Email Marketing Case Study

Overview

Bob Schoenfeld, the president of the two showroom firm is a 5th generation furniture retailer. Anyone who has been around the Seattle area for a while is familiar with their family name. Bob had a vision to offer contemporary furniture for customers interested in great design. Their showrooms are centered around a design center full of fabrics, samples, and catalogues where guests are served ONLY by designers. Their sales staff of about 12 consists entirely of professional designers with design degrees, or decades of experience and sometimes both. The designer assistance is FREE to the clients with their furniture purchase, and about 70% of their business includes design services. Schoenfeld carries zero inventory and everything is special order.

Challenge

This system of retailing has some advantages and inherent challenges. The advantage of not stocking ANY inventory is readily apparent (zero cost of holding, shrinkage, damage), but it presents the challenge of slowing the customer down. In this age of instant gratification and "same day delivery" espoused by other retailers, changing the customer paradigm to appreciate fine furniture perfectly designed for their home doesn't always come easy. This can be especially difficult on the retail floor when traffic is high - trying to manage the task of conveying the unique approach of Schoenfeld versus the temptation to pick up another customer who already "gets it."

Solution Needed

Bob was looking for a way to convert first time shoppers into new and loyal customers. He wanted to make sure that the advantages of working with a designer and waiting for the perfect furniture were accurately conveyed to each prospective customer regardless of the amount of traffic that came through the store and regardless of the designers ability to connect fully with each prospective customer.

In addition, Bob had made a substantial investment in his web presence that generates lots of traffic, but felt that it wasn't delivering enough value. He needed a way to "capture" people who came to the website and were interested, and were open to "learning more" about the way they do business.

Email Broadcast

After reading an article about the power of email marketing in WHFA Magazine written by me (Ken Mahar, CEO of Email Broadcast) Bob gave us a call. After a good initial meeting where all I did was listen and take notes, I followed up and presented Bob with an Email Broadcast solution.

First, the website needed a way to capture visitors by offering them a chance to stay engaged. We called it the "Insider's Club" and invited people to join by prominently placing a form on the Schoenfeld home page. For the first time, Bob now has a way to "convert" his web visitors into contacts. And with the right set of emails, the hope is that we'll convert these contacts into new customers.

Additionally, the design staff needed a way to properly convey the unique attributes of Schoenfeld Interiors (SI) in a professional way regardless of how much time the customer had for their initial visit. Designers also needed an "automated follow-up tool" that they could count on. Even on low traffic days a designer might speak with 4 to 6 opportunities which at the end of the month add up to about 100 prospects. Multiply that by 6 months and were talking about 600 people to follow up with. That would be a full time job in itself, but the designers still had to greet TODAY'S prospects and meet THIS month's sales goals. We offered a solution that would do both things - properly educate a new prospect on the advantages of Schoenfeld Interiors and provide an automated follow up system so EVERY prospect they had would at least receiving something in their inbox.

How it works

We created a 5-email series that would be delivered to each new prospect. The only thing the designer had to do was ask for an email address in addition to the other follow up information they were already collecting. The designer then simply enters that information into a web page intake form that we built for them. After the entry is made, the contact is immediately sent a follow up message thanking them for the visit, and telling the prospect to expect a couple more emails over the next week or so. Each email is sent out with the designers photo and contact information.

Three days after the initial "Thank You" message is sent, the second email arrives and it talks about the emphasis that Schoenfeld places on design, and that the design services are complimentary. Three days after that a second message arrives with more benefits and advantages, and so on until a total of 5 messages have been sent over a 15 day period. So, the salesperson spent a total of 15 seconds entering this person's data - and with zero extra minutes invested a total of 5 emails went out on his/her behalf educating and inspiring the customer.

After the "5-Email Welcome Series" is over, that contact is now part of the general email newsletter list. Once a month we'll be creating something dazzling to send to all the people on the list. This list will include all the former customers that SI has in their database.

We'll also be integrating the Schoenfeld database with our email database. This will allow us to send new clients a proper "Thank you for your purchase" message from the president, and also send them "Customer Only" email messages when appropriate.

The Creative

We wanted each message to have a clean, modern look, and be lightweight as far as text content. We carefully chose a heading font that conveyed modern style and clean lines - just like the furniture that SI carries. We used a highlight and drop shadow treatment for each piece on the top and bottom respectively, to give it some pop from the page. We changed the designer photos to black and white and boosted the color a bit to give a consistent look across the different photos - and everyone looks better in black and white don't they? By design, there is not a strong call to action in each piece as the series is meant to develop a relationship - not create a one-time transaction. We're swapping in photos of different inventory with each message so that all the different styles can be showcased - appealing to different people.

The Results

The program was kicked off on January 20th, 2010 so look for an update as to the results. The kickoff meeting was successful as all the designers instantly saw the advantage of having an automated follow-up system help them with the large job of staying in touch with all the different prospects that they meet from day to day.