• by Chad White , May 10, 2007

I've been reading Chris Baggott's newly released book Email Marketing By the Numbers: How to Use the World's Greatest Marketing Tool to Take Any Organization to the Next Level, and one of the things that got me thinking was the advice "Be human." Chris says, "People don't fall in love with institutions... Your chance of landing in a great relationship increases exponentially when you show a human side."

With that in mind, I decided to see how retailers do when it comes to injecting humanity into their emails. But before I get into that, I just wanted to thank all of you who signed the Hyphens Equal Disrespect petition after reading my column last week about spelling "email" without the hyphen. I invite you to read an update on the initiative that I posted on the Email Experience Council's new blog, The Voice of Email.

Okay, so how human are retailers? Not very. By my estimation, about one in six major online retailers tracked via RetailEmail.Blogspot regularly has a person with a name telling subscribers something. That was my threshold for being human -- the person needed to have a name that was mentioned in the email. So models don't count, and copy that sounds very conversational doesn't count, either.

There's an even smaller group of retailers that almost always has a human voice in its emails. That group consists of the Sportsman's Guide, which always carries a folksy message from Gary Olen, the founder of The Sportsman's Guide; TigerDirect, whose emails are signed by Carl Fiorentino, the very enthusiastic president of TigerDirect.com; and Crutchfield, whose emails are signed by Bill Crutchfield and regularly feature pictures of staff members with products.

Fiorentino has some of the best copy, which is very buddy-buddy salesman and full of details and links to products. Most of TigerDirect's emails carry Fiorentino's picture. A May 3 email even featured his name in the subject line: "Carl's Gone Crazy: $99 Intel Barebone...$99 Seagate 500gb HDD...2gb DDR2 $79...Much More." Olen also excels in speaking in the language of his audience, talking about products costing "bucks" and greeting his readers by saying, "Hello folks."

While Crutchfield includes a brief note from Bill Crutchfield in every email, it stands apart by regularly featuring pictures of staff members and customers in its emails. For instance, an April 30 email with the headline "Cool gear for rockin' moms" has a picture of Debbie, Crutchfield's director of finance, rockin' out with an MP3 player, and an April 9 email about outdoor speakers had a picture of the five-person Crutchfield Outdoor Speaker "Research" Team. Crutchfield's emails also regularly feature helpful articles and videos -- providing advice and customer service is extremely human.

Do you need to show a human face in every email? I don't think so, but I do think that giving readers some face time every once in a while helps them bond with your brand. Need some ideas on how do to this? Here are a few.

1. Let your product experts make picks and give advice. Someone on your team has product expertise and insight that readers will find interesting and useful. For example, Tom Rosenbauer, the marketing director of Orvis Rod & Tackle, is a 10-time author and fly-fishing expert. In an April 13 email with the subject line "Rosenbauer's tips and top picks," Rosenbauer talks about his favorite rods, new gear that he likes and gives a little advice about saltwater fly fishing. Similarly, Neiman Marcus' fashion director, Ken Downing, issues his Runway Reports from various major fashion shows around the world, and HSN taps its hosts to inject some personality into its emails.

2. Call in outside experts and celebrities. For instance, Spiegel likes to have guest stylists recommend and comment on outfits constructed from Spiegel's assortment. In an April 28 email with the subject line "Stylist Advice: The Secrets to Creating Your Own Look + 20% Savings!" the retailer had celebrity stylist Wayne Scot Lukas made recommendations. (Wayne Scot Lukas also showed up in a March 29 HSN email.) American Eagle Outfitters has brought in celebrity talent for its recent GradSpeak series, which features inspirational graduation speech-like letters from people like The Rock, Bethany Hamilton and Matt Leinart.

3. Tap consumer-generated content. As the MySpace/YouTube generation grows in financial power, retailers will need to reach out to consumers more for content and brand participation. Zappos, which publishes its Daily Shoe Digest newsletter based entirely on material written by its passionate customers, is already doing this. American Eagle has been active here as well, setting up AESpringBreak.com to connect with its young target audience using video clips, photos and a blog that cover its spring break parties and concerts in Cancun and Acapulco. The company is using its email newsletter to make sure that subscribers know about this special site.

Although many major online retailers are adopting this way of thinking, there are still quite a few that would rather hide behind their product assortments and continue to engage in faceless mass marketing. I think that will change by necessity.