Direct marketing internet business
Direct marketing means that manufacturers advertise and distribute their own products to customers via internet based electronic store without intervention of any intermediaries. Manufacturers may sell their own products on the internet if their electronic stores have high visibility. However, if the direct visibility of the company and broad is too low or managing an independent server is not economically justifiable, which can be case with small companies; the items may be better displayed in the well known third party emails.
II. The benefits of birect marketing
Direct marketing benefits customers in a number of ways. Consumers report that home shopping is fun, convenient and hassle-free. It saves time and introduces them to a larger selection of merchandise. They get the benefit of comparative shopping by browsing through mail catalogs and online shopping services. Industrial customers also cite a number of advantages, they particularly like learning about available products and services without trying up in meeting salespeople.
Sellers also benefit. Direct marketers can buy a mailing list containing the names of almost any group, left handed people, overweight people, millionaires, and so on. Then can personalize and customize their messages.
III. Database marketing
In past marketing was driven by a single transaction. Today, the focus has shifted towards repeated transactions or building a consumer relationship. For marketers this transformation means listening instead of telling and asking instead of acting. Service and customer satisfaction come to forefront of marketing focus. Industry trends captured by terminology such as micro marketing, mass customization, smart selling, and smart produces reflect growing corporate awareness aimed at understanding a specific customer's needs and responding effectively to meet those needs. An increased focus on information gathering, data warehousing, monitoring consumer purchase behavior and predicting future purchase patterns through modeling are called database marketing.
IV. Major channels for direct marketing
Direct marketers can use a large number of channels for reaching prospects and customers. These include face-to-face selling, direct-mail marketing, catalog marketing, telemarketing, Television and other direct response media, kiosk marketing and online channels.
Direct-Mail Marketing
Direct mail marketing involves sending an offer, announcement, reminder or other item to a person at a particular address. Using highly selective mailing also, direct marketers send out millions of mail pieces each year; letters, flyers, foldouts and other salespeople with wings. Some direct marketers mail audio tapes, video-tapes and even computer diskettes to prospects and customers.
Direct mail is a popular medium because it permits high target market selectivity, can be personalized, is flexible and allows early testing and response measurement.
The three new forms of mail delivery appeared :
Fax mail: Fax machines enable one party to send a paper based message to another party over telephone lines. Todays computers can also serve as fax machines. Fax mail has one major advantage over regular mail. The contents can be sent and received almost instantaneously. Marketers have begun to send fax mail announcing offers, sales and events to prospects and customers with fax machines. Fax numbers of companies and individuals are now available through published directories. However, some prospects and customers resent receiving unsolicited fax mail, which clutters their machines and consumes their paper.
E-mail allows users to send a message or file from one computer directly to another. The message arrives almost instantly but might be stored until the receiving person goes to his computer, inputs his password and retrieves his messages. Marketers are beginning to send sales announcements, offers and other messages to e-mail services sometimes to a few individuals, sometimes to large groups. As people begin to receive more e-mail messages, including unimportant ones, they may look for an agent software program to sort out the more important messages from those than can be ignored or discarded.
Voice mail Voice mail is a system for receiving and storing oral messages at a telephone address.
V. Marketing on the internet
Internet marketing techniques are considered to be passive if they require visitors to seek out the site. In other sense, passive techniques are considered to be those methods that require the user to pull the information from the website. Internet marketing techniques are considered to be aggressive if the site actively seeks out potential customers and initiates contact with them. Aggressive techniques are considered to be those techniques in which the website pushes the information onto the consumer, regardless of whether the consumer is interested or not.
The websites may be created to provide a corporate presence on the internet for those individuals seeking out information. Established businesses sometimes enter the website. They want the site to be present if current or potential customers which to locate information about their company or products. Generally, this type of site indicates that company has not yet identified a strategic use for web based commerce.
One way that the firms can attract visitors to their site of its relatively low cost and the ability to send messages containing full color pictures of products as well as links to order form pages. The types of relationships are typically initiated by the business offering an information service to the visitor. If the visitor is interested, he or she can sign up for the service. The amount of information required to register can vary by site. The more information required, the fewer interested parties a site can expect to receive.
Some sites may exhibit initiative to attract initial and subsequent visitors to their site by providing general information in an interactive fashion, typically with the hope of generating goodwill with the visitor.
Online banner advertising a service sold by internet marketing firms can be very effective. Firms pay these companies a fee to flash advertisement banners with links to a business site across the pages of other sites.
Another method to promote web sites is offline advertising such as television, radio and print. These advertising mechanisms are also relatively more costly than previously mentioned methods. Approximately 75% of advertising dollars spent promoting this online event goes towards offline advertising. This is a success as many more visitors than expected attempted to view the live fashion show.
Another method of online advertising that entails website business taking initiative in unsolicited, targeted e-mail advertising to past visitors or customers. This type of advertising is aggressive in that the visitor or customer does not specifically request additional sales or promotion items. The use of cookies enables the tracking of customers responses to such email advertisements.
Another method of obtaining email addresses is use to software robots to scan and collect addresses from public sources such as Usenet postings. The online equivalent of junk mail that is sent out repeatedly is referred to as span mail. Span is referred to as postage due marketing as thousands of messages sent reside on recipients host computers until they are deleted and the storage of such messages cost businesses money.
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