Hotels At Home has expanded its in-room catalog and e-commerce program to the Fairmont Hotels, Homewood Suites and L'auberge du lac Casino Resorts. The company, which is in the process of being acquired by Affinity Media International Corp., distributes its catalogs of hotel-exclusive furniture and linen products to more than 500,000 rooms.
Money Mailer has partnered with ePrize to add an online sweepstakes to its direct marketing efforts. The ePrize promotion, which applies to Money Mailer clients at the local, regional and national levels, allows advertisers to combine direct mail campaigns with interactive online promotions.
ShopRite grocery stores have teamed up with MediaCart Holdings Inc. and Microsoft to deploy "smart," ad-serving shopping carts. "ShopRite has always been one of the players to look at technology and be an early adopter, so when this came along we were asked to partner to test it and to see if it had any merit," said Karen Meleta, spokesperson for ShopRite.
Harte-Hanks Inc. has acquired UK-based digital marketing agency Mason Zimbler Ltd. Mason Zimbler provides technology companies with a full range of integrated digital marketing services, including direct marketing, advertising and branding as well as media planning and buying, research and other services.
Jason Bishara, SLM Holdings Inc., January 30, 2008
DMNews readers are familiar with customer relationship management (CRM) software and the various reasons for its use in direct marketing. David Ciccone, SVP at Merrill Lynch, has a maxim that succinctly describes the reason direct marketing and financial industry professionals need CRM software: "It's simple: Know your client and what you told them." This applies not just to database managers, of course, but to anyone with clients.
DM News' Essential Guide to Lists, Database Marketing & Data Services
There are few disciplines that can claim to underpin the very fabric of the direct marketing world like the successful management of lists and databases. The use of these tools can single-handedly mean the success or failure of a marketing initiative, from the smallest, most highly targeted acquisition effort to the grandest scheme. The professionals who work for the lists and database service providers live, sleep and breathe information and, in this guide, they share their best practices and worst-case scenarios.
