Rich-media e-mail delivers campaign success Virtual Access Networks needed a better way to tell its story. The Lawrence, MA software maker had to get the word out to corporations that its product, The Van, could help them streamline the process of migrating their workstations from older Windows operating systems to Windows 2000.
Companies put off upgrading because employees grouse about it—and because it’s expensive: Between $300 and $400 per person. Typically, IT comes in and wipes out everything except people’s work files when they install a new operating system. The costs come mainly in lost work time as employees try to remember how to reset personalized features such as their signature in Outlook e-mail, shortcuts to their favorite Internet sites and the hookup to the printer down the hall.
"Our tool can make that a lot cheaper," says Nick MacShane, director of marketing at Virtual Access.
But The Van’s power is a difficult concept to get across in an e-mail promotion, MacShane allows. Which is probably why previous e-mail campaigns fell flat with less than 1% response rates.
"So we decided to partner with Microsoft for an executive breakfast-seminar series and explain The Van," he recalls. The first meeting was set for June 6 in Chicago. To promote the meeting, MacShane wanted a delivery vehicle with flashy enough bells and whistles to impress the most staid CIO, while being able to track response and gather data for a future go-round. He found it in Boston-based POPstick Corp.’s rich-media e-mail "POPgram." POPstick transmits a text message personalized to the recipient, as in: "Dear Kris, check out this link." Those who clicked through saw an animated two-minute ad with text and audio addressing them by name. The animation includes a spaceship blasting off while Neil Armstrong’s famous quote ("One small step for man…") is heard and music plays in the background. The underlying theme of "Space, the final frontier" is playing off the explicit message of Microsoft’s open-source .NET being the future. (Windows 2000 is the operating system for .NET.) The pitch was, Come to the breakfast and learn how easily your company can migrate to Windows 2000. The call to action, RSVP by clicking this button. Or, Pass along this message if there’s someone else at your company who should receive it.
Many companies still use Windows 97 or 98, MacShane claims, and are just starting to switch to 2000. Microsoft’s .NET will allow organizations to access files and their entire computing environment over the Internet. They must have 2000 loaded to use .NET. The move "gets people away from the licensing model to the renting or subscription model, which is thought to be more profitable," MacShane explains.
About 500 e-mails went out to a list of top executives provided by Virtual Access’ distribution partner Corporate Software. The view rate (those who clicked through the text e-mail to the POPgram) was 3.16%. Of those who saw the POPgram, 51.8% responded yes or no. "Which is amazing," MacShane enthuses. "Can you imagine this? You send someone something and they open it and half of them act on it? I’ve been in marketing 10 years and I’ve never got such a response."
There were 84% yeses and 18.9% noes. "The noes are OK because [we know] the person saw the whole commercial," he adds.
The pass-along rate was 33%. "People may have showed it to their friend just because it looked cool, but we were able to grow our list by 14.6%," MacShane says. To pass along, recipients had to give Virtual Access their friend’s first name, last name, e-mail, company name and city. MacShane will add job titles next time.
About 50 people attended the breakfast. That week, Virtual Access sold its program to an attendee. The campaign cost about $15,000. "The account is worth more than that," MacShane says.
POPstick’s CEO Dan Kastner believes that, for an expensive product, the POPgram is effective because it can actually demonstrate the item. "It provides engagement and excitement."
