1. or direct response marketing and lead generation, there is per-
haps no faster, cheaper, and potentially more effective tool to reach your
owners and prospects than e-mail. Although this is probably not news to any-
one reading this column, it might surprise many readers to learn that few
timeshare developers are finding ways to integrate e-mail marketing into their
overall sales, marketing, and customer-relationship management strategies.
E-mail offers developers not only the opportunity to reach new prospects
more efficiently – and effectively – but also facilitates the less obvious but as
important goal of building better relationships with an existing ownership
base. This is often overlooked, although owners are a prime market for
cross-selling additional development units, not to mention an excellent
source for referrals. Yet, in visiting scores of timeshare marketing Web sites,
I found only one that even offered a mechanism to sign-up for any e-mail cor-
respondence – and weeks later, I have yet to receive any reply or message.
This need not be the case – for an industry that spends so much money
on developing and then marketing the timeshare product to the mass market,
not capitalizing on something as inexpensive – yet proven so successful – as
opt-in and targeted e-mail arguably amounts to a significant missed opportu-
nity. But where do resource-strapped companies with overtaxed staffers
begin? How do timeshare firms fulfill the potential of e-mail marketing in an
economy that has forced all of us to carefully measure every dollar spent?
Develop Your E-Mail Strategy
I believe that it’s not rocket science to define a solid e-mail marketing and
relationship-building methodology – and you do not need to be a large
brand to pull it off, either. From sophisticated eCRM (enterprise customer
relationship management) applications to listserver software and service
providers, to simple messaging applications such as Microsoft Outlook,
all can provide at varying levels the tools you need to get started.
An effective e-mail strategy lets developers of all sizes and resources
create campaigns around offers that allow you to cross-sell, upsell, and
resell your core and ancillary products and services over and over. And,
instead of generating sales and leads over the course of weeks or even
months after a promotion begins, an e-mail campaign is considered com-
plete within just a matter of days, and you have instant feedback.
Surprisingly, it appears that very few timeshare companies and clubs are
directly using e-mail to achieve these objectives. A review of leading time-
share industry Web sites revealed few that included even an e-mail address
for consumer questions or comments, much less a sign-up mechanism for
getting offers or newsletters. This opportunity should be re-examined by
every timeshare development company. Marketing efforts in the year 2002
and beyond that do not have an active and well-conceived e-mail campaign
business plan are not positioned to compete for today’s timeshare buyer, nor
can they best extend the lifetime value of the customers they already have.
Begin by defining your key business goals and objectives. You want to
sell more timeshare product, so your e-mail marketing effort should appeal
to non-owners and promote the timeshare concept, the attractiveness of
the property, and the benefits and value of ownership. You also can use e-
mail marketing to reach out to existing owners; perhaps convince them
that one unit isn’t enough, they should purchase additional points, or that
you have other products and services for sale to make their ownership
even more valuable. At the very least, you can build amity with your owners
by using e-mail to remind them periodically about their interest in your
resort and to encourage referrals of friends and family members.
E-mail allows you to target an audience, and taken to an extreme, slice
and dice it by demographics, geographics – even psychographics at times
– and e-mail each group a customized message in order to lift response.
Marketing with e-mail creates numerous benefits for the developer.
These include:
Direct communication with prospects and customers. E-mail
means direct business-to-consumer messaging and allows for actual trans-
actions. Communications can be in the form of a letter, an electronic
“postcard” complete with photographs, a colorfully designed HTML adver-
tisement, or streaming video and sound. The message itself can be light or
serious, solicitous or informative, friendly or businesslike. If targeted prop-
erly, an e-mail promotion can reach your core audience where they live. For
business building, though, the goal is to increase the number of people
reading the e-mail, thereby increasing the likelihood that your end goal –
whether it’s to make a sale or capture a new lead – will be reached.
Interactivity. Unlike a print ad, direct mail, or any other offline media, a
promotional e-mail encourages and facilitates direct and immediate interac-
tivity. The request made of the prospect/recipient is clear – “Click here to get
this” or “Visit here to see this.” In a standard e-mail promotion, if the prospect
follows the call to action, he or she is taken to a page on the developer’s Web
site where he or she can place an order, fill out a registration form, and more.
Any response where a new lead is captured or a sale is made is to the benefit
VACATION INDUSTRY REVIEW A P R I L - J U N E 2 0 0 28
BY WILLIAM J. BROWN
E-mail Marketing:
At What Price
Overlooked?

2. of the developer. (Just make sure
you’re adhering to offline legal prac-
tices when marketing online.)
