Coolsavings.com has introduced a new service that will let advertisers analyze responses and create targeted segments from coolsavings' database to optimize their e-mail marketing campaigns.
The service, called the E-mail Target Definition Service, allows marketers to send e-mail test samples. For example, a company can distribute 50,000 e-mails to a random sample target that is meant to represent the entire database and another 25,000 sample e-mails to a standard demographic target.
“We can use that 25,000 demographic target as our base line response rate that we're trying to improve, and then we use the 50,000 as the input to a segmentation model, where we try to locate or find segments of our database with very high response rates,” said Brian Pozesky, vice president of consumer analytics at coolsavings, Chicago.
Pozesky said the data collected from the tests help create segments of coolsavings' database, which has 15 million members. Upon registering, users are required to provide 15 to 30 points of demographic data and 50 to 100 points of behavioral data, allowing coolsavings to create highly targeted groups, he said.
“That is what provides the predictive punch, the predictive power to the segmentation model,” Pozesky said.
The service, dubbed TDS, aims to increase a marketer's campaign performance as well as to forecast it, he said.
“Advertisers can understand exactly what their cost per acquisition or their cost per order is going to be as they dig deeper into our database,” Pozesky said. “So if they're looking to hit a certain cost per order, we know the exact volume that we can send to hit that cost per order. It takes the guesswork out of the process.”
Pozesky said the service is different from other e-marketing services because of the turnaround time. He said that within a week or two the test samples can be sent, the segmentation model can be completed, response rates can be analyzed and forecasts can be made.
“With traditional direct marketing that's close to impossible, and with Internet marketing that's still extremely fast,” Pozesky said.
