Commentary

Happy Mother's Day From Your Son!

How do you explain to your mother what you do for a living? It starts with telling her people will spend $15.73 billion showering their mothers with gifts this year, according to a survey by the National Retail Federation. The study notes that people are more thoughtful about the way they give gifts -- but are marketers as creative in their tactics and messages surrounding this very popular consumer event?

Considering over one-fifth of consumers plan to shop online and spend up to $139.14, with men spending up to $172.91 and women spending $107.18 on average. (BIGresearch "2007 Mother's Day Consumer Intentions and Actions Survey.") you'd think we'd put our best foot forward -- especially since 84% of marketers stated they plan to use email to promote this event. (Constant Contact, "2007 US Small Business Mother's Day Outlook.")

Mother's Day is a great example of an annual event that encapsulates all the values of email. It's a time for planning, information-gathering, scheduling and social coordination. It's a time to buy, to share ideas, and lastly, it's about the last-minute decision for the many sons, daughters, husbands and others who procrastinated buying gifts for Mom.

advertisement

advertisement

I'm sure everyone reading this has his or her own opinion of what was effective, as it is all contextual, yet after looking across so many industries and how they cater to mothers and women in general, here are a few that I thought would help illustrate my point.

I've classified these programs into three categories: one, you totally get it; two, you're probably short-staffed; and three, you went shamelessly straight for the wallet.

"You get it"

I have to give props to FamilyFun.com. A nice series of emails in newsletter form (FamilyFun "Weekender" and FamilyFun "At the Craft Table") designed to help us plan a fun Mother's Day with craft projects for all ages. Then of course the usual credit goes to BabyCenter.com for infusing creative ideas with products that are relevant to the age and gender of your children.

Another group that gets it is 1-800-Flowers.com. While they teeter on the edge of sending too much email, and are a bit too promotional, they stand above the other flower retailers with their creative messaging. A free vase isn't enough to get me to buy flowers, and, YES, they still "go for the wallet." Still, there is some creative messaging and imagery that makes these emails stand out from any other offer from an online flower shop.

Also getting props are the photo service companies (Kodak, Snapfish and Shutterfly), which are finally getting away from the old "ten free photos" and countdown to shipping promotions. I get it, a coffee mug with a photo on it, and I get free shipping, but without creative ideas, creative messaging it's just that a reminder of ideas I already know. In fact, Mother's Day can be all about photo-taking, before, during and after the event.

"You're probably short-staffed"

While I admire some of the creative thoughts, I think most of these were back-of-the-napkin ideas that relied on the product and merchandise rather than some creative insight into consumers and how to inspire them to take action.

UPromise gets the first mention. While they are rewards-driven -- buy and you get rewarded, and it's themed to Mother's Day -- their entire approach was uninspiring, considering they know so much about their consumers and did nothing to leverage your social network around the event.

I am lumping many of the apparel and home furnishings retailers (The Gap, Old Navy, Pottery Barn, J. Crew) into this category. It's hard to get away from a merchandising view of email, but I sensed many of the programs I looked at were the result of being strapped for time and weren't creative in nature.

"You went straight for the wallet"

Personalizationmall.com and the second-tier retailers were active in sending emails (that's an understatement) - some as early as a month in advance. But every email was about the promotion -- "Buy Now!" "4-Day Sale!" "Limited time only!" -- and a countdown to shipping. This is the same trend you see during big-spend holiday events. This hit-and-miss approach usually results in the marketer just sending more and more email, rather than using smarter, more creative methods of reminding a consumer of a big event and the brand connection to make. As everyone begins to do this on the same level, the only thing that will stand out is being unique and creative.

Not every email needs to be award-winning, nor does every company have a huge staff, but stepping back and really thinking about how your consumer uses email, how decisions are made, how you can inspire action and how to measure this are keys to success. The process may be time-consuming, but so is sending more email and not understanding why sales and customer loyalty are so unpredictable for your business.

Next story loading loading..