OK OK….the title of this blog-post may go a little bit overboard, but distributed marketing e-mail is a tough nut to crack…..and we’re excited because we think we’ve cracked it well.
Our recent partnership with ExactTarget (announced here) pairs the industry leading distributed marketing platform with the world-class e-mail deliverability and reporting engine of ExactTarget. ExactTarget’s services are seamlessly integrated into the SproutLoud platform while giving our end-users one elegant system to manage all of their marketing materials and programs.
Brands set-up their e-mail templates and content, e-mail marketing programs, and rule-based e-mail triggered communications on SproutLoud’s platform for their local marketing networks to access. Local marketers then choose what they need, customize the material and programs for their local needs, attach their contact lists and set-up delivery times/dates. SproutLoud’s e-mail content engine prepares the content for ExactTarget to send, and then receives the reporting data back into SproutLoud to give brand and local-level views of e-mail marketing results. SproutLoud manages all CAN-SPAM compliance and unsubscribes for both the brand and local-level.
This partnership ensures that the distributed marketing networks now have a top-notch e-mail solution to support their local channel partners. Here’s why we think this partnership makes so much sense…..
1.) ExactTarget’s reputation speaks for itself. Check this out…..
2.) We want to focus on what we do best. We aren’t in the business of delivering e-mail. Our core focus has been building technology and service offerings that help local-level marketers access the marketing tools they need from their brand partners. Delivering e-mail is a TOUGH business. By using ExactTarget to power our e-mail engine, our clients have a seamless and integrated e-mail system with co-op marketing integration (tied in with the rest of SproutLoud’s software stack).
3.) The e-mail marketing landscape has some holes, primarily as it relates to empowering channel partners or distributed local entities with effective e-mail marketing tools. E-mail Enterprise systems have been around for a while…..these are the systems like ExactTarget (with Lyris, Silverpop, etc.) that centralized marketing departments use to power their own e-marketing efforts. However, these systems are not built to service decentralized organizations in which marketing decisions are being made at the local level. We talk about this landscape a little bit in this blog post here. We also talk about why enterprises with e-mail marketing systems already in tact still need to consider supporting their local marketing channels with their own solution. You can read it here.
Overall, we are excited about our new e-mail partnership and the services we will collectively bring to the SproutLoud community.
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