Project Overview
Weisman Home Outlets is a leading local marketer of discounted kitchen cabinets and bathroom finish supplies. Each year thousands of customers shop at Weisman to get a better deal than they can find at the big box stores or the high-end custom suppliers. Weisman approached Active Web Group (?AWG?) because we are well known for our overall marketing experience with many of the world’s leading brands. Weisman’s management understood that they were missing out on the opportunity of communicating their value message to the local community around their stores. Weisman hired AWG to get the word out.
Challenges
There were a few challenges to overcome in getting the value message out for Weisman. The first challenge was that Weisman had not collected any email addresses! Unfortunately, this is a common problem of many businesses, but one that we at AWG are used to. We have access to unlimited legal opt-in email lists for most geographic locations. We also use services to add email addresses to existing customers. Another challenge we faced at AWG was competing with the high tech slick look of emails and web sites of the big box stores. The big orange apron store is a big competitor and we needed to show the advantage of using Weisman. The third challenge is that everyone is busy at Weisman and has very little time to participate, which is another common challenge we face at AWG. The fourth and final challenge was how to track results so that management at Weisman could determine the ROI of the program.
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Goals
Whenever we are hired for a service, we map out the objectives of the program to make sure the client receives what he expects. With the four challenges in mind, we mapped out a strategy. First, Weisman needed email lists to legally send to. We used our services to buy opt-in names in the area on their behalf as well as add email names to their existing customer list. This created a very nice starter file at a very reasonable cost. Next we added an email sign up on their site and trained their reps to take email names when purchases were made in their stores. To beat our much better funded competition, which is one of the world’s largest retailers; we designed simple, straightforward email messages with the discount being the primary message. It is our and Weisman’s belief that the primary value they bring over their bigger competitor is better pricing. Let the emails show it fast. Weisman’s management was both too busy and, shall we say, technically challenged to participate much in the creation of the emails and deployment. At AWG, that is not a problem. After a few meetings, we understood the fabric of their message and created offers for them to approve on a regular basis. We send them four emails every month to approve, which takes about 10 minutes of their time per month. Simply put, we do all the heavy lifting. To track results from this marketing campaign, we have all the coupons print with a bar code. The IT department at Weisman set up their stores to zap the code when a customer makes a purchase to receive the discounted offer. We also place tracking phone numbers on the emails for people that decide to call to either make measurement appointments or place orders over the phone. Determining ROI is very important in today’s tough economic environment. The stage was set to roll out the emails after about one month of preparation work.
Success
The first month was a wind fall! Over $38,000 in sales was generated directly from the email campaign, as well as a few hundred call-ins to request directions to the stores, schedule appointments and place phone orders. Obviously, Weisman was thrilled with the results and the email campaigns have continued. We have since added a newsletter to offset ongoing discount offers. This has helped to continuously grow their list as well and improve the open rates to over 15%! Needless to say, we pulled the orange apron strings right off the competition!
Services Offered
AWG currently is re-designing the Weisman site to an E-Commerce enabled platform. We provide Search Engine Optimization, Email Marketing and Content Management.
