I had the opportunity to speak at the Canadian Marketing Association annual meeting in Toronto this week, and the topic was email marketing ROI. As some of you may know, I was a CPA before I jumped head first into digital marketing and, in particular, email. So I feel just as at home in Excel as I do in email marketing applications. Now, I know what you are thinking -- how does one go from accounting to blogging about email marketing? Well, it probably has something to do with the fact that I was a terrible accountant. However, I was able to learn a few things that have served me well over the years, and believe it or not, a few of the lessons provide insight that is easily applied to the email channel and how we can look at calculating program effectiveness. Read the full article at my MediaPost Email Insider Blog!

Having just finished MediaPost’s Email Insider Summit in Park City, Utah, I can say that the email marketing industry is definitely being impacted by the recession. However, not in the way that traditional advertising and trade shows are… email marketing is rising. Apparently, senior management was listening when marketers touted email’s high ROI, because now everyone wants a piece of email – and they want more of it.

The marketers at this event were the heads of email for major brands, including Marriott International, Overstock.com and Turner Broadcasting/CNN. General consensus was that the demand for email marketing within their respective organizations is increasing, and they’re challenged with determining how to satisfy the sharp rise in demand from the various divisions and departments that they service, without burning out their list through increased volume.

As Aaron Smith of Smith-Harmon recently pointed out in MediaPost’s Email Insider Newsletter, email volumes have already skyrocketed, increasing competition for Inbox real-estate. In 2009, it will be more important than ever for email marketers to focus on optimizing their email programs to achieve more with less. Keeping a close eye on contact frequency and email attrition rates will be paramount, as will clearly communicating the value of your email list in business terms order to manage internal expectations. Bob Frady of Live Nation gave an excellent presentation on this topic. By communicating the aggregate purchasing power of their opt-in list to senior management instead of what resulted from email click-throughs, he was able to raise email’s visibility and importance within his organization to a must have for every tour and a significant driver of revenue for his organization.

In addition to optimizing contact frequency and internal communication, marketers should look to Transactional Email inventory as a potential way to alleviate the demand for stand-alone promotions. Transactional Email is opened more than any other email communication, and that valuable real estate should be leveraged for targeted cross-sell and up-sell offers.

With a little creativity and a lot of elbow grease, we have the opportunity to prove email’s value in tough economic times and gain a seat at the marketing strategy table.