Do you know which marketing channels your customers prefer?

So, you know where your customers live, the products they buy and even which other websites they frequent, but do you know which marketing channels they prefer?

by Helen Leggatt

According to a new joint study by ExactTarget and Forrester Research, many marketers are in the dark when it comes to their customers' preferred method of communication.

More than 85% of marketers involved in ExactTarget's "2009 Channel Preference Study" ran multi-channel campaigns, yet under half knew which channels their customers prefer.

This means that while marketers may be sending the right message, to the right person, at the right time, they aren't necessarily sending it via the right channel. Only 37% of marketers had knowledge of which channels their customers prefer to use and under a third (32%) knew how consumer behavior changed across channels.

Additional highlights from the study include:-

- 80% of marketers claimed customer preference is a key factor yet just 12% ask customers their preferred frequency for email messages.

- 47% of marketers did not take any actions based on customer preferences.

- Just over a quarter (27%) of marketers analyze whether efforts in one channel boost results in another.

Tags: campaign marketing, customer preference, email marketing, multi-channel campaign