How Scotts Miracle-Gro Uses Its Email Newsletter to Nurture In-Store Sales

Author:

Stephanie Miller

Source:

One click between email message and e-commerce is so ingrained for all of us—as both buyers and marketers—that it's almost nostalgic to think of using email solely to promote offline purchases.

Yet Scotts Miracle-Gro Company (www.scotts.com), like many consumer packaged goods companies, has no direct online sales channel—and it finds that email-newsletter subscriptions boost purchases on average 1.5 times annually.

Perhaps the reason the Scotts Lawn Care Update email newsletter is so successful is its commitment to the roots of the program—customer service.

"The idea was to be helpful to customers, take out the guesswork in product selection, and let them know what products to apply to their particular lawn type in each season," says Kip Edwardson, senior manager of Interactive Marketing at Scotts.

"We've learned that knowledge equals revenue," he says. "We are guiding them through the lawn-care lifecycle, and that education encourages them to not only buy more product but to feel confident and gratified by their purchase. We take very seriously that customers gave us a permission grant, and we want to provide something of value."...