Suggesting that social media will be the death of e-mail is akin to suggesting that the advent of airplane travel in the 1930s meant the end of the automobile. Of course, nothing of the sort happened.
According to a study conducted by PMN and Pace University's Lubin School of Business' Interactive and Direct Marketing Lab, e-mail and text messaging are two activities that Gen Y members "would be the least likely to give up for a week." After these, are television and the telephone. Social media registered fifth just slightly edging out reading magazines. Also interesting is that surveyed participants spend roughly the same amount of time using social media and e-mail, both around 30 hours a month.
Marketing Sherpa looked at this question as well. In a survey asking what channel people use to share information, the responses were, "I e-mail them the link," (78%) versus "I share it through social media" (22%). In effect, this demonstrates what marketers call "segmentation and targeting"—where information that is relevant to a small number of other users (and possibly annoying to others) is sent to a specific list rather than shared with everybody.
Facebook, arguably the top dog in the social media heirarchy, has plans to incorporate more, not less, e-mail in its social media platform. In January, Facebook added functionality allowing applications to ask users for their "primary" e-mail address . And soon, this new functionality will also replace application-to-user and user-to-user notifications. Facebook recommends using e-mail for things like product announcements, newsletters, billing and other transactional communication.
While it is of course already possible to add a newsletter "subscribe" form to a Facebook page, the keen marketer will key in on the subtle qualification on "primary address," meaning the user's actual Facebook contact e-mail address. Access to a user's primary address is gold for a marketer because it provides the most direct and personal channel to the Facebook subscriber.
Social media and e-mail are both asynchronous forms of communication, meaning that there is no real-time commitment and we can engage ourselves in e-mail when it suits our busy lives. However, both also have their own relative strength and value.
Social media can reach out far and wide in one-to-many communications, attracting and engaging new audiences. Momentum, or a viral campaign, accelerates this process. Sometimes to a point where little effort is needed to push it forward. By contrast, e-mail enables us with direct and unimpeded access to a medium we find most personal, valuable, or confidential—right in our inbox without the further requirement to log in to yet another site. It's worth remembering that an e-mail address is a prerequisite in creating a social media account. Often the first and main channel for updates and notifications are pushed to us by social media sites.
Get the idea out of your head that e-mail is passé. It, along with social media and other emerging communication channels will continue to evolve and will challenge marketers to find the right mix to meet their marketing goals. Consider some simple ideas:
1 – Provide a way for your subscribers to share information on their own Facebook page. The simplest way to do this is by adding the code suggest by Facebook into the e-mail.
http://www.facebook.com/share.php?u=http://www.cypra.com
And don't leave out Foward-to-a-Friend functionality for those who prefer sharing one-to-one.
2 – Build your own company/brand Facebook page and ask subscribers to become fans.
3 – Engage and nurture your audience to encourage friend referrals to your page (slow and steady approach), or consider and plan a viral campaign (potentially fast growth but also risky if it backfires).
4 – Ask people to subscribe to your newsletter. Customize your company's Facebook page to encourage opt-ins to your mailing list (be clear on the value and set the right expectations).
5 – Make the investment to track, monitor and evaluate what is working (or not) and how to deliver more value.
Incorporate these ideas into your own marketing and you'll be in a position to exploit both e-mail and social marketing.
Andrew O'Halloran (a.ohalloran@cypra.com) is chief privacy officer and manager of industry relations at Cypra Media.
