2005

E-mail marketers would have better luck if they employed behavioral targeting techniques in their messaging campaigns, according to a recent Jupiter Research study on promotional messaging. The report, "Promotional E-Mail: Driving Sales Through Behavioral Targeting," suggests that marketers should target consumers based on factors such as Web pages viewed, time spent per page, and shopping cart abandonment.

"The vast majority of marketers are missing the opportunity to improve campaign relevance by targeting engaged subscribers," stated the report.

The Jupiter report also said that marketers who personalize e-mail often limit their efforts to inserting the customer's name in the salutation--a technique Jupiter said was not sophisticated enough to influence most consumers. In fact, only 6 percent of customers said a personalized greeting or subject line influenced their decision to make a purchase.

Jupiter is not alone in saying that e-mail marketers aren't yet using behavioral targeting. Michael Della Penna, chief marketing officer of e-mail marketing services company Bigfoot Interactive, estimated that just 30 to 40 percent of the company's retail marketers employ Web analytics to incorporate consumers' behavior into promotional campaigns.

The Jupiter report also found that 10 percent of 2,229 online consumers' surveyed have, in the last year, opened their e-mail and immediately made a purchase--while 17 percent have opened e-mail and later made a purchase. But 73 percent of consumers say they have deleted promotional e-mails unopened, and 42 percent have unsubscribed from the marketers' mailing lists, in the last 12 months. Numbers add up to more than 100 percent because respondents could choose more than one answer.

Why did the 1,176 online consumers who made purchases after receiving e-mails do so? About two out of three--67 percent--said they decided to buy because the message mentioned a sale price; 55 percent closed the deal because the marketer offered free or discounted shipping.