pURL Database Segmentation Mistakes to Avoid

When it comes to pURL marketing, database segmentation not only makes the actual direct mailing task easier, but it greatly improves the effectiveness of the campaign as a whole. In order to get the highest response rates possible, segmentation is vital. Before designing your pURL campaign, your database segmentation plan should be clearly mapped out. Here are some specific mistakes to avoid when it comes to planning your pURL marketing database segmentation.

Over Emphasis on Demographics

Many times marketers take into account only demographic information when it comes to segmenting their mailing lists. They will divide their database by age of the prospect, where the prospect lives, what kind of income the prospect has, etc.

And while demographic information can be insightful, it has far less importance than past customer or prospect behavior. Your pURL marketing campaign will be much more successful if you can segment your database based on what the prospect has done in the past. Try segmenting your mailing list based on date of last purchase, type of products purchased, the total number of products purchased, how often the prospect makes a purchase, the date of the last website visit, the number of web pages visited, the number of products viewed online, etc. This type of information generally has more bearing on future behavior than, say, what type of car the prospect buys.

Not Cleaning Up Duplicate Information

Because pURL marketing involves a direct mail or email component, it is important to start with a clean mailing list. But, because pURL marketing is so cost effective, most marketers try to throw as many names as possible into the database. The often merge data from many different sources, such as customer records, catalog mailing lists, rented lists of prospect names, etc. And often, those data sources contain duplicate records.

Not only does this mean that twice the money is spent on certain prospect names, but it also means that the final campaign results will be skewed. For instance, let's say you have a mailing list of 100 names. You send out a pURL campaign, and 33 people respond to the message. You assume you have a response rate of 33%.

But suppose that on that list of 100 names, you had 20 duplicates. That means you actually sent your pURL campaign to only 80 individuals. And if 33 people responded, you really had a response rate of over 41%.

To ensure that your pURL campaign stays as cost effective as possible, and to ensure that your reported results are accurate, it's important to purge your final mailing list of any duplicate records. This saves time and money and helps you make better decisions on further pURL marketing in the future.

Not Using Strategic Segmentation

Often, marketers arbitrarily segment their databases based on some baseline information without planning out a complete strategy. But trying to hone in on exactly the right method of making a sale to exactly the right person at exactly the right time is usually more complicated than simple baseline data.

It's easy to segment a mailing list based on zip code, or previous purchase date. But it's much more effective to take this segmentation one (or even two, three or four) steps further. For instance, what about segmenting by "customers in zip code 45678 who purchased within the past 3 months and spent $750 or more". Or maybe "prospects who requested our Christmas catalog during the month of September and still have not made a purchase by November 15 and live within next-day shipping service area". These complex database segmentations allow you to create a pURL marketing campaign which is extremely personalized and sure to be highly effective.

A pURL marketing campaign is an excellent way to present a highly personalized, one-to-one marketing message to clients, customers and prospects. The effectiveness of any pURL campaign can be increased by improving the segmentation of the marketing database.

Looking for pURL marketing? We offer full service personalized URL marketing to fit every budget.

A.COMplete pURL (personalized URL) web page is a dynamically created web page designed to speak directly to your prospect or customer on a personal level.

Individual page components can be customized for the particular reader. You can refer to your prospect by name, you can include personal images, you can reference relevant products, etc. And because, in most case, the personalized web address contains the prospect's own name, the pURLs get noticed, get visited and get results! Your prospect feels as if you are speaking directly to him - because you are!

pURL marketing can be used with email, direct mail letters, postcard campaigns, etc. And since Complete pURL offers Full-Service personalized URLs, you don't need to deal with any of the technical mumbo jumbo.

Want to learn more about how pURL marketing works? Request your free demo at the CompletePurl website http://completepurl.com.

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