Getting Started
The starting point is with a revamp of the email program. In case a brand does not have email IDs, it should run a program to collect email IDs and link them to mobile numbers. The email ID is perhaps the most valuable asset that a brand can have. In emerging markets like India, the focus tends to be on the mobile number. What brands must remember is that a mobile number only enables them to communicate with an eighth of their user base: 30-day app retention is about 25%, and half of those who keep the app installed have push notifications switched off. While brands can choose to send SMS and WhatsApp messages, the costs can be 10-50 times higher than that of an email.
Email 2.0 must become the cornerstone of the revamped program. Email 2.0 makes emails 2-way, a daily utility in people’s lives, interactive, informative and gamified. It is something customers will welcome in their daily lives – “invited advertising” or invertising!
There are two ways to implement an Email 2.0 program: marketers can do it internally or partner with a Progency (product-led agency). A Progency does to martech what the digital agencies did to adtech – offer a one-stop solution with payment linked to performance. This leaves the marketer free to think about the bigger picture and strategy rather than getting too caught up with the day-to-day grunt work of running campaigns. (In fact, the ideal marketing department of tomorrow will probably be a single person supported by a progency which in turn combines an AI-first martech platform and people.)
The gamechanger for building the hotline and thus capturing attention and data are the Loyalty 2.0 tokens. These tokens take marketing into the Web3 world. They disintermediate the Big Tech platforms, foster a direct relationship between brands and customers. What marketers need to remember is: To get customers to pay attention, pay for attention (else they will pay Google and Facebook 100 times more.) The budget for Email 2.0, Progency and Atomic Rewards comes from cutting the adwaste which accounts for half the marketing spend. Savings from this will flow to the bottom line, as will the increased revenues from customers converting more because they are listening more to what the brand is saying.
Email 2.0 and Loyalty 2.0 are thus the first steps towards profit-centric marketing. They will later need to be augmented by Martech 2.0 and Adtech 2.0. This new framework will transform business bottom lines and create loyal customers. Without profits and without customers who return and get their friends, no business can survive for long. These new marketing ideas – Email 2.0, Loyalty 2.0, Martech 2.0, Adtech 2.0 – are disruptive innovations, and can serve as the anchors for success and the creation of exponential forever profitable growth and eventual “profipolies”.
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