FootSmart signs with ExactTarget for personalized e-mails

Foot healthcare products cataloger and online retailer FootSmart has teamed up with ExactTarget for personalized e-mail marketing campaigns aimed at baby boomers.

Through ExactTarget's integration with FootSmart.com's customer database and Web analytics provider Coremetrics, the company will develop a profile of each customer based on online browsing and purchase history data coupled with offline purchases from FootSmart's catalog mailings. FootSmart will use the combined customer profile to automatically control which offers and news to include in e-mails it sends to its list of more than 1 million e-mail subscribers.

"The overall goal is to increase the productivity of our e-mail program by personalizing the e-mails more," said Kim Gnatt, VP of FootSmart. "We are going to be segmenting customers based on their online and offline purchase data."

The direct retailer's previous attempts at building targeted e-mails focused on a customer's habits and preferences, but the process was entirely manual, requiring a significant time investment. “ExactTarget will allow us to automate that entire process and deliver a better quality offering,” Gnatt said.

FootSmart sends e-mails 2-4 times a week to about 1 million customers in its database. The goal with the new integration with ExactTarget is to engage members more in e-mail through these new targeting techniques, said Gnatt. The integration will be complete by June.