• by David Goetzl , December 9, 2008

It stands to reason that the current economic climate could lead to a greater investment in online marketing, but at least one executive wants to make sure the buzz around Pay Per Click doesn't overtake what email marketing can offer.

 

Blaine Mathieu, CMO of Lyris, Inc., said the time is ripe for email service providers to band together and run a trade campaign targeting the executives who control the purse strings.

"To help remind them that email works," Mathieu said in an interview in advance of this week's MediaPost Email Insider Summit. "The potential is not maximized yet," he added. "And the industry needs to do a better job getting the message out ... especially in this kind of environment."

Mathieu suggested an "Email Works" tagline and said copy could point out that ROI for a pay-per-click campaign is indeed solid--some $20 for every $1 spent--but email marketing comes in at double or triple the rate, some $40 to $60 for every $1 put forward.

Mathieu said he believes Pay Per Click is garnering so much attention in part as a result of its measurability, but also because of a perception that email marketing is a mature tactic. But he said email analytics have improved "immeasurably" in what he calls a "2.0" era.

Furthermore, he said pay per click receives a benefit from its identification with Google. If it were the province of "only MSN, Yahoo, Ask.com and Business.com, we wouldn't have to do as much of a PR effort to promote email."

Mathieu said Lyris is ready to contribute to fund a campaign, but admits that the logistics of how it would be put together are convoluted. One possibility is to fund and operate it through the Email Experience Council, part of the Direct Marketing Association. But "more likely we'd need to start from the ground up," he said.

He did say that a successful campaign would have to include more than email--but also banner ads, traditional outlets and even pay per click. "In all honesty, like any good campaign, it would have to be an integrated campaign," he said.