The Wildlife Conservation Society hopes that people who love tigers will pounce at the chance to get e-mail about them.
WCS, which operates urban zoos and conservation sites worldwide, has set up three kiosks near the exits of Tiger Mountain, a new tiger exhibit at the Bronx Zoo in New York. People are asked to key in their e-mail addresses on the spot so that they can receive regular news about the big cats.
“If you’ve just been nose-to-nose with a Siberian tiger and you are excited, it’s the perfect time to get the relationship going,” said Alison Power, director of public relations at WCS.
The e-mail program launched on May 15, when Tiger Mountain opened its gates.
The kiosks feature an ATM-like screen that offers visitors an e-mail postcard from the zoo if they enter an e-mail address and ZIP code. Within an hour, the postcard is delivered to the visitor’s inbox.
In addition, everyone who signs up for the postcard will automatically receive a quarterly e-newsletter covering WCS’ worldwide efforts to protect animals and educate people about its work.
“Stay involved with WCS’ tiger program,” reads the HTML postcard on which a furry tiger’s mug peers out at the reader. “Learn what’s happening with our Bronx Zoo tigers, keep informed with the latest news on our work to save tigers in the world, and much more!”
A link for a tiger screen saver is offered along with one for a survey. The survey asks for name, address, e-mail address, demographics such as household income, number of children in the household and ethnicity and likes and dislikes about the Tiger exhibit and the Bronx Zoo in general.
The survey is the first stop toward building a database that will include a unique profile for each visitor.
Bigfoot Interactive, the e-mail service provider handling WCS’ e-mail program, expects open rates to be about 80% to 90% and clickthrough rates to hit the 30% to 40% range. “If you’ve just walked out of an exhibit and you’re blown away, then you say I’m definitely interested in getting information,” said Al DiGuido, CEO of Bigfoot Interactive.
Because of nearly non-stop rain in New York in the late spring, the kiosks logged in only 4,000 e-mail addresses during the early weeks. “When we get some weekends without rain and when the temperature is less than 200 degrees, we’ll see more visitors,” Power said.
Meanwhile, WCS has asked Bigfoot Interactive, to tap into the 110,000-name database of Bronx Zoo members. The zoo draws 3 million visitors a year, according to Tim Russo, marketing manager for WCS.
How does the e-mail relationship management compare cost-wise with direct mail? WCS has no idea. “We haven’t been able to send direct mail — we haven’t had the money to do it,” Power said.
However, this program will cost WCS less than $100,000 for the year, said DiGuido, which includes e-mail capture, delivery, newsletter production and measurement. The kiosks are not included in that price because they are funded with the overall exhibit.
Tiger Mountain provides a natural habitat for the six big cats in residence there, but separates them from their human visitors by a thin pane of floor-to-ceiling glass. Tigers are so endangered that there are more living in captivity than in the wild, according to WCS.
Network
