Gail F. Goodman is CEO of Constant Contact and she recently took a few minutes to chat with Bryan Haines. This is Section Two. Read the full interview.
Bryan: How does Constant Contact market itself?
Gail: We really do try to “walk the walk,” using an integrated marketing approach that leverages all of the tools that we offer, including email marketing, educational events, and social media marketing. We also use advertising and public relations to support our direct marketing efforts. One very unique element of our marketing mix is that we use free education – local seminars, webinars, thought leadership – to get our audience comfortable with us and with online marketing.
Bryan: How significant of a role does email marketing play in your marketing strategy?
Gail: Email marketing plays a very significant role. As we all know, email marketing is best used as a lead nurture and customer retention tool, so that is how we use it. We use what we know about current and prospective customers to deliver the most relevant content possible. This helps ensure that our customers and prospects get what they need, when they need it. We use a combination of direct email campaigns as well as regular email newsletters.
Bryan: What role does your affiliate program play in your marketing plan? How much of your new business comes via this channel?
Gail: Throughout 2010, we worked on expanding our partner program – not just in terms of affiliates, but also our AppConnect, Solution Providers, and Co-Marketing partner base. We made significant strides with this program, adding social media partners like Ning, WHERE, and Posterous, as well as AppConnect partners like Jack Rabbit Technologies and MonkeyMedia Software. We believe partners are a critical way for us to deliver the solutions that are important to the almost 30 million small businesses in the United States. Today, we are proud to say that we have more than 7,000 partners. The customers who come through these channels tend to be some of our strongest.
Bryan: How has the email marketing industry changed since you joined Constant Contact in April 1999?
Gail: The two most obvious changes are how social media and mobile have impacted email marketing. In 1999, neither of these was even a consideration. Today, they are part and parcel of everything we do. One of our key areas of focus as a company is to make social media simple for our customers. We have already integrated social media features and functionality into all of our tools, making it a seamless part of creating an email campaign or marketing an event. We also acquired NutshellMail this past year. NutshellMail is a free social media monitoring tool that collects your social media conversations and sends them in an email “digest” at whatever schedule you set – hourly, twice a day, daily – whatever works best for you. So many of us don’t have time to spend all day with our social media channels. NutshellMail does the work for you and makes sure that you don’t miss any important conversations. Another change we’ve seen is how consumers are spending more and more time on their mobile devices. We work with our customers to make sure their email campaigns are optimized to be viewed on any device, and have also launched an application that allows customers to create and manage their campaigns from their iPhone or iPad – with additional mobile network compatibility coming on the horizon.
Bryan: What social media networks and communities do you use to communicate with clients and prospects?
Gail: As we tell all of our customers, it’s important to be where your customers are. We’ve found the most success with Facebook and Twitter, and have a strong presence on both of those platforms. We also engage in online communities on platforms like LinkedIn, along with our own community, which gives our customers a place to have conversations with and learn from their peers.
Gail F. Goodman is CEO of Constant Contact and she recently took a few minutes to chat with Bryan Haines. This is Section Two. Read the full interview.
