Forrester Research: Forrester Retail Insights Devices, Media, & Marketing First Look: Research & Event Highlights From Forrester

 09 Oct. 2003
Looking To Benchmark Your Email Results?
After aggregating data from 4,000 email campaigns, Forrester has learned that median open rates for email newsletters and promotions are 31%. Email service messages enjoy open rates of 47% and four times the click rate of other kinds of email. Despite spam filters and email address churn, smart email beats telemarketing in the Do-Not-Call era by a long shot.


Coming Soon: The Digital Radio Recorder (DRR)
Sirius and XM Satellite Radio subscribers are approaching 1 million. But what would really get sales moving? The digital radio recorder -- a TiVo-like device that allows listeners to receive, record, pause, rewind, and (yes) skip commercials while enjoying analog or digital radio. Almost one-third of consumers say they are interested in this kind of radio control.


Hot Off The Presses
IM Adoption -- Far From In Lockstep -- Marches On, by Charles S. Golvin
Premium Content Brands Translate Online, by Chris Charron
Search Use Grows With Online Experience, by Charlene Li
How To Sell Consumer Electronics, by Jed Kolko
No Shortage Of Database Marketing Services Firms, by Eric Schmitt
Market Overview 2003: Marketing Automation -- Still Room for the Specialists, by Elana Anderson
Email Metrics Beyond Opens And Clicks, by Jim Nail


Fascinating Factoids
29% of marketers' email messages bounce.
62% of email messages offer no way to change an email address.
7.5 million SMS messages were sent during this year's "American Idol." If you had any doubt, SMS has arrived in the US.
966 million pop-up ads were served by MSN alone in the month of July, according to Nielsen//NetRatings.


Planning A CRM Deployment?
Don't fail before you start with the wrong RFP. Best practices for a CRM RFP include: 1) defining business objectives for the project; 2) mapping out key organizational processes; 3) laying out the customer information infrastructure; and 4) defining response formats.


Need Help With Your Email?
Forrester's Email Marketing Boot Camp teaches companies best practices in email targeting, design, delivery, and measurement. The day-long seminar also includes a group exercise in designing effective emails and a panel of experts from ISPs and email service providers. Our next three Boot Camps are:

November 4 (Seattle)
January 29 (Cambridge)
March 18 (Atlanta)

To register, contact Sam Stern at sstern@forrester.com.


AOL Looses IM Share
AOL Looses IM Share

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CE retailers will polarize into two camps

An old consulting maxim states that companies have to compete on the basis of either price or differentiation. Then, starting in the 1980s, competing on both axes -- not one or the other -- became the rage. Think Target, Dell, or your local supermarket chain. Sure, plenty of companies were based firmly in one camp or the other, but having the lowest price -- and differentiating by product, brand, or experience -- was deemed necessary for getting really big.

Well, the old maxim is back in style. As connected, complex devices become the norm, no consumer electronics retailer will be able to compete on both price and differentiation. Doing so will be unsustainable. Few industries other than financial services, travel, and telecommunications have seen the kind of turmoil CE has. And many companies can learn from CE's pain -- which includes more price-sensitive consumers, more complex products, more competitors (manufacturers like Dell or online players like Amazon.com), and shorter product life cycles.

The industry will polarize into two camps. Discounters will consolidate, offer limited product lines of mostly mainstream devices, and develop sophisticated data infrastructures to offer real-time promotions. Teachers will offer live demonstration areas, flexible store layouts catering to customer cohorts, and virtual product bundles.

The Device Retailer Scorecard Which retailers will succeed? Based on our analysis of consumers' shopping experiences today, Sam's Club, eBay, and Wal-Mart lead the discounters. CompUSA, Best Buy, and Amazon are in the best position to be successful teachers. Sears Roebuck and Target risk getting squeezed out. As polarization occurs, we'll also see some consolidation. If Best Buy were to swallow Circuit City, for example, the new company would have the dense geographic coverage to offer at-home service efficiently.

My favorite quote from our recent Consumer Forum

"Disney is a totalitarian regime. And I mean that in the best possible way."

That was Barry Diller, CEO of InterActiveCorp, speaking about Disney's philosophy in taking a top-down approach to designing experiences. His point, echoed by others, was that companies in industries that change quickly should rely on a bottom-up experience design approach -- keeping close tabs on the needs of customers on the street. But for industries that are more stagnant, top-down experience design is more appropriate. This was one of many great insights we learned from our Event -- it was great to see so many of you there.

Later this month, we will be publishing our 2004 online advertising projections, as well as research about telecom displacement, email design, data quality and much more.

Have a great October!


Chris Charron
Devices, Media & Marketing Group Director

P.S. If you'd like to suggest research for us to write, or if there are data points you are looking to track down, feel free to drop me a line anytime at chrischarron@forrester.com.


Research Referenced In This Issue
If you printed this email, get links to the research featured in this week's issue by going to www.forrester.com/go and entering the five-digit number of the report you'd like to read.

Barry Diller Tells (Almost) All (32856)
Can Radio Be TiVo-ed? (32591)
Comparing Best Buy, Circuit City, And RadioShack Shoppers (16222)
Dell: Welcome To CE. Here's What To Do (32768)
Email Metrics Beyond Opens And Clicks (16727)
How To Sell Consumer Electronics (16080)
IM Adoption -- Far From In Lockstep -- Marches On (32814)
No Shortage Of Database Marketing Services Firms (32421)
One-Click Email Address Changes Are Critical (32806)
Owning The Telecom Consumer (16729)
Premium Content Brands Translate Online (32805)
Satellite Radio: A Mystery To Consumers (15985)
Search Use Grows With Online Experience (32758)
Sending Email Is Easy; Delivery Is Hard (32479)
Telemarketing's Reprieve Is Only Temporary (32772)
The Future Of Amazon.com (16873)   
Winning In A Wal-Mart World (15484)

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