Using Email Intelligence to Compete with E-Commerce Goliaths

Let’s face it: Not all online retailers are created equal. You’ve got the Davids and the Goliaths. The smaller, newer online merchants and the bigger, more established e-commerce megastores like Amazon and Wal-Mart. The Goliaths have giant marketing departments and in-house data mining teams. The Davids…do not. So how can these small- to middle-sized e-commerce companies compete with the data-driven personalization and automation of the big wigs?

According to a recent case study from Springbot, the answer lies in third-party consumer data from providers like AtData.

In 2011, Springbot, an e-commerce marketing platform for small- and medium-sized businesses (SMBs), saw that its clients were missing a crucial ingredient of modern marketing success: data. As a result, the company teamed up with AtData and began providing demographic data in real-time through its analytics and automation platform.

With AtData’s Email Intelligence (data tied to an email address) and Springbot’s online marketing tools, these SMBs finally had the ability to personalize content, turn customer profiles into actionable marketing campaigns and contextualize their own customer info with outside data.

The results were pretty clear. Within months, Springbot’s clients saw jumps in traffic, engagement, conversions and revenue. First Aid and Safety, a retailer of first aid supplies and safety products, increased online sales three-fold within the first six months of using Springbot’s data-driven tools. Another online merchant, Country Club Prep, harnessed consumer data from its email list to build a new online campaign that brought a 912% increase in site traffic.

For Amagi Metals, the issue was online cart abandonment. The e-tailer leveraged data to completely revamp its abandoned cart email campaign, adding automation and retargeting. With the addition of a data-personalized email sent three hours after cart abandonment, Amagi Metals was able to improve site revenue by 50% and achieve an ROI of 2,230%.

These e-tail Davids aren’t just competing with the Goliaths; they’re beating them.

So next time you’re worried about dipping your toe into the big data pond or going head to head with Amazon, remember: It’s not about how much data you have, it’s how you use it. External data providers like AtData are an excellent way to fill in gaps in your customer database. From there, even the smallest retailer can start leveraging, integrating and optimizing data through platforms like Springbot to improve their marketing and conversions. Just like with David and Goliath, e-tail success is about marketing smarter, not harder.