The Solus E-Mail Marketing Revolution

15/09/09 posted by Michael Sharkey

Email marketing doesn’t just have to be newsletters or announcements. There is a new wave of offer-based solus email marketing that is out performing traditional forms of email marketing with stunning results.

For those new to the trade, a solus e-mail is a third party advertisement that is sent to an existing opt-in subscription database that is comprised of a target demographic. In simple terms, it is the opportunity to directly target your ideal customers via email.

Solus has been around for a long time, since the early days of email marketing in fact, however recently it has found a resurgence as media networks look to capitalise on online communities and databases that are highly targeted. The resurgence is in the form of offer based solus marketing and the results we have seen are very pleasing.

So what's on offer?

Co-branding
Many networks are now offering co-branded solus emails which means the network will support your email promotion with their own brand. This has been found to increase credibility, open rates and click through rates.

The chance to target market a related offer
Solus lists are generally segmented for best results, this enhanced targeting can be used to segment an accurate target market for your campaign meaning your offer is more relevant and more likely to acted upon.

A cost effective lead generation tool
Generating leads from targeted solus campaigns is more likely to have a lower CPA (Cost-Per-Acquisition) per lead then other forms of online marketing such as online display or even Google Adwords. These figures tend to only hold true when the campaign is highly targeted and well structured. 

Market education
Solus is a great way to educate a targeted market about a new product release, productivity tool or announcement. Since the list is targeted the market is generally willing to be educated on relevant topics that they have opted into the list for.

How to Start your Solus Revolution

Find your network of choice
Several Australian media networks are now offering co-branded solus email marketing. It's best to get in touch with a digital marketing agency (like us.. cough, cough) to help you select the best media plan and strategy.

Create your valuable based proposition
You will need to engineer a campaign that is relevant, communicates your key message and has a value based proposition to attract people to click. We recommend keeping your solus short, snappy and reducing the amount of imagery used.

Build the landing pad
A successful solus campaign needs a landing page. Design and custom landing page that allows you to easily collect prospect information and encourages the most optimal opt-in rate. Competitions always work best! Ensure you have installed sufficient tracking software to log the click through rates from your campaign.

For more information about running a solus email marketing campaign contact Sharkey Media, a friendly ideas man is waiting to help.