Lower costs. E-mail can be ex-
tremely inexpensive on a cost-per-
piece, or cost-per-e-mail-address
basis, regardless of whether you’re
in acquisitions or retention mode,
especially when you compare it with
other forms of marketing media. A
dedicated prospecting promotion –
wherein the e-mail promotion is dedi-
cated to one advertiser – normally
runs between $.20 and $.45 apiece,
including all list and sending costs. A
retention promotion is far less because the list is yours, and the cost to
send can be inexpensive, whether you’re using a software solution or an
outside e-mail solutions provider.
Targeting qualified leads on a one-to-one basis. For acquisitions
e-mailings, there are opt-in lists available for rental that span a variety of
categories, so to reach an audience interested in a particular category is
easy. For retention campaigns, the targeting is more enhanced, and
allows marketers to segment and pinpoint their house lists by a variety of
criteria – including interest, previous transaction (whether that transaction
was based on a purchase or simply a click-through on a particular product
or service), geographic and demographic data, and more. This type of
fine-tuned segmentation can help marketers create customized communi-
cations to enhance loyalty, brand-building, and sales.
The Three-Phased E-mail Customer Contact Cycle
Successful e-mail marketing is developed through a multistep approach.
Some experts have referred to this process as the e-mail customer con-
tact cycle, with three phases.
Acquisition Phase. This is the hunting and gathering phase, where you
identify your market, create the best offer for your business, and search for
and promote to your top prospects by e-mailing to your target audience.
This is when it’s critical to have salesworthy copy and design that will per-
suade these prospects to visit your Web site or, better yet, get motivated to
visit your resorts and sales centers. At Interval, we’ve used a number of
means to acquire new e-mail addresses to add to our opt-in list (where per-
missible and feasible, this has included direct mail and/or postage-paid reply
cards, magazine advertisements, and polite requests from our telephone
staff). The key is to provide a reason and a desire for your customer to want
to sign-up or follow through on the offer sent to them.
Campaign Phase. This is the next logical step – implementation of
e-mail marketing vehicles to create effective and valuable interaction
between you and your customers. But, I caution you: Create e-mail cam-
paigns that you would want to receive – it’s critical that you put yourself in
the place of the busy consumer, who gets bombarded with dozens of mar-
keting messages every day. With that in mind:
• Plan a customer-contact schedule to send e-mail campaigns with
optimal frequency.
• Design creative elements (branding, layout, and copywriting) that
attract attention, are appealing, and
cause the recipients to take action.
Where possible, use pesonalization
for a high touch value.
• Coordinate e-mail content and
approvals with your marketing,
sales, and, importantly, legal unit
to ensure consistency, regulatory
compliance, and broad involve-
ment of all customer touch points.
• Use data profiles to target e-mail
content, ensuring customers value
every e-mail message they receive-
because it’s relevant to their wants,
desires, or needs.
• Include “viral marketing” components in e-mail campaigns to drive
butterfly effects. Encourage your customers and prospects to
“spread the good news” about what a great company and product
you have, and offer a contest or reward for them doing so.
By regularly testing and retesting what works, you will hone in on and roll
out with your best efforts possible from promotion to promotion, campaign
to campaign.
Evaluation Phase. Work to evaluate the effectiveness and return on
investment of each e-mail marketing campaign, and then provide strategic
and tactical recommendations to enhance ongoing e-mail campaigns and
increase return on investment. Here’s what I recommend you carefully analyze:
• Total reach (number of e-mails delivered)
• Total responses (number of e-mails opened)
• Total customer interactions (number of click-throughs on e-mail links)
• Total conversions (number of expected results achieved)
• Total direct revenues generated (You may not sell timeshare on the
Internet, but there’s probably something you can sell your prospect.
Defined another way: How many leads were generated?)
• Total investment
• Total return on investment in dollars (Alternatively, how many Web
visitors did the campaign produce? How many visits lead to a user
providing detailed contact information? What are these things worth
to you monetarily?)
• Total return on investment in customer satisfaction (results of cus-
tomer surveys)
This is just an introductory discussion; many books have been written
on this subject and an entire industry exists to assist direct marketers and
relationship-management professionals to better use e-mail marketing.
But, a smart investment in learning and implementation should reward
your firm with an outsized return.
Interval International’s e-commerce and marketing teams are available
to answer your questions or to help point you in the right direction. Please
call or e-mail us, or look for us at ARDA 2002 in Las Vegas. ◆
William J. Brown is assistant vice president of e-commerce for Interval
International. As an adjunct professor at the University of Miami, he teach-
es graduate classes involving strategic use of the Internet. He may be con-
tacted at wbrown@interval-intl.com.
9W W W. R E S O R T D E V E LO P E R . C O M
E-mail can be inexpensive
on a cost-per-e-mail-address
basis.
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